Donny Deutsch

On finding a job you love and not taking shortcuts.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Okay, so what are the stupid things that I spend
my waking nights thinking about? Um, I'm in the Hampton's now,
so right now, this is the season of the double kiss,
and in some cases a triple kiss. I think I
think one is too many, And I thought one was
too many pre COVID, So then, you know, I think

(00:35):
if you do a double kiss, you think people are
going to think that you're rich or European, when in
fact you're from Nutley, New Jersey, and no one thinks
that just because you kissed someone twice. I just think
you're a pretentious asshole goes to French cafes on the
weekend and pops bottles. It's phrased upon other people. Um,
but I just was not a fan of the double kiss.

(00:58):
And now it's very in COVID, and now you're seeing
people that you already know, and um, you see someone
you already know, and you know if it's someone you're
kind of related to, or it's like, let's say it's
like your fiance's parents or something you're doing like the
hog or the kiss because you really know them, or
your friend, but someone that you don't really know, you're

(01:20):
not going in for the real kiss or the hog,
and like and mom saying, when I say hello to
somebody that I give a hugger kiss, they're not in
my pod. There is not really a pot anymore. So
they're just a person that I know. So now you're
someone that you sort of know, and like you're not
giving them a kiss, like you don't. We need rules,
we need like you're an A level friend and A

(01:42):
minus B plus and B because we don't know, and
we have to rank that accordingly who gets a kiss
and who gets a hog and who gets who gets
a touch? You gets a handshake, who gets Howie mandel
elbow fist pump, Like I don't do that, and I'll
fist pump. It's a separate story for a separate day.
So I don't know what we're supposed to be doing.
And then it's also like, okay, so I know this

(02:02):
person really well and I know this person like just well,
so they don't get a kiss, But does that mean
that person is less likely to have COVID or should
there be some sort of like a medical card when
someone was last tested for if we could say hello
and kiss, and then it's that weird you'll see someone
you really know and you walk up and you'll give
them a hug, and then the next person you kind

(02:24):
of know, so like they get a handshake, Like how
do we dole out the affection? Now? How do we
how do we know what? Who gets what? Because you'll
see a group of people. I had a time when
there was somebody that I connected to, like at a dinner,
meaning I liked them more than everybody else. So when
I said goodbye, I gave them I think, like a
hugger a kiss. And then the other people I met
them at the same exact dinner, they didn't get that,

(02:46):
like they weren't on that guest list, So that seems
like very snobby of me, Like why did this? And
then I wanted to double back and like I know,
it's weird that like four of you didn't get the goodbye,
howgy the kiss? But I really connected to this person.
But like, let's make touching, kissing, affection hug rules, so
they're just mandated so then we don't see him rude
or on shore. Related to that is something that's been

(03:09):
around for a long time and seems to have been
born and around the same time as the double kiss,
because when I was a kid, you heard your parents. Hi,
how are you nice to meet you? Oh? Nice to
meet you again. Sometimes one day somebody replaced me with CEA.
It doesn't matter if you know them or you don't.
You're supposed to stay nice to see you. Hey, that's

(03:31):
a bag of bullshit anyway. Most people aren't nice to
see I don't think everybody that everybody meets its nice
to see you. So that's become this like bullshit thing.
But nice to meet you if I run into someone
and I don't know them and I'm being introduced to them,
not as oh you know Dan or you met just
this is Joe Blow, I see, nice to meet you.

(03:52):
But everybody says nice to see you, and it feels
sort of pretentious. And I know that it's to protect
if you've maybe met them before, so you're covering your ask.
But they know that too. Everybody knows the nice to
see you game, and for me, it's just not that
genuine it's nice to meet you. Even nice to meet
you might be too much because it might not be
nice to meet you. But that's fine, you know, great
meeting you, pleasure meaning you nice to meet you. Um,

(04:14):
I do nice to meet you. If I if someone says,
oh we've met before all we have, we're oh I'm sorry,
Oh great, Oh well yeah, I meet a lot of people. Whatever. Um,
I don't know. I just I don't do the nice
to see you, and I do do this game which
everybody knows. I do do the game of that person

(04:34):
to say a lot to me because I know that
I've met them, but I don't know their name. And
I said, that's a Paul is like, I can make
that easy for you. Is if he's just invented, you know, fire,
and he walks over and he's like, hey, I'm Paul Burnon.
Then they say hi, Joe Blow. And but Joe Blow
knows that I didn't come up and introduce Paul, because
Joe Blow knows I didn't know Joe Blow and was
waiting for Paul to say Hi, nice to meet you, Paul,
so that that guy would introduce himself. And that's just

(04:55):
I guess a common language, because um, I don't know
my alternative, Like I know I have the option to
do a single, double or triple kiss or a no kiss.
And I know that I have the option because it's
my body, my choice to do the nice to see
you or the nice to meet you. I don't know
what my option is for Hi. You look familiar. I

(05:17):
know we've spoken. It's awkward that I have no idea
what your name is, and nor do I even know
who you are, so at least with my fiance coming
up first, he can say hello, get your name. We
could do a quick background check Google search called Private Detective,
and then get back to you on what I'm supposed
to say. Next, I'd like you to message me and

(05:38):
let me know A no kiss, be one kiss, C,
two kiss, D three kiss E all the above, Like
when decide what you feel, and I mean with people
that you sort you know that you know, and then
a nice to meet you, be nice to see you.
What do you do when you see someone you know

(06:01):
you know them, and you have no idea who they
are or no idea who their name is, but like
you've seen them, and then you don't know what to do,
and then some as you gotta name and you still
don't know, and that's even worse. My guest today is
my friend Donnie Deutsch. I've known him personally for years,

(06:22):
actually decades, but you might know him as the host
of the MSNBC show Saturday Night Politics of Donnie Deutsch,
where as the previous host of the CNBC talk show
The Big Idea with Donnie Deutsch. He has an advertising
and marketing entrepreneur who sold his company back in two
thousand for just under three hundred million dollars. He's written
to business motivation books and now hosts a podcast called

(06:43):
On Brand with Donnie Deutsch. Donnie has always been so
generous to me and has donated to my charity, be
Strong many times over the years. Today we talk about
creating your own luck, pioneering personal and professional brands, and
what it feels like to peak Hi Donnie, Hey, Bethany,

(07:06):
what's going on? Well, what's going on is I know you,
have known you for years, and um, even though I
know you, there are many people that I've had on
here that I've known for years, whether it's Mark Cuban
or um Steve Madden. I've had Hillary Clinton on, I've
had Matthew McConaughey on. But the people that I do
already know, I realized I don't really know. So there

(07:27):
are so many things that I learned through people on
this podcast. But what this is if you don't know.
It's really talking to people who have started something from
the bottom. Now they're here, they're either a game change
or a visionary, a brand builder. Um, we're going to
figure that out. So in looking at information about you,
it's more about what you think and what you're saying

(07:48):
and what you're talking about than you. There's very little
about you, even though you didn't grow up you know,
flat broke. I think you're a self made person and
that is what people come here to listen to and
what the tools are, what the toolbox is, how they
could do it for themselves. So that's what today is
going to be about, just to get a sense of
you and if you have it, if you're lucky, if

(08:10):
you're smart, what the deal is with you and your
your journey and how that journey would be different today. So, Donnie,
you grew up in Queens and Bayside, right okayside, how Sills, Queens,
very comfortable, middle class, middle to upper middle grew up
in a nice little house to public schools psight, went
to a Martin Tebury in high school four thousand kids, Uh,

(08:32):
big city high school. Kind of I saw what reality
looked like. You know, this was in the in the
seventies with bussing, and it was fully integrated and you know,
kind of how to had your wits about you. It
was it was a real life situation. And would you
were you right in the middle, like were there people
wealthier than you and a lot poorer or were you
at the top higher end because of what you're describing,

(08:52):
you know, it's interesting. I was more in the higher end.
And look, I go back now, I look at my house.
It was a tiny little house. Was three bedrooms, we
had one shower, really one and a half bathrooms. You know,
it was a very little house. School. I was comfortable.
I knew nothing different. I mean, you know, money was
not discussed in my house. It was not It was
not about making money. It was not about that. It

(09:12):
was about learning to work hard and about education and
being your best year. But it was never you know,
I remember getting to college my first day I went
to University of Pennsylvania and seeing kids with their own BMW's,
and I was like what I didn't I didn't understand, Like,
I was like, that's your how was that your call?
There was nothing I aspired to. It was nothing. I thought.
It was actually weird and I also remember having a

(09:35):
girlfriend who came from a wealthier family in Long Island
and going to meet her and her Nike or brother
had a portion of people are remember most feeling bad
for him that what was this kid gonna work for?
He didn't have the luxury of being hungry. And I
remember that from both my college days and that first meeting. Okay,
so that's interesting because there are certain people I was
talking to Cheryl Sandberg in her house, money was not discussed.

(09:57):
It wasn't something to aspire to. You know, there are
other people where like Steve Madden. It was aspired to,
but it wasn't something you talked about, but you're not.
You're talking about a work ethic, but not necessarily an
academic household. You went to Wharton. I mean that it
was no when I say work at school. Education was
important and just school was important. But it wasn't go
to school or go to a great school, you can

(10:18):
make a lot of money. It was just the the
aspiration of higher education and that will open up doors.
Few I feel, and we were our generation did not
talk about money that same way. You're older than I am,
but when I was in high school, you didn't think
about how much money a person had, a guy had,
and I feel like younger kids now do think about that.
Money is so everywhere. It's just more discussed than ever.

(10:40):
I think, just like you know, sex, I think it's
way more discussed than it used to be. And then
there's sex and money together and that's a whole other discussion.
Um No, the it what was the aspiration, especially kind
of socio economic and being a young Jewish man growing
was to be a lawyer adoctor. That was the top
of the food change. That's like what you were remembering
the Vale Victoria in my high school, you know what

(11:00):
to college name with the medical school that today obviously
being a lawyer and a doctor is fantastic, but it's
shifted a little bit. It's being a businessman, entrepreneur, it's
being a bitcoin you know, we we've seen these models.
You know, the model today are the zuker Bergs. Is
a young kid who discovers something and makes his first
billion dollars. And that's both good and bad news for

(11:22):
young people. What it shows is okay, on the one hand,
you don't have to go through the corporate structure, you
don't have to pay your dues, for years and that's
good news, but that's the bad news, and that you know,
young people think there's a shortcut, and these are so
one out of a billion cases, and there is something
to the model of paying your dues, and you know,
so I can't decide whether that's good or bad. I know,

(11:44):
it's exactly what you're saying. And it's also you know,
people aren't going to college because they want to get
on the road, and kids want to know exactly where
they're going to be. I was not successful to my
late thirties. I mean literally, I never thought about any
of this stuff. People say, now, did you we always
an entrepreneur? I was because I always was working and hustling,
but we didn't call it that. There was no You

(12:04):
just were working, putting one foot in front of the other,
had a passion. And I agree with you. I think
that you can't instagram selfie or TikTok your way into
a successful career, and reality television has been a detriment
to that. So I agree with you completely. Someone sitting
in a garage creating a billion dollar company is the exception,
and everybody wants, you know, a shortcut, and if you

(12:25):
are the exception. Also, you know you big by far
be the most successful person who kind of launched their
public brand through reality television, and there just aren't a
lot of ethanics. I mean, it's it's it's your path,
and you were very smart about it, and you the
reason is because you weren't. Yes, you were on TV
reality TV, but you were demonstrating your business and your
entrepreneurship and your brand that way as opposed to just

(12:47):
being on TV for the sake of being on TV.
You had another you have a critical mass that was
beyond that well likewise, So this is what I want
to get into. But this is why I feel this
is comforting for people listening. I was working, I was not.
It didn't matter whether I was selling pencils or buttons.
I was hustling, I was driven, I was executing. And
it's old school hard work. So just like with fitness

(13:08):
or so, you can't keto your way into being thin
if you're not going to exercise it. So it's the
same thing. You have to work hard. And you're an
old school hard work person. I mean, I remember meeting you,
and we're going to get into all this, but I mean,
did you work your ass off to get to where
you are. And I want to hear about that story, Like,
so you you get out of Wharton, what do you
want to be when you grow up? What what goes down?

(13:29):
I you know, I got a warden on the grad
and I went to work for a large agency put
over being may there and I was a fucker. I
hated it. It was very administrative, you know. I store
as kind of creative soul. Left there after about a
year or two. I left. I would have been fired
if I leave without was kind of drifted. I was.
I didn't know what I want to do. I went
on the West Coast. You know, I have any money.
I slept on our friend's couch and I needed money,

(13:52):
and somebody suggested going on a game show. Uh, And
I was able to wiggle my way in and went
on the match Gate with Gene Rayburn and one in
five dollars the super match with betting money and that
was all the fucking money in the world and five
thousand dollars. So that allowed me to stay on the
West Coast, kicked around for a while, came back, sold
jeans at the Roosevelt Race for a flea market, sold

(14:13):
Gitano jeans and was gonna go to law school and
then went to work for my dad. My dad had
a smalle agency, maybe twenty or thirty people, and I
was also a funk up there, and uh, he fired me.
You know, I was maybe in my mid twenties at
this point. What then up? Your partying just wasn't taking
it as serious. I just I hadn't brown up yet,

(14:33):
you know. And I'll never forget that. I left, and
my dad was going to sell the agency, and he
was gonna sell it for like a million dollars or
a million and a half dollars, and he was gonna
stay on for a few years. He was like fifty five,
and I knew he really didn't want to and I
said to him, I don't know how had the balls
to do this. I kind of had to probably put
I said, don't say let me come back, but let
me just put me in a corner and leave me alone.

(14:55):
Let me just figure out things my way. And once
I took that on and it told him not to
sell and took on that responsibility. I went to the
move I had. I took that on and from that
moment on, I just focused on new business. I like
kind of just in I exploded and the agency exploded.
And wait a second, because people here want ground and
figure out. So what do you mean you didn't know

(15:16):
anything about advertising? You wanted to work at O and
N I want. They kept trying to put me in
as an account executive, which and I was that was
not my raiz On Donna and that was not my
strong shop. My strong shoot was basically just selling the
drumming new business and going out and be and be
doing it in a creative way. And I remember I
pitched at the time, we had never had a TV

(15:36):
account before. It was all just print. It was more
of a design boutique. And I remember I went out
and I got us into a pitch for the New York,
New Jersey, Connecticut Punky act dealings that us done to
the dealer associations, and it was just for coc the
little TV account. But I came up with the creative
idea and we wanted and it was like maybe a
two million dollar account in our biggest account at the
time had been maybe a three thousand dollar account. And

(15:58):
it it just kind of launched us into the net
than one Ikia And when then eventually seven or eight
years later got hired to do Bill Clinton's ad campaign.
And so what happened when you found who you were?
Even within the confines of an It's interesting, it's interesting
you said there right when when you take over service,
business will go into a certain there's no widgets to
hand over. Okay, here's the widget. You can make widgets like.

(16:19):
You're just selling your creative service. So if you went
to a law firm, it doesn't matter your dad has
a law firm if you don't prove your skills as
a lawyer as a like. So I built a company
within the company, start to hirement of people, and soon
the company I built within the company was bigger than
the company, and it was just that ethos. But to
your both your short I worked i'd say in fifteen

(16:40):
or twenty years, and I took six or seven weeks
off total. That was a lot. I worked seven I'd
worked seven eighty hour weeks. But it wasn't worked. To me,
There's no place I'd rather be. I always say to people,
find something that where Friday nights, Sunday nights are as exciting,
if not more exciting than Friday nights, because as opposed
to the work week coming up. I couldn't wait to
get to work. You loved it is gonna sound like

(17:00):
such a cliche thing, but when you love it, it's
not worth you know it is. It's interesting. I monetized
my business and I sold at a very young age.
I sold at age forty three for closer million dollars.
And that's great. But I always say to people, don't
sell unless you wait want to do something else. The
reason I switch can't pro visit your money every day.

(17:22):
The reason I sold was I felt like I won
the game. Plus, it's a very service oriented business. And
I remember I found myself on a August July, I
mean in August afternoon in Orange County. I was at
the president of MITSUBCI that was a big client as
much a BC Cars daughter's sweet sixteen, and I was like,
why is the bank or not here? Why is the

(17:43):
way there's the ad guy has got to be the
one who's always like I don't want to say sucking black,
but you know what I mean. It was like I
got tired of putting the meatpads on it a certain
Then they came with this great offer, and I said,
and it allowed me to pursue other things. And since then,
I've had a media career which has had some success.

(18:04):
I'd say I was Michael Jordan advertising. You know, I've
hit a double in the media world. I never got
to where and that's what I keep scratching, clawing and
do TV shows and podcasts and fun things. And I've
built a name for myself in a prominent voice, but
still don't feel like actor where I got to them.
But there's something that bothers you about that, and we've
talked about that, and I want to understand it because

(18:25):
many people say, who cares? Who wants to be in
the media when it's just now it's all scrutiny. There's
really no upside. You have money, That's why it's It's
not about the notoriety. It's about having a voice that's influenceial.
You know. The greatest thing I loved in advertising was
when people would end up starting other agencies because of me,

(18:46):
of course, of working at my company. One of the
best days I'll ever remember the moment I was at
a w I mean way more my agency and how
is that one of their who treats getting a speech
and a young agent came up to me and she said,
you know, you really influenced my life. And I go
how and she said, you were on I guess I
don't Todays show somewhere talking about that a woman in

(19:07):
your mid thirties late thirties, if you don't have a baby,
don't worry about having a baby and being less attractive
to men. You'll actually be more attractive to men. There's
a single bout you have your family. I mean, I'm
generalizing what I'm just saying, don't have the funk baby,
have your family. Hearing she said, hear me from a
guy just really kind of empowered her. And then I
got out a bus. There was a little bus taking

(19:27):
us to and the driver said to me, you know,
I read your book on the Big Idea and inspired
me to start a business. So within an hour I
kind of touched two people. And so that's the exciting pot.
I'm having the platform that politics now, whereas like I
having a big voice turns me on and stimulants and
making more money for me. At this point, I made

(19:47):
the calculus that going into the public sphere, I was
gonna have more influence than it was gonna give me
more excitement and doubling my money or tripling my money.
I didn't need another house. I didn't need another and
that that game felt like I kind of had them again.
It's interesting he talked about him in Cuban on you know.
To Mark Cuban, I think having a basketball team and
having that platform or going on Shark Tank is probably

(20:08):
has more gifts him, more emotional hutles than if he
bought the next company. And I was kind of on
a smaller scale. That's where I wished, I understand what
speaking Shark Tank, and during Shark Tank I was Actually
it was interesting. I had had uh after I sold
my agency, ended up having showing sc the idea and
after five year run, Mark Cuban came to me and
actually I was the first person who asked to be

(20:29):
on Shark Tank, and he made the pitch to me
to be on Shark Tank. And I felt I had
done five years in the entrepreneurial space and I want
something other. So I passed on. And I don't regret
it because I just felt I did the entrepreneur thing.
But it's just an interesting thing just with your background. Absolutely,
And so what's interesting too is that and most of
the sharks they're talking about other people's businesses, they themselves

(20:51):
don't have a quote unquote brand, Like Kevin O'Leary doesn't
have a brand. He invested in other brands. Damon John
built Fubu. I want to talk about just the word
brand because it's overused. When I was coming up, there
was no word brand, lifestyle brand, personal brand. This is
not a thing, you said. And you have built a
lot of other people's and companies brand, So how hard

(21:18):
is it to build a brand? And then you haven't
what you're saying, So you haven't built your own brand
to the level that you were able to build other
people's brands. Is there something there? What do you think
about all that built I have built my brand. I'm saying,
it's just I always wanted more and bigger. You know. Interesting?
My podcast is is quote on brand. Of course you
can get it on Spotify or Apple or anywhere else

(21:39):
you netube. And the premise of the podcast I think
is interesting to your audience is that the way over
these book, every person, every celebrity, every athlete, every institution,
every religion, every movement is a brand today, every everything.
If you have a Facebook page of your brand, if
you're a politician, your brand. The Republican Party is a brand.
Uh ninepies, of course a brand. The Catholic churches a brand. Everybody,
every person is a brand in and the brand is

(22:00):
set of values. What is your value system? And that's
the premise of the show. Every week what I do
is for the first fifteen twenty minutes, I go which
brands are up and down during the week. You know
which it could be a celebrity, could be a company,
be a product, politician. And then I interview a big
iconic branding of themselves and you know, well, but it's interesting,
you're saying, but everybody can be a brand, I guess,

(22:21):
But I think it's overused. I think there are celebrities
that have a lot more money than I do and
are much more famous and more successful. They themselves are
the brand, but they don't necessarily have a brand. So
make that distinction, Like, does Jennifer Lopez besides herself have
a brand? Kim Kardashian does, well, she is just a brand.
Let's go back to define A brand is a set

(22:43):
of value. So, for instance, when you decide to buy
a pair of Nike sneakers, you're saying, I vote for
their back. You're saying, oh, that's the patting on that is, like,
I like, just do what I like what they stand
for Jennifer Lopez, whether she has a product or not,
if you want to if you decide you like Jennifer Lopez,
you want to either follow her Instagram or listen to
her music, it's because you're buying into a value system.

(23:05):
I like that she sexy, like her music, her value system, right,
But that's different than Nike. That's different like Jennifer and
I think it's the same what I'm saying. You're confligating
tooth thing. I'm saying, No, I'm not talking about Jennifer
Aniston and when she does adds for a veto, and
that's what I'm saying. Jennifer Aniston is a brand, just
like Jennifer Lopez is a brand, just like Nike is
a brand, just like um Joe Biden is a brand.

(23:28):
But the distinction I'm making is, if you're okay, So
Jennifer Aniston is a brand, She's not going to be
making money on that brand unless she's being paid to
do a movie, to be in a television show, to
market a that's what she's right. So it's different than
Jennifer Aniston iced tea, which means you're buying what one
is you. Yes, one is you're using your brand to
endorse a product. The other is the brand in and

(23:49):
of itself. So if Jennifer Andison is selling nice tea,
you're still the reason the iced tea person is paying
her five million dollars because we think Jennifer Anderston's brand
essence of plopping on up of her iced tea adds
value to our brand. Right, but Skinny Girls not Bethany
for example, But it is. But you used your brand notoriety.
You were the first endorser of scant Girl. Now it's

(24:11):
bigger than Bethany. So but yes, so it would be
no different than if Jennifer Aniston, if she was the
one who launched Snapple ice tea. It's a bigger so yes,
So you used your notoriety, your platforms, your celebrity to
get skinny Girl out there. And yet if skinny Girl
did not become bigger than Bethany or beyond Bethany, would
not even the success in its truth. Okay, so college

(24:34):
or no college, where do you stand? You have daughters?
Where do you stand this day? And age on college.
No college. It's interesting. I had Gary VM my podcast
a few weeks ago, and he's been one of these
people that it is just I'm not the college for everyone.
I think a four year degree it's some bullshit college
versus four years spent working in the workforce. Because of
what we talked about earlier today, forty years ago, college

(24:57):
was a price of entry. Now, sir, the things if
you want to go work at Golden so I actually
want to work at certain corporate institutions, you don't have
to go through college and maybe a grand degree. And
so no college is not for everyone. And if you're
somebody that doesn't have great grades in schools and you're
not interested in higher education and the academia itself, get
the work. I agree. What about your mother? We talked

(25:17):
about your father. What about your mother and your father?
Like your parents and were they so proud and tell
me about I am blessed parents person of my father
where I lost seven or eight years ago as my
best friend. And it's interesting I talked about I took
over the business and we were able to scale it.
But he did the hard part. He started something from
nothing is the hardest thing and yes, even though when
I left there were a thousand people versus thirty people,

(25:38):
I couldn't have done what he did grind it out
and in certain ways, and he when he was alive
and say the same thing. I had certain skills to
take into the excellent way, but he did. So we
came across the right journal. We were to hear about
all these horrible family business stories. You know, my dad,
he gave me so much rope and was my biggest supporter,
and I stand on his shoulders every day, and so
I wouldn't be where I am. Would out my dad,

(26:00):
and I reckonized my mom. He was the soft theme
my family though he was like my Jewish mother. And
my mom, who I all a lot of my success to,
also was the one who pushed me. She was a
school teacher and she you know, I get punished if
I didn't get certain grades in school, and she was
the one who kind of like drove me, and she
was the toughie. And so between the two of them,
I got everything I need. My mom is still left
today ninety two. She's wonderful and she's still a painting

(26:23):
the ask but I love in the pieces and I
had great parents. I was very, very very fortunate. What
if now? So if someone's wondering, are they supposed to
be within an infrastructure, within a corporate infrastructure, or doing
what you did something pre existing or to be just
an entrepreneur Maverick, how does somebody know who they are?
People want to leave their jobs. The snow globe has
been shaken right now with this pandemic. So it's an

(26:45):
interesting time to not be stunted and to get on
some goddamn road, plant some seeds and make it happen.
I think the you know, the younger you are, the
easier it is to take chances. You know, it's like,
you know, when you don't have that mortgage or those
kids to pay for. So like if you're twenty five
or twenty six and you're in the job and you
have that thing inside mean, was that saying go out

(27:05):
and do it? Just fucking do it, you know, the
back of course of this that you know, and be
course of this computer that we're on here, and you know,
like the batris to entries. So you don't need a
research department, you know, you don't need a sales department.
You know, there's so many different things today that you
could do without a lot of capex that didn't exist
thirty forty fifty years ago. So when you're young is
the time to do it. Now. That doesn't mean just

(27:28):
blow your world up. You have certainly, but but the
younger you are and the less responsibility you are, the
more quote irresponsible you can be and I don't mean
that literally responsible, the more you could go out on
a limb and do things. So it's a It takes
an idea. You know. I had this show, Big Idea
where I view entrepreneurs on TV, and I needed everybody
from Bill Gates on down to somebody making cookies in
their basement, and the commonalities, the threads for success we're

(27:52):
studyingly consistent in no particular order. That's what the show is,
So go throws them at me. First of all, there's
no such stupid hardre like that. There's no hard one.
It's a hundred hour weeks. But as I said earlier,
if you love what you're doing and it's your baby
and it's your toy, it's not hard like there's nothing
you'd rather be doing. But wait, that doesn't mean just
sitting at a desk for a hunter. He means like

(28:12):
you're thinking about it. You're working at your strategizing at
the chessboard. This child the machine. The other thing is
you can't be afraid of failure. You talk to every
great successful, uber, successful person, CEO of celebrity for't your
fifty you know, corporate chieftain, entrepreneur, a billionaire, and they'll
talk to you about their failures. I used to get

(28:34):
motivational speeches and I used to do this little exercise
where I'd be on stage and I'd say, I talk,
I give you my failure ship and I said, I
want to just demonstrate something. And I'd say, I asked
them the audiences there are a single young woman in
the audience, and they said, yes, I bring mum by stage.
So let's do a little role play. Pretend you're at
a coffee shop and I'm gonna come over you and
I ask you if I can buy you a cup
of coffee? Yes, other date and I go over and

(28:56):
I say and when I asked, you say no, And
I go over that only to th up winnings don't
in Deutsche Hope I'm not being rude. I'd love to
buy you a drink. And she says no, and now
I soap back. I go back to my chail. I failed.
Guess what, I'm the worse than her. Yeah, I fail.
So you can't be afraid of failure. Not those next
great things are not gonna happen. So embracing failure is
a huge one. So surrounding yourself with people smarter than you.

(29:17):
If you're working for somebody, they've better be smarter than you.
If you're working next to you, they should be smart
than you. If they're working for you issues. That's not
that easy. It's not that easy to find a good team.
It's not that easy to find great people. You have
to take the time, stop the machine down which some
man's hurts the machine, to find the great team. And
he is the secret source beyond the toolbox of smart
driven how the roll of things we talked about, you

(29:39):
have to have this naive sense of entitlement. Why not
mean like not in a title entitlement. It gets a
bad rap. I don't need it in that way. Like,
for instance, if I want to run from there now,
nobody's gonna tap me on the shoulder and say, Donnie Deutsche,
you should be the next. But if I said to
us solf. You know what. I love the city. I'm
from the city. I know I can raise money. A

(30:00):
great motivator. I had to run an organization. Why not me? Question?
Let me go on a run from air. I know
because when we talked about earlier it was that level
of public. I can't put my family through until you
say that. And I'll never forget when I worked on
I mean not even why not me? It is me?
It is it? Remember, and here was another little carollary

(30:23):
to that that will give you the cahunas to say,
why not me? Or it is me? I remember I
got hired to work on Bill Clinton's presidential campaign in
ninety two, and I went down and I was going
to meet then the governor and his inner circle. And
I remember the night before I was sitting at a
rib joint called Doze. And at the next table and
I hadn't met most of these people yet was George
Stephanopolis and rug Ball, James carvill Uh staying greenber the post.

(30:47):
You know, the inner circle was going to be running
the world if he got like I remember, I was
over here in the conversation for about forty five minutes.
At the end, I set to myself. I don't know.
No genius is there, you know, And that was at
that me and I remember every time, other than Bill Gates,
I yet to meet the person that I walk away
from more Cuban. Many times there's different people where I go.

(31:08):
I don't know, no genius there. Yeah, they're right, they're
dreaming there, hungry they were not, And there are no
geniuses out there. So when you put together the two
pieces of by the way, why not me or it
is me? And there are no geniuses out there. The
people are agreeing about are aspired to being you meet them,
they put their pants on once a ley. You put
those two things together. Now I agree, and most people

(31:28):
you will agree, do not work hard. Most people push
the papers around the desk, act like they're super busy.
But it's very comforting to realize that if you're working
your ass off and you're working smart, most people don't
work that hard. And anybody who works with me, the
people that succeed, they work hard. It's very very simple.
You're loyal, you're somewhat smart, and you work hard. What
have you done wrong? And this is a big question

(31:50):
mark that I talk about a lot, and I mentioned
this earlier. Now somebody's gonna say these are very high
class fuck up. And this is a lesson that I
want to talk about that might be valuable someday for
so many people. I monetized my company at a very
young age. As I said to you, I sold my
company for close to manage when I was at age
forty three. And that's great, And I did it because

(32:12):
I was a little bored and whatnot. But and since
then I've got to go after my passions in media
and television and doortan politics and all these other things.
But I often questioned how it would have scaled. You know,
I sold it because I was bored with advertising for
SAE and I said, oh, building an advertising agency two
or three times or five times of size wasn't going
to turn you on. Also, pigs get thought and hobbs

(32:34):
get slaughtered. So as it pertains that one entity, you know,
you needed your pile. What I was ignorant of is
I look back now and I see where the world
has gone and how the media's has changed. Oh what
could I have taken just that base, going on to
other things and built a full blown media empire? You know,

(32:55):
out I know somebody else with Gary's. He's the younger,
the version of me today, but the landscape is so different.
He's not spending his time just dealing with clients he gets.
So I got tired of service oriented nature, becausiness, not
understanding that the business the medium was going to come
from the business itself and I could have built. So
I often challenged myself in that, Yes, I've got to

(33:18):
do all these other things, but what would my life
had looked like? Because I always say to people, don't
sell for money. You can't go visit your money or
you know what I mean, don't do it because you're
bored and you want to do the next thing, when
you want that next challenge whatnot. But I wonder what
the challenges would have looked like had I not done
Now these are big time high class. Y has been

(33:39):
a devoted father, and if I wanted to be at
their games for thirty or I wanted to do pick
them up from school, I've been able to do that,
And what a luxury. And that's what you'd be thinking
about in your ninety not that you didn't weren't bigger
part of the media landscape. Yes, I get it though,
but I'm one of these people like you, and most
successful people are no matter what level of success they have,
they're still tortured souls, Like you're not sitting there. You're

(34:02):
not sitting here going oh that thing, Franko. And I
built this big skinny Girl brand, and I have this
kind of big media platform and made or I've done
all these tremendous you know, philanthropic things. You're just tortured
over the next thing you haven't done. You Actually, I
was gonna say, um, you just peaked probably seven years early,
because I just turned fifty. And it's not like I
care about the age and I'm not vain or anything.

(34:23):
It's more just like, what are we doing here? Like
I want to not be the golden goose that has
to lay every egg, and I want, you know, a
better quality of life. And I have an amazing relation
to my daughter, but it lacks a lot of balance.
So I think that what you're saying, well, you are
a life. What I know of your life is I
think you've naturally done that over the last three or
four years yourself. I mean, you're still working hard, but
you were manically driven, which made and goes back to

(34:46):
a lot of our early discussions to get you where
you needed to get to. I had no safety net.
Even if you don't have any money, if you have
a parents, it might leave you a house or even
if you're poorer than I was. I had no safety net,
no parents, No one's gonna take care of me. I'm
in thirties, I'm alone. If this thing doesn't happen, Really,
what's going to happen. I'm working in a restaurant as
a you know, a cocktail, which is the rest of
my life. So I didn't know what was going to happen.

(35:08):
So what percent did you think that you are lucky?
And what percentage? Smart? Great question. Um, I don't know
how to bring the opposition, but I will say I
promise you that every person on your podcast, as you
talk to people say is that luck plays a partment,
But you make your own luck. I'm gonna give you
the cliche answer in that, you know, I could talk
about the lucky breaks I've had. I've tel that's some

(35:30):
unlucky breaks, you know. I could talk about a TV
show I had on MSNBC. A company was that was
raiding through the roof and was amazing, and the president
just didn't like my face, and it was that moment
in time and like, but that's the fucking world, you
know what I mean? That's like and I can tell
you about my great breaks. You're didn't get bad breaks.
So whenever any successful person will tell you about all
this lucky thing happened to me. But it was the

(35:51):
residue of all the hard work and all the other stuff.
So you need good breaks. And some people are just
luckier than other people. They just are. It's just the world.
But it's the other stuff that gets you there, and
then the luck will come me. I wish I had
a more original, prolific answer, but that's it. No. I
think it's how you're navigating the car. The ship hits
the fan. But sometimes you can turn something really bad

(36:13):
into something good by the way that you handle it,
by the way you deal with it. How are they
handling what happens? Are they manic and they need to
talk about it twenty four hours a day? They need
to try to keep putting a band aid on it.
Do they sit back and cleanse the palette and just
take a deep breath and learn from it? I mean,
there's so many ways to handle Something'll you an example
of another failure of mine. I wrote and started my
own sort It was scripted, but it was so off

(36:35):
scripted reality show on USA that work was called dumb
and it was. It was like a curb with Theoris
as I played a fictionalized version of myself. I wrote
it on the show. I played a scummy TV host,
like a Ward Polvich type TV host, and I had
you know, a gay son, and I had I'm It
was I think the most. I'm stunned that I did it.
It was so well written, so well done. So the

(36:58):
problem with it was it was on USA, which is
a broadcast network, and it was a very high mind
the show. It just didn't get bored by Netflix or Apple.
And it lasted one season and was going And I
remember saying to people instead of like, okay, only last
one season, I got a scripted comment that I wrote
myself that I started on the largest tape in the
world and you did it and it was on I

(37:19):
agree that, okay, last five season, like I hit the
one in a thousand. Okay, maybe it's like writing a book.
Someone wrote a book, it's published people, right, It's like
a last and it was fucking brilliant and it was
really and I like, I hit that ball as hard
as I could fucking hit it. It needed to be
on an h FIOD each of our show them because
people could don't consume high minded shows when they're actually on.

(37:40):
They sween them. We know why people consumed it. It
just didn't get there. But I could have gone, oh
my god, my show was canceled, and this matter where
the versus no, look what I fucking did, but not
only that you learned from it and something else that
will affect I mean, that's what I thought of when
you just said that. And all the people you met
on your other show, the big idea you actually had
those conversations. If the podcast gets canceled tomorrow, I had

(38:00):
this conversation, like, I'm smarter and I've grown more as
a result that I am more. Importantly, you've given something
to your audience because your brand is accessible, fame and success.
In other words, that you because you were kind of
the every woman and you you play that and I
don't mean you play that fictitiously. It's like you're the
girl oh I would be sitting next to on a
bus and then all of a sudden you've got fame

(38:23):
and fortune. You made fame and fortune accessible to the
every person. And I went back to what I talked
about earlier with you, and that was, that's also the
problem you serve up because I'm gonna be the next past. No,
it doesn't. And you know, oh you have to to
be as cute, funny and sassy. You don't have to
be Jenniferston's. You don't have to be this amazing actor.

(38:43):
You don't have to be this craftsman. You can just
be you would be famous and and and have to
build a successful company. It's full of gold. That's a
great point. It is so, but I'm saying, you know,
for you, what has to be very rewarding is the
amount of people that stop you go, oh, because of you,
I've tried it. So of course you have tried that.
So that's the real gift of this podcast is not

(39:03):
that you get to talk to people like me are
people much more than me, but that you get to
share it with people and just affect their world. And
somebody takes one little thing away from today what we're
talking about. That's a win for both of Exactly, they're
creating their own toolbox, as you said earlier, for their
own success. And there are different little pieces to the recipe. Definite.
You know, you're one ingredient to the recipe. So you're

(39:32):
getting we're all getting older. Are you vain? What do
you What relationship do you have to age and vanity,
which are two separate things. Great questions, Bethany. I'm really
enjoying this. Thank you, Ages. It's very interesting. I'm sixty three.
And what I've noticed is, and to your viewers who
are not watching this video wise, they're not gonna be
able to go, oh my god, you're great for sixty three.

(39:53):
You do look great, and you work out. I was
thinking of you today. I don't work out a lot,
and I was in front of your house on the beach,
and I was thinking, Donnie's probably sucking a gym right now.
It's a lot of it. It's interesting. I got into
working out years ago, and I in one of my
books Often Wrong, Never in Doubt, I wrote a chapter
called the Charles out the School of Management, which I'd
like to go into. When you walk into a meeting,
if you're really fit and you're buff or whatever, the

(40:15):
definition have been great shape or whatever like it said.
It says there's two signals that happened on the other
side of the table of person. This is a very
disciplined person because there are a few things we can
control of our life. It's one of the things I'm
not going to say. And the other thing is the
ship hits a fan of business me. I want to
know I'll compete the ship out of the other person.
Now that's literally never gonna happen. But there's a strength
of confidence and if you know, and I've I've used

(40:35):
that in my life and it's become part of my
personal brand that it's kind of there's a people making
jump when I'm on more than Jella, always making jokes
on my god, you with my T shirts and are
you taking hd H whatnot, And it's it's just become
part of my self worth is feeling good and that
as it's helped me in the aging process and that
I will go and I'll meet people and I'll see

(40:55):
people my age and whatnot. You know, I'm not going
to compare myself to a twenty seven year old, but
if I could be the best I can be for
sixty three in every way, So I don't mind when
somebody says you look great for your age. And sometimes
people say that's a backhanded compliment. No it's not. That's
the best I can do. That's your age, that's my age,
and I want to be the most amazing sixty three
or old. I'm not going to be a forty year
old anymore. And you you have to come to terms

(41:18):
because what is interesting about age. I think everybody you
know in the forties is great, you know, early fifties,
you know what's you're heading towards sixty. You can't run
the numbers anymore and say, oh, I'm just a middle age.
You know, that's it. You're either at the beginning of
the back nine or halfway through the back nine. And
you think about your kids and how old they're going

(41:38):
to be when you pass away. You count that math
twelve times. You can't do it different and it's sixty
three or how many great years do I have left?
And I say great, I can still work out the
way I want. I still have career options in front
of me and whatnot. But you also have to settle
it and realize that most of it is behind you.
I mean it's a very sobering thought, like you know,
so what does that look like? And everybody I know

(41:59):
now at my age, they still want to work, but
they want to do it on their terms. And so
that's the you have to kind of find because you're
talking about sorry to interrupt you, you're talking about the
value of time forgetting the money. Now you're talking about
the true value. Yesterday, I was often tens of thousands
of dollars to go to some casino to do to
show up there and they think, oh, you just walk in. No,

(42:22):
that's my time. I bring my daughter, my makeup, my head,
fun that right there? You go time? And how is
that X amount of thousandaw was gonna change? It's utiles.
It's you learn there there's in economics is financial utiles.
There's money, and it's like what is the value of
that money versus and so that as you go further. Now,
that doesn't mean you want to sit and contemplate your

(42:43):
navel or just like the last thing I don't want
to do. I love when people say to me, how
do you not play golf? Oh my god, I would.
I wouldn't play golf ald time I blow my brains out,
you know what I mean? That's just not so I
still need to need drim You know why it's sixty
three and my starting. I start a podcast eight months
ago because I want to be in a conversation. I
love talking interesting people. I love talking about my j
Fox and Dennis Leary and Hunter Biden and Joe Scarborough

(43:03):
and Co Walace and half Frankin and uh Stevenin and
all the interesting people have spoken to over the past
six or seven or eight weeks. And that's fun and
giving something to people where because it is teaching people
about branding in their own brand and their own personal brand.
And so yeah, do I need to do that, No,
of course not. But it just keeps you relevant, keeps
you other and like it turns me on. You know,

(43:23):
if somebody says to me, do you want to start
your own next business? No, because I know what that
takes at this To be honest with you, I know
I wouldn't be great at it because there's so much
you have to do. You know, there's a there's a
tournament school like sucking money now, and that's as like,
what fucking money is the problem with having And I've
been very fortunate I've created wealth. Is that you're able

(43:46):
to say fuck you, like not I don want to
do that I feel like, like that's the problem. You
don't you can lose your driving it Well, you're just
valuing the money differently, you're valuing There's just it is,
there's so much required in starting that next thing and
starting the next business. That's why a lot of people
at later ages. It doesn't mean you can't be doing
great things and starting new things, but they're gonna take

(44:07):
on different forms that probably not going to be as
monetarily driven. Also, your risk curve changes. You know, for
me to start a business, and let's say, okay, I
was gonna have to invest X amount of dollars, I
don't know do I want to risk those dollars. So,
you know, everything in your life curve. So one way
the question to your question about age is on the
vanity part, I want to look and feel as good

(44:27):
as because I'm always somebody. If I feel like I
look good, that matters to me. It's just that's it's like,
you know, it's like what are we We are are
inside and we are outside, Like that's what where we're masks?
We're So I want my outside to look because that
makes my inside feel a little bit better. But the
age thing is like the age is tricky. You know,
you and you start to you know, I love that
when you're no longer. You know, the demo that all

(44:49):
marketers look for is eight to thirty four or or
eight to forty nine, or the oldest is four after
fifty four years old, nobody cares. Nobody fucking bucking me
cares what the funk I'm doing anymore? Like it's amazing,
I care. Okay, there's nobody's saying we care. He's gonna

(45:09):
buy a project because everybody wants the younger person who's
building your portfolio. So it's funny. So you start to
become And also now when you and I like are
not looking at TikTok and like, it's just like that's
where the world is, like you just there is. The
world moves on and you have to be comfortab where
you are in every set of life. So all I
can be in every sense of the work, from a

(45:31):
work point of view, from a health point of view,
from bounding point of view, from a family point of view,
is the best fucking sixty three year old of convenient
that that's my agent. Well you're putting, you're saying everything
is what you're you're putting in. You're getting out for me,
and I'm glad you brought up. We talked about the
fitness thing. I have a brand called Skinny Girl. People
think I work out. I don't exercise a lot, and
it's funny and it doesn't matter whether I exercise or

(45:52):
not as far as my weight to me because I
can not depression. But I'm installar. I'm in pajamas. I
stay home all the time. And I'll get to the
point today. Don't Liz about you. People don't real about
you that I never leave my house. It's been public
and I never leave my house. So today was the
day because it's the summer, and I said to myself,
today's to day. I'm breaking the seal. I'm going to
getting in the jeep, going to the beach and doing

(46:13):
the beach walk. It sounds like nothing to everybody else.
I was right by your house today. I took the
hour beach. I thought I didn't park in the drive.
But I love that I have that access that I
always know there's no spot. I like that. I like
that too. Out now because there's a public beach that
I can go to and I usually get a spot.
But Donnie lives happened right near there, and if I
don't get a spot, I'll go and then I see

(46:34):
his his house and his dogs, and I can get
a water if I wanted to get some fresh fruit
cut up. It's great and I like that, but I
don't use it all the time because I don't want
to be that person. But today was the day that
I said I'm checking that I woke up and I
just did the walk and I feel better for it.
I knew I was in a little bit of a funk,
and I just it broke the seal. So for everybody
who's not like sort of motivated the way that Donnie
is where most people are, we all go through it.

(46:56):
I do feel better for it. So tomorrow I'll be
back on your beach and I might be parking your i'veway,
But just do the best you can in the moment,
is what I say. You know, all right. I've talked
to um. You and I are similar in this area too.
I've talked to a lot of people who are successful
and in quote unquote successful relationships. Now we don't know
what's going on behind the scenes, but they've been married
twenty years. It works as a dynamic, and so what

(47:16):
do you think about relationships and your relationship to relationships.
I know you have wonderful kids, I've met them. You
have a good have good relationships with your exes, which
says a lot about you more than even being in
a successful relationship in many cases. But what is your
relationship to relationships and where? How have you weighed that
in your mind? And what does that mean to you?
Break down a few buckets of relationships. I think as

(47:38):
far as a parent, I think I've been a wonderful
relationships with my children as well. I have three daughters,
and I gave myself a Burnaby high gree I think
in friendships, I think I'm not great. I have. I
have three of my best friends since first grade. I
have five of my best friends from college. These forty
fifty year relationships. I think I've been a great friend.
I think it's a boss. I think I was an

(47:58):
incredibly compassionate, motive, vading, empathetic, great leader and kid very
much about the people. I think I get great grades
there um the great I I still have an incomplete
on it is the romantic relationship. So I was married
twice right now, I've been in a relationship for a
few years. I haven't had that one forever relationship that
I can look back and say, oh, I've cracked that coat. Now,

(48:18):
maybe that's not meant to be. That's what I'm wondering.
Do you really want that? Do you know? If you
want that? We struggle with this. We'll go back to
the age thing. I do know that as I'm getting older,
it is not elegant. For the most it's difficult to
be single. And in our social mix, it's like like
if I start dating when you know, the sleeping over

(48:40):
the whole this, and also everybody's got their ecosystem. You
have your ecosystem. It's a really difficulty. It takes a lot.
And the age thing is, well, Donna is describing me
more selfish. As you get older, you have your own program.
And Donnie has a very serious program, and he can
really only be with someone if they're going to be
on his program. And I get that, it's your program,

(49:01):
you know. So it is so for instance, right now,
I'm in a wonderful relationship, but then it's okay, it's
the person's kids and my kids and all the stuff
that comes with that, and so it's so I do
the best I can, and I certainly hope I don't
want it to be alone, you know, as I get
older and older and older. So we'll see if we
can figure that out. Life partner that would be ideal

(49:22):
life partner. You know, I'm not can take a lot
of different forms. You know. It doesn't mean that's going
to be married. It doesn't mean you even have to
be living in the same house all the time. I
think the older I get, the more I realized that
there are a lot of other car choices, just like
I've had children, and with my last child, my youngest child,
uh Daisy, who was amazing, she's fourteen now, and her
mom and I didn't get married. You know, we had

(49:44):
a kid like who fucking cares? Great caparents. We just
were like divorced parents were we can go from the
troma of divorce. I have gotten so much advice on
this show just by asking this question and everyone's definition.
What I've come up with is what you're sort of saying,
like the definition is not what it used to be,
and especially for people like us, and it's not just
a bullshit thing. We used to say it as a
bullshit thing, like meaning maybe non traditional. Now I'm realizing

(50:08):
that each person who has a very successful relationship, they
give each other rope. They really give each other a
long leash. Space works. And the common threat I've heard
in successful people in successfu relationships is the space. I
that's what I wanted to say to you, Like I
now I am in a relationship and it's long distance,
and I mean we're together very many nights a week.

(50:29):
But that in my mind used to be like, what
do you mean, Like you're supposed to be together all
the time. Here's the here's the dirty secret. That's actually
what we're right more naturally programmed for it. You say,
to anybody who's marrying right now, I'll give you the option.
You can be with you. You can't do this with grandfather,
and you can be with your spouse one week on
and one week off. No, you're right, the dirty everybody

(50:50):
who's been there, because who like who would want that? Like,
like that's what you want? We will want somebody who's
over emotional partner, you know, a part and that we
could share our lives with, but we don't want to.
But we don't know we wanted until we're secure, and
we want it because we're not socialized that the kids
growing up today are gonna have a lot more because

(51:11):
we grew up and that was traditional. That was like
what it was. It was wrong. It was there must
be something wrong with you. And that's what I'm saying. Okay,
so that's what I'm saying. And my fiance is younger,
and in the beginning that was counterintuitive to him. But
when I broke it down and said, you have your
pod with your kids, we have our pod with all
the kids together. I have my pod with my daughter
and we have our pod together. It's like four different

(51:33):
pods and it works. So anyway, that's what I had
to say about that rose and thorne. Not of your life,
not including kids, of this business experience, this journey, not
you know, your business business is personal to you, but
this whole journey, the rose and thorne, excluding the birth
of your children, excluding those types of things, your rose
and your thorn, the roses. And I gave you an
example that right talked for those two people who I

(51:54):
impacted you know earlier on. Of course, I run a
big business, and because I built a business, and of
course I've been in the media, I get to kind
of touch a lot of people. What a gift if
as a result of like, there's two gifts of doing
this right now, the actual hour of enjoyable interactually a
really smart person, and the other gift is, Wow, it's
somebody out there right now is driving in their car

(52:16):
or whatnot, and you are aye or us together somehow
inspire them and giving them extra Like what a fucking gifts?
So that that like, what what's fucking better than like
what you talk about? You death thing? What like oh
my god, that somebody just went home tonight and said,
you know, Donny Droit said this thing today and I
might change the way I do this. And it's a
strange river even't like what fucking great is that? The

(52:36):
phone for me is I never feel successful, Like it's
never like I've always tortured like I should be doing
this or why am I not doing this? Or what
like I beat myself up a lot and I wish
I didn't do that as much that I do too.
And that's very um honest, And that's the curse of
an entrepreneur. That's who you truly are inside, and it's

(52:56):
not something for those people listening. You'll know if you
are you aren't doesn't mean you can't be very successful,
make a lot of money. That's the true there's a
blessing in the cars. That is the true curse of
an entrepreneur. There's a hunger and a fire, and you
do struggle with it. Was that my carfer, I just
I don't feel like a successor. And she looked at
me and she kind of ran through my my doci
a and are you aren't sucking drugs? And you're like

(53:17):
what people aspire to be? And you know, it's like,
I don't feel that way. You know, I feel it's
not a sense a fordulance, which I can say. I've
written two books, and I feel in the business and
done this and done this, and I've been a great
successful father and great amazing friends, and I've done these films.
But it's like, what's what's that's what? Why am I
not well? Because your biggest crescendo of your career, and mine,

(53:38):
by the way, was in two your biggest crescendo of
your career, even though you've done so many things that
are more meaningful and rewarding and possibly more effective, it
was a while ago. And I know somebody else I'll
tell you offline, but somebody else who sold their company
for hundreds of millions of dollars when they were forty
years old. And that's just gonna be the thing about
that you needed to do it and it was the
right move. But that is peaking early, and that were

(54:00):
your crescendo was massive. The wave crested, and you don't know.
I don't know if lightning strikes twice, if it's going
to happen again to that degree, and it might be
somebody else's lightning. So I think that's what we go through. Donnie.
This was a pleasure, to say the least. And again
I know you, but this is knowing unit different. And
now that I've come to your house, you're gonna have
to come and be on on rand, Donnie Deutsch, and

(54:20):
come on and chat with our and share with the Orowinians.
He says. I mentioned against great people, but your dog.
Thanks for having me. Thanks than by the way, you
un absolutely kombucha. I like the kombucha red flavors. All right,
I'll see you later. So that was a great conversation
with Donnie. I never know what to expect here, what

(54:43):
we're going to get from someone, even from people that
I lived down the street from who I already know.
I learned so much each time, because when do you
really ever take the time to really get to know
the inner workings of someone's mind as it pertains to
business and life and success. So it was a very
interesting conversation with Monny. I need to shout him out
and thank him because he has donated thousands and thousands

(55:04):
of dollars to be strong during times of crisis, which
I really appreciate, and it's one of the reasons I
wanted to have him on because I wanted to let
you know that he has given back, goes to the
effort and keep listening and keep rating, reviewing and subscribing.
I'm reading the reviews, I'm reading the ratings, and we
are doing incredibly well and we're getting phenomenal guests because

(55:26):
of your engagement and involvement. So thank you so much
for listening. Just Be is hosted an executive produced by
me Bethany Frankel. Just Be as a production of The
Real Productions and I Heart Radio. Our managing producer is
Fiona Smith, and our producer is Stephanie Stender. Our EP

(55:49):
is Morgan Levoy. To catch more moments from the show.
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