September 24, 2025 • 17 mins
The ability to speak with conviction can transform your life and put you in rooms with the world's most influential people. As someone who has shared stages with Ed Milet, Tim Grover, Jesse Itzler, and Charlie Kirk, I've experienced firsthand how mastering communication opens extraordinary doors—but my journey to that mastery began in the most unlikely place: a prison cell.
Before incarceration, I lived with what I call "false bravado"—confidence that only emerged when partying or using substances. When sober, deep insecurities surfaced. At 23, sitting in jail with a decade of wasted potential behind me, I made a decision that would alter the trajectory of my life: to focus relentlessly on personal development. I began with the fundamentals—reading books, improving my writing, and meticulously building my vocabulary through daily dictionary work. This wasn't just about words; it was about reprogramming my brain to think and speak differently.
My first attempt at public speaking in a prison program was disastrous—voice quivering, face flushed, confidence shattered. This experience with glossophobia (fear of public speaking) could have deterred me completely. Instead, I recognized that everything I wanted existed on the other side of that fear. I raised my hand at every opportunity, volunteering to speak until eventually becoming an inmate counselor leading discussions. After release, I leveraged social media to further refine my skills, recording videos daily and critiquing every aspect of my delivery until my messages became automatic.
This transformation didn't happen overnight—it's been 13 years in the making. Most people abandon their goals after months of inconsistent effort, but exceptional results demand exceptional commitment. Are you willing to invest a decade becoming the person you aspire to be? The only way to reach that level is by creating an undeniable track record that convinces not just others, but your own subconscious mind, that you are who you claim to be. Stop waiting and start demanding what you want from life today.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The ability to speak an articulate message and
inspire, move, persuade andinfluence people is such a
valuable skill set.
That skill set right there willget you in the room of the top
one percenters in the world.
If you stand for something thatyou believe in and you speak
with conviction and certaintyand you do it over and over and
over and you really want yourvoice to be heard by the masses,
(00:20):
you start to get around themost influential people in the
world.
Welcome back to another episodeof the Unstoppable Mindset
Podcast.
I'm your host, sean Crain.
We're here in beautiful Goleta,california, 805.
If you're from the 805, goahead and drop a comment below.
(00:42):
Make sure to share this episodeand this message with somebody
that wants to be inspired,that's looking for direction or
focus or purpose in life.
You guys, all I want to be, isan example, and that means for
me, every day, I got to strivefor excellence.
I got to go above and beyondevery day in everything that I
(01:04):
do.
If I truly care about you, myfamily, if the words that I
share hold value and havemeaning, I need to back them up
with so much action, with somuch results, that they are
undeniable.
And that's what I'm striving tobe is an undeniable figure that
has a track record of successand always doing what he says
he's going to do, beingauthentic, showing up, pouring
my heart and soul into the worldand every message every day
(01:25):
that I get.
That's my goal and I'm fired up, you guys, and you know I had
someone ask me the other day,sean, how do you become a public
speaker?
How do you start speaking onstages?
I've been able to speak onstages all over the country with
some amazing, amazing people EdMilet, tim Grover, jesse Itzler
, marcus Luttrell, I mean.
(01:46):
The last event I was at that Ispoke at, charlie Kirk was the
keynote and we all know CharlieKirk just got assassinated,
right, and I've been sharing alot of content about that.
But in this particular messageI want to talk about my journey
to becoming a public speaker andgetting close to people like
that.
You know, the ability to speakan articulate message and
inspire, move, persuade andinfluence people is such a
(02:10):
valuable skill set.
That skill set, right there,will get you in the room of the
top one percenters in the worldIf you stand for something that
you believe in and you speakwith conviction and certainty
and you do it over and, over andover and you really want your
voice to be heard by the masses,you start to get around the
most influential people in theworld, right?
There's an old saying, right,like the pen is mightier than
(02:31):
the sword, well, the tongue ismightier than the sword.
What does that mean?
That means that the ability tospeak eloquently, the ability to
be influential in your speech,in your speaking, it is such a
valuable skill set.
You can get people inspired tochange.
You can help people to changetheir whole mindset.
You can help people to overcomeyears of trauma or setbacks or
(02:51):
procrastination if you know howto speak to people and get them
inspired for change.
And so for me, this has been adecade plus in the making.
I want to take you all the wayback to when I got incarcerated.
Now, prior to going to jail, Iwasn't a guy with a ton of
confidence.
I had what you call falsebravado.
Okay, when I drank or partiedand did drugs, I was very
(03:13):
outgoing and fun to be around.
I had false bravado.
But when I was sober and Iwould come down off of that high
, I was very insecure.
I didn't have confidence, andthat's why I use drugs and drink
to numb out that feeling, tomask that feeling.
They say that alcohol is liquidcourage.
Or when you're younger I'm surea lot of you can relate to this
like going to parties.
(03:33):
Or when you first start talkingto girls.
Or maybe for you, girls, whenyou first start talking to boys,
you have a couple of drinks andyou loosen up and you feel
better.
All of a sudden, you have thatfalse bravado, you feel like you
can be the way you want to be.
Your inhibitions are lessened,right.
Well, for me, that was the wayI was as a young person.
But the problem with that Iwasn't building genuine
confidence in myself.
You know, confidence comes fromhaving an undeniable track
(03:55):
record of you showing up andgoing above and beyond to get
results in your life.
That's when you becomeundeniable in your subconscious
mind.
Right, that's what everybodyneeds to strive for.
But when I was 23 and I went tojail, I didn't have that.
I had just wasted the past 10years of my life.
So I just had a track record ofnot doing anything I was proud
of, and I remember man wantingto be a person who I felt proud
(04:18):
of, wanting to be esteemed,wanting to be able to look in
the mirror and be like dude,you're really doing something in
your life.
And I didn't have that at thatmoment.
And so I remember, in jail Ijust started focusing on what I
could do each and every day tobetter myself and I share this
story all the time because itliterally changed my life.
But I started reading books.
I started writing letters backhome focusing on improving my
penmanship, my grammar, myspelling, all that stuff, and I
(04:40):
started looking up words in thedictionary.
Now, I started doing this earlyon.
Number one I was reading booksbecause I had nothing to do.
I was writing letters back andforth to my dad and I remember I
got a letter from him and hewas critiquing my spelling and
he was like telling me about allthese words I misspelled and
grammar and punctuation that wasoff.
And I was like damn, like Ididn't like that.
I took it as a personalchallenge and I remember
(05:00):
thinking to myself well, I havenothing but time in the cell.
I'm going to make sure that Iwrite every letter back to my
dad perfectly flawlessly.
And I started doing that and Iremember in a short period of
time he wrote me back.
He goes, man, your letters areamazing, like you're getting
help from somebody, like how areyou learning how to spell and
write this way?
And what was happening was everybook that I was reading I'd
come across all these words Ididn't know the meaning or
(05:22):
definition of.
And I'm sure when you read,sometimes you come across a word
and you don't know the exactmeaning of it.
But with the context and thesentence you can kind of put two
and two together.
I used to do that all the time.
I'd just skip over the word andkeep going.
But I remember because I hadall day long in this cell.
I thought to myself why am Inot looking up these words and
memorizing them?
So, like a little kid, insecond, third, fourth grade, I
(05:46):
started keeping a vocab list.
I started writing down allthese words and their definition
and the type of speech rightVerb, adjective noun and I would
go through every day andmemorize them and memorize them
and quiz myself.
And before long I had papersall over my cell with vocab
lists.
And not only would I memorizethem, but I started then using
those words in my letters backhome to my dad and other family
(06:07):
members.
I started using those wordswhen I would talk and converse
to my cellmate, even on thephone, talking to people, even
to the inmates, even to mylawyers, it didn't matter.
I wanted to change this bad youguys.
This is what change reallylooks like.
A lot of you say you want tochange.
You're not willing to do themundane work every day, for as
long as it takes I mean like thetedious shit, right, like some
(06:29):
of you want to change yourhealth and fitness, but you
don't have attention to detailwith every meal that you eat,
you don't scrutinize every macroyou put in your body.
You're not taking every rep tofailure.
You're not really pushingyourself.
So in life, if you want to getresults, if you want to evolve,
you have to push yourself likeyou've never pushed yourself
before.
If you think you're workinghard right now but you don't
have the results, it's becauseyou're not working hard.
(06:51):
You're not.
You get what you demand.
In this life, I wanted to besomebody who was articulate.
I wanted to be someone who wasoutgoing.
When I first started changingmy life, I had a vision of the
person I wanted to be, and Iremember always seeing actors in
the old movies and even thenewer movies.
Whoever, the main character wasthe guy with charisma, the guy
who got the girls, the guy whokilled the bad guys, the guy who
stole the spotlight.
(07:12):
They were always well-spoken,they always had charisma, they
always had good energy aboutthem.
I wanted to be like that in mylife.
I wanted to be the maincharacter and the superstar.
It's the way I felt ever sinceI was a child.
But I lost that version ofmyself when I was an adolescent,
(07:32):
right, and I was hell-bent ongetting back to my truest,
authentic self, and so that'swhy I wanted to be good at
speaking and that's why Istarted reading books and
writing these letters home toperfection every day, because
that was a reflection of mebecoming that person.
You know.
So, dude, I literally had apocket dictionary and I would
look words up in that thing allday long and I would write these
words down.
I'd write their definition andmanner of speech down, and I
started to use those words in myletters back home and when I
(07:54):
was speaking to people.
And what happened was itstarted to create a new program
in my brain.
I started to speak differently,I started to think differently,
I was more eloquent, I wasarticulate, and so this, over
years and years and yearsstarted to change my speech
patterns and, like I said, theway that I would articulate
myself to people.
But then I actually had to putit into motion.
(08:16):
To become a public speaker.
It's not enough just to be ableto have an extensive vocabulary
.
You got to know how to speak topeople.
You have to know cadence, youhave to know when to bring your
emotion and your passion intosomething and then when to tone
it down.
You know, you have to know howto use pauses.
You have to really be able toconnect with your audience.
It's very, you know, it'salmost.
(08:36):
It's an art form, publicspeaking.
And so the first time I got achance to speak in front of
people, I didn't have thisexperience.
I was actually in a drugprogram in prison and I got in
front of all these inmates and Ichoked, my voice quivered, my
face got red, I was nervous andall I was doing was telling the
truth about my life and mybattle with addiction.
But it was because I wasspeaking in front of people for
(08:57):
the first time.
My nerves were rattled, Iwasn't used to it, and they say
that public speaking is one ofthe greatest fears humans
possess.
It's actually calledglossophobia, which is from a
Greek word, glossa.
That means, you know, fear ofthe tongue.
And I remember in that moment Ihated the way I felt.
I went and sat down in theaudience amongst other inmates
(09:17):
after I got done speaking infront of them you know, in all
these chairs that we were allsitting in and they were
clowning me and making fun of meand I hated that feeling and I
remember I realized like I don'twant to feel that way.
I got to master the art ofpublic speaking.
I had to face that fear head on.
This is where a lot of people gowrong.
You want to become a certainperson, you want to achieve
certain results in your life.
But when times get tough, whenthere's resistance, when you
(09:38):
don't do as good as you want todo, when you're met with
adversity, how do you show upthe next day?
How do you react to that?
You guys, anything that youwant to be in life, all the
results that you want, are onthe other side of that fear.
You have to push through it.
A lot of times the fears aremagnified in our own brain
because, like for me, thatfeeling of choking in front of
all those people and just beingembarrassed.
(09:59):
I hated it and I could have letthat feeling make me feel less
than I could have like, oh, I'mnever doing that again.
That's most people's initialreaction, right?
But instead I said, screw that,I'm going to do this as many
times as I have to to ensure Inever have that feeling again.
I'm going to master the art ofpublic speaking.
And so every time I got thechance in that jail, in that
(10:21):
prison, in the program I was infor the next X number of years,
I'd raise my hand in thesegroups and I'd speak in front of
all the inmates.
And it got to the point where Igot really good at speaking and
sharing my story.
Then they promoted me to inmatecounselor.
I'm literally in the sameprogram, leading lessons and
teaching the other inmates.
In a very short period of timeI went from somebody that
couldn't speak in front ofothers to somebody who could not
(10:42):
only speak eloquently in frontof other inmates but actually
start getting them to open upand share, get them to talk
about their past, get them totalk about the changes they want
to make.
This was not only me becominggood at speaking, but me
becoming a leader for otherpeople, a coach, somebody who
can make an impact in life.
It happened because I wasworking on developing my skill
sets, because I had clarityaround who I wanted to be, but
(11:03):
then I wasn't going to let theresistance and the fear and the
doubt inside of me stop me and alot of people do, and that's
never.
That's why they never get towhere they want to go in life.
You know, and a couple otherthings that I want to share with
you.
At that time, something powerfulwas taking place inside of me
and I started looking at myselfas a different person.
This had been three years of mejust working on myself, not
(11:24):
just public speaking, buteducating myself, working out my
personal development, my growthevery day, and I started
thinking about what was possiblein life.
I started thinking about how Iwas helping these other inmates
and getting them to open up andshare about their life, their
goals, their mistakes, and Istarted seeing myself in a
different light, as someone whocould truly be a catalyst to
help others.
And I would sit on my rack atnight and I would close my eyes
(11:47):
and I would envision myselfgiving entire speeches to these
vast audiences and I would beable to see their faces, like I
was there in the moment and Iwas just articulating this
powerful message word for word,just on point, hitting them with
the emotion, hitting them withthose one-liners, getting them
to think about their lives,triggering a transformation for
(12:08):
people in the audience.
I would envision those momentsover and over and over and
honestly.
Anytime I got a chance to tellmy family or other inmates, or
even counselors, or even theguards, what I wanted to do with
my life, I didn't shy away fromspeaking the truth.
I would tell people I want tocoach, I want to speak, I want
to write a book, I want to goout and make an impact in the
(12:29):
world.
And sometimes you'd getresponses from people like oh,
really, you know?
Like, oh, like.
How are you going to do that?
You know people always aregoing to judge, they're always
going to doubt you.
But if you can call your shotand stand firm in your beliefs
and you have conviction in whatyou want to do, there's nothing
that can stop you in this life.
But in order to get to thatpoint, like I said earlier, you
(12:49):
want to create a track record ofundeniable evidence that you
are who you say you are, so thatyour subconscious mind grabs
hold of that belief and, nomatter what people say about you
, you have a core belief ofcompetence and confidence that
you've created over time.
The only way you do this is bybeing repetitive and consistent
(13:10):
and developing these skillsright and doing it over and over
and over and over and over, andfacing fears and pushing
through them.
It doesn't matter what's inyour path.
You got to fight through it.
That's the only way I was ableto get here to this point today.
So all that took place before Ieven stepped foot out of my jail
cell, out of the prison that Iwas in.
But then I use social media toenhance it, to sharpen myself,
(13:36):
and I remember recording videosand then watching them back and
like cringing, like oh damn,that was my facial expressions.
That's how I sound.
You know.
I thought I was like this worldclass speaker because I have
been doing it in jail and I gotgood at writing and I had
developed myself, but I wasnowhere near the level that I
need to be at.
So I started recording videoson social media every day and
(13:57):
the cool thing is, when you golive, you could see yourself and
I remember I would change myfacial expressions, I would
practice my cadence, I wouldwork on these speeches all the
time.
All my one-liners, all mystories, all the messages, all
the things that I touch on.
I've said them thousands, tensof thousands, hundreds of
thousands of times, to the pointwhere now it's just automatic.
(14:18):
When I step on stage and I geta mic, I get an audience.
I know exactly just how to tapin it's repetition.
It's automatic to this point,you know.
But then to actually get onthose big platforms for the guy
like a Charlie Kirk or a guylike a Marcus Latrell or Ed
Milad number one speaker in theworld, jesse Itzler, probably
the best speaker in the world Ifyou've ever seen him live, you
(14:39):
know what I'm talking about Ihad to demand that I got on that
stage.
What I mean by that is I wouldgo directly to the event
coordinator, I would messagethem, I'd build a relationship
with them through social mediaor at another event I was
networking at, or maybe theyheard of me through, you know, a
client or a mutual acquaintance.
But I would always let it beknown what I wanted to do.
(14:59):
What was that purpose God puton my heart?
And I tell them, man, I want tochange lives.
I want to share my story.
I want to impact your audience.
I want to get them to thinkdifferently.
I want them to look at theirlives and realize how precious
it is, and I want to get them tolive with more urgency and
understand what's at stake.
Like, give me a chance to sharemy story, give me a chance to
(15:22):
get on that stage and changeyour audience members' lives,
like I will.
I promise you that.
And what is the first thing thatthese people would do I
guarantee you, without evenseeing them do it is they would
go check out my social media and, because I put out so much
content and put in all that workand all that practice and all
that repetition, all thosevideos that I shared with you
earlier, they'd see something inme right, the undeniable track
record of me doing the work.
(15:44):
They would see that right In myvideos, in my skillset, and it
would give them the confidencethat I could go on stage and add
value to their event.
So that's how I've been able toget on stage and speak with
some of the most eloquent,impactful speakers of our time.
Tim Story is another one.
If you've heard Tim Story speak, I spoke with him twice and
he's incredible, and these areall individuals that I look up
(16:05):
to that I wanna emulate that.
I always take little bits andpieces of what they're doing and
I wanna make it my own, butthis is something that God put
on my heart.
I'm passionate about it, I lovedoing it and the reason I
wanted to share this clip isbecause that's been 13 years now
in the making to get to thispoint and share with you guys
what I've been doing.
I want to ask you something.
You know you only get to liveonce and the things that God's
(16:26):
put on your heart and the goalsyou have and the visions about
who you want to become like,those are special.
Those are for you and nobodyelse.
Are you willing to put 10 yearsin plus to become that person,
to get these opportunities thatyou say you want?
Because a lot of people talkabout what they want but after
six months or a year or whatever, they stop, they quit, they
give up.
And there's a lot of you outthere.
I've coached a lot of you.
(16:48):
I've spoke to a lot of you atevents.
I see a lot of you at the samereoccurring events and you're
the same you were the yearbefore, but you tell me about
your goals and you tell me aboutwhat you're passionate about
and you tell me why you want todo it, but you're not changing.
You're not really all in andthat's why you're the same and
you're stuck.
And so, man, I just want you torecognize that you get a gift
(17:08):
here an opportunity to go outand create and become somebody
that's exceptional.
The only way you get to thatpoint is by creating a track
record of undeniable evidencethat you are who you say you
want to become, meaning you putin the work, you face the fears,
you develop the skills and youget whatever it is you have to
have in this life.
(17:29):
Demand what you want, call yourshot and get up today and go
out and get after it.
The ability to speak an articulate message and
inspire, move, persuade andinfluence people is such a
valuable skill set.
That skill set right there willget you in the room of the top
one percenters in the world.
If you stand for something thatyou believe in and you speak
with conviction and certaintyand you do it over and over and
over and you really want yourvoice to be heard by the masses,
(00:20):
you start to get around themost influential people in the
world.
Welcome back to another episodeof the Unstoppable Mindset
Podcast.
I'm your host, sean Crain.
We're here in beautiful Goleta,california, 805.
If you're from the 805, goahead and drop a comment below.
(00:42):
Make sure to share this episodeand this message with somebody
that wants to be inspired,that's looking for direction or
focus or purpose in life.
You guys, all I want to be, isan example, and that means for
me, every day, I got to strivefor excellence.
I got to go above and beyondevery day in everything that I
(01:04):
do.
If I truly care about you, myfamily, if the words that I
share hold value and havemeaning, I need to back them up
with so much action, with somuch results, that they are
undeniable.
And that's what I'm striving tobe is an undeniable figure that
has a track record of successand always doing what he says
he's going to do, beingauthentic, showing up, pouring
my heart and soul into the worldand every message every day
(01:25):
that I get.
That's my goal and I'm fired up, you guys, and you know I had
someone ask me the other day,sean, how do you become a public
speaker?
How do you start speaking onstages?
I've been able to speak onstages all over the country with
some amazing, amazing people EdMilet, tim Grover, jesse Itzler
, marcus Luttrell, I mean.
(01:46):
The last event I was at that Ispoke at, charlie Kirk was the
keynote and we all know CharlieKirk just got assassinated,
right, and I've been sharing alot of content about that.
But in this particular messageI want to talk about my journey
to becoming a public speaker andgetting close to people like
that.
You know, the ability to speakan articulate message and
inspire, move, persuade andinfluence people is such a
(02:10):
valuable skill set.
That skill set, right there,will get you in the room of the
top one percenters in the worldIf you stand for something that
you believe in and you speakwith conviction and certainty
and you do it over and, over andover and you really want your
voice to be heard by the masses,you start to get around the
most influential people in theworld, right?
There's an old saying, right,like the pen is mightier than
(02:31):
the sword, well, the tongue ismightier than the sword.
What does that mean?
That means that the ability tospeak eloquently, the ability to
be influential in your speech,in your speaking, it is such a
valuable skill set.
You can get people inspired tochange.
You can help people to changetheir whole mindset.
You can help people to overcomeyears of trauma or setbacks or
(02:51):
procrastination if you know howto speak to people and get them
inspired for change.
And so for me, this has been adecade plus in the making.
I want to take you all the wayback to when I got incarcerated.
Now, prior to going to jail, Iwasn't a guy with a ton of
confidence.
I had what you call falsebravado.
Okay, when I drank or partiedand did drugs, I was very
(03:13):
outgoing and fun to be around.
I had false bravado.
But when I was sober and Iwould come down off of that high
, I was very insecure.
I didn't have confidence, andthat's why I use drugs and drink
to numb out that feeling, tomask that feeling.
They say that alcohol is liquidcourage.
Or when you're younger I'm surea lot of you can relate to this
like going to parties.
(03:33):
Or when you first start talkingto girls.
Or maybe for you, girls, whenyou first start talking to boys,
you have a couple of drinks andyou loosen up and you feel
better.
All of a sudden, you have thatfalse bravado, you feel like you
can be the way you want to be.
Your inhibitions are lessened,right.
Well, for me, that was the wayI was as a young person.
But the problem with that Iwasn't building genuine
confidence in myself.
You know, confidence comes fromhaving an undeniable track
(03:55):
record of you showing up andgoing above and beyond to get
results in your life.
That's when you becomeundeniable in your subconscious
mind.
Right, that's what everybodyneeds to strive for.
But when I was 23 and I went tojail, I didn't have that.
I had just wasted the past 10years of my life.
So I just had a track record ofnot doing anything I was proud
of, and I remember man wantingto be a person who I felt proud
(04:18):
of, wanting to be esteemed,wanting to be able to look in
the mirror and be like dude,you're really doing something in
your life.
And I didn't have that at thatmoment.
And so I remember, in jail Ijust started focusing on what I
could do each and every day tobetter myself and I share this
story all the time because itliterally changed my life.
But I started reading books.
I started writing letters backhome focusing on improving my
penmanship, my grammar, myspelling, all that stuff, and I
(04:40):
started looking up words in thedictionary.
Now, I started doing this earlyon.
Number one I was reading booksbecause I had nothing to do.
I was writing letters back andforth to my dad and I remember I
got a letter from him and hewas critiquing my spelling and
he was like telling me about allthese words I misspelled and
grammar and punctuation that wasoff.
And I was like damn, like Ididn't like that.
I took it as a personalchallenge and I remember
(05:00):
thinking to myself well, I havenothing but time in the cell.
I'm going to make sure that Iwrite every letter back to my
dad perfectly flawlessly.
And I started doing that and Iremember in a short period of
time he wrote me back.
He goes, man, your letters areamazing, like you're getting
help from somebody, like how areyou learning how to spell and
write this way?
And what was happening was everybook that I was reading I'd
come across all these words Ididn't know the meaning or
(05:22):
definition of.
And I'm sure when you read,sometimes you come across a word
and you don't know the exactmeaning of it.
But with the context and thesentence you can kind of put two
and two together.
I used to do that all the time.
I'd just skip over the word andkeep going.
But I remember because I hadall day long in this cell.
I thought to myself why am Inot looking up these words and
memorizing them?
So, like a little kid, insecond, third, fourth grade, I
(05:46):
started keeping a vocab list.
I started writing down allthese words and their definition
and the type of speech rightVerb, adjective noun and I would
go through every day andmemorize them and memorize them
and quiz myself.
And before long I had papersall over my cell with vocab
lists.
And not only would I memorizethem, but I started then using
those words in my letters backhome to my dad and other family
(06:07):
members.
I started using those wordswhen I would talk and converse
to my cellmate, even on thephone, talking to people, even
to the inmates, even to mylawyers, it didn't matter.
I wanted to change this bad youguys.
This is what change reallylooks like.
A lot of you say you want tochange.
You're not willing to do themundane work every day, for as
long as it takes I mean like thetedious shit, right, like some
(06:29):
of you want to change yourhealth and fitness, but you
don't have attention to detailwith every meal that you eat,
you don't scrutinize every macroyou put in your body.
You're not taking every rep tofailure.
You're not really pushingyourself.
So in life, if you want to getresults, if you want to evolve,
you have to push yourself likeyou've never pushed yourself
before.
If you think you're workinghard right now but you don't
have the results, it's becauseyou're not working hard.
(06:51):
You're not.
You get what you demand.
In this life, I wanted to besomebody who was articulate.
I wanted to be someone who wasoutgoing.
When I first started changingmy life, I had a vision of the
person I wanted to be, and Iremember always seeing actors in
the old movies and even thenewer movies.
Whoever, the main character wasthe guy with charisma, the guy
who got the girls, the guy whokilled the bad guys, the guy who
stole the spotlight.
(07:12):
They were always well-spoken,they always had charisma, they
always had good energy aboutthem.
I wanted to be like that in mylife.
I wanted to be the maincharacter and the superstar.
It's the way I felt ever sinceI was a child.
But I lost that version ofmyself when I was an adolescent,
(07:32):
right, and I was hell-bent ongetting back to my truest,
authentic self, and so that'swhy I wanted to be good at
speaking and that's why Istarted reading books and
writing these letters home toperfection every day, because
that was a reflection of mebecoming that person.
You know.
So, dude, I literally had apocket dictionary and I would
look words up in that thing allday long and I would write these
words down.
I'd write their definition andmanner of speech down, and I
started to use those words in myletters back home and when I
(07:54):
was speaking to people.
And what happened was itstarted to create a new program
in my brain.
I started to speak differently,I started to think differently,
I was more eloquent, I wasarticulate, and so this, over
years and years and yearsstarted to change my speech
patterns and, like I said, theway that I would articulate
myself to people.
But then I actually had to putit into motion.
(08:16):
To become a public speaker.
It's not enough just to be ableto have an extensive vocabulary
.
You got to know how to speak topeople.
You have to know cadence, youhave to know when to bring your
emotion and your passion intosomething and then when to tone
it down.
You know, you have to know howto use pauses.
You have to really be able toconnect with your audience.
It's very, you know, it'salmost.
(08:36):
It's an art form, publicspeaking.
And so the first time I got achance to speak in front of
people, I didn't have thisexperience.
I was actually in a drugprogram in prison and I got in
front of all these inmates and Ichoked, my voice quivered, my
face got red, I was nervous andall I was doing was telling the
truth about my life and mybattle with addiction.
But it was because I wasspeaking in front of people for
(08:57):
the first time.
My nerves were rattled, Iwasn't used to it, and they say
that public speaking is one ofthe greatest fears humans
possess.
It's actually calledglossophobia, which is from a
Greek word, glossa.
That means, you know, fear ofthe tongue.
And I remember in that moment Ihated the way I felt.
I went and sat down in theaudience amongst other inmates
(09:17):
after I got done speaking infront of them you know, in all
these chairs that we were allsitting in and they were
clowning me and making fun of meand I hated that feeling and I
remember I realized like I don'twant to feel that way.
I got to master the art ofpublic speaking.
I had to face that fear head on.
This is where a lot of people gowrong.
You want to become a certainperson, you want to achieve
certain results in your life.
But when times get tough, whenthere's resistance, when you
(09:38):
don't do as good as you want todo, when you're met with
adversity, how do you show upthe next day?
How do you react to that?
You guys, anything that youwant to be in life, all the
results that you want, are onthe other side of that fear.
You have to push through it.
A lot of times the fears aremagnified in our own brain
because, like for me, thatfeeling of choking in front of
all those people and just beingembarrassed.
(09:59):
I hated it and I could have letthat feeling make me feel less
than I could have like, oh, I'mnever doing that again.
That's most people's initialreaction, right?
But instead I said, screw that,I'm going to do this as many
times as I have to to ensure Inever have that feeling again.
I'm going to master the art ofpublic speaking.
And so every time I got thechance in that jail, in that
(10:21):
prison, in the program I was infor the next X number of years,
I'd raise my hand in thesegroups and I'd speak in front of
all the inmates.
And it got to the point where Igot really good at speaking and
sharing my story.
Then they promoted me to inmatecounselor.
I'm literally in the sameprogram, leading lessons and
teaching the other inmates.
In a very short period of timeI went from somebody that
couldn't speak in front ofothers to somebody who could not
(10:42):
only speak eloquently in frontof other inmates but actually
start getting them to open upand share, get them to talk
about their past, get them totalk about the changes they want
to make.
This was not only me becominggood at speaking, but me
becoming a leader for otherpeople, a coach, somebody who
can make an impact in life.
It happened because I wasworking on developing my skill
sets, because I had clarityaround who I wanted to be, but
(11:03):
then I wasn't going to let theresistance and the fear and the
doubt inside of me stop me and alot of people do, and that's
never.
That's why they never get towhere they want to go in life.
You know, and a couple otherthings that I want to share with
you.
At that time, something powerfulwas taking place inside of me
and I started looking at myselfas a different person.
This had been three years of mejust working on myself, not
(11:24):
just public speaking, buteducating myself, working out my
personal development, my growthevery day, and I started
thinking about what was possiblein life.
I started thinking about how Iwas helping these other inmates
and getting them to open up andshare about their life, their
goals, their mistakes, and Istarted seeing myself in a
different light, as someone whocould truly be a catalyst to
help others.
And I would sit on my rack atnight and I would close my eyes
(11:47):
and I would envision myselfgiving entire speeches to these
vast audiences and I would beable to see their faces, like I
was there in the moment and Iwas just articulating this
powerful message word for word,just on point, hitting them with
the emotion, hitting them withthose one-liners, getting them
to think about their lives,triggering a transformation for
(12:08):
people in the audience.
I would envision those momentsover and over and over and
honestly.
Anytime I got a chance to tellmy family or other inmates, or
even counselors, or even theguards, what I wanted to do with
my life, I didn't shy away fromspeaking the truth.
I would tell people I want tocoach, I want to speak, I want
to write a book, I want to goout and make an impact in the
(12:29):
world.
And sometimes you'd getresponses from people like oh,
really, you know?
Like, oh, like.
How are you going to do that?
You know people always aregoing to judge, they're always
going to doubt you.
But if you can call your shotand stand firm in your beliefs
and you have conviction in whatyou want to do, there's nothing
that can stop you in this life.
But in order to get to thatpoint, like I said earlier, you
(12:49):
want to create a track record ofundeniable evidence that you
are who you say you are, so thatyour subconscious mind grabs
hold of that belief and, nomatter what people say about you
, you have a core belief ofcompetence and confidence that
you've created over time.
The only way you do this is bybeing repetitive and consistent
(13:10):
and developing these skillsright and doing it over and over
and over and over and over, andfacing fears and pushing
through them.
It doesn't matter what's inyour path.
You got to fight through it.
That's the only way I was ableto get here to this point today.
So all that took place before Ieven stepped foot out of my jail
cell, out of the prison that Iwas in.
But then I use social media toenhance it, to sharpen myself,
(13:36):
and I remember recording videosand then watching them back and
like cringing, like oh damn,that was my facial expressions.
That's how I sound.
You know.
I thought I was like this worldclass speaker because I have
been doing it in jail and I gotgood at writing and I had
developed myself, but I wasnowhere near the level that I
need to be at.
So I started recording videoson social media every day and
(13:57):
the cool thing is, when you golive, you could see yourself and
I remember I would change myfacial expressions, I would
practice my cadence, I wouldwork on these speeches all the
time.
All my one-liners, all mystories, all the messages, all
the things that I touch on.
I've said them thousands, tensof thousands, hundreds of
thousands of times, to the pointwhere now it's just automatic.
(14:18):
When I step on stage and I geta mic, I get an audience.
I know exactly just how to tapin it's repetition.
It's automatic to this point,you know.
But then to actually get onthose big platforms for the guy
like a Charlie Kirk or a guylike a Marcus Latrell or Ed
Milad number one speaker in theworld, jesse Itzler, probably
the best speaker in the world Ifyou've ever seen him live, you
(14:39):
know what I'm talking about Ihad to demand that I got on that
stage.
What I mean by that is I wouldgo directly to the event
coordinator, I would messagethem, I'd build a relationship
with them through social mediaor at another event I was
networking at, or maybe theyheard of me through, you know, a
client or a mutual acquaintance.
But I would always let it beknown what I wanted to do.
(14:59):
What was that purpose God puton my heart?
And I tell them, man, I want tochange lives.
I want to share my story.
I want to impact your audience.
I want to get them to thinkdifferently.
I want them to look at theirlives and realize how precious
it is, and I want to get them tolive with more urgency and
understand what's at stake.
Like, give me a chance to sharemy story, give me a chance to
(15:22):
get on that stage and changeyour audience members' lives,
like I will.
I promise you that.
And what is the first thing thatthese people would do I
guarantee you, without evenseeing them do it is they would
go check out my social media and, because I put out so much
content and put in all that workand all that practice and all
that repetition, all thosevideos that I shared with you
earlier, they'd see something inme right, the undeniable track
record of me doing the work.
(15:44):
They would see that right In myvideos, in my skillset, and it
would give them the confidencethat I could go on stage and add
value to their event.
So that's how I've been able toget on stage and speak with
some of the most eloquent,impactful speakers of our time.
Tim Story is another one.
If you've heard Tim Story speak, I spoke with him twice and
he's incredible, and these areall individuals that I look up
(16:05):
to that I wanna emulate that.
I always take little bits andpieces of what they're doing and
I wanna make it my own, butthis is something that God put
on my heart.
I'm passionate about it, I lovedoing it and the reason I
wanted to share this clip isbecause that's been 13 years now
in the making to get to thispoint and share with you guys
what I've been doing.
I want to ask you something.
You know you only get to liveonce and the things that God's
(16:26):
put on your heart and the goalsyou have and the visions about
who you want to become like,those are special.
Those are for you and nobodyelse.
Are you willing to put 10 yearsin plus to become that person,
to get these opportunities thatyou say you want?
Because a lot of people talkabout what they want but after
six months or a year or whatever, they stop, they quit, they
give up.
And there's a lot of you outthere.
I've coached a lot of you.
(16:48):
I've spoke to a lot of you atevents.
I see a lot of you at the samereoccurring events and you're
the same you were the yearbefore, but you tell me about
your goals and you tell me aboutwhat you're passionate about
and you tell me why you want todo it, but you're not changing.
You're not really all in andthat's why you're the same and
you're stuck.
And so, man, I just want you torecognize that you get a gift
(17:08):
here an opportunity to go outand create and become somebody
that's exceptional.
The only way you get to thatpoint is by creating a track
record of undeniable evidencethat you are who you say you
want to become, meaning you putin the work, you face the fears,
you develop the skills and youget whatever it is you have to
have in this life.
(17:29):
Demand what you want, call yourshot and get up today and go
out and get after it.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.