#17 Embracing Imperfections with Champion Boxer Cam Awesome

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, what's going on everybody?
Welcome to the possibilitymindset podcast.
I'm Devin Henderson, your host,and I believe that something
greater is always possible foryou.
All right, cam, what's up?

Speaker 2 (00:20):
I also believe that you believe that too.

Speaker 1 (00:21):
Yeah, he's not just like saying that, like you,
believe that at a deep level,there's always a greater thing
to aspire to.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
But to a fault.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
some will say yes, yes, that is the trick sometimes
with knowing that somethinggreater is always possible.
But should we always bepursuing that, like when other
things are at stake, like if I'mlike, oh, there's something
better in my career, but if Ichase this certain thing right
now, it might sacrifice, say,quality time with my family.
So you do have to kind of keepit in balance and in check.

(00:51):
I think that's what you'resaying.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah that is part of it, right?

Speaker 1 (00:54):
It's like so anyway, okay, awesome.
Well, hey, I'm excited tointroduce Cam and tell you who
he is and what he's about andeverything.
But first of all, I want tothank et cetera.
Shawnee, they have been soamazing.
Shannon, the manager, has beenjust so great about getting me
spots in the schedule to usethis space.
They provide breakfast and ourserver, sonya, is amazing.

(01:20):
And how are your hash brownstoday, by the way?

Speaker 2 (01:23):
Yeah, really good, really good.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
So it's funny, because I usually order this
veggie omelet and everything andI text Cam.
Last night I'm like, hey, letme know what you want to eat,
what to order.
And he's like hash brownssimplest order ever.
And I kind of forgotten you'revegan.
And so I'm like, oh yeah, thatmakes sense, but you also got
fruit with it.
So how long have you been vegan?

Speaker 2 (01:44):
Over 10 years, 11 years now.

Speaker 1 (01:46):
Okay, maybe we'll hear more about that.
I'd like to see why and how youthink that affects you and why
people might consider doing that.
Okay, awesome man, we'll get tothat.
So, okay, if you're listening,I'd love for you to get the full
experience and watch this onYouTube, because every once in a
while there's something visualso you can find me on Devon

(02:06):
Henderson speaker on YouTube andsubscribe to that.
We're trying to reach morepeople.
So the more people thatsubscribe and like the episode,
we can extend our reach andbring these valuable lessons to
people who may desperately needthem.
Okay, and if you're on Apple orSpotify, go ahead.
Rate comment.
That also helps us extend ourreach and I want to give a big

(02:26):
thank you.
I know Cam's like am I here for?

Speaker 2 (02:29):
a reason.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
Am I just going to sit here?

Speaker 2 (02:31):
the whole time.
I want to thank people too.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
You got anybody you want to thank.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
I like St Sonia.
Yeah, the satch brunts are fire.
Yeah, that's a great job.

Speaker 1 (02:37):
That's funny, but I want to big thank you to.
This is a listener at SQLunderscore dangolf.
Yeah, I think I'm saying thatright.
So thank you so much for buyingme coffee.
There's a feature through mypodcast platform where you can
buy me a coffee to.
You know, support the show,show some morale support, but

(03:00):
this person coffees are $5.
Sql underscore dangolf boughtme 10 coffees.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Wow, shout out to them.

Speaker 1 (03:08):
I know, so thank you for that.
I'll be drinking a lot ofcoffee now.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
You're not going to sleep for a week.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
I know, I know I'm going to spend it all the day,
so, but seriously, thank you forthat.
So, okay, awesome.
Now that we've got all thatdone, let's introduce the man of
the hour.
Okay, everybody, this is Cam F.
Awesome, so get ready.
He's got quite the quite thebio here.
He's a keynote speaker, he's adiversity consultant, event

(03:33):
emcee and a multi-time nationalchampion heavyweight Olympic
boxer.
That's as impressive as that ishard to say.

Speaker 2 (03:43):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
It's like a national champion heavyweight Olympic.
It just keeps scaling up.
It's Olympic.
What Boxer I mean?
This is so cool.
So, as I'm acting like I'mlearning this from the first.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
You're a boxer.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
As a motivational speaker, cam shares lessons he's
learned traveling to 30 pluscountries as captain of team USA
.
So Cam's Olympic journey wasfeatured in the Netflix original
documentary Counter Punch,which, I am ashamed to say, I
have not watched it.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
I do not die at the end.
You don't die at the end.
I don't die at the end.

Speaker 1 (04:18):
Spoiler alert.
We actually Netflix is one ofthose platforms where we're like
we're trying to get our kidsmore and more away from screens,
because screens are alwaysgoing to be there.
It's like candy, it's likewe're not like ruling it out,
but it's like it's always there.
So how do you kind of keep youknow?
So Netflix was one of thethings to go for now, but when
it comes back on, I know whatI'm going to watch.
All right, yeah, spirit.
No, it's a kid show.

(04:40):
No, I want to watch CounterPunch.
So if this is a quote, this isa Cam quote, it's okay if I
quote, you Go for it.
If you can fail without beingdiscouraged, success becomes
inevitable.
Man, is that possible to failwithout being discouraged?
100%?

Speaker 2 (04:57):
yes, 100%, yes Okay.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
All right.
So that's a quote.
Cam lives by.
His secret to remainingresilient through ups and downs
is keeping a positive mindsetthrough practicing gratitude,
which I have seen that play out.
You're very thankful for me forthe time that you know we put
into each other In the words ofCam.
He's the most decorated USamateur boxing boxer in history
and he was also this is the coolpart.

(05:19):
This was recent.
He was inducted into the KansasCity Golden Gloves Hall of Fame
.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah, congratulations , thanks.
When was that Made me feel old?

Speaker 1 (05:28):
Made me feel old, I still got it.
I can't be in the Hall of Fame.
Yet that's hilarious.
Well, that's great.

Speaker 2 (05:33):
I saw it on LeapDin, I think About two or three weeks
ago.
Yeah, I thought that was morerecent man.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
That's great man, congrats.
I think you're going to see alot of people who are in the
youth world and the marketspeaking, do motivational
speaking to high schools youths,all that.
But now he's been transitioninginto the corporate world and
it's going really well.

Speaker 2 (05:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
So because his message is versatile and
something that adults need tohear.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
Adults are just children with the ability to
drive.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah, there you go.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Like the same message you give to students, like the
same things we need to hear asadults.
What do you think changes nowthat you have you pay taxes?
Yeah, it's like the same issueswe have.
We had, a lot of us still have.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
Yeah.
So, speaking of that, let'sjump into it, man, because I've
heard bits and pieces of yourstories from your keynotes, from
copies with you.
I know that you had a roughchildhood man.
So we talk about thepossibility mindset, always
asking what else is possible.
You'll see that his life hasjust been one.
What else is possible after thenext?

(06:28):
So can we go back intochildhood and talk about how
hard that was for you?

Speaker 2 (06:32):
Yeah, how it all started there.
So I think everything isperspective, because I think
it's like 40% of the populationdoesn't have drinking water
within a mile of their home.
So when I say things were toughfor me after traveling to 30
countries, like maybe it wasn'tall, like, that I love that
perspective.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
I mean that's that's so true man, I lose sight of
that constantly.
Question.

Speaker 2 (06:54):
What would it look like if you lived in a utopia
where life was perfect?
Yeah, would it look like morepeople were dying of obesity
than starvation?
Would it look like somethinglike that?
Wow, something found a way tocomplain about everything.
Wow, yeah, luxuries becomenecessities.
Hmm, and I think that's wherewe are in life.
Wow.

Speaker 1 (07:13):
That's, that's profound dude, absolutely, man,
yeah, We've, we've.
I've talked about that recentlywith my daughter with air
condition, like you, just likeit.
You know, if you go into aplace where there's no AC, or
you like you forgot to turn iton, you're like, oh and it's
just, or you're in air conditionand you go outside, you feel
the difference right when, ifyou didn't have air condition,
there wouldn't be that shockfactor that we constantly

(07:36):
experience when we go fromluxury to a place of well,
discomfort, you know.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
Luxury to to normality.

Speaker 1 (07:43):
Yeah To normality.
There you go there.
What other people in that, likethose parts of the world that
you're saying, are struggling,or all parts of the world where
they're struggling, Um, they,they.
That's like you said.
That's normal to them.

Speaker 2 (07:54):
So my, my dad's from Trinidad and like they grew up
like not the greatest area inTrinidad, he came to America for
like, a better life and thatwhole story.
But like you hear the rots andI came to America with this,
with $8 in my pocket and likeeveryone says those stories and
to me those stories were sillyand irrelevant to me because
like, oh, my dad did that andsomething your dad does can't be
cool or exciting.

(08:15):
And I always I didn'tappreciate what it was, because
I saw it.
I saw someone stop going toschool at the age of eight, came
to America, started a businesslike, helped his 12 brothers and
sisters come to America and,like my dad is a billionaire
compared to where he was, um, alittle bit about me and I was.

(08:36):
I struggled with confidence.
I struggled with weight, uh, mywhole life.
And like you're watching TV andeverything's like prom and
dating, and like you know you're14, you're super insecure, I'm
like gain weight and I was like,okay, I'm going to join a team
to like lose weight, get inshape, cause like that's
important to me.
And I wasn't good enough tomake a team, like I try out for
every team.
And I kept getting cut and I waslike, well, how else does a

(08:57):
person lose weight?
And for like a year or two,like, and then one day I was in
class and the teacher explainedhow calories work.
You consume about 2000 caloriesa day.
You burn about 2001 calories aday.
You break even, yeah.
And then I was like, oh, youdon't have to do sports to burn
calories, I can do anything.
And because I was a really coolkid, uh, I had rollerblades and

(09:20):
I decided that I was going togo role-blading.

Speaker 1 (09:22):
We were a cool kid.
I was the coolest Becauserollerblades though, are a new
place today, right, like they'reeverywhere, but at the time I'm
joking, yeah, yeah there was acertain vibe.

Speaker 2 (09:29):
No, I know you're in my neighborhood, that's why no
one was neighbor.
No one's role-blading.

Speaker 1 (09:34):
Because skateboards were kind of like the thing.
It was cool.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
Actually in my neighborhood I wasn't even
skating, like your word, andnotice that I say we like were
the exact same age or somethingLike I'm not 10 years older than
you I'm 44.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
Oh, I thought you were your 30s.
So we're like ah, well, earlierI said something about when I
was in my exit in my 30s and Iwas like dang, I'm old now
because I'm seeing him at 30.
You didn't realize I was.

Speaker 2 (09:56):
No, I didn't know you were already gone.
I already, I joke, I joke.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
I love it, man, it's OK.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
So you're role-blading that burns calories
, so I did morning after morning, after morning, six, seven
mornings in a row and by likethe seventh morning I woke up.
I was sore because I was doingthis like two hours before
school started, because I haveto wait an hour to stop sweating
before.
I got to school All right, let'sget moving into the seventh
like Zero progress.
No one stopped me.
It was like hey, man, I cantell you're working out, keep it

(10:23):
up.
And then, like I, I like, Iremember looking at my rule of
blades, like and thinking do Iwant to do it again?
Like I just, is it a waste oftime?
And I thought back to howcalories work and I was like
well, every diet you can thinkof is just different variations
of burning more calories thanyou consume.
The only way for this to happen?

(10:44):
Two ways I can consume lesscalories, which ain't going to
happen, right, or I can startburning more calories.
So I just, I was like you knowwhat, there's no other way to do
it, I'm just going to keepdoing it, okay.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
And after about three months people were like look at
Ken, he thinks he's skinny andI would blush bro, cause I was
like it's working, it's workingyeah.
And I saw it as an equation andthis is what has carried me to
be able to do.
I believe I can do anything.
I won't.
Anyone could do anything ifthey follow this equation One
plus two equals three.
In this equation, you are one.
You should always be your ownnumber one.

(11:14):
No one's going to believe inyou until you believe in
yourself.
And this is how it looks.
If you start to believe inyourself, you start to take the
actions of a person who believesin themselves, like, let's say,
you have like a test coming upor something Like, if you
believe that you pass, you'dstudy because that's the process
.
And if you made the decision,oh, do I hang out with friends
or do I go study?
Well, you know what you got todo.
So you start to study and onceyou make start making the

(11:34):
decisions of a person whobelieves in themselves, you
start to get the result of aperson who believes in
themselves.
And then, funny thing happensOnce you start believing, once
you start seeing the results,everyone else starts believing
in you and you don't need tolean on yourself so much.
That's one of this equation Oneplus two equals three.
Okay, in this equation three,the last thing is the outcome,
the goal, the objective.

(11:54):
Yeah, what do you want?
Two is appropriately namednumber two because the crappy
part of the job, it's the hardwork, it's the things that
people want to do, it's thewaking up early in the morning,
it's the going role playingwhile you're sore, it's the
doing it when you still don'tfeel like doing it.
And what I love about thisequation is there's no room for
your emotions.
When I say, if you can failwithout being discouraged,

(12:15):
success becomes inevitable.
Being discouraged is a feeling,because we don't quit when we
fail.
We quit when we get discouraged, and a lot of us get
discouraged before we even start, so we don't.
So, with this concept ofremoving your feelings from this
, look at the equation as it is.
Me plus burning more caloriesthan I consume equals losing
weight, and it worked.
Now, the reason why I wasrole-blading so intensely is I

(12:37):
was going to go to the boxinggym, but I wanted to lose weight
Before I went to the boxing gymbecause I was intimidated.
It was like brushing your teethreally well before you go to
the dentist, or cleaning yourhouse before you.
Your house cleaner comes overand never had a house cleaner,
but I heard people talk about itand I feel good.
And so I got to the boxing gymand I was like, okay, I'm not, I
don't want to, I'm not, I'm notaggressive.

(12:58):
And I was getting bullied inschool Like I didn't want to
fight, I didn't want to spar, Ijust want to do the workout, I
want to look like a boxer.
So I just did a boxer's workoutbut they didn't coach me
Because I wasn't interested.
They're like I do whatever youwant.
So I would just watch what otherpeople did and I put logic to
it and I realized quickly thatmost things people do didn't
make sense.
They would hit the heavy bagand like, if you're hitting the

(13:23):
heavy bag, a lot of people punchlike in the middle of the heavy
bag, like where someone's bodywould be, because they're lazy,
they're developing bad habits,like no one's face is down there
.
Why are you punching down there?
Well, because it's easier to do.
So I told myself okay, if Iever hit the bag when I'm
sweating, I'm going to hit thebag when I'm sweating, I touch
my face on the bag and that'sthe line where I hit.
If I'm too tired to hit there,I just don't know, I just stop.

(13:44):
Uh, then one day after likelosing, I was.
I was there.
The gym was open for hours aday.
I was there as soon as itopened and I was the last person
there every day.
And sometimes I want to closeopen because it was just me and
the coach.
And he's like, all right, I'mgoing to go home.
Uh, and after about six, sevenmonths of that, my coach was
like you're in better shape thananyone else in the gym, do you
want to spar?
I was like, oh, my parentswon't let me.
And then everyone laughed.

(14:06):
I was like joking, I'm joking,I'll get my mouthpiece.
And I was so nervous.
It was the.
I never made a team before, sothis is like my first
competition.
It wasn't.
It was like work out in the gym.
But it's a huge moment.
I I thought about this all day.
I was like thinking school,like okay, I'm sparring tonight,
like and I get there, and I wasso nervous and I turned out
turned out that the guy I wassparring had just recently lost

(14:26):
a fight to a guy with one arm.

Speaker 1 (14:29):
Uh, so either like he's humbled or he's mad, or
where's he at, oh no he sucks.

Speaker 2 (14:34):
Oh, okay, and it wasn't one arm, it was like the
dude had a nub and they put aglove on his nub and he lost the
fight.
To that dude, okay.
And I was like, okay, he's notthat good.
And my goal was just not to gethit.
And I did so much moving that Iwas like, oh, I burned so much
calories in those three rounds.
I was like I burned morecalories.
I felt like in those threerounds and I did my whole
workout.
This is all I want to do.
And I was so worried about notgetting hit.

(14:54):
I was just, I was really goodin defense and then I became.
I never had a community.
This is the first time I founda place where I I felt like I
belong, because everyone else inthe gym was like, oh, there's a
.
Because I was big, I was heavy,so I was perfect to spar.
I wasn't strong enough to hurtanyone, so I was the perfect
sparring partner and I justsparred everyone until I
developed this concept of seeingpunches coming before they came
and no one could hit me in thegym.

(15:16):
And immediately I was like, oh,let's go back to the equation
One plus two equals three.
Me plus not getting hit equalswinning.
If I win all the time, I canjust be the best in the country.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
Cause you said you're not the most aggressive person
in the ring.
You told me that earlier.
So that's kind of what that wasmore of a defensive position in
your boxing.
Yeah, yeah, okay.

Speaker 2 (15:38):
All right, and I would.
And so I said I was like, okay,I'm having my first boxing
match and I started to fight.
I didn't tell anyone for myfirst four fights because I was
afraid to tell someone thatsomeone like as passive as me
was like a boxer.
Yeah and uh, and I would.
I, I could have.
I was at 200 pounds and I couldhave either fought super heavy
weight anything above 200 poundsor fought a more appropriate

(16:00):
weight class, a little lower.
But I realized that men are somacho that they they're so macho
that they they don't use theirbrains and they're all muscle.
I'm like, oh, you have all thismuscle.
Muscle requires oxygen.
You're going to get tired inthe first round if I move around
enough.
So I was like, okay, myfighting strategy is I run from
you until you're tired and thenI start to punch you, not till

(16:22):
you're hurt, but till you can nolonger defend yourself and the
ref will stop it.
Hmm, uh, so it was that equationone plus two equals three and
um, my parents moved my senioryear in high school and I had to
walk to the gym six miles everyday and I didn't have this back
when MP3 players came out foriPod and I didn't have batteries
.
So for three hours a day, I'dwalk to the gym five days a week

(16:43):
and I would just make upstories in my head.
Uh, I didn't think anything ofit, but if I'm going to be the
author of a story, I'm going tobe the protagonist.
So I was like I was kickingbutt in all these stories.
I was winning all my fights, Ihad all the money.
None of this was true, but youknow, I just had something to
think about.
But I realized I was givingmyself affirmations and I would
pat myself on the back for threehours and then work out and

(17:03):
doing that for an entire year.
I gained this confidence that Inever had.
Uh, almost it was disillusioned, because immediately I thought
I was like well, I'm going to bethe best boxer in the country
Great.
A year before I'd never playeda sport.
But in the years, like, oh, I'mgoing to be the best.
And it was obnoxious to somepeople and I qualified for the
2008 Olympic trials.
I lost, but I was in the sportfor two years.

(17:24):
It's pretty good accomplishment.
Turn around, I won nationals in2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012.
I won the United States Olympictrials.
I am on top of the world Likecocky, doesn't even describe me,
and I understood that certainpeople didn't like me and I
basked in it.
I wore, I fought, in pink, in apink skirt, because sure, I
look like a, I look soft, butyou can't beat me, so it doesn't

(17:45):
matter, you actually wore apink skirt in the ring.
Yep, wow Fought in pink skirt,cause what are you going to do
about it?
Are you going to lose to a dudein a pink skirt?
Yeah, and I was.
I would.
I would, admittedly I wasobnoxious.
And then I left the country tofight in Azerbaijan.
I've been there three times,still can't spell without spell
check.
And I forgot to tell the drugtest testing agency I was
leaving the country and theyshowed up to my home here in

(18:07):
Kansas City to give me a randomdrug test and I wasn't there,
Even though I tested negative inAzerbaijan, to even fight in
the tournament that same week,to show there's nothing in my
system.
But they still suspended me fora year and kicked me off the
Olympic team and I went fromthis like cocky, arrogant person
to like the shell of a personthe same unconvenant person I
used to be and I was depressed,I was heartbroken.

(18:32):
I was so embarrassed Cause likeKansas City is not a big city,
so like I was getting a lot oflove, the Kansas City star was
amazing to me.
I was like in the newspaperconstantly and and on TV and
around here and people would seeme and one more like hey,
you're, you're the boxer dude,right?
I'm like, yeah, like you, readyfor the Olympics.
I'm like, yeah, but then I gotsuspended and I didn't post
about it because I was soembarrassed.
And what year was this?
2012.
Okay, and I would.

(18:54):
I started to avoid peoplebecause I was afraid to tell the
story and if you read the ESPNheadlines, it says I failed to
meet drug test requirements,Right?

Speaker 1 (19:03):
Yeah, that paints a picture, it does.

Speaker 2 (19:06):
But if you read the article, I got the minimum
sentence because they didn'tsuspect anything.
But no one cares about that.
Yeah, and maybe I was over.
I was internalizing it.
So I stopped leaving my houseand started drinking.
I got up to 277 pounds thebiggest I'd ever been and I was
like, okay, I don't have adegree, I don't have any
certifications, I don't have anyskills, I'm broke.
I need.
Well, I have to go back toboxing.

(19:26):
I have nothing else.
So I started doing personaltraining and all that and I lost
a bet and had to be vegan for28 days.
And I didn't understand thetime that the bet, the diet,
entails sobriety.
Okay, so this is the first timeduring my suspension I had to
be vegan, I had to be sober.
Wow.
And on the other hand my word,I lost a bet.

(19:47):
So I said I do the 28 days andI stopped drinking and just
going through withdrawal and andI just being aware of how much
you hate yourself and I was like, okay, I so real quick question
.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
But can I pause your room?
Yeah, because you know you'resaying in the one plus two
equals three.
There's no room for emotion,right.
So that's if you want to besuccessful.
Clearly there's some emotion inyour story right now.
That's why I am just curious,because there's people probably
going well, I'm emotional person.
Yeah, I deal with likedisappointment, discouragement,
that's maybe made them give upor want to give up.

(20:23):
So what would you say to peopleabout that?
When the emotions do creep inin a negative way, how have you
dealt with them?
How has that pushed you maybeto even be better?

Speaker 2 (20:32):
I'll tell you exactly .
Okay, all right, 2012.
I was when I decided I wasgoing to get back into boxing
because you know, I know theequation and but I'd work out
for two or three days and kindof fall off and then I realized
I haven't worked out four days.
I'm mad at myself again and Iwas beating myself one up one
day and I realized there's adifference between me and 2012

(20:53):
and me walking to the gym inhigh school.
One of us liked me and Irealized I was humbled by life
and I believe words are powerfuland that's why I asked you
who's your middle daughter?

Speaker 1 (21:08):
Yeah, uh, elsie is my middle daughter.

Speaker 2 (21:12):
Now, how old is she?
Uh, nine, nine.
So if you, you look at Elsieand you're like, you know in
your heart, your soul, anythingshe wants to be in life she can
be if she puts time and shebelieves in herself.
You know that in your soul.
What would it look like if sheknew it?
And I started to think aboutthat and I decided to look up
the definition of humble.
So if you could look up thedefinition of humble, let's do

(21:35):
it.

Speaker 1 (21:36):
And while you're looking up, I'll look at it.

Speaker 2 (21:37):
Yeah, yeah, I keep looking up at it and I realized
what the definition of humblewas, and a light bulb went off
in my head.
So I want you to read me thefirst definition, okay, and
think about your daughter inmind.

Speaker 1 (21:48):
Okay, here's one little slow.
So, go to the phone here.

Speaker 2 (21:54):
This, this completely changed definition.

Speaker 1 (21:57):
Speaking of laziness?
Okay.

Speaker 2 (22:00):
Efficiency, yeah, okay, okay, go ahead All right,
so you got the definition uphere.

Speaker 1 (22:05):
Having or showing a modest or low estimate of one's
own importance.

Speaker 2 (22:09):
Okay, Now with with with Elsie in mind, would you
wish that definition on yourdaughter?
No, Maybe that's a fluke.
Read me the second definition.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
Okay, of low social, administrative or political rank
.
What about that one?

Speaker 2 (22:21):
Nah, is there a third one that makes sense?
No, okay.
Now the reason why and this iswhat the realization I had in
2012, the change in my life,yeah, the reason why humility
and humiliate sound like thesame word is because they are so
Latin, root word of lowly.
So when you think about asituation, let's say, you're
killing in the speaking world,right, you're booking all these

(22:42):
key notes and everything, andthen you run to me and I'm not
doing too well, what are youdoing that moment?

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Encourage you.

Speaker 2 (22:47):
Well, a lot of times we humble ourselves down to that
person.
You don't want to be bragg, youdon't be braggadocious, Right?
So what we do is we lowerourselves down to that person.
But I believe if we continue tolower ourselves to the lowest
common denominator in the room,we're doomed to be a depressed
society.
The idea of lowly.
If you tell your daughter to behumble, if you constantly beat
into her the socialization ofbeing humble, then how is she

(23:09):
going to excel being small?
Because being lowly, you can'ttell her to shoot for the stars
while still holding on to theground.
And I had that realization andI realized, oh, I need to
believe in me, Like I need to.
First of all, I need to love me.
And when I say being humble,when I say I'm, no, I'm, and I
throw away the concept of beinghumble, I am not humble.

(23:30):
I went out and I legallychanged my last name to awesome
because I I realized how hurtfulbeing humble was to me.
I was humbled by life.
That's not a positive thing,Cause people will agree yeah,
you were humbled by life, but welook at being humble and
humility as a positive virtue.
So when I asked this questionoutside of course, the religious
context cause.
I want to respect everyone'sreligious beliefs, but who does

(23:51):
being humble serve?

Speaker 1 (23:56):
I guess with that and , by the way, I'm absorbing a
lot of this, I don't know if Icompletely agree- so I'm kind of
I don't want anyone to agreewith me, I just want to
challenge the way we think.
A lot of questions, but I'mjust going to go with the
narrative.
The question you're askingright now is who does being
humble serve?
Well, I feel like in my faith,I'm called to be humble, so I
feel like it would serve my God,it would serve me and it would

(24:17):
serve others.

Speaker 2 (24:18):
And in the working context and in like speaking or
performing.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
Yes, I guess.
I guess to me humility is moreof a maybe starts inward right
Of of don't think of yourselfmore highly than you ought to.
Why?
That says it in the Bible.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
Okay, Outside of religious beliefs.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
Let's just do away with faith.
Okay, then, what was the?
What was it like?
Why, why, why would I do it?
Or who told me to?
Or would you?

Speaker 2 (24:49):
Well, I'm seeing who does.
Who's being humble serve inthis, and even like in for your
career is like okay, be humble.
You're getting like as a boxer.
Do you think I can walk intothe ring humble?

Speaker 1 (25:03):
My gut tells me yes, I think you could.

Speaker 2 (25:07):
There's so many boxers and this is why why I
know I can't because there's somany boxers who are amazing in
the gym and they're beating upworld champions and sparring,
but when the lights turn on,they don't think they deserve to
be there and they never performto their ability.
They're humbled by the bigstage.

Speaker 1 (25:26):
I guess what I would look at is confidence with
humility, those two workingtogether or what would make it
and I've never been in the ring,but I in the ring of life,
right, like, like competition.
I mean I would say that I thinkyou can.
You can be humble and have aconfidence that you know you.
You, you were serving yourpeople.

(25:46):
Now you're not there to serveyour opponent Maybe Not the
sandwiches.
You know, you know because Imean, if you're serving your
opponent, if we're called tolove all people, the fighting is
not real.
This isn't your real enemy inthe ring Right.
This is your, your brother,that ultimately you love and you
want to serve, and yourhumility could potentially serve
him by saying wow, even thoughCam is as awesome as he is and

(26:08):
he can dodge my punches and hecan hit hard, deep down, he
loves me, he wants the best forme.
So you know so so are we really?
I mean, are we all meant to beheavyweight champs and to always
win?
Or is maybe winning sometimeslook like losing, or losing look
like winning.

Speaker 2 (26:26):
I don't.
We don't even need to definewhat winning is, but it's the
way we carry ourselves, is whatI'm, what I'm trying to get to
when it's time to set goals.
A lot of us set goals that wethink we can achieve, but you're
so much.
I believe, just like we said,there's greater things out there
.
I believe there's so muchgreater that you're capable of
that you're not allowingyourself to get to because
you're being humble.
And a lot of people say well,being humble doesn't mean

(26:46):
thinking less about yourself.
It means thinking aboutyourself less.

Speaker 1 (26:52):
I'm here to tell you.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
That's not true, ain't nobody going to think
about you more than you thinkabout yourself.
So when you do think aboutyourself, what are you thinking
about yourself?
How kind are you to yourself?
It's just you in there, rightyeah, are you a great teammate
to yourself?
Let's say you live in fourthfloor of an apartment.
You carry your groceries allthe way upstairs, you put them

(27:13):
on the counter and then yourealize you forgot your phone in
the car.
What do you say?
Oh Devin, sometimes we'reforgetful.
Buddy, let's go get that phone.
That's not the way a lot of usreact.
Oh stupid idiot, why do youneed?

Speaker 1 (27:25):
a phone.
Yeah, it's like beatingyourself up like that.

Speaker 2 (27:29):
You're making yourself smaller.

Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah, I agree with that.
We should love ourselves Like I.
Wouldn't like, if you forgotyour phone, I wouldn't talk to
you the way that I and Aileytalked to I, wouldn't be like
you're an idiot.
Why would you forget that,which I might say my own head to
myself?
So it's like why aren't I asnice to me as I'm as nice to you
?
I definitely agree with that.
Self love, self love.

Speaker 2 (27:46):
I changed my last name to awesome and the whole
idea of like I'm up here and Isee someone down here.
I'm not coming down to you,buddy, sorry, I'm gonna pull you
up to where I am.
No, I don't think anyone'sbetter than me, Cause a lot of
people say I don't think I'mbetter than anyone else.
I'm humble, I'm like sure, butyou also think there are people
who are above you.
Well, yeah, I don't thinkanyone's above me and I don't

(28:09):
think anyone's below me.

Speaker 1 (28:10):
I like that.
I like that.
I had a coach tell me that onetime that we do tend to look at
people are they're moresuccessful or I'm better than
them.
But if we can see everyone, Idon't even play a film.
Now, the part that I'm gettinghung up on what you're talking
about, and maybe I'm paying toomuch attention to it, is that I
don't feel like humility,whatever the definition might be
is what's holding me back.

(28:31):
Yeah, so I guess my owndefinition of humility would be
like being willing to makemyself less to bring others up,
which I know is exactly theopposite of what you're saying.
But like, if we talk about, say, Christ, for he humbled himself
to death, even death on a cross, right, I mean he gave up his
life, and so if we're willing tosacrifice life, why aren't I
willing to sacrifice anythingelse?

(28:53):
I mean, life's the mostprecious thing that you could
give up.
So if we walk into a room andI'm like a successful keynote
speaker and you're not, I don'tthink me going.
Now if I were to say, okay,tell you what, I'll start making
less money, booking less gigs,then I am coming down to that
level.
But if I talk to you more of anurturing, caring, gentle way, a
palatable way that you canaccept hey, I am booking this,

(29:13):
but hey, man, you can get thereand you can bring them up to
that level in a humble, kind,gentle way is what I mean.

Speaker 2 (29:20):
Oh okay.

Speaker 1 (29:21):
So I don't know if that makes sense or not to you,
but what do you think aboutimposter syndrome?
I think it's real.
I think a lot.
I think more people have itthan they admit.
That's just because throughdeep conversations I figure out
it's almost like everyone has it.
It feels like it's some leveleveryone does.
I don't know if that's true ornot, so don't trust that

(29:44):
statistic, but maybe you don't.
But I think that it's somethingthat we just see ourselves as
worthless, you know.
So it's a perception.

Speaker 2 (29:56):
Yeah, and it's definitely a perception and it's
the way we see ourselves.
It's the you're afraid to askfor a raise because you don't
think you deserve it.
You don't think you're worth it, but you see somebody else who
is what makes that person anybetter than you?
Yeah, and that's when I hadthat realization of okay, I got
this far.
Now it's 2012,.
I'm beating myself up.

(30:17):
I changed my last name toawesome as a reminder that I am
worthy, that I'm great enough,and me being me, refusing to be
humble doesn't I'm not saying beobnoxious because I'm just
lifting other people up.
I'm not, but I'm not beatingmyself up.
I'm gonna be my biggest fan.
So I changed my last name toawesome.
I changed the way I wasthinking.
I no longer beat myself up.

(30:38):
I started to give myself grace.
I started to be my biggest fan,my biggest supporter, my big I
cheer myself on.
I returned to boxing.
I won nationals every singleyear until 2016, where I won the
2016 Olympic trials.
And then I lost ininternational competition in the
finals on a split decision anddidn't get to go to Rio.
And when I lost that fight, Iwas in Argentina in my hotel

(31:02):
room and it was July 4th and Iwas like, okay, I put all my
eggs in the boxing basket.
I didn't make it.
I could go where I was in 2012mentally, because I had a choice
to make that day.
And I got back to my hotel room, I made a tweet it's still out
there and I said lost my fight.
Today, my Olympic run is overTime to reinvent myself Three

(31:26):
times.
Because it was the thirdOlympic trials I was a part of.
See what's next for me.
It may not be boxing.
I knew immediately what I wantedto do and because, a year
before I had met you at an openmic, you told me about the
National Speakers Association in2015.
I went to their annualconference a week after I lost
in the Olympics and peoplethought I was crazy.
I was already moving on and Iwas like, oh, if I were to go

(31:49):
back home and just like sit andwallow, oh, I'd hate myself, I'd
cry, I'd do all that.
I'm like, no, let's speak it up, let's keep it moving, cause if
I could do the Olympics, Icould do speaking.
So, all right, what's thatequation?
Look like One plus two equalsthree.
I gotta change the equation.
The equation will always change.
You will always be number one.
The goal will change.
Number two will change and Isaid, okay, my goal is I want to

(32:10):
be a successful speaker.
What does that mean?
Okay, first I have to learnabout speaking.
I have to learn about thebusiness.
I have to become a greatspeaker.
And the approach I took withboxing is I'm not very athletic.
I get that.
If you watch my fights it's alittle.
I was called awkward.
I was an awkward fighter, so Iwas like okay, I'm not gonna
beat you with athleticism, so Ican't let you outwork me.

(32:32):
So we were the same weightclass, same age and everything,
and you had a hundred fights andI had three fights.
Who do you think would win?

Speaker 1 (32:42):
Me yeah, that's fun to say yeah, so only in these
made up scenarios can I beat youup.

Speaker 2 (32:51):
I'm sure you can magic me up, man.
Oh yeah, probably.
So I took that approach.
So in boxing because I wasn'tathletic I said, okay, I'm just
gonna get a hundred fights,because the average boxer has
like 30 to 40 fights Like once Ihave a hundred fights.
I'm the most experienced guy inthe room and I retired as the
most decorated boxer in UShistory because I just fought
all the time.

(33:11):
I don't say I'm the greatestwinning percentage in history.
I've just won more boxingmatches than anyone else because
I allowed myself to be in thatsituation, I gave myself room to
fail and after you gain allthat experience, I think I
believe experience isintelligence right Cause if we

(33:33):
both have a task to do and youspend two years thinking about
how you're gonna do it and thenI fail for two years, when we
start year number three, I'mgonna be so much further than
you.

Speaker 1 (33:43):
Now, you're better than me.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
Yeah, to make sure you can.

Speaker 1 (33:49):
Find a way to make the winner again.

Speaker 2 (33:54):
So that kind of philosophy in my state kind of
changed and I realized a lot ofpeople who suffer with imposter
syndrome.
They don't believe they belongto be there.
They don't believe they belongto be there.
Belong to be there, they'resupposed to be there, yeah, they
don't believe they belong to bethere.
I do words.

(34:14):
It's like an.

Speaker 1 (34:14):
S, that's like a.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
I will say I know it comes off very obnoxious to
people the idea that I dismisshumility and I'm okay with that.

Speaker 1 (34:25):
Could that be the name of your book Dismiss
Humility?

Speaker 2 (34:27):
I was, so my Ted talk that I'm gonna do this.
Humility is overrated, reallyyeah.
All right, because I thinkpeople lean so much on humility
as a way to keep themselvessmall, because you won't wish
those definitions on yourdaughter.
So what we do is we come withour own definition of humility
to make us feel better and whenyou actually look at the word
and the Latin word and where itderived from and the meaning of

(34:49):
it, it's not a positive virtue,but it's a virtue that is of our
nation.

Speaker 1 (34:54):
I'm going yes, like I agree.

Speaker 2 (34:56):
I don't want you to agree.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
And I'm more like just it's funny, because on the
last podcast, which it was withan IT professional and he was
talking about other cultures andother cultures would go huh.

Speaker 2 (35:05):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
And it just means I hear what you're saying, I'm not
necessarily agreeing, so anyway.

Speaker 2 (35:10):
I don't want to think I understand.
This is such a sensitivesubject to a lot of people's
core beliefs.
I'm about to cry.
If you cry, cry Cause it's likethrowing that for me, I'm very
emotional.

Speaker 1 (35:20):
We just start crying and throwing up and talking and
people are like, uh, unsubscribe, no, no, it's good, and I also,
admittedly, take a long time toabsorb a new idea.
So like for me to sit here andlike process.
All of this right now abouthumility is like well, but I'll
probably listen to this laterand be like gain some more
clarity on what I think.
But, but I appreciate a freshperspective and a peek into your

(35:42):
mind, because it's very well.
We've been very successful inyour life in so many avenues,
and so it's just good to hearlike what's, what's going on up
there, man, and so this isreally good man, I'm
appreciating this.

Speaker 2 (35:53):
Thank you, I'm sure in that and I often get like I
am, what's the word Delusional?
I get delusional and it used tobother me because I Jenny and
believe it.
You think I'm delusional, soyou don't think I'm gonna do it.
Yeah, and I would see it aslike a slight, but now I see it

(36:14):
as a positive.

Speaker 1 (36:15):
Delusional about what ?
About what you can achieve.
What I can achieve, yeah, nice.

Speaker 2 (36:19):
And I think that I don't have imposter syndrome.
I think I deserve to beeverywhere I am.

Speaker 1 (36:24):
Well, it sounds like to me.
Like you, a lot of adults justlose sight of dreams as a kid.
Like as a kid we're, like wecan do whatever we want to.
Yeah, you know, I mean, if theright people believe in us and
who's the right person.

Speaker 2 (36:34):
Who's the right person?
Okay, all right, you are.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
Right.
Do you think it matters, though?
I mean, can people have aninfluence on our life and help
us believe in ourself more?

Speaker 2 (36:43):
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, so okay, cool, oh yeah, I'm
very big on that.
But the thing is, if you don'tfirst believe in yourself,
everyone else can believe in youas much as you want, and it's
not gonna really help.

Speaker 1 (36:55):
I don't know.
I think people can help youfind that belief in yourself.

Speaker 2 (36:58):
I agree with that.

Speaker 1 (36:59):
You know, so yeah, so anyway, we only get stuck on
the only thing.

Speaker 2 (37:04):
That's the small part of my life but that allowed me
to have the confidence to get onstage.
Now, the whole idea of that islike when I got into speaking, I
understood just like comedy.
I was like, okay, I'm gonnasuck in the beginning, I'm going
to suck in the beginning.

Speaker 1 (37:18):
I love that idea.
I'm like my listeners know I'mabout start ugly.
You know it doesn't.
It doesn't even mean likeyou're out there to like be
sloppy or careless, you knowit's just about let's just get
out there and it's going to besloppy and careless.
That's not the goal, but that'sdefinitely going to happen.
But then, like that's, you growfrom there.
Yeah, so I love that man.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
Yeah, and I realized I took the same approach in
speaking as I did with boxing,where I was like okay, I don't
have the natural ability, so I'mjust going to work everyone, so
I'm going to get more fights.
So I decided how can I speakmore than anyone?
Yeah, so I bought a van and Ilived in my van for three years.
I spoke at high schools, middleschools, I MCed Gallas, I did

(37:58):
vegan festivals, I did stand-upcomedy and I lived in a van for
three years because you wereliterally Matt Foley For real
Right Do you know how I foundout?
Someone said because I totaledmy Prius and I was getting my
insurance money.
My friend was like oh, youshould buy a van and live down
by the river.
And I was like I don't, I don'tget it.
And then I Googled it.

Speaker 1 (38:17):
She sent me the link and you're like I'm living this
life, People can live in vans.

Speaker 2 (38:20):
I never knew and it never occurred to me.
And one of the cool thingsabout being living in so many
different, traveling to so manydifferent countries, is I got to
see how, how many differentways there are to live.
Of course we live the way, alot of times we live the way our
parents or our family live, butthere's so many different ways
to live and I embraced this vanlifestyle and it allowed me to

(38:41):
lower my expenses.
I'd know I didn't have to payfor flights, hotels or car
rentals and it allowed me tospeak for a lower fee, which
made me more desirable to moreschool, more schools, and I
spoke at 200 schools a year forthe first three years in that
van.
It's a lot.
I I wanted to be undeniably goodwhen I told you my fee.

(39:02):
I wanted to get so good thatwhen I told you my fee, you say
you should probably charge moreand then I will, and.
But I could only get thereunless I put in that work.
So I looked at that three yearsin the van as my college,
because I never went to collegeand was like okay, you got to
eat ramen noodles, you got togrind.
Life goes suck for a little bit, get over it.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
What was the hardest thing about living in a van for
three years?
If you were to say one thing,that would have made it easier.

Speaker 2 (39:26):
Can I get two things?

Speaker 1 (39:27):
Yeah, you get two things Two things.

Speaker 2 (39:29):
First thing I realized when I packed the van I
packed too many things and Ididn't pack anything.
99% of the things you own youdo not need.

Speaker 1 (39:37):
Wow, hear that, lynn.
Now I'm not preaching to mywife.
We agree, we're trying to livethe more minimalistic lifestyle.
It's just hard to do Like wealways like what do we throw
away?
You know, and so she alreadyknows this.
But it's like how do you?
How'd you do it?
I mean, did you achieve it?
Did you finally start throwingout the right things?

Speaker 2 (39:58):
I well, july.
So it was a year later.
I was on, I woke up in bed.
It was July 4th.
It was a July 4th 2017.
It was a year from when I madethat tweet.
I'm going to reinvent myselfand I owned the van but I didn't
have any money to to to fix itup, to make it nice, to put air
conditioning in it.
And it was July 4th and I wokeup and I saw, like your memory
tweet or whatever it was like,you posted this a year ago.

(40:19):
Oh yeah, and I I felt disgustedin myself for the first time in
a long time, highly as I thinkof myself.
I said, well, I said I wasgoing to do all these changes
and you know, I didn't really doanything last night.
I'm not really doing anythingin my life.
I'm going to leave now.
I was like I'm going to pack upthis van.
I don't know where I'm going,and I started packing things in
the van.
I was like, okay, too manythings.

Speaker 1 (40:39):
You were like four scum with a van.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
Basically.
Yes, yes, I was like time to goand I packed everything up and
I was like I'm going to justbecause it's it's hot, it's July
and Kansas.
I'm like you know what?
I'm just going to drive north.
That was my logic.
Wow, don't know, I'm going, I'mgoing to make it to.
How'd you pick north?
It's colder, higher.
Okay, that was my logic.
All right, yeah, and I said Iwould get to Des Moines, iowa.
Okay, I would go to Chipotleand I'll sit down and I'll map

(41:02):
up where I'm going next, but Icannot go.

Speaker 1 (41:03):
That's a great plan.
By the way, chipotle I meangood things happen in your head
when you're good things.

Speaker 2 (41:08):
Chipotle, yes, yes.
Problem was, uh, packed up thevan.
I brought 12 shirts, uh like,limited my stuff because I
needed space in the van.
Got to Des Moines Chipotle'sclothes on 4th of July oh yeah,
I didn't take that out.
Oh man, that's how quickly.
Because I was like I need toget this done.
Yeah, and uh, I ended up inCanada, actually like I ended up

(41:28):
doing like a festival in Canadaand Way over achiever I brought
my passport.
Yeah, I brought my passport.
And uh, and throughout that Istarted booking gigs while I was
on the road and by that timethe school year had started.
Back up, I drove down toArizona uh, because their school
year starts in July.
So I drove down there to end ofJuly and I started speaking at
schools for anything.
And one school was like weloved you.

(41:50):
I'm like hey.
They're like oh, you're leavingtown.
I was like, well, I could, I'min a van, I could stay a little
bit longer.
So like, oh, if you can stayaround until next week, we got
two more schools for you tospeak in.
Oh, wow, and that's what I was.
But it was great.
Man, it's a hundred degrees atnight, bro, that's a metal box
with no air conditioning.
It was wrong.

Speaker 1 (42:06):
Did you have a way to sleep outside, like on top of
the van or beside the van, or isthat just too too many
rattlesnakes in Arizona?
No, it was.
It was, I wouldn't sleep like I.

Speaker 2 (42:14):
I never thought about considering sleeping on top of
them, but I have the AC Well,and I didn't have the AC unit up
there that I could have slepton top of it.
I never considered that Uh, butI would sleep in Walmart
parking lots with my back doorsopen.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
I was going to say really, yeah, wow, and sketchy
doors open.
That's scary man.

Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and .
But the thing is like I, I, Irealized like one plus two
equals three, me become becomingtwo.
Number two is becoming a dopespeaker.
Undeniably good.
Three equals the life I want.
Yeah, the freedom, because Inever grew up with financial
freedom and I said, okay, thisis the way I'm going to achieve
it.

(42:51):
And I can achieve it while whilespeaking at schools and
changing lives.
Bro, the amount of selfies andhigh fives I get to do sometimes
.
I can't sleep at night, Just soit's like you feel like a rock
star for a day.
Yeah, First of all, these kidsare just happy they're out of
class.
But then you give them a messagethat they want to hear and you
connect with them.
And the thing with with middleschoolers uh, I like to think
that they're the worst people onthe planet, because they know

(43:12):
what feelings are enough to hurtthem, but they haven't
developed the empathy to care.
So if they don't like you, theywill tell you, and I got to
learn real quick what was goodand what wasn't, and it was.
I'm so grateful for signing inmy speech.

Speaker 1 (43:27):
They will tell you Okay, and it helped me become
who I am.

Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yeah, another thing that helped me become, become
who I am, is you.
I invited you to my first uhtalk.
Yes, one of my first talks islike in front of an adult
audience.
Yep, and, from being honest, Ijust wanted to show off that I
was in front of an adult.
I'm not, I'm not talking tokids anymore and I was like, hey
, you want to come out?
And you're like, yeah, and yougive me feedback.

(43:51):
And you showed up with a penand a pad and you, you sat in
the corner and you took notesand I was bro.
I was so glad that you werethere because you got to see me
kill it, cause I was like, yeah,I'm killing it Right.
And I got off and like shakingeveryone's hand and good, and
you're like, hey, do you want tobe for coffee?
And like, time for you to tellme how great I was.
That was.
It was time for you to tell mehow great I was, what year was

(44:16):
that 2016.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Wow, wow, cause you had come to your first NSF Cause
you had come to your first NSAconference right around then,
right after that in Phoenix.
Yeah, it all goes back toArizona.
Yeah, man, um, yeah, no, Iremember that.
I remember sitting down.
I'm trying to remember now ifyou asked for feedback or if I
volunteered.

Speaker 2 (44:33):
You said are you looking at?
You said are you looking forfeedback?

Speaker 1 (44:35):
or an audience Before I came.
Okay.

Speaker 2 (44:37):
And I said feedback because I never thought, but I
was like I don't want, I'll justsay feedback, sure Cause, of
course it's going to be positive.
And then we sat for coffee.
Yeah, and it was one of the.

Speaker 1 (44:45):
The greatest lesson of my speaking career was when
you sat me down and I waswaiting just to be padded on the
back when I was just like Iknow that people say like I've
heard it said like when you askfor feedback, you're really
seeking out a compliment and Iget that yeah.

Speaker 2 (45:01):
We sat down and you said the first thing you said is
your introduction.
And I was like, oh no, I waslike this is not going where I
thought I was going to go andwith the introduction that you
give or that they give for youbefore you come up.
That they gave for me before Icame up.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Oh, and they didn't have one.
You didn't have one.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
You didn't want.
You said it wasn't.
It wasn't uh, because I letthem just choose whatever.
They said, oh gotcha, and itwasn't relevant to what I was
speaking or anything like that.
And you pointed that out.
And then you said my ownintroduction and then you broke
down kindly, by the way, kind,very kindly Inch humility, you.
You were, yeah, bro, when Itell you, I got back to my car

(45:38):
after we left Starbucks and Iwent from this high of like I
got my first corporate gig torealization and I sat with it
and it was a discomfort, Uh, andI was like, and even though I
was like, I was so grateful forit Because I was like okay, I
got so much stuff to work on.
Yeah, and if I, if you didn'ttell me that, I would still.

(46:01):
Now I have my introduction thatI give school.
I have a, a printed outintroduction I bring to schools.
I email it beforehand becauseof you.
There's so many things that Ido in my speech now because of
you.
Even you said closing out,because I just kind of ended it
and you're like well, you saidsum up what I spoke about, and I
never even considered doingthat.
I thought they just heard mefor the last hour.

(46:21):
Why do I need to sum up what Isaid?
And I'm so grateful that yougave me that feedback and I
realized that's what we need.
We need to gym, Of course, weneed to believe in ourselves and
we need to be delusional.

Speaker 1 (46:36):
I love your believing yourself.
Be delusional, don't be humble.

Speaker 2 (46:41):
But every so often you need to get back to reality.
And you snap me back intoreality and I was like, okay,
and then I got to discuss,started I changed up the way I
was doing everything since thatmeeting and still I'm.
I can't wait for you to see mespeak again.
Oh yeah, because I wantfeedback.

Speaker 1 (46:56):
I can't because I watched you, maybe a year after
that, speak at a school to youth.
Do you remember that?
And that was that was I hadseen improvement, you know, and
and I think that's before youhit the van and hit the road.

Speaker 2 (47:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Yeah Well, and what's great about you is that you
know there's a lot of timeswhere I sit down to coffee and
people want feedback.
You truly absorb the feedbackand you take notes and anytime.
I remember we met for coffee atBlack Dog a year or two ago and
I was telling you like whoprints my business card?
And you're writing these thingsdown and you say I feel like if

(47:27):
someone gives me advice and Idon't at least go pursue it and
seek it out and give it someattention, then I've kind of
wasted this person's time and Ihaven't really validated them
meeting with me.
And I think that's just reallycool that it doesn't just bounce
off.
You you absorb and then youprocess and you either accept it
or you reject it.
But the fact that you take itin and actually make changes
based on the feedback you know Imean that that makes someone

(47:49):
like you know, someone whoyou're pouring into you feel so
much like okay, this is, I wantto pour more in because it's
it's been received well, and youjust want to keep, keep giving.
So kudos to you, man, for justlike taking and that's a hard
hit man to to go from that I'mawesome, I'm thinking to oh
really.

Speaker 2 (48:06):
I know that Best thing ever.
And the thing is because I I'veseen you speak, I've seen your
show also side, but when I firstseen you do, I don't like to
even call it magic.

Speaker 1 (48:14):
Oh, mentalism, yeah the blind show.

Speaker 2 (48:16):
Yeah, I was like I wonder how this guy's doing it,
because how are you pulling aprofit?

Speaker 1 (48:21):
Because I was sure I went with Shannon Pulling a
profit, I went with Shannon.

Speaker 2 (48:23):
I was convinced it's like a hundred people in the
room.
I was convinced 98 of them werepaid off actors.

Speaker 1 (48:28):
It was like it was the only way.

Speaker 2 (48:30):
I was like this whole show just for me and Shannon.
It was like the things you weredoing were so mind blowing your
stage presence, everything.
And I value you so much as aperson and your knowledge that
if you give me advice and Iwaste your time, like when you
gave me that advice, I activelyavoided you Because I don't want
you.
If I said, hey, what do I needto do?
And you say, hey, add this toyour website.
I don't want you to see meagain before I've added that to

(48:51):
my website, because I'm like,what am I going to ask you for
the same thing twice?
And do you know, when you giveyou've given the same person the
same advice before and you'relike, well, you're not really
taking this.
So how much deeper are youwilling to?
Like the Vulch?
Yeah, like so I'm very big.
Everyone I meet, I have notes,I keep my laptop out.
I can tell you every singletime we've met, every location

(49:13):
we've met and everything you'vetold me to do.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
That's amazing and you know, I bet like everyone
can relate to this story ofgoing from feeling like, like
being delusional, but not in agood way.

Speaker 2 (49:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (49:23):
Because I think sometimes like maybe you need to
be delusional to attack that.
Maybe if you weren't delusional, like to go along with this
whole be delusional thing, maybeif you weren't delusional, you
wouldn't have had the confidenceto go in and do that gig, to
then learn, to then have thatlow, yeah.
And I remember I had the samekind of thing when I wrote my
first motivational speech.
I did it for some familymembers and I went in thinking

(49:44):
I've written this whole scriptout, I've interjected some magic
tricks, some audienceparticipation, and I went in and
it was like the war.
It was just like a train wreck.
It was like I was just talkingand talking.
They were just sitting therelike mm-hmm, and it was like
this I got in the car with mywife afterwards, because it was
her side of the family, and Iwas like, okay, I have nothing,

(50:05):
like I have so much work to do.
But it was that I didn't evenneed feedback.
I could tell them the feedbackfrom the people sitting on the
couch.
You got feedback.
Yeah, I got my feedback Ineeded, but it didn't make me
quit, it made me go.
Okay, this is ground zero.
Now, how do we go from here?
And that's what I see in you,man, and you just like, haven't
stopped, you just shh.

Speaker 2 (50:22):
The thing is I'm not special, like, of course I call
myself awesome, I name myselfawesome, but I don't think I'm
special.
So I think everything I have,you have it.

Speaker 1 (50:31):
Everyone else has, mm-hmm no one's any better than
anyone else.

Speaker 2 (50:34):
It's just the work that we're willing to put in,
yeah, and what we think we'recapable of determines a lot
about our actions, mm-hmm.
And so when I say delusion Idon't actually mean it, because
in reality I could achieve thosethings.
Like people would say it wouldbe delusional for not being able
to make your high schoolbasketball team or any team

(50:55):
sport to be coming the numberone box from the country in two
years.
Like when I walked to the gymevery day I was having those
talks, talking to myself in thedelusional way of like you can
do this, can't nobody beat you,you're the best.
And eventually you start tobelieve yourself.
So it's no longer delusion.
But what happens is otherpeople might think it's delusion
.
So what we do is we end updoing what other people think we

(51:21):
can do.
So I'm like, ok, maybe.
Well, I think I can go to theOlympics.
But it kind of sounds crazy ifI say it out loud.
So I'm just going to say I'mgoing to do what they think I'm
capable of doing.
So remember I said I didn'ttell anyone I had for my first
four boxing matches.
I didn't tell anyone because Ididn't think they would think I
was a boxer and Charles Horton,I think, believed is.

(51:44):
I saw this quote years later.
It's I'm not what I believe Iam.
I am not what you believe I am.
I am what I think you think Iam.
And now that I look back at mystory, I was like, oh, going to
the gym, like in high school inNew York.
I grew up in high school in NewYork and I was super awkward

(52:06):
and I didn't have any manyfriends and I was a shell of
myself.
And in my senior year of highschool my parents moved to
Florida and that's why I had towalk six miles to the gym.
But when I got to Florida Irealized, oh, none of these
people know who I am.
I can be anyone I want to be.
I can adopt my mom's Englishaccent.
No one will know the difference.
So I decided I was going to be aculmination of cool people in
New York.
I went to school with and mycamp counselors it's like I

(52:27):
would say what I think theywould say.
I would do what they would, Iwould carry myself the way they
would, and everyone in Floridabelieved that was me.
A month before I graduated highschool, I went back to my old
school to do my graduation there, and I couldn't wait to get
back to show everyone this new,confident person.
And the second I walked throughthose high school doors I

(52:49):
reverted into the even myposture, everything about myself
.
And now I look back I realize Iwas being who I thought they
thought I was and they thought Iwas that same person before and
I couldn't change that.
And then I went back to Florida.
As soon as I graduated.
I went back to Florida.
I was like I'm never going backto New York because I don't
like who people think I am there.

Speaker 1 (53:11):
So your mom had a British accent.

Speaker 2 (53:12):
Yeah, she's from England.

Speaker 1 (53:13):
From England.
So it sounds like if you wereto really be true to what you
believe at your core, which islike it only matters what you
believe, you wouldn't be caringwhat all these other people
think about you.
That wouldn't be changing yourbehavior.
You would just be focused on.
This is who I am.
I believe in myself, so I'mgoing to be the real me right
now.
But you couldn't do that backthen because you were too.
You know you had to.

(53:36):
What's when you're fixated onsomething?
You were too fixated with, like, what they were thinking about
you.
That was sort of paralyzing you.
You couldn't be free to justlike be the new you.

Speaker 2 (53:47):
And I will say I say it a lot and like it sounds
obnoxious, arrogant, all that,but it's possible to think
better of yourself.
And when I say I changed mylast name to awesome, I didn't
come back from the courthouseand was like, okay guys, I'm
awesome.
I was still a little bitdepressed, I was still not 100%
there, but it gave me the hopeto like to keep going more of

(54:10):
the delusion or people call itdelusion and I think it's funny
to call it delusion, so I referto that, but yeah, it didn't
happen overnight.
And a year later I wasn'tawesome Like I.
My book is coming out.
It's called becoming awesome,because I think everything you
do is working towards who youwant to be.
And if you want who you want tobe, why are you doing the same
thing that you're doing?
And I've kind of taken thatapproach.

(54:31):
But it doesn't happen overnight.
And there's I still haveinsecurities that I work on.
I still have parts of myselfthat I believe is flawed that
I'm continuing to work on, butthe whole idea of becoming
awesome is fixing those thingsand knowing that I can, and even
even like seeing your feedback,accepting reality and

(54:51):
understanding I can change it.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
Yeah.
So one thing I heard you say inone of your speeches I think it
was to the students right wasdo hard things, and I love that.
That stuck with me, you know,because I believe the same thing
.
I think that that if we want togrow, we got to do the hard
things.
And right now I've recentlyhave quit coffee again.
I don't know if I'm going toquit coffee, quit coffee, but

(55:15):
now I've been drinking mud waterso I take cold showers, you
know, I think that makes usstronger.
I mean, it does good things foryour body.
So so I do believe in thisdoing hard things right.
I believe, like with your, withyour work, you got to put in
the work to, you know themarketing and building your team
up to get to a place where youwant to go.
But what hard things are youdoing, like on a daily basis,

(55:36):
that you feel like you'rehelping propel you forward to
the next thing?

Speaker 2 (55:42):
One thing I do is being sharp.
I think it takes a lot of us.
We're naturally, we go towardsthe least resistance and what I
found is if you put more effortin the front, front end of
things, you become moreefficient all the way around.
So I believe, like this morning, I show up early.

Speaker 1 (56:05):
Yeah, he was here before I got here.

Speaker 2 (56:07):
One thing you can control you're not going to beat
me somewhere, like, and I'llshow up somewhere early and I'll
get work done there.
So when you walk in, I'malready getting that, I'm in
workflow and then we get stopped.

Speaker 1 (56:17):
Like the Brian Regan bit, I'm making money right now.
I'm getting on the plane, yeah.

Speaker 2 (56:23):
And that's.
And I'm like okay, those arethe things, those little, those
little things.
Everyone's thinking about thebig changes, like what are these
small changes we can make inour lives?
And these things are difficult.
Going to bed early, I realizelike and I figure this out
during the pandemic I am, westart to all of us.

(56:44):
We wind down during.
Everybody's time is different,but we wind down in the evening.
Let's say, I start winding it.
When are you?
You're a parent, so, but I'llspeak on myself.
Like I start wind down.

Speaker 1 (56:54):
You're like you're worthless to me right now in
this scenario.
You're a parent, so there's nonormal.
I love that you know that.

Speaker 2 (57:00):
I was like, oh, you can't just go to sleep when you
want to go to sleep.
So I totally get that, but Ifind I'm less.
I start winding around myproductivity around six, seven
o'clock, I don't do anything,okay.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
And I realize, do you get off screens at that point
too, because they say the bluelight can affect your sleep, do
you?
I don't know what your rulesare.

Speaker 2 (57:15):
I get off professional screens Like I get
off my laptop or same laptop,but it's Netflix.
But you might, okay, but it'snothing productive that I'm
doing I'm like watch Netflix,hang out and I realize I spend
most of my money and consumemost of my calories between the
hours of 8pm and midnight.

Speaker 1 (57:32):
Yes, I could see that that cause Chipotle delivers.
Now, oh, you know what I'msaying.
Now I could just start havingit.
But yeah, I mean, dude, once Idiscovered Chipotle delivery,
yeah, it's dangerous.

Speaker 2 (57:43):
Here's why I can't do Chipotle delivery.

Speaker 1 (57:45):
Here's why I love it.
You just have a rule that youjust can't do it.

Speaker 2 (57:49):
Because I don't want them to show up.
I want to look you in the eyeswhile you scoop the rice.

Speaker 1 (57:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (57:54):
And look a little deeper if I don't get enough
rice.
Oh really, Cause when you getyour to-go order, it's small.
Oh yeah, when I'm there likeextra rice and I will get the
order, and after you put thesalsa I'm like, hey, can we go
back and add a little extra riceto that?

Speaker 1 (58:06):
See, that's funny, cause I'm the annoying guy who
is always telling them hey, halfscoop of rice, a little bit
more, because I have.
I'm very like, I watch my cal,the whole calorie thing, the one
plus two equals three.
I'm always trying to lose 20pounds.

Speaker 2 (58:20):
So it's like.

Speaker 1 (58:21):
I know that everything adds up on a Chipotle
burrito and it's like lessbeans, less rice, less guac,
less meat.
Otherwise I'm, just like youknow, never going to meet any
kind of goals.

Speaker 2 (58:29):
So anyway, okay, yeah .

Speaker 1 (58:31):
Yeah, 8 and 10 PM, so that's when.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
Between 8 and midnight.
Midnight Okay, and those arefour hours, so I started going
to bed at eight.

Speaker 1 (58:41):
Wow, and you can fall asleep.

Speaker 2 (58:43):
Not at first, okay, not at first, but regardless, I
was waking up at 4.45.
And it sucked, doing hardthings, yeah.
First 10 days sucked, yeah, andthen eventually I started
falling asleep earlier.

Speaker 1 (58:55):
Huh.

Speaker 2 (58:55):
Finding how that works.

Speaker 1 (58:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
And then I realized I would work from 5 AM till 10 AM
.
Five hours, yeah, uninterrupted, yeah.
And by the time most peopleclock in and start getting that
work, I'm done with my work day.

Speaker 1 (59:07):
That's my most productive time too.
Early morning hours, Like whenI'm most focused.
That's crazy.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
And yeah, and that kind of changed the way I was
spending my time.
And now I have to re-change itbecause I'm doing comedy at
night.
Again.
I'm like, okay, I can't wake upat 5 AM anymore, but doing
difficult things, and it's likeif life, I believe life, life is
a game of cards, right, and ifyou don't like the way the hand
is being dealt, you have toshuffle the deck.
Shuffling the deck looks likedoing things completely

(59:35):
different.

Speaker 1 (59:36):
Yeah Well, and you do open mics, speaking to doing
hard things.
You're not afraid of open mics,like most new people are, but
just the fact that you'regetting your reps in, that's
hard Right To just stick with it.
It's like when you lose theweight, you lose the weight,
that was hard, but to keep itoff.
So to keep doing these openmics, because you're always like
what's the next story, what'sthe next bit that I can even add
to my motivational speech.

Speaker 2 (59:58):
Right.

Speaker 1 (59:59):
I mean you're doing it for all kinds of reasons.

Speaker 2 (01:00:01):
Yeah, and I see and I'm competitive in a sense in
everything I do when I seesomeone killing something, I'm
like, yeah, it's possible, I'mgoing to kill it too.
So I never see it as like, oh,I'm mad at that Killing it.
Like no, no, you're justshowing, if you can do it, I can
do it.
Yes, and you would say, I cando it, cam, you can do it as

(01:00:24):
well.
Like it's just weird for me tosay it out loud, because that's
a whole humility thing.
Right, no, I can do it too, yeah, and so I have this concept of
the top five.
So anything you do in like your, your the sum of the five
people you hang out with themost right.
So I think of it industry wise.
So, like in boxing, I havespecific top five.
The first and the top five isterpop.
First person out of the fivethat you hang out with is the

(01:00:47):
pinnacle.
That's like, and to me it wasMuhammad Ali, and you don't need
to spend time with this personor know them personally for them
to be in that, because that'sthe top of the game, that's the
goal I'm getting to him.
He's at the top.

Speaker 1 (01:00:58):
And, by the way, does that they have?
How much did his influence ofthe defense and the dodging have
to do with your whole defensivestance, with boxing?
Was that everything to you?

Speaker 2 (01:01:08):
No, it was actually.
I don't care for Muhammad Ali'sboxing, oh okay.
It was his personality In boxing.
I've met so many people in theroad, a lot of older guys and
like or woman like I metMuhammad Ali 30, 40 years ago
and everyone who tells me thathas an amazing story of how he
made them feel I've never met.

(01:01:29):
Someone said, oh yeah, I metAli, like I was great.
It was like no, I met Ali andguess what happened.
And he stole my pen and likeand he.
I realized that that and that'swho I want to be.
I want to be that person thatchanges people's lives.
I don't care for his boxing somuch.
The reason why I did thedefense was a guy named Emmanuel
Augustus.
He was called the drunkenwarrior.
He had a losing record as aboxer.
He wasn't that great but he hadfun, but so the pen.

Speaker 1 (01:01:52):
Okay, so, yeah, so I need, yeah, so I attract your
big time the first one's apinnacle.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
The second person is someone who, let's say, in the
boxing world is better than you.
So someone in the gym who'smore experienced, who's been
doing it longer.
Look at that person.
Maybe Ali is not attainableright now, but that person is.
You're with them every day.
If they go for a run, you gofor a run, you do what they do
because they became great that.
And you're always chasing thatsecond person, that third person

(01:02:18):
, someone who is just as good asme same experience level and
everything and this person is myfriend, my peer.
I will never let them getbetter than me, and that's also
their job too.
They should never let me getbetter than them, and any
opportunity I have, I'm going totry to make them better,
because it's going to force meto be better.

Speaker 1 (01:02:38):
And one, just to pause, reminds me of we in
soccer and high school.
For conditioning we would do athing called the 12 minute run
Just how many laps can you makearound the track in 12 minutes?
And me and this guy named JakeBrown always would do it
together, shoulder to shoulder,just would run it and we'd be
pushing each other and it waskind of like you're not going to
, I'm going to beat you.
And he would say the same thing, and but we were like always
like the top, the firstfinishers, you know, and if I

(01:02:59):
didn't have them there at myside, I wouldn't have done it
that quickly.

Speaker 2 (01:03:03):
So I can see that analogy that's great and I
remember you know the Budweiserhorses.

Speaker 1 (01:03:09):
Yes, clydesdale, clydesdale.

Speaker 2 (01:03:12):
One Clydesdale can pull 10 tons.
How many do you think two canpull?

Speaker 1 (01:03:15):
Interesting.
Well, I would say 20.
You would say 30.
35.

Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
Wow, because they're they're competitive and they'll
never let another horse outrunthem.

Speaker 1 (01:03:24):
Wow that's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:03:26):
So when you have someone next to you to compete
with.
A lot of us don't likecompetition, but I think
competition is the best thingfor you.
It doesn't have to be hatefulcompetition.
It's to help push you.

Speaker 1 (01:03:35):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:03:36):
And so that box in the gym.
If he went for a three mile run, I went for three and a half.
If he jumped rope for 20minutes, I did 25.
He is not going to be betterthan me.

Speaker 1 (01:03:44):
And what's great about having that kind of
relationship?
Because I have that with,actually, todd Lemansky, who was
on a previous podcast episode.
After gigs, usually from me,after keynote, from, after a
magic show, we call each otherand we'll be like, hey, this
went really well and it's.
We never see it as braggiebecause it's like, man, I
crushed in this area or did this, and because we can both do
that because we're like peers,you know where.

(01:04:06):
You could also tell a mentorthat, but it's hard to tell
people who are, you know, up andcoming, hey, man, I went in and
crushed, or whatever.
Because it's like, okay, youknow, but you would probably say
, well, don't be humble, just doit, and you know bring them up,
my question did you crush?
Have I ever?

Speaker 2 (01:04:23):
Yeah, but a lot of times you wouldn't tell someone
who's like doing bad and likecrushed why?
But you did.
Why wouldn't you want to?

Speaker 1 (01:04:29):
Well, I would tell I know I would tell someone above
me because they'd be proud of,like Mark Mayfield, a mentor to
both of us, like, hey, mark,this went really well and you
know I did this joke, this tagthat you gave me, or whatever.
But to someone low, I think, Idon't think you couldn't tell
them that you didn't crush, like, let's say they're like I just
bombed, like if you're doinglike comedians, I just bombed.
You want to be like oh, I justcrushed in a better audience for

(01:04:51):
better money.
It's like you're going to behum, hum, humbling your tone to
that person and gentle so thatyou don't just crush their
spirits entirely like amen.

Speaker 2 (01:04:59):
You can be obnoxious.
You did go well for me.

Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
You know, pete mind, I've been doing this longer man.
You got this dude.
I remember being there bombingin those same scenarios.
You can do this, so I thinkthere's a.

Speaker 2 (01:05:09):
Well, that's you pulling them up.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
Yeah, exactly it's pulling them up in a hum, in a
tone of humility, you know.
So that's.
I think we probably agree, morethan maybe we think.
Oh I agree, humility thing,yeah, and it's on the wall
concept and I think it's.

Speaker 2 (01:05:23):
I throw it out there and I'm not.
It's a concept I'm stillworking on.
I'm not 100% done completing.
That's why I haven't used onstage or anything like that.
But it's a concept that's beenfloating around my mind.
Yeah, idea of humility Numberfour, person in this.

Speaker 1 (01:05:35):
Notice how I keep pausing you.

Speaker 2 (01:05:36):
I'm not going to let you finish this.
No, I love this.
It's so good man.

Speaker 1 (01:05:39):
Yeah, it resonates obviously.

Speaker 2 (01:05:41):
And it could change different.
So even that number two personcould be your mentor in whatever
the industry is Okay.
So the number four person for mewas a boxer who wasn't as
experienced as I was, but wasjust as hungry as I was, so he
wasn't as good as me.
Okay, so to me I'm his numbertwo, he's my number four.
Okay, all right, got it, and Ihe should first of all you'll

(01:06:03):
name.
I'll never let him be betterthan me and I'm gonna give him
all the tools to do it, becausehe needs to push me to be better
and, and if he ever does, I'mhappy for him.
Sure, uh, with that person,they're looking up to you.
Be that example, be kind tothem, be to them what you want
number two to be to you.
Um, if, if you see like theyperform, or they had a fight or

(01:06:24):
something You're like they didwell, just shoot him a text like
hey man, great job, because tome that validation means so much
for someone who's lost.
Uh, or if you don't know yourpath, when I first was going for
my first national championship,a guy named russheed warren, he
was like a three-time olympian.
I sent him a message on myspace.
I was like, hey man, I'm gonnabe going to my first nationals

(01:06:46):
and I can't wait to see you.
I heard a lot about you.
And he responded see you there,champ.
Screenshots weren't a thingback then, man, but I was on
cloud.
I started training hard.
I was like, oh, russheed warren, he's like he knows who I am.
And and if you that's what youcould do for that number four
person, you can give them thatmotivation, that drive.
Yeah and the fifth person's, themost important person.

(01:07:08):
It's you.
Why would those other fourpeople want to spend time with
you if you wouldn't want tospend time with yourself?
Hmm, are you the best versionof yourself?
Hmm, and you can't progress ifyou want.
So that's the way I looked atthat and I took that same model
from boxing and I brought intospeaking and, uh, I it's a

(01:07:29):
little more abstract, becauseBoxing is very objective,
whereas, like, you win or youdon't, yeah, so speaking is a
little more of an abstract, anabstract Concept concept.
But we have, like markmayfields and we have kerry
philips and we have these peoplethat we look up to, who've done
it before, and and those arethe people I constantly look up
to, and you are that person.
For me, actually, we you're notmy number three, you're my

(01:07:51):
number two, buddy, okay, and Isee the things you do and I see
the places you're performing andI'm like, okay, it's possible,
might not get it this year, butI'm gonna figure it out.
Yeah and the thing is, we canfigure anything out.
It's we might not figure it outour first try, but again, if
you can fail without beingdiscouraged, success is

(01:08:12):
inevitable.

Speaker 1 (01:08:13):
I love that.
The one, two, three, four, five, so number five.
Uh, you know we talk aboutspending time with these people.
How do you spend time withyourself?

Speaker 2 (01:08:20):
Uh, oh Well, that was the second thing of the two
difficult things in the van.
First thing was the amount ofstuff that I can bring in.
The second thing was how lonelyit was.
Second thing was how lonely itwas.

Speaker 1 (01:08:31):
It's lonely.
I mean you, I bet.
I mean I feel lonely when I goout for two days and I can still
text my wife and everything,but I can't imagine.

Speaker 2 (01:08:40):
Yeah, it's.
It was so lonely and uh, andwhen I got to the van I was like
, okay, I'm done drinking,because this is my livelihood,
I'm.
So I stopped drinking in thevan.
I was like, okay, I, I, I lostthat kind of social connect with
people.
I, just because usually I oldcam, I go to karaoke, go to a

(01:09:00):
bar, I sing a song that no oneexpects I know the words to, I
get off.
Someone high fives me.
I buy that person a shot, boom,I'm in with their group for the
night.

Speaker 1 (01:09:08):
What is that song by the?

Speaker 2 (01:09:09):
way, it's just an array of them.

Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
Okay, I think maybe.

Speaker 2 (01:09:16):
I know that one, but uh, the isley brothers
contagious.
Uh and r kelly and I sing allthree parts in different voices
and stand in different parts ofthe stage.
I make it like a per and noneof these people will ever see me
again, so it doesn't matter ifI make a fool of myself.

Speaker 1 (01:09:29):
Yeah, man, and, and there's just so many people to
connect with so in the van, doyou start to develop a different
relationship with yourself andbe more disciplined about the
time, like I'm gonna read more,I'm gonna meditate more, I'm
gonna pray more, I'm gonna, youknow, work out differently or
what's?
What does it look like tochange that relationship with
yourself when you're so?
Because there's probably a lotof people I know, there's people
who are lonely, who are evenwith other people all the time.

(01:09:50):
They're in families, they're inwork environments, they're not
in a van alone in the desert.
What do you do when you feellonely?
How can you culture thatrelationship with yourself?

Speaker 2 (01:10:00):
uh.
So one of the things I startedto do was the idea of, like I
should be reading more.
I should do.
It took a long time for that toset in, uh, because I was like,
okay, I guess I'll just, I'lljust park in this mcdonald's and
use their wi-fi and anddownload some stuff for Netflix
and and you have just so muchtime.
It seems like there's nothingto do with all the time.
And then I look back at sixmonths.

(01:10:20):
I was like, well, I did a lotof speaking but I did nothing
else.
And then I started, I startedto read and I started to do
those things.
But one of the things thatreally kind of changed the way I
looked at everything was Istarted volunteering because,
like everybody needs help, huh,and whether it's a dog shelter
or like a uh, I do a lot offarms and you just go and do

(01:10:42):
farm work with people.

Speaker 1 (01:10:44):
Man volunteering.
What did that do for yourspirit?
Just being giving?

Speaker 2 (01:10:48):
First of all, everyone who is there
volunteering, even if they're oncommunity service, it's like
it's a different energy and likeit's very supportive and it's
like a kindness that, a kindnessthat you don't get anywhere
else and it's like just for thepeople are just there for the
good, and I was able to make somany connections with so many

(01:11:08):
different people because of thatand I kind of built communities
in each city and a lot of itwas kind of vegan based, because
I would go to farms becausethey were always there to help
and uh, and they would give youfood.
Uh, and that was a really,really cool part with me was
like to get into volunteeringall those places and meet, meet
with people and hear people'sstories.

Speaker 1 (01:11:27):
Yeah, oh, I'm sure, I'm sure you, yeah, so as we
kind of start to campsfire likewe're gonna.
We're gonna be rolling out ofthis pretty soon, but, um, well,
we're kind of still in the vein, like we're talking about.
You know, you just came out ofthe mentorship thing, we, you,
you shared the jay-z Kanyeillustration you share with me,
because I talked beforehandabout Helping people and

(01:11:48):
sometimes you're helping peoplewho are potentially going to be
your competition or who are yourcompetition.
Uh, that you like, like cam andI are in the same market,
basically in in terms ofspeaking here in kansas city,
and there might be times wherewe were competing for the same
gig.
I don't know that it's everactually happened, but it could.
So you know, um, I can help him, he can help me, and I've

(01:12:08):
always shared that illustrationthat if you like someone else's
flame, it takes nothing awayfrom your flame, but you can
burn brighter together.
Yes, but, as we were talkingabout that, you shared the thing
about jay-z.
Would you just share that withthem?

Speaker 2 (01:12:19):
Yeah, uh.
So I I'm a big fan of jay-zevery the way he's handled his
business, the way he trends.
So the reason why Itransitioned from sports into
speaking is because I saw theway jay-z transitioned from Well
, I did, I transitioned fromsports into business, the
business speaker.
I saw the way jay-z transformedfrom music into business Okay,
and I saw the way he carriedhimself and and he kind of he's,
he's my number one in the speakin the business world.

(01:12:41):
That's my number one.
Okay, I don't have to meet himor anything like that, but I
aspire to him and I he was thefirst rapper to to hit a billion
dollars, which is like crazy.
And then Kanye West, hisprotege, hit the billion dollar
club but passed jay-z and I waslike, oh, I wonder if Jay-z is
like, oh sure, a littlecompetitive about that.
And I heard Jay-z speak aboutit in an interview.

(01:13:01):
He said he got to his billionthe way he got to his billion
and he made sure when he gotthere he wanted to help other
people get there as well.
And if he would have had a jay,if he was, if he would have had
a jay-z to help him get towhere he was, he would be
further than where he is now andhe sees Kanye West's success as
a branch of his own success.

(01:13:21):
And I was like, oh yeah, wejust burn brighter together, man
.

Speaker 1 (01:13:25):
Yeah, that's great.
I love that illustration, man.
That's crazy awareness from himand I love that you absorbed
that and shared that.
So, man, thank you.
So I just couple finalquestions for you and appreciate
that.
But I do love how you noticethat like I should have hit the
record button as soon as Iwalked into the room, because
when camera, because we hadbreakfast together first, and it
was like I was like wait, savethat, save, because that's too

(01:13:46):
good, don't, don't go deeperwith that.
But it's like it's always thisrich talking with cam and I
appreciate that.
I also love just your, I meanyour humility.
Even with your idea abouthumility, you're kind of like I
don't know it's this thing thatI'm thinking about, but I love
how you're always thinking Um,you're always creative, uh, and
but you're always like but, but,but.
I might be wrong about this,you know, but I'm gonna go ahead

(01:14:07):
and say it, see how it feels,see how it lands, and then, and
then go from there, kind of likethat start ugly idea.

Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
So, yeah, it's being being imperfectionist, yes.

Speaker 1 (01:14:16):
I think so much perfectionist someone's weight.

Speaker 2 (01:14:18):
We wait till things are right.
Like, like I told you, I havemy first book coming out.
There's some holes in it,there's, there's gonna be some.
I've never written a bookbefore, so now, by my third book
, like, oh, now I'll do this,I'll do that, do this and you
gain that knowledge, but until Irelease that first one, I'll
never get to the third one.
Yeah and how many of us arewaiting and things until things
are perfect.
Yeah, to get them started.

Speaker 1 (01:14:39):
I think so many people wait way too long for
version version 1.0, thinkingthat's the one that needs to be
perfect.
It's like, no, no, that's themess.

Speaker 2 (01:14:46):
Yeah, you know, get through that, work through it
and get to 2.0 and and keepgoing and it's important to keep
1.0, like don't forget if youcan record whatever it is,
because then you get to see yourgrowth.
So you start podcast one, surepodcast one might be trash, yeah
.
Podcast 15, I don't know yet.
Podcast 15, it's gonna be a lotbetter, yeah.

(01:15:08):
And then when you get topodcast 130, sure, it's gonna be
a whole different production.
And you look, but I, after youget to podcast 150, go back and
just watch podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:15:18):
I remember Ed Sheeran did that on one of the talk
shows where he was like watchingold.
They had him watch old footageof himself and he's just like oh
my gosh, you know, and if he'sdoing that, can't we all?
Yeah that's, I love that.
Save 1.0 that's gold man, Ilove it.
Well, awesome, okay, well, hey,before we kind of conclude here
, and I do have just a couplequestions left, so again.

Speaker 2 (01:15:37):
I'm gonna One of them .

Speaker 1 (01:15:38):
I'm gonna put you on the spot.

Speaker 2 (01:15:39):
I do this with all the guests, all right.

Speaker 1 (01:15:42):
It really made one of the guests freeze up like I
don't know, but it's, it's allgood.
So thanks once again to exit,roshani for hosting this.
Hey, um, go to youtube at devonHenderson speaker for the full
experience.
Subscribe, like it if thisepisode meant anything to you at
all.
Um, also, if you were inspired,you know, on apple or spotify,
if you're listening, please rate, please comment.
That helps us extend our reachand get messages like cams to to

(01:16:04):
more people.
So, um, one thing too whereveryour, whatever platform you're
on, comment, let us know what isone thing that cams said that
made you Decide to do somethingdifferently in your life today.
So, okay, awesome, uh, withthat, how can people connect
with you?

Speaker 2 (01:16:19):
We'll link your website, but go ahead and tell
us cam camf awesome calm and atcam of awesome on all social
media platforms, because I'm notfamous enough for anyone to
steal my name yet at cam fawesome Okay please trust the f
perfect.

Speaker 1 (01:16:32):
Yes, yeah, you got it Okay, and then can't you have a
.
You have a product which I toldyou I'm gonna start doing some
Affiliate.
My goal is to start doing someaffiliates with some products I
really believe in like this oneright here, that some of you
know what this is, the magicalliquid in this can, but
hopefully that's coming soonthat I can talk more about that.
But you have your own productand you're gonna be starting up
a podcast again.

Speaker 2 (01:16:53):
That's the plan.

Speaker 1 (01:16:54):
Yeah, that's the plan and you have your own.
What is your product, man?

Speaker 2 (01:16:57):
So, uh, I Again.
I love the concept of businessand when I got into the speaking
business, first of all Ithought, like I'm just gonna be
a good speaker, yeah, verylittle to do with the speaking
business when you turn.
And now I'm starting to learnmore about business.
I decided to start my own andthey said If you're gonna start
a product, start a product thatyou need and you would use every
day.

Speaker 1 (01:17:17):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:17:18):
Okay and uh, when I bought the van it came with the
seat cover.
Yeah, so like when I was sweatyI didn't want to sweat my pants
I would put the seat cover onthe seat and then every softener
wash it Not as much as I shouldhave, but yeah, well, of course
, do we ever.

Speaker 1 (01:17:31):
I, when I think of a van that you live, and I think
one of those seat covers, that'sthe wooden beads that are.

Speaker 2 (01:17:39):
Hippy vandana the budget for it.

Speaker 1 (01:17:44):
He didn't have the budget to be a hippie, I know
yeah things are rough back then.

Speaker 2 (01:17:49):
But I got the seat cover and I loved it so much and
even when I stopped using thevan, I still took the seat cover
and I put it in my Prius andPeople in the gym be like, oh
man, where'd you get that from?
And everyone was asking meabout it.
I was like, oh no, it came withthe van.
And one day I looked at the.
I saw there's a website and Ichecked the website.
The website's closed out.
The company is closed down.
So I was like, okay, I took it,I shipped it to china, I had

(01:18:10):
them remake it.
Wow, ship, sent it back, getsamples.
And Uh, they sent to me andthey're on amazon right now and
I'm starting to sell them.
And I realized that I couldn'tfind a because I wanted sponsors
as a speaker and and my podcastand all that.
And I was like I can't findsomeone who thinks I'm worthy of
being sponsored.
So If I can't find someone tobelieve in me, I'm gonna believe

(01:18:33):
in myself and I'm just gonna doit my own.
It might take a little bitlonger, but I'm so grateful that
I'm taking this route becausethere's so much I'm learning
about business and shipping andhandling and different concepts
of of generating differentstreams of income that I would
have never Learned if I wasn'tgoing through this procedure,
and even if I did this for ayear and I broke even, it would

(01:18:55):
be so worth it from the thingsI've already learned from this.

Speaker 1 (01:18:57):
Yeah, nice, okay.
So how can we get?
We can just link to the productin the in the show notes.

Speaker 2 (01:19:03):
Well, what's it called Steak cover?
It's called no sweat seats.

Speaker 1 (01:19:06):
No sweat seats.

Speaker 2 (01:19:07):
No sweat seats.

Speaker 1 (01:19:08):
I'm not even affiliate, but I believe in this
man and I might be man by that.
Yeah, maybe we'll do itaffiliate.
Yeah maybe let's be my first.
My first product is yours.

Speaker 2 (01:19:17):
I would be honored.

Speaker 1 (01:19:18):
Okay, okay, awesome, maybe we'll get that set up.

Speaker 2 (01:19:20):
I know, I'm also honored that you because I I do
think you're my number two onthat list and you were.
You're the person who got meinto speaking and I thought it
was so cool that you asked me tobe on your podcast and I
wouldn't say I was humbled by it, but I would say I was
certainly surprised.

Speaker 1 (01:19:37):
Oh, that's funny, Maybe a little bit delusional.
Maybe your delusional wouldthink I should be on the spot
cast.
But, yeah, I think I'm goodenough to have awesome fun and
no, that's good.
Well, and, by the way and Iknow we're wrapping up like this
is how it is with cam you justAlways fun, man, you.
When I saw you do the open mic,I was like there's more that.

(01:19:58):
There's more to this guy,because I saw man, this guy's a
boxer, he's got this history of,like, you know, tough childhood
grown up.
I was like, man, there's astory there and that's all any
speaker needs Is a story whichwe all have, as we learned with
will, sever and you know, backin the tell your story episode,
but you had this story.
I was like this story needs tobe told.
And the fact that you alreadyare comfortable on stage and
you're funny, you're like, soyou're like 80 of the way there

(01:20:21):
I don't know how I chose, you'reso close and so it's like let's
just get this guy, you know,connected with the speaking
community.
And so it's just been awesome,dude, that you have risen to the
challenge and done it.
You did it, man, you're doingit, and you're just always
growing.
So it's really, really cool towatch that and just see this
growth man.
So congratulations oneverything.

Speaker 2 (01:20:42):
Thank you, man.
I'm just trying to get my devinon.

Speaker 1 (01:20:44):
Yeah, thanks, thanks for being here, man.
I appreciate it.
So, okay, all right, um, andhere's the.
Here's the last one, the onethat's like that.
Just one piece of advice for mydaughters, let, piece of life
advice.
What could you tell them?

Speaker 2 (01:20:57):
Don't base what you can do off of what others
couldn't.
Hmm, there's a lot of peopleout there who will tell you, hey
, you shouldn't do that, becausethey've done it and they got
burned or they weren't capableof accomplishing it and they
were heartbroken.
And a lot, of, a lot of timeswe try to save other people the
embarrassment or Try to guidethem away from failure.

(01:21:20):
But I realized everything I did.
Everything I failed Is why I'mlike.
2008 lost the olympic trials.
2012 one olympic trials gotkicked off.
2016 one olympic trials Didn'tmake it to olympics.
Signed up for the 2020 olympictrials.
Flew to trinidad and tobago, mydad's home country.
Got my dual citizenship.
Fought in the olympic trials,won by knockout.
Returned to the us, continuedto speak, living in the van To

(01:21:42):
because I had to fund myself.
Then the pandemic happened.
I didn't get to go.
I believe if I were to tellsomeone back when I was walking
to high school that was going tobe go to four olympic trials,
they would probably tell memaybe you should try college.

Speaker 1 (01:21:59):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2 (01:22:00):
So I would tell your daughters Do what you want,
understand there's going to beconsequences that come with it,
but don't base what you're goingto do what based off what
others couldn't wow, okay, here.

Speaker 1 (01:22:10):
That, girls.
That's sound advice, awesome.
All right, we're going to wrapby.
Um, I do this with my audience.
I say what else and they say ispossible, because when you
embrace the possibility mindset,you never stop asking.
So I'll say what else you sayis possible.
All right, you ready?
Yeah, okay, here, we're gonnanever stop asking the question
what else and what's possible.
We'll see you next time.

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