From You vs You with Lex Borrero: Enrique Santos on Breaking Free From Labels

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Am I going to get built for this therapy?

Speaker 2 (00:03):
The financial success wasn't there, would you still be as
driven to do it?

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Paruco Henrique Santos? Soyore second, I say, Where'm i?

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (00:12):
Henrique Santos, And I've been really busy Right now I
can't talk. I'm busy, bro, I'm busy.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Why become a police officer? Service is not a job.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
It's a mistake that control is safety? People. Oh, I
want to be famous, I want to be rich.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Did it trigger any insecurities? Sure?

Speaker 1 (00:34):
A lot of people don't talk about these things.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
But I know a bunch of people, a bunch of artists,
a bunch of managers that work as hard as I do,
don't have what I have, which tells me that people.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
Will forget words that people will never forget how you
made them feel. How do you deal with success knowing
that success is the paycheck. I don't do this for
the money. I do it because those same wars that
you told somebody are the same exact words. Unity here.
So you can be Ladino and live simultaneously in two
worlds and still have success in.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
All right here we are, you know, always get to
sit down and have some honest conversations. I feel privilege
that we've been able to build a friendship where we
always talk about these things every time we meet up.
But how do you deal with success and preventing the
pressure of getting to you and essentially causing your personal

(01:23):
life to be affected?

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Right well, knowing that success is the paycheck. I don't work.
I don't do this for the money. I do it
because I enjoy it. I feel that I'm doing it
for the right reason. As long as you're doing it
for the right reason, everything falls in place and it
feels natural, it feels organic, it doesn't feel forced.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
What is the right thing?

Speaker 1 (01:47):
I mean, always following your passion to be able to
do what we do, to be creators, to be in entertainment,
but then recognize that through entertainment you're able to affect
positive of change. You're able to you know, touch so
many people's lives, not only touch people, but hopefully you know,

(02:07):
touch people and engage people, but wake something up in
them that also woke up in you and in me
to be able to to create, to create more and
to turn that into something positive. With I would say,
with the with the hopes that people will not only
engage with you and connect with you, but also do

(02:31):
something positive with that as well. Does that make sense?

Speaker 2 (02:33):
Do you feel like if you could do what you
do and the financial success wasn't there, would you still
be as driven to do it?

Speaker 1 (02:43):
It would probably be more difficult to do it because
you do need money to be not that you need
money to be creative, but you do need money to
invest to be able to have the time. I would
say to invest not in material things, but you know
it goes way beyond you know, cameras and microphones and
having the gear the technology to do it, because nowadays
anybody and you can you know, it's a lot more

(03:04):
accessible than before. Anyone can do a home make a
home podcast studio by microphones, and there's so much technology
to edit and it's much more accessible. The investment is
the time to be able to create that space where
you're able to regenerate energy and keep your creative juices

(03:28):
going without getting burnt out.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
What do you think motivates you to specifically do what
you do right? Because it's as I'm going and steping
in your seat now doing this, it's really interesting because
I'm so used to getting things done but not necessarily
putting myself in a place where I have to be
the talent. Right. And one of the things we talked
about in La when we hung out last time was

(03:52):
how to break the box that we created ourselves. Do
you feel like your own success in radio communications has
put a box around the things that you could do
because people expect you to do one thing, right, Like
for me, it's like people expect me to be the executive,
the manager. So when all of a sudden, I'm creatively

(04:13):
leading a presentation or producing music, people feel like, oh,
he's not really the producer. He's taking percentages or he's
doing this because he's a manager, and they try to
put you in the box. You know, people expect that
Enrique Santos to be for sure a radio presenter.

Speaker 1 (04:31):
For sure, people box me in. But before I get
into the boxes, I want to say thank you, thank
you for your friendship. It's something that I treasure deeply,
and congratulations on what you're doing and you break it
out of you of your own box.

Speaker 2 (04:45):
Listen, this is and we'll talk about this as well
as like this is me stretching my vessel to receive
a new age in my life. Right, like you want
to do it what I think. For me, it really
I came down to feeling in a box, right like
I started. I posted a video yesterday on Instagram that

(05:06):
you know, I was really surprised because the amount of
comments had got. But it was me watching a video
of myself from twenty fourteen years ago when I was
like a nobody, like legit, a nobody in the business.
And later yeah, I was like, yo, you know I
made it. I'm CEO X and I'm gonna make you payments. Bro.

(05:26):
I couldn't even make myself famous, let alone somebody else.
But that kid understood the power of his creativity, understood
the power of being the talent, right like. He wasn't
afraid to get in the video and speak in that
way because he like really based it on that. But

(05:46):
somewhere along the way, I the fear kicked in and
I created the box of oh no, no, I'm the manager,
because if I'm the manager and you fail, there's a
separation between you. Fairly.

Speaker 1 (06:01):
You see that kid that you posted that les that
I saw that you posted on your Instagram, that was
celebrating he was acknowledging his moment, what it took for
him to get to that point at that moment. He
was appreciated, appreciative of that of that moment, and he
was celebrating that moment. And I think that's that's something

(06:21):
that we need to do more often. It's just as
humans understand where we're at, not where we want to be. Right,
How many people don't have the new car, and okay,
but that car is not new enough. I want the
new one that's coming out next month. I got the
new watch, and this watch is cool and it's beautiful,
but I don't want this watch. I want the new
one that's come you know, coming out next year. And
that's that's what keeps us going, keeps us challenge. We

(06:44):
all need a challenges as humans, and it's okay to
celebrate their moments, keeping keeping your boots on the ground
and keeping humble about it. But there's nothing wrong with
celebrating what you what you everything you had to sacrifice
to get where you're at in life. So that's what
I saw on that video you posted. Yeah, going back
to the boxes. Absolutely, I feel boxed in all the time,

(07:07):
and every day I try to find ways. I've never
liked labels. I always think that labels do us more
harm than good as humans. And that goes to and
we need labels to kind of understand psychology and humans.
And you know, you have genres of music and they
go they get put into different columns and boxes. Again,
we get boxed in. If you're a title or CEO

(07:27):
of a company, people expect you to wear a suit
and tie. You can't just wear like shorts or dressed
down like the rest of your employees. I don't agree
with that. Again, but you get boxed into that. So
I get boxed into it. I have certain days of
the week or certain hours of the day where it's
Enrique the morning radio broadcast guy, the host of the
morning show, and then it's Enrique the English He's hosting

(07:49):
his English show. So now you know, it's a different
in Endrique, and the English is different in the Spanish.
Some people have a hard time making the difference between
all that. And then it's Endrique, you know, the executive,
And then it's adityk. If I'm in my role as
a police officer, it's you know, it's a little more serious.
So people don't expect cops to have a sense of
humor or to be human, and that's it's not my

(08:14):
job necessarily to break that box in other people's view,
but it's definitely my responsibility to not box myself in
or not not allow any of those titles or that
box to limit my creativity or who I am. And
I learned a long time ago. If I have something
to say, say it, If I feel something, express it,

(08:36):
and opportunities how many times don't we see people that
have passed that? And as we get older, this happens
more frequently, right, And you're like, shit, I wish I
could have told him or her that, you know, So
those are moments like now, if you know, celebrate, hey,
good job. There's nothing wrong with with celebrating other people's

(08:59):
their globes and their triumphs.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
It's interesting because it speaks to the human condition. Right.
The human condition is we need to always feel like
we have more, because more defines what box we get
put in.

Speaker 1 (09:16):
Right.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
It's a different box if you're the CEO of a company,
right than if you're the person at the front welcoming people.

Speaker 1 (09:22):
Right.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
But these boxes are really created by the fact that
we have been programmed to think that we need to
achieve success to feel okay, We need to fit into
the status quote of being married, or you know, for women,
they get a lot of pressure. It's like if you
don't have kids at a certain age or you know,
whatever it is. It's like all these boxes that we

(09:44):
need to fit in. It's a narrative we've been fed that. Honestly,
for me, you know, I followed it. I hate the serial.
I said, oh great, yes, Like, in order to have
self worth at that level, I have to have the
achievements and the awards and all these things. And what
I've found in our business specifically, is there's a lot
of people that get to a place of success and

(10:07):
realize that it didn't fill the void, and then life
stops having meaning, right. And we've seen so many of
our peers, unfortunately, you know, take their own lives or
go through these situations because of that necessity to fill
that hole. And for me, that's really what you versus
you is about. It's like understanding that we've been programmed

(10:29):
with a story. We've believed the story. We speak to
ourselves about that story every single day, right Like to
your point, you get a watch and you're like, wow,
this watch is incredible, But then I see yours and
it's like, damn, I wish I had that right, and
then that creates the void again, and we've, in my opinion,
we've masked that with Oh, but that's motivation, that's challenging.

(10:52):
That's human nature to want more things. And while yes
it will motive you, yes it'll put goals, and it's
good to have goals in your dreams, the core of
who you are needs to still get to a place
where you're okay no matter what.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
Sure when did Lex break that rhythm and realize.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
That when I got to everything I wanted and felt
like something was missing, there was there was a hole
in my life that needed filling, and none of the
things that I had achieved. We're doing that even though
I am super giving, I am motivated to people, I

(11:33):
truly do it. Like my office, as you know, the
purpose is to change lives. I just felt avoid and
that void caused me to go to search for something right,
And is when I started to understand that the whole
concept is the universe is and divine order and no
matter what, you're okay. So like you don't need to

(11:56):
be successful to be okay, we don't need to work
harder to be okay. Like the idea that we have
to suffer in order to live a better life is
a state of mind, because it's just how you process everything.
Like I also posted about this in New Years, whereas
I say to people, well, if I drink this water
and I don't like it, and you drink the water

(12:17):
and you like it, the water never changed. It's just
the filter that it went through. And what it shows
you is that the work in order to feel content
in life is to love and accept whatever you're going through,
because it is exactly what your life is intended to
go through. You came here to learn, and that moment

(12:41):
of sitting down and appreciating the fire that you're sitting
in and changing your perspective could change your whole life experience.
I was seeing this clip on TikTok Tony Robins saying,
you know, you want to change your life, change the
way you think about your life. And I had seen
that clip before and it didn't really make sense before,
and all of a sudd and they clicked and it's like, yeah,
it's one hundred percent just perspective. So just like there's

(13:04):
people that have mastered going into an ice tub and
sitting on the ice stub, ten seconds and for them
this is a daily routine. For me, it's torture. But
it's just perspective. The eyes never changed, right, And you
can master the art of sitting in ice and being okay.
You can master the art of walking on fire and
not burning you. You can master the art of jumping
off skydiving and not feel the fear. Like everything is

(13:29):
just an illusion based on how you perceive life and
the boxes that we've been put That's why I brought
it up, because we had this conversation. It's so interesting
because I found myself lying to myself. I found myself
lying to yourself that you were happy lying to yourself.
You know that, like this boxes that we put on ours,

(13:50):
we said, like so many times we say no, no, no,
I don't. I don't let myself be put in a box, right,
I don't let myself be put in a box. I
am creative first, like I always said, paint to my stuff,
paint the canvas and we'll frame it later. And that's
like a saying I say, I like that. And then
I found myself, like when the opportunity came to be creative,

(14:10):
saying to us, so no, but you're the manager subconsciously, so.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
You would tap the brakes on yourself.

Speaker 2 (14:16):
Yeah, you subconsciously put that right, or so many times
it's like, you know, we were talking about this, for example,
in doing a show like this is I'm going to
have to put the extra hours and what are people
are going to say? And then maybe I lose my job?
Like you know, some of our guests here were scared
to have some of these conversations because they're like, oh, man,
like what happens to my perception if I do that?

(14:39):
So we think and we say to ourselves, no, we
have these we don't have any boxes. Yet subconsciously we
put the same boxes ourselves. And we also especially when
we're in a position of success, I found myself giving
a lot of people a lot of advice that you
don't give yourself because we were very easy to talk

(15:00):
and we don't realize we talk to ourselves completely negatively.
Ricky and I we're talking about this yesterday because we're like,
how much do you talk to someone? And you're like, man, listen,
keep going, bro, you have to don't don't even stress
it like life got you, and then when it's happening
to you, you're like I'm going to lose my rent orrow,
Like what's going to happen?

Speaker 1 (15:19):
And you realize that those same words that you told
somebody are the same exact words you need to hear. Well,
A'SU what happens? As humans, we need that reinforcement. We
need that positive reinforcement. Sometimes we need that tap on
the shoulder, that pick me up someone to say, hey,
you know that's we need to be celebrated too. As
humans we don't realize that, but you know, and in entertainment,

(15:40):
not too many people are you know, offer that advice,
or if they're offering that advice, sometimes it's not always
coming from the right place.

Speaker 2 (15:48):
Did it trigger any insecurities? Sure?

Speaker 1 (15:51):
My weight? What I look like? Did I fit the
mold of you know, being on stage and interviewing you know,
celebrities apps.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
How do you feel like you tackled that? Like, you know,
because I find it really interesting when the insecurity kicks
in and your body goes into contraction, right, like the
managing of that in order to not psych yourself out,
because it's always easier to fall into the insecurity or
the fear than it is to like push it away.

(16:20):
So when you noticed it and you were faced with
that reality. Was there anything that subconsciously you did right
away or consciously did to like try to push yourself
out of it, or you just kind of really had
to deal with it over time?

Speaker 1 (16:34):
Deal with it with time, a little bit of experience
going through, you know, you learn to manage your nerves
a little, you know, a lot more your emotions obviously
as we get, as we get older and as we mature.
I learned for me, you know, being under pressure. I
learned with time also that sometimes I feel like I'm
totally in control of an interview or that you know,

(16:58):
I'm involved in a conversation where I think it's absolutely
fantastic and oh man, this is going to be amazing,
and then I go back and watch it or listen
to it, which I don't like going back and listening
or watching myself on videos or even hearing my voice.
It's the weirdest thing, but when I do, because I
dis critique myself so much. But sometimes when I feel
I'm totally in control and my interviews are going fantastic,

(17:20):
I'll watch it or hear and I'm like, oh that was.
And then sometimes when I'm nervous, when i'm less in
control and I think I bombed. I'll watch or hear
that interview and I'm like, wow, that was amazing, that
was good stuff. So it's kind of weird, but I've
found that in this industry, and specifically in radio or

(17:43):
where you're especially you're doing live media these days, you
perform tight, you prepare tight, perform loose. So always know
where you want to take the conversation, always you know,
knowing what you want to get out of it, and
just letting things flow.

Speaker 2 (18:01):
You know, it's interesting that you touch on like the
ones that you think you bomb are the ones that
are really good because you know. One of the other
points that I've discovered was the idea of running away
from the fear the It's kind of what we've been
taught like always look for the light at the end
of the tunnel, or you know, be afraid, and similar

(18:24):
to you experiencing that, I've found in my life that
the harder the situation or the most uncomfortable it makes
me if I lean into that, the bigger the blessingness,
because I've learned that that's where the goal is, Like,
that's the lesson, right, that's the sitting in the fire
instead of running away from the fire moment. Yeah, but

(18:45):
it's interesting that you've related to your own experience because
sometimes again, I feel the exact same thing, the things
that make me super nervous, and then the times that
I feel comfortable is where I've made the mistakes, Like
the times that I'm like, oh, yeah, you know, I'm
one hundred percent I know how to make this deal
and I go do it and I landed, and then
I'm like, oh my god, I could have pushed for

(19:07):
an extra million dollars because I was just so comfortable
in the thing that the fear factor that allows you
to like kind of zoom out and look at yourself
almost as as as the watcher as I call it,
is not there because you're like you're running things in programming,
for sure. So for me it's been it's been really
interesting over the past two years to learn that the

(19:29):
harder the situation, the more that I lean in, the
more that I face that fear or face that and
then I find the goal in that over.

Speaker 1 (19:37):
Creatures of habits. Right, So if you think, you know
how many times when I remember when I first lived
by myself, I'm a homeboy. I love being home. I
love watching movies, relaxing movie days and on weekends. You know,
I live a very noisy life in that there's always conversations,
and there's always phones, and there's conferences and emails and

(20:12):
things that need to be recorded on video and on audio,
and so there's a lot of noise. So when I'm
able to disconnect and keep things quiet, sometimes I purposely
create that oasis where I need that airplane mode. I need,
you know, I want to be in full silence because

(20:33):
I want to talk to myself. I want to hear myself.
I need to have that conversation with myself. How am
I feeling all the conversations that we have as humans internally,
you know, as long as we're not answering ourself. If
you're answering yourself back, especially out loud, then you have
a problem. So they have psychiatrists for which most more
a lot of us could benefit from talking. That's another
thing mental health that we don't talk about, especially with
first responders, is something that's near and dear to my

(20:56):
heart that a lot of people don't talk about these
things because culturally it wasn't things. It was also it's
alcial generational, right because my parents and grandparents never really
and by no fault of theirs, they've done the best
they can with the information they have. That the same
way parents of this generation do. But coming up, if

(21:19):
you know, if the kid had a problem or issues,
you know, they would say kid's crazy, not realizing the
damage you're actually doing. Or now you look back, it's
you know, it's calling somebody crazy. That person mayn't be crazy,
that person may be depressed, that person may be just in,
you know, in in need of a chat.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
Do you go to therapy?

Speaker 1 (21:41):
I've gone, and it's very beneficial. Reluctantly at first.

Speaker 2 (21:45):
Do you feel like you lied to your therapist?

Speaker 1 (21:47):
No, honestly, you know, do you lie to yours?

Speaker 2 (21:50):
Well? You know what I found. I found that, like
I found not necessarily that I lie, but I tell
my own story, right. So, you know, therapist, for the
most part, you're sitting there talking right because they ask
you two questions. I get you going, it's like an interview.
But I found that I respond to a lot of
the things that the person asked originally from a place

(22:13):
of like ego, I want her to prove me right, right,
So I've gone to a lot of couple therapy and
individual therapy, and I'm always like, but this is what's
going on and I need to know this. And then
this person did this and I don't know how to
react to this and this, and then it's like I
started to understand that, Okay, what else can I do here?

Speaker 1 (22:31):
Man?

Speaker 2 (22:31):
Something? Every time I leave out of therapy, I feel
really right, but I sometimes also feel like I needed
to confront myself. So I went and I tried MDMA therapy.

Speaker 1 (22:43):
What's that?

Speaker 2 (22:43):
So it's like ecstasy but in therapy form like hyahuasca,
no very different than ayahuasca. And we will talk about
ayahuasca because I've also done that. Have you done ayahuasca?
I have not? Okay, so we're gonna talk about aska
MDMA therapy. I didn't even know it existed, right, But
essentially you take the purest form of MDM. Isn't that

(23:04):
what ultra is when you go to ultra, Yeah, that's
exactly that. You know, you might be like, you're doing therapy.
I don't know what kind of therapy you're going through therapy. See,
that's what I'm trying to say. You see, so you
learn the ultra they're all kind of crazy things, but
that you you know, you mix it in an apple
juice and you essentially drink it over the time of

(23:27):
your session, which could be hours, like four or five hours. Right,
it's like micro dosing. Yeah, it's like micro dosing, right,
so you don't get the all the effects that you
get from when if you take it, I don't know,
at the club or.

Speaker 1 (23:38):
It's like a healthy micro doc because it's apple juice. Yeah,
this apple.

Speaker 2 (23:42):
You got to watch your way while you do while
you're doing therapy. But the funniest part of it all
is that what I found in that therapy and it's
it's like really laughable. I wish I could have filmed
myself in the times that I do it is that
the first hour the medicine doesn't hit you yet, so
you're talking from that place of eagle, like, you know,
I think that I see this correctly, and and I

(24:03):
don't know why I'm afraid and blah blah blah, but
I feel like I could do so much more in
the world, and and I don't feel like I'm enough.
And you start going into whatever the therapy, and then
when it hits you, what and you realize you're full
of shit? You're full of shit. Like you can call it.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
You can call it on your own, like right now, you.

Speaker 2 (24:22):
Know what it is is that you It's called the
heart medicine. It was originally, if I'm not mistaken, developed
to deal with PTSD from soldiers during the Vietnam War.
And so the open heartness that allows you that's why
people love to take it an altra and stuff, because
all of a sudden, you're everybody, everybody happy, no ego, nothing,

(24:44):
You're just saying to everybody, everybody getting a hide and kiss.
So all of a sudden, your your heart opens up
and your like subconscious opens up, and you can realize
the simple fact of Like I was in one of
the therapy sessions and I was saying all these things,
and the spiritual leader that was leading me through said,
have you ever just stopped and realized you're actually okay

(25:09):
that nothing that is going on in your life changes
the year. Okay, you know, I've done it in couple
therapy and you're like blah blah bla blah blah blah blah,
and at medicine hits and you're like, wow, I'm just
judging you. I want you to believe in my law.

(25:30):
And that's the problem. The problem is our perspective makes
a law. Right. Our perspective says, that's it. When someone
walks into my house, I want them to take off
their shoes and they need to say hi, because that's
how my mother taught me and you might as well.
But when someone takes them out, when someone doesn't or
someone doesn't say hi right away, we're like, oh, that

(25:52):
person's a piece of crap. That person's this, and the
person's that. And it's because we set our perspective as law,
not understanding that. One is just our perspective, right, it's
our filter drink in the water. Two, that person's also suffering.
We're all just humans suffering.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
This is amazing. So psychedelic therapy with apple apple juice.

Speaker 2 (26:15):
Yeah, I mean you get your marriage. Yeah, you know what.
It transformed my life. It really did who I would
have never thought. But it just gave me the understanding mind, dude,
through guidance and a lot of work that I was
looking at life from my perspective making a lot, which
is what happens to us. We've been taught like your parents,
like we were talking about parents, right, they were taught

(26:37):
to do this this way. They have no other way.
And the reality your mind is like the top computer
in the world, and there's things in your mind that
you could do by yourself. Like in your computer, you
might know how to send an email or opening seale. Right,
that's like when you get to read, listen to a podcast,
read a book. That's you doing that. Then there's times

(26:58):
where you're like, man, I don't know how to like
split my screen, so I got to call tech support
at the office. So I call, you know, Joe, Joe,
come here and help me out with this. That's like
what we're doing right now. It's community, right. And then
there's times that you need a software engineer. It's times
you need somebody that works at Google toll come mess
your shit up in order to make the computer work correctly. Well.

(27:20):
To me, what I realized is like, that's what this
alternative medicine has done for me, is the Google software
engineer that says, hey, your mind has the complete power
to change your whole entire life. Is not religion, is
not you know, self help books. It's literally your mind.
You are and if someone is realized you're you're the

(27:42):
truest reflection of everything you could be just how you
look at the world. So if you could change how
you look at the world, you could change your life.
And that's really the work of like tiny Robins and
these guys that are really transformative is that they have
been able to master how to walk you through changing
your mentality. So all of a sudden you feel like
miracles are happening in your life. Is because your output

(28:05):
of life is different and your intake of life is different. Right,
So that was m d m A. Then I was like, Okay,
this is transformative. Let me go deeper. And I have
been scared of doing ayahuasca because when people talk about
ayahuasca they talk about like Peru, right, you know, or
like in the jungle, your foot.

Speaker 1 (28:26):
Half maked, you see all that?

Speaker 2 (28:28):
All that to me screens to the to the no heck,
to the nons coming out. None of that. I'm doing
none of that. Who convinced you, honestly a few of
my close friends and clients, Uh really because it will
be in one of them, and but but really just
convinced me to say, hey, there's there's another way. And honestly,

(28:49):
my spiritual leader who I did the first mdm A
therapy with he was like, you should try it. It
will help you look into other things.

Speaker 1 (28:57):
How is that different than the other therapy? With the NBA.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
Opens you up to listening to the reality of this place.
Right with guided help, you can understand the number one
change of your life, which is everything's perspective that allows
you to see that. Ayahuasca puts you in a dream
stage and makes you deal with your shit. And the

(29:24):
way I've described it to people is like it will
give you answers by showing you the reality of what
it is. And for some people that have traumas and things,
it will make you sit in that trauma and make
you evolve into it.

Speaker 1 (29:40):
Because but is it a voice or are you like
replaying images?

Speaker 2 (29:43):
It's like unlike, you know, some people do other things
and you start seeing fairy details. And this is at
least in my experience, it was completely I was in control.
So it's kind of like when you take a drink
and you're not drunk, you're tipsy, so you feel kind
of you feel something for the most part.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
What is it just like a bad mohito. Some people
have described it as literally testing the jungle.

Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah, it tastes like you just ate some dirt implants.
But here's the thing. All it does is that it
allows you. It puts you in this way where your
brain just starts opening up and whatever you're thinking of
is just going to give you things in that thought process.
So if you at least for me, again, my experience
was I wrote some things down that I wanted to

(30:28):
work on, and it made me sit on those things,
even the painful ones, and gave me clarity on things
that I wasn't addressing. And so for me, it's been
incredible so far. The people that I've shared the experience
with that have done it as well, I feel like
it's been incredible. Uh, it's not for everyone. You you

(30:50):
I think, if you're going in their way too afraid,
you don't feel like you're at that place correctly, it
could you know you're you're going to approach the medicine
with fear. But for the most part, I would say
it is incredibly transformative. It is the software engineer coming
in your mind and doing it.

Speaker 1 (31:10):
It's not like a rewire, No, it is whatever you.

Speaker 2 (31:13):
Wanted to be how so, because it just focuses on
the things you wanted to focus on. Right, Like you said,
you you.

Speaker 1 (31:20):
Went in there with certain things you wanted to tackle
or address written down.

Speaker 2 (31:24):
Yeah, like I'll give you I'll give you a perfect example. Right,
I was feeling some trauma, some pain, some hurt from
how a past relationship had ended. Right, And in typical
human form, I looked at that situation for my POV
and said, oh no, but it's that this person like
they're being like this and they're doing this, and this

(31:46):
is why the situation that happened. And yeah, I did
this bad, but like, shoot, look at all the good
stuff that I've done. And then the medicine puts you
in that and for me one of the most emotional
parts of the journey because it started to show me
the reality of my own bullshit and it started to
show me like, okay, you want to let that go.
Here's how you heal. And I think one of the

(32:08):
biggest things that it really brought to light is digging
deep into the hard moments of your life and like
sometimes we're afraid of go say sorry and have the
hard conversation.

Speaker 1 (32:19):
But here's where I'm intrigued by this. Where is the
here's how you heal? Is it yourself telling you this
is what you're going to do or is it just
a voice that.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
You Literally is your mind running and your thoughts speaking
to you. That's how I described it. It's like I
saw the things and your mind is going through the transition.
Just like Will was sharing something with us about I
am legend right when he fell not on legend and
he said you It was one of the most interesting

(32:47):
acting experiences because he has to act his part and
because he's alone, he has to embrace the energy or
the emotion of whatever he was talking to that person
or when he was talking to for example, the maniche
in the store is like can you have her say
hi to me? Or love? Whatever? Was that? That part?

(33:08):
It's exactly the same thing. It's like you've noticed your
brain whenever you see something that's like ah, I should
go get something to eat, and you're like nah, but
then but then I'm going to feel like crap after well,
your brain does the same thing. When you're in Ayahuaska,
it's like, man, like she's wrong. Wait, wait, wait no,
Like have you thought about it this way? Have you
thought that maybe you just were never honest and that's

(33:31):
what created all that. So to me, just again, it's
software engineering your own mind, So if you haven't tried
to encourage you to.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
Have your chicken shit for.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
That, Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
I like being in control. I don't like anything that
where I don't feel I can back myself out of.

Speaker 2 (33:54):
Really interesting, you said control. Do you feel like you
truly have control?

Speaker 1 (33:59):
No, we really don't have We have very little control.
We have a lot less control than what we would
like to think or admit in everything and outcomes and
lives and relationships and in any situation we walk into.

Speaker 2 (34:11):
So then the story that you're in control is just
the story you're telling yourself because you're your subconscious automatically
went to no, we don't.

Speaker 1 (34:20):
Have control, right, Well, no, that's I think that's a
I think that's just a defense mechanism.

Speaker 2 (34:24):
Just me.

Speaker 1 (34:25):
I'm a very but yeah, but to your point, because
but I called myself out on my own bullshit and
I didn't have to do hyauascar.

Speaker 2 (34:31):
It's really interesting that concept though, because even the idea
of feeling like you need to be in control and
then understanding that you're not totally control, but we approach
everything in our lives like that, And so the question
comes like what if by trying to be in control
while knowing that you're not in control, you're stopping some
sort of bigger blessings.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
That's true, And I'll go back to what I had
a little lapse a little while ago, and I have
forgotten about going, you know, being single or having time
and creating those oasis and your point about feeling uncomfortable
and how many times in our lives don't we do
things that take us out of our comfort zone? And

(35:10):
he had mentioned about that's where the growth is. How
many people had would we have not met if we
don't get out of bed that day? How many you know,
relationships would we not have nourished had we not went
out to a club and bumped into somebody or bought
somebody or drink or someone bought you that drink. But
everything's a risk in life, right, So it's I think

(35:33):
with me with the it's not that I'm not a
risk taker. I like risk, but I think it comes
from my law enforcement background of mistrust, and not in
general mistrust, but in reading people, analyzing people situations. So

(35:55):
I think that's where you always want to you know,
you know you'll see cops when you walk into a restaurant.
Maybe you haven't realized it, but it's part of the
psyche of of law enforcement officers. You'll never see a cop,
for example, in uniform, sit with his back towards the door.
He's gonna sit always facing the doors. He or she
is always looking for if something were to go bad,

(36:17):
an escape route, you know, that's the kind of thing.
So I think that's where it's just a protective barrier.
I think that that that I it's that guard that
I always have up. But it comes from my background.
I mean it goes back to the filter.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
It goes back to the filter, which is it's ah again,
that's that's the U versus your battle, right, It's like
finding we find some sort of security in our teachings.

Speaker 1 (36:50):
Am I going to get built for this therapy?

Speaker 2 (36:53):
But I have a question for you now that we
talked about you've been a cop, and you've mentioned a
few times why why become a police officer?

Speaker 1 (37:01):
Well, service is not a job, it's a calling. And
I learned very on in as a kid that I
enjoy helping people and I enjoy community. I was a
police explorer through high school and then I became a dispatcher,
and then I went to the to the police academy

(37:22):
and the.

Speaker 2 (37:24):
Joys of.

Speaker 1 (37:26):
You know, number one, law enforcement officers and first responders
see human beings that they're worst unfortunately death and they've
been victims of crime. So to be able to step
in and help somebody and transform that negative moment and
that negative contact into something positive. When you find the

(37:50):
guy that carjacked some woman, an innocent family down the street,
when you you know, you chase down and you're able
to grab somebody who's still some old ladies purse, because
you see your parents reflected in these people, and you
see your your grandparents and the human nature of it.
It's just it's just so fascinating. And cops per se,

(38:15):
generally speaking, are a form of psychiatrists, you know, the
good ones that are doing it for the right reasons,
are there to help people through these very difficult situations.
So that something has always fascinated me. When I parked
my police car and traded it for for a microphone,
it was a blessing. I was in my mid twenties.

(38:39):
I saw some funny Now that you asked me, I'm
reflecting back, and I specifically remember when they offered me
to do full time radio to leave police work totally
to do radio full time and host the morning show.
I remember that there was some some people that worked
the midnight shift. I was working the afternoon shift and

(39:00):
we're parking my police car and the midnight shift will
come in, and a lot of those men were about
my age now, two or three of them that had
heart attacks. They were just miserable, upset, and I remember
saying to myself, I don't want to be that guy.
But then now in my role, I feel like I
do a disservice to that profession if I'm not looking

(39:22):
back and helping those men and women that are doing
that job that right now, in my opinion, pays very little.
Not everyone respects, not everybody understands. It's easy to criticize,
especially in the digital era era. You know, when you
see a fifteen or twenty second clip and people want
to Monday Night quarterback that they don't know what that is.
I've been in that situation. I've been shot at, I've

(39:44):
had to shoot to defend myself and then been dragged
through the mud and drag through the dirt and know
the pressure of you know, possibly being indicted and possibly
having you know, people think that cops get up every
day and go out and want to beat people up
or want to kill people. No one wants to make

(40:05):
that decision. That's going to be a burden for the
rest of your life knowing that you took someone's life.
So in my position that I've been blessed to do

(40:29):
better for myself and follow another career path, I take
it with a great sense of responsibility if I'm able to.
Since I've walked that beat and I've been in that situation,
I can speak the truth. I know what it feels
to be in that situation. So why not use my
platforms to prop these good men and women up that
are doing God's work. If you ask me on our

(40:50):
streets to keep peace and law and order, and the
respect is twofold because I respect that profession. I do
it as a volunteer basis now as a reserve Miami
Police officer. They do it in a full time position.
But when I wear the uniform, they say, I think
it is one of us. It's a sense of Hey,

(41:12):
I acknowledgment and respect.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
One of the hardest parts of that job, like you said,
is the being misunderstood right and the potential that being
misunderstood can lead to tragic things in your life, like
going to jail or being convicted or you know. And
I would say, for me, that's like, like you, I've
always admired cops. I've admired soldiers. I come from a

(41:37):
military family, and I always would say that, Like even now,
even the content that I consume is very much driven
by law enforcement and that idea, Like I love the
idea of what you're.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
Doing with Will Smith now and you're a fan of
all the bad boys based on that.

Speaker 2 (41:55):
But I actually love Michael Lorry. If if I would
have been a cop, definitely beer Mike Ler. You're rich,
you and you get to shoot guys that doesn't credb Wait,
Mike Lori had hair. Yeah, damn.

Speaker 1 (42:10):
I had to go there.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
It's okay, I'll guys do it better, you know what
I mean? You know, because the wind would be flowing
through your There is it true that you went bald
because you were doing a but you turns under the sheets?

Speaker 1 (42:20):
Uh?

Speaker 2 (42:23):
I have heard that. That's a funny one. But but
you know, and even training, I do quite a bit
of tactical training on your social media, and it's for me,
it's just like the need to have the high level
of adrenaline to calm my mind down, and so I've
actually become really really good at it because the fear

(42:43):
and everything else is gone. But what I was getting
to is that one of my biggest fears has always
been potentially being in a situation where you get caught
between a circumstance where where it's really perception right like
you you, and then you can face life in prison
or whatever it is, right like so many people that
get accused wrongfully, or you're in the wrong place at

(43:05):
the wrong time, or you know something happened and somebody
passed away when you whatever it is, when you're like
defending yourself, that to me, that level even I would say,
like I don't ever really get angry. I get frustrated,
like frustration, Like so, I can't imagine the frustration I
would feel if I know I'm innocent and I'm stuck

(43:26):
in a situation where I have no control. It's actually
even my fear about marriage always came from not the
actual marriage, the divorce part, because you now have a
court that gets choose and decide how you look at
your own personal life, and that freaked me out. You
know even when I do contracts, that's always the thing

(43:47):
is like I double triple check just because I know
that the moment it leaves your hand and it goes
into a court, it's up and you know, in God's hands.
And I say this to say, you know, what are
you afraid of?

Speaker 1 (44:00):
What?

Speaker 2 (44:00):
What makes Enrique afraid? What do you what do you fear?

Speaker 1 (44:06):
I fear death, not mine, but death and separation, loneliness
of the people that I love most. I just recently
lost my grandfather on my father's side. He was the
last one, so my four grandparents, my mom's mom, my
mom's father went first, and then a couple of years,

(44:27):
oh very quickly, then her father, and then my dad's
mom and now my dad's dad. He lived in ninety five.
We celebrated his ninety fifth birthday and the following week
he checked out. So the fear of I'm not having time,
I'm not spending going back to what we said up

(44:48):
you know we were talking about earlier about if you
say something he's celebrating in life. There's a song that
Gran Puerto Rico look middle and be that with whatever
I'm I'm I meant to receive in life. Let me
have it now while I'm still alive and can enjoy it.
And I try to as much as I can remember
that and hit the brakes and you know, pause and

(45:10):
breathe and understand and enjoy now that this moment. I've
made a lot of mistakes in my life where I'm
always ten steps ahead of myself. I'm always a couple
of weeks or months or years ahead of myself, and
I'm not enjoying them now. So my fear of missing out,
and again this has only come with life, experience and age.

(45:34):
I don't want to keep sucking that up.

Speaker 2 (45:35):
I want to. I want to.

Speaker 1 (45:36):
I try as much as I can to, you know,
silence that phone and not getting sucked into the algorithm,
which I do unfortunately. And it's funny because my partner
actually gets frustrated and he'll take my phone and actually
puts a limit and I haven't taken it off. Just
reminds me I normally get to that limit. It's like
it's like an hour minute and I normally get into it,

(45:58):
like in the first hour and a half half of
my day, and I get the alert, but it reminds
me I still leave it on, and it's funny because
if I have you know, we have a lot of
eyes and bodies that are involved in the production and
the assistance and my show and stuff, and they'll see
it and they'll laugh. Why do you have that? Why?
You know, why do you have that on there? You know,
my partner put that on there, But take take it off.

(46:19):
It's like, now you have to go through that. I said, no, no,
because it reminds me. And it's true that, you know,
we need these reminders to keep us grounded, to keep
us real, to keep us connected, to enjoy the here,
the now, the present that I think a lot of
us fall into because there's so much ship that's competing
for for our attention, right, So what do you pay

(46:41):
attention to?

Speaker 2 (46:42):
Yeah, that's so interesting, the concept of time here, right,
because you know, I recently had a friend who just
like a few days ago, who was getting ready to
go to dinner, and so was her husband. And by
the time she got home from the salon, her husband
had had a heart attack and passed away. And and

(47:04):
you start thinking about like, what could have I have said,
what could have done? And I think it goes back
to the conversation we were having about control you know,
we we seem to want to have control in order
to have safety, and the loss of life around you

(47:29):
allows you to understand you actually don't control anything.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Or we think that we mistake that control is safety.

Speaker 2 (47:35):
Yeah. Yes, it's a narrative you tell yourself about the
well being of yourself through controlling, and especially as as
men as successful man, you know when you see your
dream come true that the one of the biggest fears
is also losing it. Right, so you you tend to
overjudge yourself or be hard on yourself, or think, I

(47:58):
have to work all day long because because if I don't,
then I'm going to lose this success. I'm going to
lose the things that work so hard for I'm going
to lose. And I think one of the hardest part
of that is digesting the fact that you don't have
control and that there is a high level chance that
if you relinquish control you could probably have a better
life experience. My spiritual leader was having this conversation with

(48:20):
me where he said, it's not your job to figure
it out that entails you having control and life is
so uncertain that you actually have no control, and it
played into this belief I've had for a long time
about not believing in balance, because balance is the idea

(48:45):
that you can hold two things in perfect position in
order for it to be driven at the same time.
So you don't believe in balance, No, because life can
throw you anything. If I take this straw and I
put it in my hand and I balance it perfectly,

(49:06):
it just takes and I'll go right. I believe in rhythm.
I believe in finding your rhythm. Your heartbeat works in rhythm.
We talk in rhythm, we walk in rhythm. The world
is flow of energy, and in finding your rhythm, that's
what really instead of I'm trying to find a balance
between work and personally, No, No, you try to find
a rhythm that works for you, and that rhythm could

(49:28):
change sometimes your edms, sometimes your solsa, sometimes your classical music.

Speaker 1 (49:32):
You know.

Speaker 2 (49:32):
But the concept of saying that to me, for me
was like eye opening because it made me understand that
whenever I'm driving, I'm only going as far as my
knowledge knows right, and whenever I'm not driving, I can
let the universe take me wherever the universe is, and

(49:54):
the universe allows me to meet Enrique Santos, the universe
allows me to meet will Smith. The universe allows me
to do the things that I've done, not by I
deserve it, but by design of the universe plans. God's
plans are just bigger than yours. And that's easily said,

(50:15):
harder to believe.

Speaker 1 (50:16):
With that said, where is that balance of letting paying
attention to the universe, letting the universe dictate what's going
to happen, and then your your dreams and your creativity
and what you want to accomplish because it might life
standing in the corner, you know, ten fifteen years ago,

(50:38):
just standing there waiting for the wind to blow. What
you know, you would have not have created the empire
that you've created.

Speaker 2 (50:44):
What I've learned in my personal life is if you
are operating from fear, if you're operating from a place
of distress, I mean I need to control because this
is going to fall apart. And if I fall apart
and the deal doesn't close, and I got to do it,
so I got to stay up all night, that's fear
got it. So to me, what I've learned is when

(51:04):
fear kicks in, stay still, because you can work over
time and still fail.

Speaker 1 (51:13):
It sits still for how long.

Speaker 2 (51:16):
Until you can identify it? Okay, what is not led
by fear.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
So you don't make a stupid mistake or make a
decision based on fear.

Speaker 2 (51:27):
It doesn't even have to be a stupid mistake, so
you don't suffer on your way to reaching your dreams.
Because we suffer because we think, we think, and we've
been programmed to think that if we don't work really hard,
if we don't work forty eight hours a day to
try to finish it, then the success is not going
to happen. But I know a bunch of people, a

(51:50):
bunch of artists, a bunch of managers that work as
hard as I do, don't have what I have, which
tells me that what I have is a gift, or what.

Speaker 1 (51:58):
A combination of things. You just better at what you
do than they are, but it's a gift. You're more determined,
you have more drive, but it's a gift. Your ideas
are better, but it's a gift. At the end of
the day. It's always a gift, right, But you realize
it and that's why you're being blessed. Yeah, buy more gifts.
Some people don't realize it, or some people think that
they're just entitled automatically, you know, to they just deserve

(52:21):
and that they have to have these things because they
just have to.

Speaker 2 (52:24):
I'll give you a good example. When I took over
the company and we started to grow it, and I say,
I went from being an entrepreneur to a CEO. My
idea of being a CEO was being an entrepreneur. As
an entrepreneur, you're accustomed to pinning the wall, doing this,
hitting the thing, like doing everything because you're trying to
hustle up. Right now, It's like, okay, great, we raised money,

(52:47):
we have the companies doing well. We're all good. Now
I'm a CEO and I started speaking to friends of mine,
who you know, are CEOs of multi billion dollar companies,
and they'll be like, so what are you doing this year?
Like what are your travel plans? And I'll be like, man,
I don't even know what tomorrow is going to bring,
like because I might need to cancel my trip. And

(53:08):
one of my friends said, oh, you're not rich enough,
and I was like, what is what He's like, Yeah,
I spend January to March in Aspens, skiing I in
the summer, and I said, but when do you get
any work done, I said lex The key of being
a CEO is understanding that it's just the vision, the
work itself. The idea that you have to over hustle

(53:31):
stops you from having the brain space to think of division.
I have clarity. So the work is hiring the right people,
put in the right and then carrying the vision.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
And then do you think that CEO is planning all
those trips and not in the trenches, not rolling up
their sleeves, not you know, helping paint those walls. Is
that a disadvantage, not limiting themselves.

Speaker 2 (53:54):
To the opposite. They've understood that their value is the vision,
is the creativity is the guidance right, And their value
of the person below them might be operational, and the
value of the person below them might be logistics. And
the problem of it, like what they've understood is that
it is not their job to figure everything out. Is
their job to create the north star and bring someone

(54:16):
that could figure out operation, who can figure out logistic,
who can figure out creativity, who can figure out that.
And that goes back to my original point. If you
take that into your own life and you say, okay, well,
if my job is to be still enough to listen
and know and mature enough to identify when I'm operating
in fear, and it's the universe in God's job to

(54:39):
figure it out. But once they figure out, once they
put the north start, they're the CEO. Once they say
here's where you should go, they're not going to have
the courage to go move cities or leave jobs to
change to another job. Then that's the part where where
I think the difference between people are is that some
people are courageous Tom Brady. On the field, it's you

(55:00):
and fourth quarter because the emotional like that kicks in
and creates the fear and creates the mistakes and creates
the anxiety.

Speaker 1 (55:09):
Going back to feeling uncomfortable, all those emotions that you
just mentioned, kicking into hyper speed and gets that adrenaline
going that we talked about earlier, and you end up
performing better than what you're probably thinking. You are not
in control probably and you know and playing horribly and
you're actually probably playing the.

Speaker 2 (55:29):
Best, which tells you that your mind will psych you out, and.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
That goes that place into the you know, the fight
or flight theory that is also you know ingrained in
in law enforcement.

Speaker 2 (55:43):
Yeah, which is again my background.

Speaker 1 (55:45):
So it's all of that background and training and and
and that also is applied to my daily work.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
But in the process of doing all this work on
yourself and obviously maturing as a man, have you been
able to IDENTI if I kind of the trauma triggers
that have come up and Will and we'll talk about
about Will because because we had the pleasure of working
together in that amazing interview about beautiful scars, But in
Tantrum he talks about, you know, my inner CHIWLD is

(56:15):
throwing at the tantrum. Do you have you been able
to identify that in yourself, Like when when your filter
of the trauma that you might have experienced as a
kid or as a young adult kicks in and you realize, oh,
this is this is my inner child playing the tantrum.

Speaker 1 (56:31):
For sure, I'm very conscious of other feelings and how people.
People will forget words, but people will never forget how
you made them feel. It's a constant thing that I'm
always working on. But I like I like seeing people happy.
I like making people happy, and so Adrika also and
trying to make other people happy has not been happy

(56:52):
a lot of times of my life. So I've identified
also moments where no, it's okay that if you know,
I want to take this trip and it's gonna cost
me so much, it's okay because it's my work, it's
my money. I worked for it, and I'm not going
to feel guilty about it. Or in the past I
would have been, oh, you know, or if I'm buying
a car, if I'm buying a watch, or whatever it

(57:14):
may be. You know, in the past, I would like
guilt trip myself. Not that I didn't deserve it, but
I'm like, wow, but this money could be going to
help another person, another family member. But what's wrong in
I work so hard and I get up every morning.

(57:34):
There's nothing wrong in investing in myself, in my own again,
mental health, it's an investment. I'm not into material things.
I have what I need. I consider myself minimalistic when
it comes to that. You know a lot of people
have five, six seven cars that like collecting cars. That's cool.
I'm just the way my brain works. If I have

(57:56):
more than one car, I worry about, like, Okay, where's
the car charger and what car is it in?

Speaker 2 (58:01):
And where do I leave?

Speaker 1 (58:02):
You know, if I have my hat, I'm just very
that way. So in my my everything in my life
is that way. You know, my closet, I have, you know,
my shirts organized. And if I have something that I
don't use, I don't like having it even in my house,
I'll donate it. I'll find a way, I'll find someone
that make use of it. And but in that I'm

(58:23):
gonna I'm in a constant, you know, not battle, but
I think it is a battle now that I think
of it, to make it. I'm gonna. I'm in a
constant battle to make my life easier and eliminate the
drama and the stress again because I live a very

(58:45):
noisy life because of the work I do. So when
I get home, I want peace. See, I want a
little bit of that balance. I understand what you're saying
is far and it's more about frequency, and it makes sense.
I want to be on the right frequency. I want
to try to find out although balance is never are
you going to find the perfect balance. But I try
to balance my day with work, play, you know, my

(59:09):
responsibilities and me being silly. Just I consider myself, you know,
a silly guy. I like laughing at myself. I like
laughing with my friends and having a good time. And
I'm taking myself so serious because sometimes the line of
the line of work that I do is very serious.

Speaker 2 (59:24):
Part of the journey to that I've learned. My spiritual
leader asked me once. He said, you know, Les here,
you have a given heart. You know, you're really passionate
about helping people. You are always thinking about how to
facilitate someone else's life, and you know you give from

(59:46):
a pure heart. So the question is why are you giving?
And I was like, for all the same reasons you
just talked about. I said, no, no, no, no. Do
you identify when you're giving? If you're giving because you
feel the need to fix, the fear to fix, acceptance
to feel because And I was like, well, how do

(01:00:08):
I notice? I said, well, you ever given to someone
and then when you needed them, they don't, you know,
they're too busy, or they call you back, or maybe
you gave them a roles and they gave you a
casio and you start feeling like why that person acting

(01:00:37):
like that was me? He's like, you were given when
you were feeling good. But when you're contracted and you
don't feel good all of a sudden, it's very easy
to be like bro I'm not calling that person back.
He didn't call me back. I helped him do this
and he didn't even come like I said, wait, wait, wait,
were you given that because you wanted something a return
or you're given And reanalyzing that in my life as

(01:00:58):
I've as I've approached giving giving up my time, giving
off my money, giving off whatever it is is, it's
been really interesting because I have found areas of my
life where I was like, Okay, this is about me
feeling good in this moment because I want that person
to think like, wow, this is such a great guy.
He gifted me and it wasn't necessarily like what it

(01:01:19):
is because the second thing he said to me was like,
stop trying to save people. People don't need saving. You're
preventing life from showing them the lessons when you kick in,
and you kick in trying to save them your way.
So in my relationship, for example, it'd be like, something
goes wrong and I'd have to like to do this,

(01:01:40):
and I don't sometimes consider the emotion my partner might
be feeling because I'm just trying to solve the problem,
because I'm an actual problem solve and solving the problem
is what she needs and all she really needed was
just a hug and say hey it's okay. Like she
didn't need me to go into action and work.

Speaker 1 (01:01:56):
Out remind her that the next time she wants to watch,
That's what I was.

Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
But part of the conversation as well, as we're coming
to a close, do you feel that you're trying to
still discover who Enrique is? Especially? You know, I say,
in our business, we tend to build these customs, right,
and you spoke a little bit about that with Will
and and and we build this this protection mechanism around us,

(01:02:25):
whether that's our team or or our PR team or
or even ourselves, right, like we create Lex instead of
Alejandra because Lex is this image of perfection about you know,
Enrique is the you know, beautiful, smile, funny guy at radio.
And they tend to be protection mechanisms for who we
truly are, right which we we we explore that, and

(01:02:48):
we're exploring that in our conversation as we're going through
this therapy session, this mutual therapy session, this free therapy
session zero point ninety nine not free therapy.

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
I'm afraid of the but I'm afraid of the bill.

Speaker 2 (01:03:03):
But do you feel that that you're still in that
journey of really letting that inside you, that inside and
recau Do you feel like it's you know, it's a
true reflection of everything that you are.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
No for the for the for the most part, you know,
I am. I consider myself a very authentic person. What
you see is what you get. You know, are there
layers sometimes where I, you know, put up certain barriers
and I want to protect myself. Yes, you know, absolutely
take it into consideration. You know that I do a
syndicated morning show every day. I'm in a very vulnerable situation,

(01:03:41):
and I speak very freely about everything and anything. There's
nothing that's really taboo on my radio program with my audience,
which is which has been key to my success. I
would say, you know, my audience appreciates that the way
I look at it. You know, I'm at the same
level with them. I'm not below them, I'm not above them,

(01:04:02):
and people appreciate that. That's been again part of a
big part of my success. So and I keep true
to that. I try to lead by by example. I
don't preach to my audience. But it's amazing lex and
it's so much pressure every day because people will literally,
you know. First of all, for us folks in radio,

(01:04:26):
I like to say that we are the original influencers okay,
before social media.

Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
You know, we are the.

Speaker 1 (01:04:35):
People that is still today. It's amazing how people will like,
what's that shirt that you're wearing? You know, Hey, my
son saw the shoes you were wearing. What brand is that?
Where can I buy those?

Speaker 2 (01:04:44):
You know?

Speaker 1 (01:04:44):
Could you send me the link to this, that and
the other. So so with that, you know, and going
back to what you had asked me about when that
I realized I was famous, and fame to me is
not really I think that's I think it's overvalued. And
I run into a lot of people, especially young people,
Oh I want to be famous. I want to you know,
I I want to be rich. You know, Wow, you

(01:05:07):
have X amount of followers. I want that, you know,
And I'm like, do you really to analyze? You know,
don't do that for the likes, don't do something for it.
And I get asked that a lot. You know, how
can I do what you're what you're what you are doing?
And I'm always just to just tell people, you know,
I do things, on on do things, because that's what

(01:05:29):
you're really passionate about. So I'm passionate about what I do.
I'm blessed, and I realize that blessing every single day
to to have a microphone that you're able to positively
influence people. Especially doing morning radio, you basically set the
tone of what people's day is going to be, you know,
So with that is uh, you know, we filter a

(01:05:51):
lot of not that it's not real, because my show,
I consider is very very real, but I try to filter,
you know, turn take into consideration that they're there's a
lot of co listening. A lot of the people that
listen to me are families that are in commute, that
are taking their kids to school. That there's grandparents and
parents and moms and dads and primarily kids listening right
of all different ages. I take that with a great

(01:06:15):
sense of responsibility, you know, to use the right words,
to be positive, to not be negative in such a
negative world that we live in right now, when everything
it looks to it seems as if it's looking to
to divide us. Just really you know, try to bring
people together, and I get lost sometimes in that in
that process. That's why those quiet times for me are

(01:06:37):
so important, so that I check my shelf so that
I don't believe my own bullshit all without having to
take hiahuasca. Everyone that you'll convince me.

Speaker 2 (01:06:46):
I have this question about being a radio host right
because I find it so interesting to speak to a
mic and not have an audience, and it's like you're
not getting a response right away, so you don't know
if that hit, if the joke hit, if it didn't hit.

Speaker 1 (01:06:57):
You're always going to have that right because we have
no idea how many people you're impacting are listening to
you right now, are watching. Specifically, with audio, it's so unique,
it's so powerful because audio is the one source of

(01:07:18):
media that you don't have to have someone's full undivided attention.
They can be multitasking, they can be listening to you,
and they could be doing exercise, and they could be
listening to you, and they could be eating, they could
be showering and still listening to you. So it's the
only source of media that doesn't require one hundred percent attention,
yet it still has your attention. Does that make sense?

(01:07:39):
And you don't know the impact or how many people
you're actually reaching, And the same goes is true now
for social media with cameras, or how many people are
watching or on demand too, you know audio and video
and is on demand. So we could be having this
conversation here today and they could be in and we
could be impacting somebody, or it could be somebody could
be seeing if for the very first time. Six months

(01:08:01):
from now or a year from now.

Speaker 2 (01:08:03):
What are you most proud of.

Speaker 1 (01:08:06):
I'm most proud of the person that the man that
I had become coming from an immigrant family, my parents
and grandparents that were born in a dictatorship in communists Cuba,
to be able to come to this country. It's funny,

(01:08:26):
you asked me. I had a real come to life
moment the very first time I was invited to the
White House. It was during Hispanic Heritage Month. It was
for a president administration that I had not voted for. However,
that administration decided to invite me to the White House.
I'm in the White House for the very first time.
The bartender serving me a vodka soda was born in

(01:08:47):
Communist Cuba, just like my parents and my grandparents. And
I started thinking, Wow, my brother was actually serving his
second term in the United States Army. Very proud of him,
and that was my It was a very special moment
for me because I realized, Wow, my parents and grandparents
were born in a country that they were never able
to speak their mind or exercise vote democratic vote. Yet

(01:09:11):
here I am in the White House for the very
first time, celebrating my heritage, my Hispanic heritage, celebrating my
grandparents and grandparents. The bartender was born also in Communist Cube,
and he's serving. He had told me he'd served like
six or seven other presidents in his position, with a
lot of pride. My brother's serving in the United States
Army says, where else in the world could you, you know,

(01:09:34):
not vote for a president yet his administration.

Speaker 2 (01:09:37):
Invite you to.

Speaker 1 (01:09:39):
To the to the White House. That's That was a
very proud moment for me. I've had a lot of
proud moments like that throughout my career and blessed to
have simple things.

Speaker 2 (01:09:49):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:49):
I've had a lot of big accomplished, big accomplishments, and
I'm proud of all of those, but I think I'm
most proud of the simple things when people come up
to me and say thank you. I was going through
a dark time in my life. I thought about checking out,
doing harm to myself, doing something stupid and I heard
your radio program, I came across some of your content,

(01:10:10):
and you changed my day. You made me happy. So
those are the things that I'm that I'm proud of
when I'm able to connect, when I get people that
saying hey, because I identify with that too. But I
I with the language thing and the cultural thing my
parents are are. You know, we're born in Cuba, but
I was born here in the United States, and I
speak fool Spanish only because my parents told me I

(01:10:32):
cain gos and I'm so thankful to that. But I
get so many people now and parents tell me, hey,
thank you, like thanks for what? Because thanks to you
and your prank calls and your interviews and your content
that you do with the English on the English side,
I'm able to show my kids that, you know, you
can be Latino and live simultaneously in two worlds and

(01:10:54):
still have have success in your You're an example of that.
I'm like, that makes me proud?

Speaker 2 (01:10:59):
Is it?

Speaker 1 (01:10:59):
My kids are now learning they were born here in
the United States, just like you, but they're learning now
that they're learning to speak Spanish, they want to you know,
So you've made basically as they're saying, you've made Spanish cool,
you know, enough for my kids that were born here
in the United States to want to speak the language.
And then with that, you know, I identify with that

(01:11:20):
because I embraced also my cultural identity, you know, early
on as as an adolescent. But I remember as a
young young kid, I rejected a lot of that. I
rejected a lot of Spanish language and Spanish music and
not so much culture because I was still in the culture.
But all my primos and my friends at school everyone
spoke English, you know. So I'm proud of the little things.

Speaker 2 (01:11:45):
I love that love that, you know, it is the
little things that really count, I think, you know. So
on the show, we always do something and you know,
you versus you is the idea that, you know, the
biggest battle we have is our internal one, and that
the words, the power words have go beyond to your point,

(01:12:08):
not only what we can say to others. Right, And
I always say, I can tell you I love you,
and you could feel that. I can, you know, curse
at you and you can feel that. And I realized
that we are with ourselves more than we are with
anybody else, and we're speaking to ourselves more than we
are to anybody else. And so I believe in the
power of the words we are saying to ourselves. And

(01:12:32):
we started this since the top, and it's what is
one sentence that you can say to yourself right now
that will change the way you perceive this week?

Speaker 1 (01:12:48):
Wow, I love you, Take care of yourself, pay attention
to where you're at and the positive impact that you
have on others, and what you're fponsibility is in this
moment in life. We're responsible for our actions, right, and
we get tied up in so much bullshit. We've got
to be better well and Drika has got to be

(01:13:10):
better for himself. It's it's it's touching to me this
one particular question that you're asking me and how you're closing,
because I recently wrote a letter to myself and if
you haven't done it, I recommend it. I was just
going through some old pictures of Endrikuae as a kid,
and I started, Wow, what was I thinking that in
that moment and that you know in life, in that

(01:13:32):
particular moment that day. It's trying to like reminiscing taking
me back there, looking back to and even to your
question when you ask one of my you know, most
proud of in my life. And I look back and
I'm like, wow, I'm proud that I'm proud that I
am where I am. I'm proud that I made it
to where I am. But I guess so much, so
much more to go. I think one of the best

(01:13:58):
therapeutic things and if I can, I recommend everyone doing it,
sitting down, taking a day to yourself, writing yourself a letter,
write a letter to yourself. It was very it was transformative,
it was very, very powerful, and it took me back
to that moment with your question. I think we need

(01:14:20):
to listen to ourselves more, you know, be better to ourselves.

Speaker 2 (01:14:24):
Yeah, I would say mine is you're okay, no matter
what seems like it's not. You're okay and everything's okay.
And sometimes again it's the most the most powerful thing
you could say. And I'll steal this one from will

(01:14:46):
Is as you can make it. You know, it's like
you're okay, right, that concept of like everything that is happening,
it's just irrelevant to the fact of how you're internal
and even for myself and the work and everything.

Speaker 1 (01:14:59):
But do you find your like saying to yourself that
you're not okay.

Speaker 2 (01:15:04):
I find myself not saying that I'm not okay. I
find myself facing the circumstances sometimes in my life and
feeling the contraction of fear or feeling the contraction of stress.
And while I've gotten again a lot better at catching
it and at least being aware, it doesn't stop from

(01:15:27):
you know, it's not a day and night changed. No
one's ever arrived, right. So I find myself being sometimes
in places where the circumstances of the day well send
my body into shock, and even things like you know,
before coming here this morning, last night, I had the

(01:15:48):
weirdest dream, like but it was a nightmare.

Speaker 1 (01:15:52):
Like I woke up, I had that effect, you know,
I knew it was you.

Speaker 2 (01:15:59):
I woke up. I was like Jesus nosque, but like
I had one of those dreams that like, I rarely
have nightmares, but it it It triggered an emotional reaction
in my morning or even while I was at the gym,
like I was trying to kick off the thought of

(01:16:22):
the possibility of the nightmare that I was having even happening,
and I noticed my body going into shock right in
the middle of a work on I caught myself doing that,
and so I felt the need to tell say, hey,
you're okay. You know, but it felt so real and
it came from circumstances that were happening in real life.

(01:16:43):
So it was like, you know, when you overthink something
at night, your your brain takes you for the ride,
like like when you do ayahuasca. But so you know again,
same thing as like the power of really catching yourself
and being able to say the words, because it's it's
like that. In therapy, they use this exercise and where

(01:17:07):
you they tell you close your eyes. Imagine you're driving
down the PC in California and you hear the waves,
and you hear the wind blowing, and you hear the
engine of your car, and then you see these amazing
orange trees and you pull up down the side of

(01:17:29):
the road and you pick one out and you cut it,
and it's just all the water you bite into it.
Your brain believes that it's happening, so it creates for life.
And that idea of that exercise from a mental state
shows you how powerful your words are because you can

(01:17:52):
create that same change in your life through what we
say to ourselves. So it's why I asked this question
always at the end, because I've really believed that the
goal of sharing this, this this fellowship with each other
is that that you can leave out of here more
blessed and more enlightened and more joyful than than when

(01:18:13):
you walked in. So with that, thank you, brother. I
appreciate you coming and being on this journey with me.
I'm excited and I'm excited to share the story, share
this time together, and thank you. And I'm excited to
catch up later and and and talk about your journeys
as we both evolve, right And but I'm so proud

(01:18:33):
of everything you've done. I'm so proud of of who
you are and who you've been to me since day one,
since I started this company, since before I knew anything
about Latin music. You've always shown up. You've shown up
to an event in the middle of COVID for me
like that that goes ways, you know, that goes beyond.

(01:18:55):
And so I really appreciate who you are in my life.
I appreciate your friendship and and thank you for being
a part of this journey. You versus you.

Speaker 1 (01:19:02):
One of the things that I really enjoy and that
really make me proud is to see uh friends succeed
to have have a dream and and you know, to
see them grow even beyond what they what their original
plan was. And this happens all the time when I meet,
you know, people in the industry, when I meet you know,
new artists, when they come in, they have to see

(01:19:24):
them grow and then all of a sudden touring the
world and charting and becoming you know, some of the
most popular artists on the planet. That that all those
things make me very proud that I had at least
a little bit to do with with that, with their
with their journey and I and I'm proud of your journey.
And this has been fantastic. I'm just scared of the

(01:19:44):
bill I'm going to get for.

Speaker 2 (01:19:45):
This session to change change.

Speaker 1 (01:19:48):
This is going to be one therapy session. I am
a lot happier now leaving than when I got here.
Appreciate you, Love that, Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:19:56):
Thank you you. Versus you. As a production of Neon
sixteen and Entertained Studios in partnership with the Iheartmichael Tuda
podcast Network. For more podcasts, listen to the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

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Episode Transcript

Host

Enrique Santos

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}From You vs You with Lex Borrero: Enrique Santos on Breaking Free From Labels