# MastermindTalks Keynote 2016 | Gary Vaynerchuk

## Метаданные

- **Канал:** Gary Vaynerchuk
- **YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4
- **Дата:** 02.10.2016
- **Длительность:** 1:42:26
- **Просмотры:** 266,774

## Описание

BEING SELF AWARE IS KEY. NO ONE IN ANY ROOM IS GREAT AT EVERYTHING. I BELIEVE IF YOU WANT TO BUILD A BUSINESS AT SCALE YOU MUST TRIPLE DOWN ON YOUR STRENGTHS AND CREATE UPSIDE FROM THAT RATHER THAN WASTING TIME FOCUSING ON YOUR WEAKNESSES. 

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Gary Vaynerchuk builds businesses. Fresh out of college he took his family wine business and grew it from a $3M to a $60M business in just five years. Now he runs VaynerMedia, one of the world's hottest digital agencies. Along the way he became a prolific angel investor and venture capitalist, investing in companies like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Uber, and Birchbox before eventually co-founding VaynerRSE, a $25M angel fund.

The #AskGaryVee Show is Gary's way of providing as much value value as possible by taking your questions about social media, entrepreneurship, startups, and family businesses and giving you his answers based on a lifetime of building successful, multi-million dollar companies.

Gary is also a prolific public speaker, delivering keynotes at events like Le Web, and SXSW, which you can watch right here on this channel.

Find Gary here:

Website: http://garyvaynerchuk.com
Wine Library: http://winelibrary.com
Facebook: http://facebook.com/gary
Snapchat: garyvee
Twitter: http://twitter.com/garyvee
Instagram: http://instagram.com/garyvee
Medium: http://medium.com/@garyvee

## Содержание

### [0:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4) Segment 1 (00:00 - 05:00)

(upbeat techo music) - I'm never interested in bullshitting. We are going to, not a mobile first world, we're going to a mobile-only world. AI and automation will never stop. We're gonna become robots. And nostalgia is the most under-priced asset in our society. I can buy a business for $80 million, and sell it for $4. 6 billion. Can we win? Like can we fuckin' sell shit? Losing is comfortable. Losing is delicious. There's just no other gear. Your destiny is your destiny. It's on you. I just don't even know how not to be me. - I know we said we weren't gonna have any speakers at this event, but I didn't say Q and A's. So, we're very, super grateful that Gary was able to join us. Most of you, anybody not familiar with Gary? It's a pretty tuned in audience! - [Gary] It motivates me! - Well yeah, there's a lot of people, obviously, there was a little bit of a procession when he was coming in, almost like a wedding or something like that. Super excited, Gary's here for just a little bit. I know he has a conference call right around the corner, so we're just gonna go right into a Q and A. Gary's amazing when it comes to rants, it's funny how I actually decided on Gary. We did a comedian in year two of Mastermind Talks, during a dinner. And it was so well received, and I was like, man it's be great to have like a comedian who actually could deliver great business stuff, and I was like fuck, Gary's hilarious! So, that's why we have Gary here. So, ladies and gentlemen, no introduction needed, Gary Vaynerchuk! (applause) - Thank you. Super pumped to be here. Obviously a lot of friends that I know intimately, so that makes it a lot of fun. Yeah, you know, obviously a lot of what I've been focused on for the last couple years has been to actually push my brand into a place where I could go to an event and just do Q and A. Which I think at the end of the day, knowing so many of you, I'm and will always be concerned about can I bore people? Can it become boring? And there's a lot of you that really know me, the truth is there's so few things I believe in. There's really only three or four true kind of like principles that I believe in. Luckily for me, and luckily for so many of us, we got to live during this era where everything changes so much. I'm baffled by people not understanding what happens when we move to a Snapchat universe, all the same shit that happened on every other platform that had people's attention, whether it's print or radio, television, or Facebook, so for me, thank God that the markets gonna move on an everyday basis and thank God people get old. And what I mean by people getting old is at South by Southwest it was funny. Chris Sacca exposed this thing in his big Vanity Fair piece, which we make fun of, but for years we had this very small group that at South-by would get together at like midnight and go in literally just a small hotel room, just sit there and we would basically, we called it the jam session, all it was literally "Is Pinterest worth a billion dollars? " "What do you think is gonna happen with Uber? " and we did that for seven or eight years, it was really interesting to see where people were right and wrong, and it was just amazing debates and I learned so much. But to me the Q and A and the banter and the content is so imperative. It was two years ago at the jam session where literally the founders, the founders of Twitter and Instagram and these tools poo-poohed Snapchat. And like just really, it was crazy. I was literally emphatically yelling at them, like you guys changed the world, and everybody said the same shit about your product five years ago, how did you get so old so fast? (audience laughs) And so you know, obviously whether it's entrepreneurship or investing or running a company, I think for the people here that have had the time, 'cause I know some of you are so busy, in the last six months to a year I've been spending a lot more time on what really has allowed me the privilege of standing in front of you which is, I'm not really IQ strong, I'm really probably, I would actually argue that I'm probably below-average to average on IQ, but I do think my parents blessed me with over-the-top EQ, and my emotional intelligence and self-awareness and empathy and the way I built my, you know, the reason VaynerMedia has gone from 30 to 650 people and hasn't broke is predicated so much on EQ. And then consumer behavior, like projecting what I think you guys are gonna do before you realize you're gonna do it, has a little bit to do with that stuff as well. So, thrilled to go anywhere, I'm real excited to do Q and A and thanks for having me. Are you guys gonna mic it? You gonna run it? Great. Let's just get into it. Just name and question. - [Cameron] Cameron Herold, I've got a question regarding second in command. I ran a session today about your Chief Operating Officer.

### [5:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=300s) Segment 2 (05:00 - 10:00)

I wanna know who is running VaynerMedia for you and what makes the relationship between you and that person so strong. - So that's an interesting question, and an interesting time to ask that question. This Friday, my brother A. J. who's been the C. O. O. of VaynerMedia from the beginning is leaving the company. I think some of you might have read a month ago AJ finally announced, cause he's been very private about it, my brother has Crohn's Disease. And truth is, and I know some of you know AJ, AJ and I are really different, just like I'm much more, I mean AJ is thrilled to have his seven friends and I'm desperate to be deep friends with every fucking person in here. (laughter) And so AJ was no question the C. O. O. of the company, for the first five or six years. Over the last year and a half we knew this was coming so we commoditized him out. There's a guy by the name of James Orsini, who ran for 25 years ran big agencies, Satchi and things of that nature. You know the truth is and something I've been talking a lot about with my own friends, not as much publicly, maybe John knows, very few people know this in this room, maybe one or two, I really run VaynerMedia. Like I think because I play GaryVee as my side hustle, and because I'm good at it, and because I work 18 hours a day, a far majority in this room, including people like Dale, like people at Yanek, like people I really know, I don't think really understand how much I actually operate the business. And so, for me, every operational decision runs through me, I've got a lot of context on it, I'm there. And I think the key, and I'd be curious and we can maybe talk afterwards, I think the key for me in having a number two, or number three, is less about them running it in the way that you framed it, it's more about them complimenting the things that you're not good at. Like, I'm very self-aware. Right? For example, knowing that 20% of you, a lot of you don't know me, but knowing the ones that know me knowing that 20% of you didn't even like me on first impression at a conference or things of that nature, like self-awareness is imperative. And as an operator, I'm very self-aware and I know where my short-comings are. And so I think for anybody here that's looking to scale, I think there's way too much pride in this collective room, like nobody here is good at everything. And that's super real. And I think we all know that. And we have strengths and weaknesses and I think, I've been a guy, and I've watched a lot of companies do this at scale, I really believe on tripling down in your strengths. I do not, I'm not a big fan on working on your weaknesses. I think you have to be dangerous in your weaknesses, like I'm not a dope when it comes to the finances or the other things that I don't wanna do, but I'm far from being interested in being world-class in it, It just doesn't leave enough room for you to be world-class at what comes natural to you, which is always gonna have more upside. So, it's been AJ, it's gonna be James, I'm building something else, I don't know, I'm sure a lot of you that have bigger organizations if you're not in a solo entrepreneur land and if you've run companies, one of the things that I realize and I realize I did at Wine Library and I'm gonna make it official at VaynerMedia, is I'm gonna create something called Office of the CEO. So there's gonna be these six people and they're my family, they're the inner circle, they're the people that nobody else in the company tells anything to because they know that the second they tell them they're gonna tell me, right? Everybody's got that inner circle, and by the way, some of them are ranked number five in the company, and another person might be number 174 salary level, so now I'm gonna make it official because they just help me scale. When there's that level of trust, I think sometimes people silo a level of trust just to your right-hand woman, right-hand man, like one or two people, I actually am looking for scale, and so I'm gonna build a five, six person team that basically is just gonna take care of the thing that's the most important to me right now. Like we just landed one of the biggest banks in the country. I can't even announce it yet. One of the biggest banks in the country, it's gonna be 30% of our revenue, it's an enormously big client, I really need to make sure it goes well. I need to put everything on it besides the great team I put on it. So they'll keep an eye on that. And this one employee that I think is a superstar and they're gonna vet it, so the other thing I would give a recommendation to that has I think thematics into were you're going, is building an inner circle that everybody in the company knows is you. Just even the five people within an organization in that group won't even have a title within it. It's just gonna be, that's what they are. Office of the CEO. Something to consider that I see a lot of value in. Thanks for your question, man. - [David] Dude, David Osborne I was born in Austin-- - Are you literally that lazy? You just...

### [10:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=600s) Segment 3 (10:00 - 15:00)

You couldn't go there? (laughing audience) - [David] Gotta sit up front. - Just gonna stay up here. - [David] So... (laughing audience) Dude, I was born in Austin, Texas. Two questions: One, what the fuck is Snapchat? Man, I got on it because you told me to get on it, and I still don't know what the fuck it is or why I'm on it! (laughing audience) I know a lot of young people follow me, and I got no idea why-- - [Gary] That's a very common marketers' question right now. - The second one is what you invest in outside of VaynerMedia. Do you put money in anything that cash flows or anything like that? - [Gary] Got it, so... I'll answer second one, because it's very detailed. I had a $25 million venture fund called Vayner/RSE. I'm closing one called Vayner Capital, that I'll be announcing in the next month or so. It's gonna be a $55 to 70 million fund, very different. Vayner/RSE was 25 million, when I made 100 investments. So a lot of different things, more angel investing like I used to do. This new one I'm gonna raise 50 to probably end up being 60, 70 million dollars. I'm probably only gonna invest in 10 companies. So it's going to be much later stage, and I'm use VaynerMedia and its capabilities to help the outcome of companies that are further along. So I've always Angel-- I've made up net between Wine Library, which has been a very successful business for a very long time, that I get income from 'cause I ran it and it's family business, Vayner, I get seven figure book advances, and I get paid six figures to speak. Like with all that lucrativeness, the investment in Uber and Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr and Buddy Media those are gonna end up making me the most money. So that's what I do. And then, but... I really truly see myself as an operator. You know, I will never not run a business. At scale, by the way. I'll never-- And this is a fun thing to say in this room, I will never be GaryVee full-time. Like, even though it's gotten to a place, and it's starting to get to a place where I think I can make a lotta money doing it, I just really enjoy running businesses. Snapchat is very simple. I mean, it's just attention arbitrage, right? It's... It's a platform that people are consuming their content from. There's nothing else to say. The stories, have you gotten to a point where you understand-- That's the newsfeed. It just looks a little bit different. You know, it's interesting. If you take your phone right now and look at every social network: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn-- if you consider it that, Pinterest... Like if you literally put all seven of the things we group up with: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram They all, functionally, are the same. It's basically one hardcore piece of content, and then social commentary in one shape or form, and then you just go this way. Snapchat has been the most confusing, 'cause it had totally different UI/UX experience left and right, up and down, very confusing. What's interesting though, on the flip side, is if we were to go and I'm actually thinking about making this video, because I've just realized this through friends and family that are what I call normals, not in our world. Just like kids I went to high school with, right? If you go to Times Square right now, and you give 20 people Snapchat, that have never used it, within an hour, if you help them, within an hour, they really understand it. And just to give you context, that never happened with Twitter. As somebody whose grown up in the last 10 years, normals never fully understood Twitter, and they really understand Snapchat, and they're addicted to it. And so... Just another place for people to create content. You know. I think the bigger thing-- The reason I'm so bullish on it and the reason in December and January I got very loud about it, even though I've been talking about it for two years, is DJ Khaled was the cherry on top of understanding, and we kinda started talking about a Vayner in September, "shit. " 30, 40 year olds are starting to use this and for real, and this is how they all go, either they start in a tech-nerd environment or a kid environment, right? Then they bubble up, and then the first thing you'll notice is 30 to 40-year-olds in New York, San Francisco, and L. A using it, and then that will happen in the middle of the country. And then it'll go 40, 50, 60, 70. Snapchat's already bigger than every other social network that's come before it, except for Facebook. Already, right now. Instagram, yes, but Instagram's such a weird one cause it got bought 500 days into its lifecycle. And so it got vigged so much by Facebook. And so... It's just an important place man. I, for this room, there's no more important place right now to figure out how to story tell and do what you do. How you communicate, what you sell, except contextually, you have to figure out how that works in a Snapchat environment. Because the biggest fear I have for people that are

### [15:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=900s) Segment 4 (15:00 - 20:00)

entrepreneurs, growth hackers, smart, doing their thing, is we're going to not a mobile first world. We're going to a mobile only world. Right, like, I'm on a three-day business trip right now. No laptop, this is it. That blows my mind. Like, that's just crazy to me, that I don't have my laptop. I'm running business-- like I do stuff! This is not like, you know, and so there's a lot of people here that rely on their tactics in a digital environment based on landing page optimization and all the things they think about in a desktop universe. And so A, what you're doing on your website and how you're storytelling to the world, you have to figure out mobile only and B, and probably more importantly, as you guys know, it's being contextual and relevant in all these other channels, as well as being relevant in your home base. And so, that's that... (microphone) - [Zach] Hey Gary, my name is Zach Obront. Question is, I've heard you mention before that you think of VaynerMedia as 650 people to leverage you. - Yes, the scalable version of my marketing talent, yes. - [Zach] What's the thinking both from a why perspective and a how perspective of doing that versus the most typical agency model of trying to remove yourself or make it more self-sufficient without you? - Well it is self-sufficient without me. And why don't you hold the mic because there might be a detail here. - [Zach] Yeah. - It's fully self-sufficient without me. I think, again in the same way as your first question, I always think the paradox of how I run shit and what I'm excited about to keep you interested for 10, 20, 30 years Most of what it looks like is going on isn't. I think you'd be very fascinated by the fact that, I don't know, of the 100 million dollars in revenue from VaynerMedia will do this year, 60 or 70 of it has almost has nothing, like I don't even know the client. Nothing. They're not buying Gary Vaynerchuk, of course once in a while they may think that, but we're very clear that this is an agency. So it's very self-sufficient without me. But why it's the scalable version of me is the craft that the agency is doing. Meaning we're leaving a ton of fucking money on the table, by not doing banner ads, by not doing search, by not doing a ton of shit. We probably left $25 million straight up on the table, by not wanting to build websites. When I say it's a scalable version of me, my main plan seven years ago was, how am I gonna buy- As I started meeting Zucks and Travis and stuff, I was like, "Fuck I'm not these guys. "This is not who I am. " And back to self-awareness, I'm like, so I'm not gonna make my money the way they're gonna make their money. Seven years ago, I'm like, "How am I gonna buy the Jets? " Right, and so... (laughing) I decided that what I was better at than all of them was I could sell shit better than them and stuff. And then I kinda gave it a lot of thought for a year, and I said, "Huh. " There's this guy by the name of Dean Metropoulos, he's just a private equity guy, but he did something that I believe in. I'm a very big believer that nostalgia is the most under-priced asset in our society. For example, had I been further along, and I wouldn't have seen it, but had I been further along, it would've made sense for me to buy Marvel in bankruptcy and then make it into movies and make a trillion dollars. That makes sense to me, because the Hulk has been around for a while. Like, Spiderman matters. Dean Metropoulos bought Tuna Under The Sea tuna fish, he bought Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, he bought Bazooka Joe Gum, and then he just runs them better and flips them. For me, I wanna buy brands like Snickers or PUMA or Lacoste or I don't know, Timex or Peter Pan Peanut Butter. I wanna buy brands that have been neglected that are under-priced. Run them through the VaynerMedia machine, and then flips them, because those are the kinda things you-- I can buy a business for $80 million and sell it for $4. 6 billion, if I can do what I've done in two businesses that I've ever run, which is growth revenue, extraordinarily quick. That's what I set out to do, which meant that was gonna have to eat shit for 10 years, at the height-- and again, Dan a couple people here, you guys knew me, like I had a lot of leverage in 2007 '8, '9, '10, I was in it. When I announced VaynerMedia Zucks texted me and said, "The fuck are you doing? "Building an agency, client services? " I was a disappointment to all my tech-titan friends. I mean it! Like, straight up disappointment. But, I was like, "Cool, you go do you "and make trillions and change the world. " (audience laughter) I just need to make $4 billion to buy the Jets. And so this is the only way I know how to do it. And so it look a lot of humility and patience to get here seven years later and have what I have.

### [20:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=1200s) Segment 5 (20:00 - 25:00)

It also took the fact that I had to know that my people skills were much better than everybody else's. So that I'd be able to keep. Because my vulnerability is they could leave tomorrow. Not building a product, I'm not in SaaS business. But I also had enormous confidence in my ability on a people level. And so that's where we're at. And so that's what I mean by that. - [Zach] Awesome, thank you. - Yeah. - [Ben] Hey, I'm Ben Greenfield, fitness. com/snapchat. (laughter) On page seven of your book, which I've owned for about 10 minutes now, it rocks. You talk about how one of the biggest lessons that you learned in 2015 was that you had to start taking better care of yourself. - Yes, health-wise. - [Ben] And I'm curious to get a little bit more of the nitty-gritty details about that, like what'd you do as a busy family man, entrepreneur to start taking care of yourself? - Well John why don't you come up here, and why don't we tell this story together? (laughter) - [John] I was hoping you'd say that. - You got it. - Is there a mic up here? - Yeah, let's get a mic for this man, this man has a lot to do with it. Let's clap it up for this guy. (audience applauds) - Hey, guys. This is very exciting. - I'll let him take over at some point, 'cause he'll know where to take over, I'll give you the context. Basically, super-fuckin' random, like just random fuckin' flight from San Francisco to New York. I'm just sitting there and I'm like you know, when am I gonna take care of this health thing? I know that it's not right, I know I'm not winning, I got into a good place in my head around my health where I looked at it like a business, and I said I'm not doing the behavior that's gonna make me successful and eventually this is gonna catch up, and the weird thing is, it got to a place where I was like, wow, I don't do anything right. I eat like shit, I've never worked out once in my life, and somehow I can literally work 18 hours a day and not be tired, and my fat is equally proportioned through my entire body so it's hiding (audience laughs) how fat I am and like inside I must be fuckin' Yokozuna from WWF but it's not like, you know. And so, I just started talking to myself, I talk to myself a lot, and I was like, I need to address this. So that's what I said, and then the flight's delayed. Super funny, it happens, no big deal. And I'm just talking and talking, and I was like you know what, when I turned 30, I freaked my shit with Wine Library and I started Wine Library TV and got into tech and I completely changed my behavior. On my 30th birthday. Driving to Wine Library, looking in my rear view mirror, I'm like, literally this is what happened, my birthday, my 30th birthday, I looked at myself dead in the mirror, in my rear view mirror, and I said "You're fuckin' full of shit. " and what I would say to myself, talking to myself I was like, you say that you're gonna buy the New York Jets, none of your behavior maps you pulling that off. And so if you're gonna do it, you better lay down some serious foundation from 30 to 40 because family's coming and all this, right, so I said to myself, "Wouldn't it be romantic if on my 40th birthday, "because I don't think I need another, "what am I gonna work, from 19 hours a day to 24? " I was like, that's not gonna be it, I was like, you know what, health. That'd be a really good one to address, let me get my shit together there and literally before the flight took over, I said, 'cause I was 38 and four months old, I was like, fuck it, why wait 'till 40? I'll do it at 39. And then, literally, I was like you know what, fuck it, I'll do it as soon as possible. And so that happened about a year and a half after we met where I tried my first version of what I just told you, which was I decided to go the peer pressure route, and I publicly Tweeted and Facebooked that I wanted to get a trainer that's when you took over. - Yeah, so this is 2011, I think? - Mhmmm. Maybe '12. - It was right when Thank You Economy came out. - Okay '11. - 2011-ish and Gary and I met. he was giving a talk at the Apple Store in SoHo, I went down in my Jets gear which is not like me blowing Gary, I'm just a big fuckin' Jets fan to my ever-lasting dismay and so we met, we chat a little bit, just rapport building relationships and as most people do inappropriately, he commented on my physique, turned out I was trainer, give him my card, which he then lost. Couple week later-- - I threw it out. - Yeah, fuck this. (audience laughs) 'Cause at that point I was like, 2011 John was like I'm super professional, business cards. I should have just fuckin' Tweeted at him. And then, he put up on Facebook that he needed a trainer and so people did what is inexplicable to me, people who follow Gary, instead of leveraging what they do, they all just jumped on that Facebook thread, pick me, pick me and the shit that Gary talks about not doing.

### [25:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=1500s) Segment 6 (25:00 - 30:00)

And so I was like fuck that and I just posted on my Facebook and sent everyone on my page over to blow up his thread and so then, I got an email maybe 20 minutes later from Phil Torano who was then Gary's assistant and that Monday, I was in the gym with Gary. So the plan, initially, was to train four to five days a week, for an hour and then Gary made it a habit of cancelling on me at least three times a week. And I let him off the hook. It was really cool to be working with Gary. But we do a lot of work together. And then-- - That story, I'll jump in, so that's right. Because, by the way, and I talk a lot about it in business, for some of you that are following along. I talk about religion over tactics. I just wasn't in the religious place to take care of my health. I was half pregnant, that's why I cancelled. I'm publicly saying I never get sick. He's supposed to work out with me at 6:30, at 6:22 I'm like, dude, I'm so sick. (audience laughs) - Yeah, mother fucker. I was in West Village at the time going to the Upper East Side like a $40 cab ride. And it's like, this mother fucker. It's like, it's cool bro. - We built a really nice relationship and when I made that decision, the first thing I did was call him and I said, "I need your help. " And what my plan was, was what I realized, by the way, in that moment, was I was not held accountable to myself. - Right, and so he called me and he's like, "I have this crazy idea. " "Tell me if it's retarded. " "What I would like to do is hire someone "to be completely in charge of my body. " "I want to bring them on full time "as staff and they're going to be "in charge of my food, "they're going to travel with me, "take care of my workouts and everything. " And I said, "I think it's a great idea "if you don't fuckin' cancel on them all the time. "But you also have to find somebody who's good. " You got to, someone who sits in the venn diagram of being good enough for me to feel comfortable recommending them. I had moved to L. A. at this point, I was no longer eligible for this job. And they have to be good enough, at a point in their business where it makes sense to only have one client. It needs to make sense in all these different facets. And so, the only guy I could think of was a kid who had started as an intern for me, he became my prodigy and then started his own business, Mike Vacanti. And so Gary had trained with him briefly. - That was the worse four months like two sessions. - Yeah like in four months he had like three sessions. And so, I was like, "Mike will kill it for you. " He really is, he's a great trainer and a phenomenal dude and I knew that he had the right metal to be able to work with Gary and travel with him 300 days out of year at points. And so that's how it started. And so Mike became the CEO of Gary's body and since then, Gary has made tremendous physical changes and it's also given him a lot more energy and that's more or less the gist of that. - Has not given me more energy. I'm just fully, has not. (audience laughs) - He's less broken than he was. - No, I mean look, look. I mean, do I expect a 57 like I'm not naive that there's so much good that's supposed to happen but like, I never want to say things that haven't happened. I don't have more energy. What I do have, is at least my left glute is now active. (audience laughs) That is something I have now. Who knew that a glute could go so inactive? Go sit down, I got more to do. - Here you go man. - Thanks, good to see you, love you bro. (audience claps) So, the answer is and this is how I believe about every business. I talk a lot about fitness entrepreneurs who are so good about their physique and their regime and all that, but then, in their business, their looking for the secret or the 12 courses that don't let them do the work. Once I made the religious decision to do the work and I had one interesting unlock that maybe can help you in some way. I figured out, in that really zen place. I was like, fuck, it's 'cause I'm not competitive with myself. I don't give a shit if I run four minutes and nine seconds and yesterday I did 4:11. I'm competitive with everything in the world but myself. And so I realized I needed to be held accountable to another human. I work out every single day and don't cheat. I've been unbelievable 'cause I don't want to let Mike down. And because, I know every morning I'm going to go on the scale and Mike's going to know. I've suffocated myself and by the way, Mike's tenure of two years all-in, is done July seventh. I have a new guy starting for three years. And I'm very comfortable in saying this, if I was ever to stop doing it, I would revert back. So many people after six months or a year, they're like, "All right Gary, "you don't need Mike anymore. " "You got it now. " I'm like, "Absolutely not. " It's the accountability to another person is what was the break through for me. - Cool. Yeah, you got it brother. - [Man] Hi, Gary. - Hey, man. - [Man] I'd like to ask about chatbots, do you think that's gonna be the next big thing? Should we be investing in chatbots? - Like bots in general? - [Man] Or, messenger as a platform? - Yeah, I mean, look. It's huge in Asia, there's enormous opportunities for bots to make life more scalable

### [30:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=1800s) Segment 7 (30:00 - 35:00)

things of that nature. So yeah, do I think bots in messaging apps are a pillar? Yeah, I do. And I think it's gonna take 3, 4, 5, years, for it to be a real scale, but it's talking about search in '01 or email in '96 or social in '07, I think it's a real genre. And here's what's more important: it's kinda like Google Glass or other things that have not worked out, whether it works or not AI and automation will never stop. We're gonna become robots. So, whether bots on messenger become the way you win is far more irrelevant than the fact that you get the taste of what the concept is, so that if in two to four, seven, nine, 14 years from now it's VR augmented execution that breaks through for you. The thing that pisses me off is how many of you have not used Snapchat 'cause you "think it's a waste of time "in case it's a fad" and you don't realize the tasting the execution sets you up for the next thing. I wasted, I wasted a fuckload of time on Socialcam because it was a fad except it taught me 90% of what made me successful on Vine and Instagram video and Snapchat, and so please, enough of "well what if this is here tomorrow? " Who gives a fuck? It's here right now, milk it for what it is, learn what it means, and it's gonna iterate on top of that and that's why I think bots are massively important for this group, not because you figured out what bot to make on Slack or on Facebook Messenger to build your business, but because you'll learn what bot thinking is, how humans interact with augmented, and then learn from that and ideate. You got it. - [Dave] Hey, I'm Dave Asprey, The "Bulletproof" coffee guy. - Hey man. - [Dave] Hey. You mentioned earlier when you were hiring a personal trainer CEO of your health "pick me! Pick me! " All over the place, right? I'm dealing with the same things. What do you do to prevent the people from coming into your circle who are there as basically brand parasites, they want to be there for three months, six months, say "hey, I worked for Gary V.! " and then go out and build their own brand and probably steal half your shit. How do you get around that? - So, first of all, I get around it by not being crippled by it. So I'm just not worried about it. It's a cost of entry and it's a byproduct, and I'm actually flattered by it to be very frank with you. So mentally that's where I'm at. Number two, I'm never worried about stealing. It's interesting that you brought that up. I try to give away all my shit all the time. Like to me, one thing I've learned, is that 99% of people won't do anything with your information anyway. (crowd murmuring) It's all execution and especially what I do for a living, I'm trying to figure out new platforms of attention quicker and better than the market, so -- I mean, by the way, pre-rolled YouTube video. There's 9 years of content of me saying it's shit except six months ago Google changed it and now you can target people's Google search behavior in pre-roll video and all of a sudden it's fucking good because I know exactly what your intent is. I don't give a crap about Google's bullshit demographics, no longer am I crippled by "are you really "a 33 year old African American female in Houston? " I don't give a shit. I know that you searched the Houston Rockets so I got what I need, right? So you know, the truth is I've got it in a mental box where I understand. The one that's probably bothered me the most is "Jab, Jab, Right Hook". I wrote a book called "Jab, Jab, Right Hook" give give, and then ask. Unfortunately, so many think it's give give and then take. Even more scary, I don't like when I watch people give me things I don't want and then expect me to give them things and then be like, "What up, bro? 'Jab, Jab, Right Hook? '" I'm like, "Fuck you dude. " (crowd laughs) I didn't want you to send me your bullshit t-shirt. I don't consider your fuckin' piece of shit t-shirt a jab dickface. (laughter) So, I would say, look, and I think more importantly I'll give you one other slight tweak that I actually think is more helpful than anything else I've said here, and this will help a lot of you I hope. Because it's been huge for me: it's never the hiring. Too many people here are crippled by hiring and making the right call, it's about the firing. So if you're gonna let somebody into your inner circle don't worry about what their intentions are, if they're full of shit, once they get in if you can taste it, get 'em out. Got it? - [Dave] Thank you. - You got it, brother. - [Dev] Hey Gary. - Hey, man. - [Dev] My name's Dev, I'm a search guy, and I wanted to ask what are some of the keys

### [35:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=2100s) Segment 8 (35:00 - 40:00)

to new business growth at VaynerMedia? You guys scaled immensely fast over the years up to a hundred mil, right? So what were some of the keys that basically led to growth of new business? - The pillars that got us there were, number one culture internally. I'm a big fan of B and C players. I'm gonna give you a lot of things, like the hiring and the firing, another one that I think has that same ethos is that I'm actually very fond of average players on your team. If you go for scale. If you're gonna build a four person company, y'all have to be ninjas. I get it. But if you're building a 700 person company, you don't have 700 As. As a matter of fact, if you really break it down, anybody that works for someone else isn't like you. There was no me working for you. So number one, it was the acceptance of not being crippled. First, hiring ultra-fast -- ugh. The hiring process at VaynerMedia is, "Are you alive? You're hired! " You know? (crowd laughs) The truth is, it got a little bit better than that when I got out of the equation. But when I hired employee 30 to a buck 50, people barely got off the elevator and I was like, "Here's your punch card. " A lot of the early people knew who I was, and they thought it might be hard -- I mean they couldn't believe it. I was like, "You like sports? " "Nah. " You're hired! (crowd laughs) It was just whatever because I realized we were growing. And here is something very interesting: one thing that you have to understand is, you can't be the judge and the jury for the market. One of the reasons I grew it so fast was we were so ahead of the market with social media marketing and strategy that even if they were B and C players, I knew they were A players to the market. So my B and C could walk into Campbell's Soup and seem like a super A. So I think one of the things is if you're great at search, what you need to understand is who you're selling to may not be as great as you are. And please, I wanna make sure I'm being very, this is what's great about having time to give these detailed answers, I'm not talking about selling stuff you don't believe in. You gotta understand a lot of people, you know what's funny? I had a lot of "no" men and "no" women around me. For somebody's so hyperbolized, I like people who will push back against me. I need the context. So a lot of them pushed very hard in 2010 and '11 of, like, "Gary, what's the--" right in my team, like does this mean anything? Does this help the client? And I educate him, like look, and this was before there was paid social that could drive the business results we have now so it was very organic, I go, "look, "here's what you have to understand. "They're paying us $5,000 dollars a month "for the amount of content and strategy we're giving them "and just the IP for 60,000 a year is a gift "for these companies. "They're paying $5,000 dollars right now "for the catering bill on their bullshit commercial. " So it's about contextualizing. One was the culture, keep continuity. The amount of people I have, our voluntary turnover rate is 75-100, like it's unbelievably better than the market. Two, it was my brand leadership as a, I mean, I had a real, what do you mean I had, I have a real fuckin' racket. I get paid $100,000 dollars to go and speak and then land million dollar accounts. That's fucking good, you know? (crowd laughs) You know what I mean? It was funny, I saw you shaking your head to some stuff right now. I always pay attention to who's vibing with me when I speak, and I use their positive energy to keep my momentum going. This one Toyota talk, small group this size, it was just one guy giving me vibes. Mentally, I'm like "I'm gonna go thank "that guy after this talk. " Guy ends up being the fucking CMO of Toyota. This was a dealership, like, northeast steelers, you know? The speaking, my brand. And then finally, and this will always be tried and true, as charismatic and as cool as I am, as much as we have continuity, there is no 100 million dollars, there is no 30 to 650 people three-to-100 million revenue in four years without doing good work. So the biggest growth we had, the biggest, was somebody at Pepsi being blown, Lipton, Brisk Ice Tea, South By Southwest 2009. Seven weeks after Instagram came out, we made Instagram cans for Brisk Ice Tea for South By Southwest, it got them a lot of press, Instagram blew up, that guy left and went to Mondelez and hired us, right? In corporate America people are leaving and going to different companies and hiring us -- the key to our growth was word of mouth of our good work when people went to other companies.

### [40:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=2400s) Segment 9 (40:00 - 45:00)

Yeah. You got it, brother. - [Man 2] Hey man. - [Man 2] Family question for you, I'm not sure if Mark has asked you this at the Social Media and Marketing World or not. But I know you're really good about keeping weekends to yourself. - Yes. - [Man 2] Four or five years from now, your kid says, "Hey Dad, you're not around "as much as I'd like you to be. " - I'm super scared of this conversation, by the way. (audience laughter) I'm being dead serious. - [Man 2] Yeah, I am too, I mean, our kids are the same age and-- - Keep going. - [Man 2] What, you know, does it change the plans-- - I don't know. - [Man 2] To buy the Jets, does it-- - One thing, I was super excited about being here because when I get to do long Q and A with a lot of people that have some sense of who I am and there's a high caliber of individuals, A, I'm never interested in bullshitting, B, I think I'm even at a heightened degree of not wanting to bullshit, if that makes any sense. I don't know. Like I am not interested in lying about this issue. One of the things I think some of you have noticed, is I'm starting to talk about suicide and depression in entrepreneur land 'cause it's real. A lot of, most especially looking at this room, at the age group that a lot of us are in this room, there's less fake entrepreneurs here than when I go to the Y Combinator event in a couple months. Like, it has become such a popular thing to sell. There are so many 22, 23, 24-year-olds that are truly not entrepreneurs that are being entrepreneurs 'cause it's the cool thing to do and what it's leading to, and the cliche, and this is of course generalization, but the thing that I've seen because I'm very in it right now is a lot of the 24-year-olds that are in entrepreneurship are the people that can raise, you know, $3 million or $1 million to do it and a lot of those people are rich, white dudes. Okay? And the cliche thing with a lot of these rich white kids that are 22, 23, 24 starting these internet companies is, they grew up in a private school. They went to a big time college. Mom and Dad facilitated a lot and the first time they've ever dealt with any true meritocracy or market conditions is the day their app hits the market and the market says, "Go fuck yourself," almost every time. (audience laughter) And it's this, we have, and a lot of you are parents, or are gonna be parents. We have an absolute wrong game right now in our culture in America, by the way, this happens to every empire. This is what's happening to us. It's black and white. We are in the eighth place trophy business right now. We just are. We're rewarding kids because we think, we're doing fake self esteem. It's the politically correct thing to do. And my wife knows, I don't give a fuck about anything when it comes to what the kids are doing in school but when they go and do camp or sports, no eighth place trophies. Like, my little guy Xander, he's got a little basket in our apartment, he has never made a single basket on me, nor will he until he's 15 or 16 years old. (laughter) I'm being dead serious. Because it's not life. It's just not life. (laughter) (applause) It's true, he will never score. He's got a weird complex already about it. And so, I think that we're living through a very interesting time right now of depression and suicide. There's been three suicides in the tech ecosystem, the hardcore tech ecosystem that we know and nobody talks about it and we need to talk about it. And there's a lack of self-awareness right now in the game and I'm worried about it. And I forgot about the question because I was wrapping that back to something. What was it again? Oh, if they say, so on that, I think you've got to talk real truths and so I don't want to bullshit. If my kids say that, I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to tell them. I know that I was a lot more scared of it a year or two ago until I realized that, (laughs) this is just so fucking real. Oh, I'm getting to a wealth level where I'd be able to grab my kids from school on Friday and fly private somewhere for three days with them. I actually am so curious if I'm going to get caught in the middle. I do believe, and I've watched very carefully, that there's a financial arbitrage level where you can buy time at such an incredible pace that you might be able to sell it back to that time together. Know one thing, I haven't missed a recital or an important school event for my first grade daughter yet. You know. If I'm in New York, which means, luckily I'm not traveling 300 days a week. I've missed stuff but I'll never miss it if it's controllable and the other thing I'm very fascinated by

### [45:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=2700s) Segment 10 (45:00 - 50:00)

is a lot of my friends spend time with their kids but they're not spending time with their kids. So like, a lot of my buddies are absolutely like, will razz me, and then I'll razz them back and be like, "Dude, I was over at your house the other day. "You're not with you, you play Call of Duty "when you get home from work. " Like, you're not with your kids. Listen, I'm going to say another thing. There's a couple things that I'm absolutely adamant about. I will never give you, I will never judge, forget about give you, I think we all like to spew a little advice. I will never judge somebody's relationship or how they parent. I'm the by-product of immigrant parents, where I didn't even see my dad until I was 15 years old and he's my best bud. We have the greatest relationships of all time. So, of course I'm effected by that, right? by, "Shit, my dad got away with. " But I'm also not taking for granted that my kids are wired the same way that I was. I think it's an always moving thing. So, I don't know, man, I don't know what I'm going to do. But I really, I just know my truth which is if I'm not happy, then everything else breaks, and if it makes me unhappy not to hustle, and do my thing, that's a vulnerability. And that's a real truth that people don't want to say out loud. Which is, I know what the politically correct thing to say here is, I know what everybody wants to say, but I'm suffocated not being me. And my kids are way worse off if I'm unhappy than being happy, and so, I don't want to let them down. I'm pretty, I'm already, listen, I'm taking seven weeks vacation a year and it's hardcore quality time in that seven weeks. And then with weekends, I actually weirdly think I need to work more. I'm like, "Fuck, there's two days a week. " I don't know. I'm concerned about it because I don't know my kids well enough yet, right? I don't know where, like I know the way Lizzy and I are building them and I'm hoping with the DNA that they have, that they're going to be extremely self confident and self worth and a lot of those kind of things that will keep them into a place where that won't be as much of an issue or concern or their worth won't be wrapped up in my behavior. And I mean that. Like, one of the things that my wife and I share, and it's probably the foundation of our love affair with each other is we don't fucking give a fuck about what anybody thinks, including each other, think about each other. (audience laughter) I came home the other day. I was like, "Liz, you have to tell me about your side dude. "Because you really don't give a fuck. " If I texted Lizzy right now and was like, "Hey, ran into Jordan and Dan and John at this event "and we're going to go to Korea for nine months "to work on this new startup. " She would literally text back in like two minutes and be like, "Do you want me to pack? " Like it's unbelievable to me how much she's an enabler of my behavior. (audience laughter) I mean it, I mean it. And she does her thing and so, I don't know. And it's the most interesting variable in my life but I'm convinced that I will never go as far as "the market wants me to," because I know myself too well and I just won't be happy if I can't do me. (applause) - [Char] Hey Gary, it's Char. It's just a question related back to your point about nostalgia being really underrated. - Yes. - [Char] And then bringing that back into some of the new social media platforms and I wonder what your view is about voice coming back? So apps like Anchor which I think, personally, are really interesting particularly for-- - Me too. - [Char] For a different demographic, so I'd love to know what you think about-- - The problem with voice, and I love Anchor, I've been watching it very carefully as I know you know. It takes too much time. We like time more than context. So why voice is incredible is, do you know how many times you misinterpreted a Tweet or an email? A fuckload. 'Cause tone is lost in writing. What Voice does incredibly well is you won't lose it because that's just something we know. The problem is, I have no interest in listening to anybody's Anchor here because it takes too much time. That's the problem. So, I'm bullish on voice. I mean, from 2008, '9, '10, '11, I was like, "Ooh, voice Twitter, voice Twitter. " Anchor is the first voice Twitter that I've seen. Problem is it takes too much time and time is becoming, like every second that goes by, time is becoming more valuable. Like we are willing to pay unbelievable amounts of money to buy time. Uber's built on it. Uber sells time.

### [50:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=3000s) Segment 11 (50:00 - 55:00)

Uber sells the perception of time. Like you think the car, in New York City, the amount of times I have an Uber coming and just watch cab after cab drive by. (audience laughter) I'm like, "This fucking blows. " You know, so. Time is, I would tell you that if you're hungry to actually build a start up, I tell everybody to build time apps. 100%. Anything that sells you time. That's why the Postmates and the same day deliveries and all that stuff, time. - [Alex] Hey Gary, Alex Icon on Snapchat. Thanks for selling me on Snapchat. - You got it, brother. - [Alex] Yeah, the question I want to ask, you talked earlier about leveraging Vayner into buying businesses. - Yes. - [Alex] So when are you going to go all-in on that and what are the businesses you're going to start with? - I don't know. I don't know what businesses I'm going to start with. I've been looking at deals for the last 18 months. I even got into one letter of intent but I didn't like the way the numbers looked. So first of all, number one rule is, it had to be big at one point and it's not right now. Right? So, Bubblicious Bubble Gum, did $128 million in revenue 13 years ago, 17 years ago, now it does seven, right? So there's a lot of things like that. Like Green Giant food sold not too long ago. Fila, remember Fila, for all you hip hop heads and Grant Hill fans, it was big for 48 seconds, right? Like Z. Cavaricci pants, John. (audience laughter) It had to have brand for a certain time. By the way, this is how the toy business works. Like, My Little Pony, for anybody's who's 40, like I am, or in that general range, if you go in the toy aisle now, it's our toy aisle because we're parents now and we'll be nostalgic and we want our kids to play with Strawberry Shortcake and GI Joe and Star Wars and My Little Pony and dadadada. So, it has to be underpriced, had to have a lot of revenue, and my preference would be that it would skew very strong 13 to 30 because my marketing behavior usually starts there and it's underpriced there. So any brand that you want to sell to, if something to an 18-year-old in America today and you don't spend 90% of your money and energy on Snapchat and Instagram, you're an idiot. That's where their attention is. And that stuff is always underpriced. Snapchat and Instagram influencers and Snapchat marketing are underpriced, grossly underpriced right now. The way search was grossly underpriced when I started doing it in 2001. And there's long tailed search SEM's that are underpriced by the word wine is not five cents a click any more. And Facebook advertising 24 months ago was the greatest steal in the market when I was yelling about it and everybody was like, "No, they took away our," everybody got romantic. They took away our organic reach. Who gives a fuck? They took away your organic reach and they give you the best ad product that ever existed in return. Same thing right now, you're debating Snapchat. It's a fad, dadadada. And then in 24 months you're going to be on it and you're going not land grab as much, it's going to be harder to build fanbase. It's going to get noisy. The early users are going to stop buying. It's just the same fucking pattern recognition forever. You got it. - [Cole] Hey Gary, Cole. - Cole, what's up, man? - [Cole] What's up? Quick first question for your fund, the $50 to 70 million? - Yeah? - Is it open to outside investors and what's the maximum offer or buy in? - So yeah, we still haven't closed. The minimum is a $2 million check and super happy to talk to you about it. - [Cole] Perfect, thank you. Bigger, sorry, that was just real quick. Bigger question, was talking to Yanik today and you know about Thrive where he spoke, what do you think about someone who's in a startup including a social element or a give like a Tom's Shoes in the startups today for the millennials that seem to be, and again, what Yanik was citing today, research that they're more inclined to buy from someone that makes a difference than someone that's just making a profit. - Yanik's right. The problem is marketers ruin everything. (audience laughter) So what's happened is, my data shows, and what I'm looking at is that the trend is already swung the other direction. You know, Yanik, I don't know what, if you look at the data but I think what's happened is, there was probably three months there a year ago, where every startup, and I look at seven to 25 startups

### [55:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=3300s) Segment 12 (55:00 - 60:00)

a week because I invest, came in and said, "Gary, Gary, I got it, all right, listen. "I have an umbrella company. "It's an umbrella and for every umbrella you buy, "we give an umbrella to some poor dude in Seattle. " (audience laughter) You know like, and so what happened was, when Tom's Shoes did it, and when a couple of the early people did it, it was novel. It caught our attention. Yes, the younger set does care more about charity and giving and, you know, no question. They're wired differently. The problem is, it became a tactic. Every scum bucket marketer that I know started a startup that had a buy one get one, give one, and it became tactical and now there's 8,000 of them out there and now it's just noise. It's the same old game. Supply and demand and so, I think there's an opportunity. The problem is where's the intent? So many people now do it because they think it's the hook for their business to succeed, not because they actually give a fuck about curing a disease or helping somebody in an underprivileged environment and when your intent is fucked, you lost. And that's real and you guys know it. And you also know that you've done many things where your intent was wrong, it was tactical, and it never wins. So, if your intent's, what's that? - [Man 3] Amen. - Amen, brother, thank you. It's true and so, I think can somebody tomorrow start a company that's buy and give and win? Absolutely, if it's their truth. A, it's harder to break through because there's so much shit, and B, unfortunately there's just not so many people that have that truth. - [Man 4] Hey, it's me again. - Does he get more air time? Strategy. - [Man 4] This is a prediction because I know you like to be right about shit. Do you think Snapchat will add at any point in the near future something for sort of endemic discovery rather than having to push people from other networks? - I don't know. And I do like to predict, and I feel comfortable. The reason is, Evan's done so many things. I don't know Evan well enough to know what he's going to do. What I do think is that Snapchat's gonna do something very smart in the way they're doing the stories thing. How many people here actually like Snapchat and use it as a human? Like, not as a marketer, that's me. I mean, as a human you like it. So you notice how they went with continuous stories, I think they're going to do a very smart ad product in between people. So that's what I think they've set up. That I'll predict. I think there was no reason to do it except the continuous content gets stopped. And I think it's really cool if you go, if you really think of data, think about, you follow GaryVee and Tim Ferris, and you can actually buy an ad in between those two people. You can buy an ad between Kim Kardashian and Toyota. Like, you'll have the data to know what the continuation is and you can insert a five or 10 in there. I think if you could do that, boy, I would buy the shit out of that if I actually knew the two media entities, I would just understand who that person was and what they were interested in and be able to create and sell in that environment. - [Man 5] Two questions, three questions left. - No, we could do a little bit more. I'm going to try to be late for my call. This is too fun. (audience laughing) - [Diana] Hey Gary, Diana here. - How are you? - [Diana] I'm great, Good. - [Diana] So if Snapchat's on this side, I kind of see meditation on this side. - Okay. - [Diana] I know you're very kind of futuristic and have made quite a few predictions-- - I have. - [Diana] On the meditation side. - Obsessed. - [Diana] I'm really curious. How do you see meditation playing out as a consumable in the marketplace? Is it events? - Yes. - [Diana] Is it online? Everything. - Yes. Meditation is the fitness industry over the last 20 years. - [Diana] That's you think it's going to be. - Meditation in 20 years is a foundational pillar in American consumer society. Mental health is the next physical health. Everybody here in 20 years will have some, there'll be the lightweight version of it, like oh, there's some cool little app and it just makes me sleep better or escape, and then there'll be more extreme stuff. And the truth is, just so everybody knows, and I appreciate you knowing that, and people that follow me. I know really nothing about it. I just know consumer behavior and I know when I see the tea leaves, I just know it is going to be, there is, I'm 100% positive that the next retail explosion, like that looks like Soul Cycle or like Blockbuster Video is going to be, there is going to be a Starbucks and Soul Cycle of meditation. The place that every trendy rich cool person goes to and sits there. (audience laughter)

### [1:00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=3600s) Segment 13 (60:00 - 65:00)

So I think, think about it as every other genre that pops. So there'll be the Starbucks and Soul Cycle, there'll be you have UFC fighting, there was the merchandise company, they'll be the Tap Out or the Life is Good. There'll be a brand that owns the meditation swag, right? And then there's going to be all the other things. I think it's going to be big. Like, as a matter of fact, you guys heard earlier, the $50 to $75 million 10 companies, one of them will be a major bet on meditation. I don't know what but I will. E Sports, VR B2B, I think virtual reality's being sold as a consumer thing way to early. It feels like Internet '91, '92. So I think it's way to early but much like in '91, '92, the people that made money were like the infrastructure of the internet itself. I'm very hot on virtual reality B2B. meditation. I'm very hot on e-sports and I'm very hot on fully integrated direct to consumer products. - Yeah, hey man. - [Chris] Thanks for being here tonight. Chris Caplin. The stump question for you tonight was around your children. - Yes. - [Chris] So, I have a 10 year old girl who's going on 25 and a 12 year old boy who I just gave an iPhone 6 to without a data plan. But wants a Snapchat account, has an Instagram account. And what are your thoughts and ideas on our youth and their just obsession with social media? - [Chris] I know it's inevitable and I want them to be a part of it 'cause they teach me but how do I-- I don't want to be a helicopter parent either. How do we control the 4,000 fucking passive aggressive assholes out there who tell my child horrible, horrible things? - Right, they're fat, or ugly, or what-- So a couple things. One, I truly believe the way that we always solve every problem is the religion not the tactic, back to the question about fitness, so I think that if you've been able to instill the right pillars into your child, you win. Like, it's unbelievable how much peer pressure wasn't able to penetrate me because of what my parents did in building that self esteem and things of that nature. Look, this is evolution. Like, you know, when I was a kid, girls that got second phone lines, that was gonna ruin them. Like they were gonna lay in their room and be on the phone all day. Or Zelda was gonna fucking make me like not capable of being a human in society. (audience laughs) Like, you know, whether it was video games or whether it was punk music or rock and roll in the 70's or whether it was Elvis shaking his hips. Like, I mean, what Miley Cyrus did four years ago on the MTV Music Awards that got everybody freaked out, is tame on Instagram. Like, evolution. And so I think you've got to instill good principles into your kids. It's unbelievable how many parents have come to me and said, "I'm not letting my son on Snapchat. " Right, because they're scared of sexting, because that was the headline for Snapchat. Meanwhile, like, "Does your son have a phone? " "Yeah. " "Does he have the internet on his phone? " (audience laughter) "Yes. " I'm like, you know he can go to jizzhut. com pretty easily. (audience laughter) You know so, I think that-- I promise you, that's far more dangerous of what you're scared of, than the random 12 year old floozy chick in science class. (audience laughter) I think the way you solve everything, by the way, is communication. And I think a lot of parents are scared to have real talk. And so I think you have conversation. And look, a 10-year-old and a 12-year-old is still a 10 and 12-year-old. You have to be observant, but it's gonna be what it's gonna be, man. Listen, the funny thing is, I don't know if it's because I like so don't want to die and stay so grounded to my youth. Or because I'm in this stuff. I'm sure you guys all feel the same way, like, we were just there. Like I was just in sixth grade spending four months trying to figure out how to steal Playboy's from 7-11 with my buddies. You know, it was just two minutes ago. So like this-- I think we love our kids so much, we go on defense. It's the way people run their business. When something gets good they go to defense. And that's the second they start losing. And so I understand why, and I feel those things too, but it is what it is. Conversations and instilling the right things into them. And my big thing actually, is more I'm gonna watch my kids to make sure they're not the kids that are doing the bad stuff to other kids more so like-- I want them to feel the adver-- I'm actually okay with getting their feelings hurt

### [1:05:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=3900s) Segment 14 (65:00 - 70:00)

and things of that nature. I want to have those conversations. But like this obsession with protecting our kids from getting their feelings hurt is a little too far. Like I want Xander to get punched in the fucking mouth. (audience laughs timidly) I do! (audience laughter) I think it'd be good for him. He's just a rich kid from the Upper East Side. Fuck, he needs a good beating. - [Man 6] Hey Gary. So often I work with a lot of entrepreneurs and successful different people and stuff. And it's not always but more often than not there's a cost often. Kind of they're unaware of the cost that the brand building has created. So while you've been crushing it and I use that term obviously because of your book. And with respect I've read your book and I kind of hated the book because it showed me how to do something I was scared shitless to do in such a simple way. And I'll never forget the day I posted my first video, and thanks for making me look like a total asshole in the world. Because I tell you, I put this video out and it was so bad. But I was so scared and you simplified the whole process for me. And it's gone on to do different things, and I'm very grateful for that. But I work with a lot of very interesting people who often have a lot of success and I was gonna say, to be politically correct, there's oft sometimes not a cost, but the reality is, almost every time there is a cost. - There's always a cost. - [Man 6] I'm just wondering, and I'm not trying to expose you, but I'm just wondering from your point of view if you wouldn't mind sharing a degree of that cost or you know if there is a cost in your point. - I mean, the cost is-- There's a lot-- I actually, when I really think about your question, the biggest cost I'm worried about is if actually I do something wrong. So for the most part, I don't do anything wrong by our standards in society and I'm scared that I've done such a great job of building, to the people that know me, a very good thing, that I'm scared of like-- I always think, like what could slip me up? I think about that a lot. As far as to answer your question directly, what's been the cost? Well, leisure. You know like, it's fun to like do fun stuff and like I don't remember the last time that I was fundamentally completely calm. (audience laughter) Let me explain what I mean. Everything's on me. My whole family, my brother, my two brother-in-law's, my brother, my parents, my sis-- everybody's livelihood at this point, and lifestyle, is on my shoulders. The whole kit and caboodle. Like that's called pressure. And then if you really like are wired the way I am, I genuinely care about the people that are in my ecosystem. Even like employee 432, I feel pressure. I feel pressure, so the biggest cost I think is peace. Like when you're the one, you know like, this whole notion of like being the entrepreneur, I don't know-- And I see a lot of you shaking your head, like you guys, you gals know, it's on you. It's super fun to be number two. Like I always bust AJ's chops, I'm like, "you've got the fucking gig. " Because like when the whole thing's on fire, like you still can go, "What are we gonna do? " (audience laughter) - [Man 7] That's true. - Right? For me I think the biggest thing I gave up was like it-- it's very-- And I'm doing it right now-- Man, it's been you know, eighth grade, ninth grade, it's been a long time when I didn't recognize that not only my life but pretty much everybody else I gave a fuck about in the world, was predicated on my behavior, period. Like for real. So peace of mind and like "ahh. " That is just, you give that up. And I've given up a ton. I mean, the first five years of my marriage is one of the great regrets of my life. Like because I was hustling so much. I easily and should've and desperately wish that I went on two more weeks vacation with Lizzie to Paris and Japan and just ate sushi for a week. Like, and I didn't. And I don't get it back. And so it makes me very conscious of the kid stuff and so I've learned from that behavior and I've been much better with the kids. Seven weeks vacation, still. I don't even like saying it out loud. And there's other things. Friendships. There's a lot of good friends that I have from high school and college that I don't have a relationship with anymore that would have been very fruitful in my life that are just gone.

### [1:10:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=4200s) Segment 15 (70:00 - 75:00)

Pressure's tough man. Right? But for me and for a lot of people in here, there's just no other gear. You're just, your destiny's your destiny. So I'm not naive, I don't think it's so great being me. I really don't. I love being me, but I recognize why me is not great on paper. Like I truly believe that there's a much sweeter spot in our society than the one I sit with. I romance it as the guy or girl that makes like 347 a year as a solid exec, has a ridiculous work-life balance, goes to every fucking little league game, has four weeks vac-- Like you know. But I just don't know that gear. I don't have that. - [Man 7] Sorry. Do you think that people like you exist to pull people into the gear or the middle ground where they can-- - [Gary] I'm sorry? - [Man 7] Do you think people like you need to exist in the world to pull people into a space where they can have a bit more peace of mind? In other words, that you pay a price for that. And this is a very personal question, because, despite the fact that I'm always in front of people and speaking or whatever, it's very, very extremely lonely to do what I do. - It's the loneliest! - [Man 7] Yeah. - Dude, there's nobody else. Like, if you're truly, truly the number one of your thing, there's just, what else? Like, who? Where? Like I talk to no-- Do you know that I never talk to my wife about work? (clicks tongue) Goose egg. And I think that the people in here that have that same thing, they realize, what are we gonna talk about? 99% of my day is fires. I'm in the business of eating shit. (audience laughter) Do I really want to come home and tell my wife that-- Like, I don't celebrate victory. Like, the biggest vulnerability-- One of the weakest things, one of the things that I'm doing worst in my company is we are killing it and we don't celebrate dick. Like we win an account like, "yeah. " We don't even talk-- Like, I don't know. All I do, all my energy is spent on the negative. It's what I do. It's what you have to do. Because if you don't address it, it becomes cancer, and becomes your vulnerability. And so, I get it, brother. I think there's a huge price to pay, you know? pay. But I would not have it any other way. I'm happy as shit. Because I'm living the game that I was built for. But this is why I'm so scared of the reverse. I'm scared of the people, the cliché thing is everybody right now at Princeton who five to seven years ago would have went to Bain and McKinsey, made a lot of money, met another attractive smart person at Bain and McKinsey, married them, bought a second home in the Hampton's because one made 740 at fucking Goldman and one made 297 at this. That same fucking person today is starting a start-up and has the Uber for maids. (audience laughter) And is gonna lose. Is gonna take a three to six year set back. Is gonna lose equity in their ecosystem. Is gonna have a bruised confidence. Because they weren't-- I'm, as an entrepreneur, as a one, I only want to lose. Like, losing is comfortable. Losing's delicious. That's why I love being a Jets fan. You know, like-- (audience laughter) So, I'm worried actually, it's so funny who I'm trying to talk to these days, is the people that aren't built for what you and I know. Because it's super glamorous. This is why I'm visceral to what's going on Instagram. And you've been hearing me talk about the bullshit entrepreneurs who rent! Rent watches, planes, girls, baby giraffes, (audience laughter) and then sell people on how they got it because they allude to they having it, versus renting it, and then selling bullshit and they're selling entrepreneurship that is not what entrepreneurship is. It's just not. (applause) Keep going. I think we're getting somewhere. (audience laughter) Thank you, brother. - [Steve] Hi Gary, I'm Steve. I'm a behavioral profiler. (audience laughter) I don't wanna ask a question

### [1:15:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=4500s) Segment 16 (75:00 - 80:00)

as much as I want to make a statement. - Okay. - We need you just the way you are. Now, I know there's a lot of questions probably in some peoples heads in here about your style, the way you do things, but you're basically created this way and there's people in this world that wouldn't do shit if it wasn't for people like you. And so I just want to encourage you in the fact that you know you're thinking about your fatherhood and your husbandry and all these different things. But they hooked up with you being the way you are. - I get it man. - [Steve] And that's you and I want you to be proud of it. - [Gary] I am. - And I know that. - [Gary] I really am. - I just want to say that-- - I appreciate that - [Steve] for everybody else. - And, listen-- - This is who you are, you're like a modern day prophet for the business world. And Elon Musk is another one. I mean, you're an anomaly. You're not normal. - Listen-- - [Steve] I say that because there are social norms - [Gary] I get it. - You're so far outside of the social norm that you stand out, you become an anomaly, and everybody's freaked out at it. But it's who you are, it's what you are. And stay being that. - You know, my man, I think you'll find this interesting based on what you do, I'm so in-tune to that, that I've had very intense conversations with my wife which is, people not having self-awareness or being blind to it. I know that the way I'm wired is the cliché thing where there's that person that's super famous and they die and then like the country mourns and then the family goes, "Yeah, but there weren't there for me. " Like I'm so conscious of that, I'm so aware that I'm for scale, that I know it comes at the cost of those 10 people that I hack at it a lot because I'm trying to figure out like, "boy do I know? " And it's a crazy feeling to know it. Like hear thanks for-- Like, I don't know. You know what else by the way? It's super easy for me not to get caught up in it. Like, I didn't do anything. My mom and dad had sex at the right second. Like this is who I am. This has always been who I was, even-- It's so fun for me to have my grammar school and middle school friends pop up because of Facebook. They're telling me shit that I long forgot and it's just the same shit. Like there's something about the way that I communicate that makes people see it slightly different and then allows them to do something with it. And so I'm not running from it, I just-- If I can do anything to hack not doing the cliché thing that happens to people like me, which is the people closest to me lose the most, the people furthest away from me win the most, I'd like to at least do that. But other than that, I just don't even know how not to be me. - [Steve] (mumbles) - Well thank you. (audience laughter) - [Melissa] So to that end, Melissa Lands of the Fresh 20, to that end, I'm a little nervous to ask this question in a room full of HD men but, so, do you think that there's room for women? Like what's your prediction on women changing that dynamic and going from the crush it economy to the live it economy and kind of changing the dynamic of what it means to be a successful entrepreneur? Do you think that women are going to make that change in business or not important? - So I want to make sure I understand it. So, give me a little more detail. - [Melissa] So for most of the highly successful women entrepreneurs that I know, they're not concerned about crushing it, they're concerned about living a holistic life so that you-- - You mean with children, go in detail. - [Melissa] No, not even children, just having a little bit more of a balance. Being more connected to the people on the ground, to their friends, to their family. Like living in a way that they don't have to make the sacrifices that you're making. - Yeah, look, I mean, 99% of the dudes don't want to do what I'm doing either. So, look, a couple things. One, boys and girls are different. - [Melissa] In what way? - [Gary] And so like, this has been a very interesting topic. VaynerMedia was built on female leadership. I wrote the first check to Birchbox after they had 50 no's. Like, I have a higher percentage of female entrepreneurs in my ecosystem and I get all this credit and I feel terrible about it because the reason I've done these things is I'm actually prejudiced against dudes in a world where I think EQ, it has been proven that EQ is not more favorable to a woman, I'm being prejudiced to guys that they can't be as EQ oriented as women, even though I am.

### [1:20:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=4800s) Segment 17 (80:00 - 85:00)

So, what do I, I think it's first of all, look how far we've come in America on race and gender in 30, 40, 50 years. It's really good and there'll be more and I think that it's really cool. When it comes to business, it's so sports for me, that you would be, like it's stunning to me how I cannot even wrap my head around even thinking of anything other than the market. You know? Like I never would think, "Oh, you're a Hispanic. "Oh, you're a transgender. "Oh, you're a Black dude. "You're a girl. " I would never think, I don't care. Can we win? Can you fucking sell shit? And so, I think that, one, I think a lot about if I was exactly my way as a woman, how much would starting a family pull at me from a chemical we're different game. I'm fascinated by that, just like in general. But I think that a lot of White males really, really worry about what other people think of them and they have it best. So I'm very empathetic to what a woman's going to think about what everybody else thinks about them and I think that's holding people back. Boy, girl, Black, White, more than anything in the world and so I do think, I think that's the key to the question that you're asking. Once a person is capable of really getting into a place where they're content with themselves and can, at a very high level, not worry about the market's feedback to themselves, they can win. In whatever they want. And so, "living it," first and foremost, is defined super different by every person. And so, that's just how I see it. But it's funny, it's really an interesting issue. It's a really interesting genre for me. My daughter is much more similar to me than my son is. I can tell that already. And so, I want her to be, if she wants to, be number one and I don't want anything to stop her but I also, pretty interesting about this, and I say this to my minority and female entrepreneurs, if one person, one, if one person in the world that looks like you ever achieved it, then you can too. Like, there's this big argument right now with a lot of my female entrepreneurs. They're like, "It's so hard to get money "from White man VC's. " I'm like, "Getting VC money is nothing compared "to the market. " (applause) The market's much tougher than Dickhead Don on Sandhill Road. - [Melissa] But I think you misunderstand my question so I didn't do it right. - So let's do it. - [Melissa] My question's not about women equality because I think that I can do anything-- - Go ahead, go ahead. - [Melissa] That any man in this room can do. - [Gary] Go ahead, yup. - [Melissa] And maybe better. My question is, do you think that women business leaders are going to change the culture from the crush it culture to-- - No. - [Melissa] No at all? - Nope. (audience laughter) - [Melissa] Awesome, like it's interesting. Because we're living in this world where our concerns are different. - I don't think the crush it culture is really the culture. Really, I don't. It's just one of the sub-cultures. There's much more momentum for politically correct. Just so you know because a lot of my content goes viral on Facebook, which by the way, it's so funny, a lot of my content is going quite, scaling quite well on Facebook, by the way, here's the secret. Captioned videos. Do not put up another video on Facebook without captioning it. So there's a tactic for tonight. Anyway, my content is dismantling it. Which is so funny because my paid team, my team sits next to me and I'll know because we're putting up content. We're very much in sports culture, like yeah, they get excited, they're super pumped and I'm super sad for a quick second 'cause I'm like, "Fuck, here comes seven million people "that have never seen me before so here comes "the top 15 comments of this guy's a fuckface. " You know? (audience laughter) Here's why I brought that up. All of my content that's "crush it," that's winning, is viscerally getting pushed against. Like the top thing that everybody does, do you want to see your kids? This guy's going to die at 42. You know, like, I do not think that crush it culture is the main culture right now. I think the work life balance, politically correct, we're all going to accomplish fucking everything and do everything balanced right game is the culture. And Bernie's very popular, right? Go look at the data, I'm looking at it very carefully

### [1:25:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=5100s) Segment 18 (85:00 - 90:00)

'cause I don't want my head chopped off for being a capitalist. 16 to 24 year olds, for all the entrepreneurs there are, there's a bunch of people that think working hard is bad. Like capitalism is bad, like you're in an ecosystem of a lot of winners, crush it, we're going to fucking do it, but the macro, the thing has already changed. The thing's changed. America lost. Like just, I want everybody, I don't know how much you get around, it's over. We've had too many decades and too many generations, you, me, we're the problem. Like just, it's not our faults. We were just born in the generation of 200 years into our empire. We are soft. (applause) - [Man 8] Gary, you talked quite a bit today about self-awareness. How do you build and sustain self-awareness? - I don't know. I hate this question because fuck I really want to give a good answer and there's people that do different things. Like, I don't feel like I have a grasp on how to teach self-awareness or maintain it. I know I have rely on it. I know that there's people, I've seen people talk about how to do it. Like, I respect that may be true, I've never dug under the hood or watched somebody do it. I have seen this and this is something for a lot of you that are building things to think about. I have seen a lot of my people grow in their self-awareness out of the safety that I've created in the environment, in the culture of the company and so within safety, they've been able to expand their emotional intelligence. But I don't know, man. But boy, let me tell you something, for that gentleman, or whoever else, if you know how to do it, if there's a way to really do it, it's the drug. It is the game. It's unbelievable how powerful it is if you have it. It just saves you. Makes you likable, makes you like yourself. It makes you understand shit. The other thing, you've got to understand, there's something that comes along with it, there's a cousin of all these feelings, empathy, is something I live on. Do you know that nobody's ever let me down? If you really understood why I'm so damn happy, and I really am, it's because nobody's ever let me down because I actually have zero expectation of others. Like zero. Because I understand, I get it. I'm empathetic. You couldn't, you shouldn't, you weren't raised that way, you didn't see it, you didn't like, I don't know. I'm not sure but I can tell you this. If I could wish besides health on my children two things, it would be unbelievable self esteem which I do think I can control and then I wish it was unbelievable self awareness which I don't understand that I can control as much. - [Man 9] Hey Gary. - How are ya? - [Man 9] Great. I'm going to take this opportunity to get some free life coaching, so thank you, in advance. I founded a successful company, and if I keep doing it for a few more years, I'll have hit my number, and I'll be done. - Right. - [Man 9] The problem is, I have this burning desire to be on the Snapchat, and like, giving advice, and helping young people, and all that? - Yeah. - [Man 9] But I don't have the type of business where that would like, feed into, leads, or anything like that, so it's a bit dilemma for me. - Yes. - [Man 10] Do I start doing that now, or do I keep grinding, and try to like, hit this financial thing? And my girlfriend asked me last night, she's like, well, if you died, what would you be happier about, having that dollar in the bank account, or having your book published, and helped a lot of young people, and I was like, oh, fuck. (laughs) So, I just wanted to throw it out and-- - Seems like you found the right girl. (laughter) I think, I think my answer to that is, you should do both. I don't, like, what I would do if I were you, and what I normally do in these situations, is I would audit the rest of it. So like, let's get real, are you willing to get very real with me? - [Man 9] Let's do it. - How many hours do you work a day? For real, don't bullshit me. - [Man 9] Six. - Do both. (laughter) - [Man 9] Okay, thank you. (laughter and applause) - Because eight is a fuckin' half day, (laughter) and that means you... And that means that you have two hours to do all that good, and that's fuckin' awesome, really. You know what's funny? I want what you want, too. I, it's what I do, so much, unfortunately for me

### [1:30:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=5400s) Segment 19 (90:00 - 95:00)

like, that's what cost me 16, yeah, you know what I mean? So, you should, I mean, if you, if you truly, if you wanna shoot it black and white straight? You should do both, you should figure out how to get to eight, hopefully it doesn't take time out of, time together, hopefully it's coming out of, I don't know what the fuck you're doing with your other, fuckin'... (laughter) "House of Cards", surfing, I don't know what the fuck you're doing, but like, two hours a day you can find to give advice, and do that stuff, and it's, it is, it is you know, it's so funny, like doing that, doing the whole personal brand thing, and being out there, it's such a double win. Like, depending on how much vanity, and like, that stuff you have in, it gets to scratch that. I mean, I was waiting for my car today in LA, some dude was flying down the highway, almost died, pulled over, and was like, "Gary V! " And just left, like, that's the biggest high, ever! (laughter) Like, I was so pumped! And then, on the other hand, the fought, the other, and it's an equal, I don't think it's better, or worse, for me, I mean, we're all wired different. The emails of people, like, hey man, you really helped me, like I was signing up for all this crap, I did this, this happened, you know. It's so, it's intoxicating for people to email you, and say that you changed their life. I have that happen to me every day now, it's crazy! You know? It's crazy. So if you feel like, if you're feeling a yearning towards it, you should do it. - [Man 9] Awesome, thank you. - Yeah, man. - [Man 10] Gary, you talked about fires, and fighting fires, and I think that's a battle that probably all of us do on a daily basis, right? So-- - Yes. - [Man 10] Well now, I have a two part question, one is, what do you fuck up on, often? - Yes. - [Man 10] And when you lose, how do you not lose the lesson? - How do I So I love losing, and I hate losing, right? They're like, polar opposites. So the thing I most fuck up on, is that I think I can do everything. I have big eyes, you know? Fat kid cake. Right? Like, I just have big eyes. I just, because I work so much, and I work so hard, and so intense I always think that I can pull it off, so, sometimes I'm just trying to do 78 things, and you can't. That's my common mistake, I'll always do that. Its, because somewhere deep down, I still think it's working out, 'cause I think it's a net-net game, but it is where I fall short, on more than a micro level, probably a, three fourths micro, all the way up to macro. For me, I never, I mean, I don't know if it's the same reason that I remember everything that's ever happened, like I remember everything. Like, I remember Flowtown. Like, like you know? Like, I remember everything. Like just, fuckin' everything. And so, I, because of that, I guess? I don't lose the lessons? Because I can never, ever, understand why someone would knowingly make the same mistake twice. So. Yep. - [Man 7] You still good with time? Yeah, I'm fighting it. I pushed the call for a second. - [Woman] Thank you for this. - You're welcome. - [Woman] I wanted to ask you a question, in fact, you were talking about self-awareness. - Yes. - [Woman] And, where do you get most of your self-awareness is this one of the things you feel like you've had-- - Yes - Or is it life lessons, is it really the shit, like, the hard moments? Can you give some examples of where you've had some-- - I think it started-- - [Woman] Big awakenings? I guess, right? - Yeah. Yeah, you know what? So, I realized somewhere around sophomore year of high school, that suddenly way more people than I wanted found me annoying. (laughter) That was probably the first time I was like, maybe I was losing that like, I remember back, I remember early high school being like, wait a minute! They're not highly entertained and finding this interesting? (laughter) So, I do remember, I think it's DNA. I don't know where I get it, I don't, but I, when you said that, like, I do remember, from 12 to 18, I found my way, how to make this, more palpable, and I thought really owned it, and got great at it, until I became more of a public figure, and every time I fuckin' post a piece of content on Facebook it goes viral, 4,000 people say I'm a dick face. (laughter) So, you know, I think that I try to deploy self-awareness as much as possible, and now, I'm self-aware that 20% of people on first impact (laughter) are not gonna like it. And so, I do think it came from the lessons of life. Like, I think one of the things that one has to do, is accept themselves, right? And I think once I'm, once I did that, then it didn't hurt so much to have 20%, two out of 10 people not like it. Because the cool thing with me is I also have three out of 10 people that like it so much. And think it's the coolest thing they've ever seen

### [1:35:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=5700s) Segment 20 (95:00 - 100:00)

and you just play it out, and then for me, because I know I'm grounded in very good truths, and principles? I get a second at-bat at it which is, it's so rewarding for people that thought you were a douchebag, to turn, and become an advocate. I would tell you, probably the 50 biggest advocates I have on social? Initially hated me. - [Woman] Okay. So was there, like, you know, a lot of people are in fear-- - Yes. - [Woman] Of being authentic, right? - Yes - [Woman] They don't even know necessarily, who they are, or even the unknown unknowns about their own personality. - No, that's a really good point, that's right. - [Woman] Okay. And so, but you, you have just always had that, what would you, what advice would you? - I just tell people that they're gonna die. You're gonna die! - [Woman] Are you gonna die right this-- (laughter) - You're gonna die, [Woman] - Okay. - And at 91, when you're sitting there, and you're like, "You know what? Fuck! " (laughter) I mean it! One of the, this is interesting to me, this is where, this is where hard wiring is something I believe in tremendously. It took me, again, when this started all happening, my 20's and 30's and 40 and then I've started realizing this, boy did I fuckin', was I attracted to old people as a kid. Like, one of, I don't know if any of you did this, and, then maybe we have some connections that way. I was weird as shit, like, I, like, my friend would be, like, I grew up in the 80's, when, which meant, you played outside, right? And so, when we were outside playing, grandparents would visit once in a while, and maybe 'cause I didn't have, my, both my grandparents, three of my four grandparents died before I was born, people die young in Russia, 'cause they didn't wanna fuckin' live. (laughter) And so, maybe that's why? And I used to think that's why, but now I just realize, I mean, I learned a lot from just talkin' to old people and I think I picked that up, at like, you know what I smelled? Regret. And I'm gonna tell you something. As scary as it is, for you to judge me? And for you to not think I'm cool, and this and that? What's way scarier, the thing I've, I think one of the scariest things in the world, is regret. You know why? You can't fix it. I can fix you thinking I'm a dick face over the time. I can't fix being 96 and becoming 64 again. And so, I think I'm so visceral to the regret that I smelled on old people as a kid, that it impacted me heavily. Yeah. [Tanya] Hi, I'm Tanya. - Hey Tanya. - [Tanya] I work with teen entrepreneurs, have four of them here, and I was just wondering if you could give them a piece of advice as kids that are in high school, - Yeah. - [Tanya] 15, 16 years old, that are running successful companies, trying to balance, you know, everything in life. - Yep. - [Tanya] Any piece of advice that you may have for them? - Yes. Kids? Don't listen to Tanya. (Tanya laughs) Don't listen to your parents, definitely fuckin' teachers, (laughter) don't listen to me, (laughter) listen to yourself. And I fuckin' mean that. (applause) You'll learn, if you're wrong, you'll learn. And it's much better to learn by tasting it, than reading about it, or being told about it. That's my advice to 'em. - [Tanya] Thank you. - You got it. That's, and by the way, that's advice to entrepreneurs, right? Like, that' what you, like, that's not advice to operators, who are going to be CEO's of Fortune 500 companies. They've gotta listen to parents, they've gotta, like, they're gonna play that game. But if you're an entrepreneur, there's, it's binary, you've gotta go completely the other way. 'Cause the market's the judge. And it's back to what you and I talked about. When you're the entrepreneur, it's lonely. You know, Mom's not there to save you. - [Woman 2] Hey. - [Woman 2] (laughs) I'm a New Yorker and a Jets fan, so, let's go Jets. - I love you already. I also love your hair. - [Woman 2] Oh, thank you! - You're welcome. - [Woman 2] I think you kind of, sort of answered, sort of what I was gonna say, I'm kinda new to not giving a fuck? - Okay. - [Woman 2] It's a new thing for me? - Yep. - [Woman 2] It's kind of happened-- - But has it always been there? (laughter) - [Woman 2] Yeah! - It's always been there, right? - [Woman 2] Yes! I was like, always nice to people. - But you're like, you know what, I like this guy-- - [Woman 2] Yeah, I've just kinda left-- - I'm nice to people! - [Woman 2] No, no! (laughter) I know, but I also, I feel less responsible for people's feelings. - Let me tell you something real quick, and some of you know this. I'm only razzy on stage when I'm not talking to anybody individually. I'm actually very uncomfortable with confrontation on a one-to-one level, and I would never, ever think about hurting somebody's feelings, for, like, why? - [Woman 2] Yeah. - You know, so-- - [Woman 2] I'm with you. - You know? It's just when so-- I'm more visceral when somebody else is doing something to someone. I'm more of like, he's being mean to him

### [1:40:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6SeKH5Rdl4&t=6000s) Segment 21 (100:00 - 102:00)

and I'll, that's when I'll jump in, you know? - [Woman 2] Yes. And I don't mean just being mean. - I get it. - [Woman 2] Although, I have no problem with confrontation, whatsoever. (laughter) I'm a lawyer, so it kinda, and a New Yorker. - By the way, you know what, I apologize, my, I would actually argue, my biggest weakness is, ever, was my lack, my visceral reaction to confrontation which made me very bad at firing, for about 10 to 12 years, because I was terrible at it. Like, I was so full of shit, like, I would never give any critical feedback, and then you just walk in and be fired, because I've got pent up, enough courage to finally do it, I was terrible at it. And it, and I was really bad at it. And it's something I'm very embarrassed about. And the worst version of it, is it's how I broke up with girls, and I hate to say it out loud, (laughter) because I wanna be really, like it was, it's the single thing I'm most embarrassed of, of the way I broke up with girls that I dated, because I wasn't a man enough to break up to their face. That felt good. (laughter) Good to get the, good to get the poison out. (laughter and applause) All right, go ahead. - [Woman 2] We forgive you. - Thank you. (laughs) - [Woman 2] So, my question really is, like, what's the ROI on not giving a fuck and being apologetically yourself. 'Cause that's-- - Speed. The thing that you, when you're not spending any time worrying, you're spending time on executing. Speed. And I like the way a lot of you reacted to that, because that's a weird answer to that question. But I can see that a lot of you caught it, and some of you understand it and do it. Speed is the game in what we all do for a living. And if you're not worried about dwelling on what people think, you're in execution mode. And I do everything in my possession, everything in my power, excuse me, to put myself in full execution mode at all times. - [Woman 2] Awesome. Thank you. - You got it. All right, now I have to go. I love you guys! (cheering and applause) I had a lotta fun, a lot of fun. Thank you.

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*Источник: https://ekstraktznaniy.ru/video/19173*