Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / 115. George Foreman III, Former Pro Boxer & Founder of EverybodyFights

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115. George Foreman III, Former Pro Boxer & Founder of EverybodyFights · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

0:00
Speaker 1: Look at conflicts as an ability to make all your
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Speaker 1: relationships stronger. You're not always going to nail it to me.
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Speaker 1: On the other side of conflict is growth when you
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Speaker 1: face it head on with the goal of ending on
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Speaker 1: the other side, friends and family.
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Speaker 2: Hey, Hurdler's Emily Abadi bringing you Episode one one five
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Speaker 2: of Hurdle, a wellness focused podcast where I sit down
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Speaker 2: with inspiring individuals to talk about everything from their big
0:39
Speaker 2: wines to how they've gotten through someone of life's toughest moments.
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Speaker 2: On the show, you can expect vulnerability, motivation, and candid
0:47
Speaker 2: discussions with everyone from top athletes to aspiring entrepreneurs on
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Speaker 2: what it really takes to follow your passions. My mission
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Speaker 2: is simple to inspire you to be your best self,
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Speaker 2: move with intention, and have some fun along the way. Today,
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Speaker 2: I am bringing you my repost of the episode I
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Speaker 2: recorded with George Foreman the Third back in June twenty nineteen.
1:14
Speaker 2: George is a former professional boxer and founder of Everybody Fights,
1:20
Speaker 2: a boxing inspired group fitness studio. Now, if you ask
1:25
Speaker 2: George what it was like to grow up with a
1:28
Speaker 2: two time heavyweight champion as a dad, he's actually pretty
1:31
Speaker 2: humble about it. Because that's all he's ever known. Graduating
1:36
Speaker 2: with a degree in business administration from Rice University, Foreman
1:40
Speaker 2: went on to preside over his dad's business, traveling the world,
1:44
Speaker 2: meeting celebrities and managing contracts. Amidst all of the glitz
1:48
Speaker 2: and the glamour and the chaos, he came face to
1:51
Speaker 2: face with his hurdle moment. Standing at six foot five
1:56
Speaker 2: and weighing in at more than two hundred and eighty pounds,
1:59
Speaker 2: George he realized he wasn't happy in his corner of
2:02
Speaker 2: the world, going as far as to shut himself in
2:05
Speaker 2: a hotel room for three days. Then he made the
2:09
Speaker 2: jump into boxing himself. After a year of training, George
2:13
Speaker 2: stepped into the rank for the first time, weighing in
2:16
Speaker 2: at two hundred and thirty one pounds. He'd go on
2:20
Speaker 2: to have an undefeated professional boxing career that ended in
2:22
Speaker 2: twenty eight twelve, a year before he opened the first
2:26
Speaker 2: Everybody Fights in Boston. In today's episode, we chat about
2:30
Speaker 2: everything from facing depression and the scary side of entrepreneurship
2:35
Speaker 2: to his goals for expanding EBF, the nickname for Everybody Fights,
2:40
Speaker 2: dramatically by next year. I do want to take a
2:43
Speaker 2: second before we get in to today's episode, to promo
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Speaker 2: ebf's new digital form of at home fitness called EBF Live,
2:51
Speaker 2: and I'll link to that in the show notes. On
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Speaker 2: EBF Live, users are able to chat with each other
2:56
Speaker 2: and the trainer during class, participate in weekly roundtable discussions,
3:01
Speaker 2: and track their rounds on ebf's leaderboard. So definitely check
3:06
Speaker 2: it out and as always, let me know what you think.
3:10
Speaker 2: Hit me up over on social at Emily Abadi at
3:13
Speaker 2: Hurdle Podcast, and I'm always available for you over email.
3:16
Speaker 2: It's Emily at Hurdle dot us. And with that, let's
3:21
Speaker 2: get to hurdling today. I'm sitting down with George Foreman
3:30
Speaker 2: the third. I love when I go into intro someone
3:32
Speaker 2: and they have like a laundry list of things I
3:34
Speaker 2: can say about them right off the bat. I mean,
3:37
Speaker 2: you're an entrepreneur, founder of Everybody Fights, a coach. Some
3:41
Speaker 2: may recognize your name because you're also the son of
3:44
Speaker 2: businessman and former two time heavyweight champion George Foreman.
3:49
Speaker 1: Daddy Daddy.
3:51
Speaker 2: There's so much to dive into after that intro, but
3:54
Speaker 2: I think what I would love first is why don't
3:56
Speaker 2: you tell me what Everybody fights?
3:57
Speaker 1: Is Everybody Fights is a fitness facility essentially at its core,
4:03
Speaker 1: and we run you know, one hundred and forty classes
4:06
Speaker 1: a week, four different styles of classes, group fitness focus.
4:10
Speaker 1: But we took it a step further and not only
4:12
Speaker 1: can we allow two hundred people to work out at
4:15
Speaker 1: prime time, we also have not actually not in my
4:18
Speaker 1: gym in New York, but all the other ones. We
4:19
Speaker 1: have full time open gym, so you can just hit
4:21
Speaker 1: the weights if you want to, luxury locker room, sign
4:24
Speaker 1: the steam room, et cetera, kind of the whole nine
4:27
Speaker 1: yards to get people no excuse not to show up
4:29
Speaker 1: in the gym four or five times a week. I
4:31
Speaker 1: just want you in there. You don't even have to
4:32
Speaker 1: work that hard. So that's it. We're known for our
4:34
Speaker 1: boxing component. It's one of our four boxing classrooms, one
4:38
Speaker 1: of our four classrooms, but it's only about thirty percent
4:41
Speaker 1: of what we do from a modality standpoint. But even
4:43
Speaker 1: when you're in the other classes, we're taking the attitude
4:46
Speaker 1: that we're preparing you to be a better boxer, even
4:49
Speaker 1: when you're running. It's a boxer focused roadwork, got et cetera.
4:53
Speaker 2: So what are the other things you can do in
4:55
Speaker 2: the gym besides box.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, so you can box, you can run, you can
5:00
Speaker 1: and lift or do straint training, cardio recovery classes. We
5:04
Speaker 1: even have yoga classes. That was actually my first class
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Speaker 1: in the entire company was a yoga class. No, people
5:11
Speaker 1: wouldn't believe that those are all the different ways you
5:13
Speaker 1: can train.
5:13
Speaker 2: That ABS And where are ebflications right now?
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Speaker 1: Eb applications are two in Boston, one New York here
5:20
Speaker 1: and Philadelphia, and then we have one in Kentucky and Chicago. Oh,
5:25
Speaker 1: in Atlanta just opened yesterday, and keep track of them.
5:29
Speaker 2: There's so much going on. Congratulations, that's super exciting.
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Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you.
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Speaker 2: Not necessarily a boxing gym, but a gym that does
5:35
Speaker 2: involve a lot of boxing. Yep, you have an extensive
5:39
Speaker 2: background in boxing. Before we get into that, I just
5:42
Speaker 2: really want to rewind it back kind of start from
5:44
Speaker 2: the beginning. Where'd you grow up?
5:46
Speaker 1: Grew up in Houston, Texas, a little bit of South Carolina,
5:48
Speaker 1: mostly Houston, and then went to boarding school when I
5:51
Speaker 1: was like eleven years old to Boston.
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Speaker 2: Wey, Boston, that's.
5:57
Speaker 1: Where the best schools were, they said there, Yeah, and
6:02
Speaker 1: then last two years were at a military school. In Indiana.
6:05
Speaker 1: So I had a couple of years there, and that's
6:07
Speaker 1: like my childhood right there, in a.
6:09
Speaker 2: Quick little snapshot. Tell me what it's like growing up
6:12
Speaker 2: with a dad that everybody knows.
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Speaker 1: M It's really hard for me to answer that question
6:18
Speaker 1: because I don't know what it's like to grow up
6:21
Speaker 1: with a dad that nobody knows, because by the time,
6:24
Speaker 1: nobody knew who my dad was anymore. It's kind of
6:26
Speaker 1: like now I'm a grown man. So when I was
6:28
Speaker 1: a kid, I remember I was six, and sometime I
6:33
Speaker 1: don't have anything to compare it to. You know, When
6:34
Speaker 1: I was six, I was at a friend's house and
6:37
Speaker 1: they said, your dad's on TV. And we went in
6:40
Speaker 1: the living room and all the grownups are around watching
6:43
Speaker 1: him fight on TV. I think could have been pay
6:45
Speaker 1: per view Cherry Cooney, and it was a big deal,
6:48
Speaker 1: and all the grown ups were impressed, and I was like, oh, yeah,
6:52
Speaker 1: my dad's on TV. And so since he was a
6:55
Speaker 1: big star, you know, and about two years later, three
6:58
Speaker 1: years later, he was the biggest sports star and by
7:01
Speaker 1: the numbers at least, And so I just don't know.
7:05
Speaker 1: So the things that are awkward, I guess are just
7:07
Speaker 1: when you meet people, especially at times when he's like
7:10
Speaker 1: super famous, they assume because they feel like they know him,
7:14
Speaker 1: they know you. That's probably different. Everything else is pretty obvious,
7:18
Speaker 1: I think.
7:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty obvious. I mean these days, I feel like
7:21
Speaker 2: any celebrity sports star would have you. They have people
7:23
Speaker 2: like stationed outside of where they're at trying to talk
7:27
Speaker 2: to them. Was that something that you guys ran into
7:29
Speaker 2: a lot.
7:29
Speaker 1: Like we definitely had, you know, growing up, people are
7:32
Speaker 1: always driving in front of our house over and over
7:34
Speaker 1: throughout the day. People would it was funny. They'd always
7:36
Speaker 1: ask my mom if she was the help. They would
7:39
Speaker 1: actually get asked that. She would say, yeah, I'll go
7:41
Speaker 1: get that. And so if that was awkward, I think
7:46
Speaker 1: everybody around you they look at you as not you,
7:49
Speaker 1: but your father is an opportunity and you as an
7:51
Speaker 1: opportunity to get to an opportunity. So that's awkward. Yeah,
7:55
Speaker 1: but whatever, man, life is hard, Like that's not hard stuff,
7:58
Speaker 1: that's just stuff. I don't there's nothing to complain about.
8:00
Speaker 1: I think it's just it's definitely when people sometimes know
8:05
Speaker 1: more about you and your past and your family's pass
8:07
Speaker 1: than you do. That's very different. But everything else I
8:09
Speaker 1: can't even like every time I comment on it, it feels
8:12
Speaker 1: like I'm complaining. I'm not negative about any of it,
8:14
Speaker 1: you know, totally.
8:15
Speaker 2: I mean, it's funny when you reference being younger and
8:17
Speaker 2: you have this memory of like them being like your
8:19
Speaker 2: dad's on TV. I feel as though, at some points
8:23
Speaker 2: when I reflect on my younger years, like I've totally
8:25
Speaker 2: blocked out, Like I don't remember anything from like before
8:29
Speaker 2: age like thirteen, I'm like, what even happened? Then, I
8:32
Speaker 2: don't even recall that? Okay, cool, So I'll give you.
8:36
Speaker 1: I'll give you one more story. Sleep and ninety one
8:38
Speaker 1: is a guy named Vanda Holyfield, my dad, if I
8:41
Speaker 1: don't know, not everybody knows him. And so my dad
8:44
Speaker 1: fought him and it was the biggest pay per view
8:46
Speaker 1: event ever, and nobody had a box where you could
8:48
Speaker 1: tune in, like most people didn't have those in ninety one.
8:50
Speaker 1: They had closed circuit and they did a one point
8:52
Speaker 1: four million pay per view bys those are big by
8:55
Speaker 1: today's standards, So that's how big the fight was. The
8:58
Speaker 1: Next day, I have to my dad lost a decision,
9:01
Speaker 1: so I had to go home to school the next day,
9:03
Speaker 1: and I got teased so bad, so that I remember
9:06
Speaker 1: that was I didn't enjoy that. And then so after
9:09
Speaker 1: that that was like, oh, Dad's got to win. I
9:11
Speaker 1: was like, that was the first time I actually care
9:13
Speaker 1: whether he won or lost, because I was like, I
9:14
Speaker 1: don't want to go school on Monday if he loses.
9:17
Speaker 2: But whatever, were you athletic growing up?
9:20
Speaker 1: No? No, no, worst athlete?
9:22
Speaker 2: Yeah? Why do you say that?
9:23
Speaker 1: I was a book a lead?
9:24
Speaker 2: A book a lead. Oh I don't think I've ever
9:26
Speaker 2: heard anyone use that.
9:27
Speaker 1: Try this first time I ever said it. When I
9:29
Speaker 1: was six, I had one of my cousins who told me,
9:32
Speaker 1: you know, you can read too much. That was me
9:34
Speaker 1: growing up, and I didn't get into athletics until I
9:37
Speaker 1: was oder.
9:37
Speaker 2: Okay, so let's kind of talk about that. I know
9:40
Speaker 2: you mentioned you went to boarding school in Boston. What
9:43
Speaker 2: happened after that?
9:45
Speaker 1: So Boston, everything went great. I asked to go to
9:49
Speaker 1: boarding school because I was a weirdo. And after my
9:52
Speaker 1: tenth grade year heard there was a school that had
9:54
Speaker 1: an airport. I wanted to be a pilot. That was
9:57
Speaker 1: a hot idea. So it was a military school. So
9:59
Speaker 1: I was like, I coult up and go to military
10:00
Speaker 1: school to learn how to fly. To the summer camp,
10:03
Speaker 1: called my dad and said, this is awesome. Can I
10:05
Speaker 1: stay here? I heard it's really hard during the school
10:07
Speaker 1: year at the military school, but it was the only
10:10
Speaker 1: boarding school at the airport, and he said yep, And
10:13
Speaker 1: so I stayed in military school for that purpose, got
10:15
Speaker 1: into lacrosse at the time Indiana, and then graduated, and
10:21
Speaker 1: part of halfway through that, I went to the Air
10:22
Speaker 1: Force Academy to a recruiting program over the summer for
10:25
Speaker 1: a few weeks, and then they broke the news to
10:27
Speaker 1: me that George, we really want you awesome, and you know,
10:30
Speaker 1: I'd gone through the whole process, but the distance between
10:33
Speaker 1: your butt in the top of your head is so
10:35
Speaker 1: great that you won't be able to fly fighter jets
10:37
Speaker 1: like the planes I wanted to fly. I'd had to
10:40
Speaker 1: fly like cargo jets and maybe be two bombers or
10:43
Speaker 1: something like that. They told me if I even got
10:44
Speaker 1: to become a pilot. So I said, you know what,
10:47
Speaker 1: I'm going to college. And so I heard about the
10:50
Speaker 1: school named Pepperdine and visited it, applied early, got in,
10:54
Speaker 1: didn't look.
10:54
Speaker 2: Back, didn't look back. So what you go to school for?
10:57
Speaker 1: And by the way, I regretted it. I should have
10:59
Speaker 1: served my country, But at the time, I was like,
11:01
Speaker 1: I've had enough military school for the moment, right right?
11:04
Speaker 2: What you study in college?
11:05
Speaker 1: Business admin did that for three years, and my dad said,
11:10
Speaker 1: there's one rule. You have to get straight a's. You
11:12
Speaker 1: don't have to pay for anything. But my dad my
11:14
Speaker 1: mom were divorced and my mom had bills, so I
11:17
Speaker 1: was like, I'm not going to spend my dad's money
11:18
Speaker 1: on my mom's bills. So I got three jobs, but
11:21
Speaker 1: I still got now one.
11:23
Speaker 2: How does the thought process for that work? You're like,
11:26
Speaker 2: one job's cool, but I could probably take two, and
11:28
Speaker 2: then two jobs are cool, But like, I don't need
11:30
Speaker 2: to hang out with any of my friends, So.
11:32
Speaker 1: What are friends for? Man? Like I grew up my
11:34
Speaker 1: dad was my friend and our time social time was
11:37
Speaker 1: working always, so my brain didn't register. So it's like
11:40
Speaker 1: I have free time. I got my a's for straight a's,
11:43
Speaker 1: I can work, So I work security. I worked at
11:45
Speaker 1: the student center overnight. I'd do my homework till six
11:49
Speaker 1: in the morning, work and they're watching it, and then
11:51
Speaker 1: I babysat.
11:53
Speaker 2: Those jobs are all like you have your like very
11:55
Speaker 2: serious security job, and then.
11:57
Speaker 1: I babys what better verson that he was at your
12:00
Speaker 1: kids in a security security ard. So my dad found
12:04
Speaker 1: out and he was like, what you did? Huh? My
12:08
Speaker 1: sister told him me. She was like, Monk has three
12:10
Speaker 1: jobs because he was boasting about how like I'm boing
12:12
Speaker 1: the game. You just used monk.
12:14
Speaker 2: What's the root of that?
12:15
Speaker 1: Short for monkey? That's my dad'sn't name. Okay, that's what
12:18
Speaker 1: everybody calls him in the family. But yes, he was
12:20
Speaker 1: boasting about how it wasn't working and I'm getting straight
12:22
Speaker 1: aed and she was like, he has three jobs. And
12:24
Speaker 1: we got in a big fight and he's like, if
12:25
Speaker 1: you want to work, you can come work from me.
12:27
Speaker 1: And then there's a transition period and I moved to
12:29
Speaker 1: Houston and transferred to Rice.
12:31
Speaker 2: Okay, so when he says you can come work for me,
12:33
Speaker 2: what kind of job is that? And did you even
12:35
Speaker 2: at the time were you interested in doing that? And
12:37
Speaker 2: then you said you guys were best friends, But I.
12:40
Speaker 1: Think as interested as like if you grew up on
12:41
Speaker 1: a farm, like are you interested in like harvesting crops?
12:45
Speaker 1: Probably not, but you know how to do it, you know,
12:47
Speaker 1: and it's fun and it's the family work. You know,
12:49
Speaker 1: so that's all I knew growing up. Like if I
12:51
Speaker 1: wasn't in school, I was counting rounds behind my dad
12:54
Speaker 1: and he'd be running. I'd be twelve while he's doing
12:58
Speaker 1: his road ory driving helping him. Chop would dig holes,
13:01
Speaker 1: recording his sparring. I was always working. Then when he
13:04
Speaker 1: got into consumer products, I was reading scripts with him,
13:07
Speaker 1: you know, like I set up his first AOL email
13:10
Speaker 1: when I was like, I don't know, I had to
13:11
Speaker 1: be really young when I did that back and so
13:13
Speaker 1: always with him, just whatever I could do, I would
13:15
Speaker 1: do it right. I was like the local, the family
13:18
Speaker 1: it kid. So yeah, at the time, I had done
13:21
Speaker 1: a little bit of everything. When you ask what kind
13:23
Speaker 1: of work, Yeah, yeah, what kind of work. So anyway,
13:25
Speaker 1: I was always doing a little bit of everything. But
13:27
Speaker 1: he always had to have somebody physically with him. He
13:29
Speaker 1: never went anywhere alone. Ever. He's still liked that. And
13:33
Speaker 1: you think that celebrity lifestyle. Yeah, so you know, he's
13:37
Speaker 1: been a celebrity since he was eighteen win the Olympics
13:40
Speaker 1: and it was like a high profile win nineteen. So
13:43
Speaker 1: just always having somebody with you, it's important anyway, So
13:47
Speaker 1: he is the exclusive travel companion of a guy like
13:50
Speaker 1: him at the time. You look travel around the world,
13:53
Speaker 1: you're in private jets, you get to go like live
13:55
Speaker 1: in the four seasons, you can like leave your food
13:57
Speaker 1: at the four seasons between trips, like it was the
14:00
Speaker 1: best job you could have. And he was like, you're
14:02
Speaker 1: gonna do that because he had an issue with the
14:04
Speaker 1: guy who was working with him at the time, and
14:06
Speaker 1: so I was like, all right, cool, And so that
14:08
Speaker 1: started the summer between my before my junior year, and
14:12
Speaker 1: then by the end of that year he actually said,
14:16
Speaker 1: here's a deal you want to negotiate it. It was
14:17
Speaker 1: a contract extension with a mining car cash centers, and
14:21
Speaker 1: that was my first opportunity to actually do business manager roles.
14:24
Speaker 1: And when within a year after that I was exclusively
14:27
Speaker 1: managing everything.
14:28
Speaker 2: Wow, I was like, twenty one, did you feel overwhelmed?
14:32
Speaker 1: Not with work? Like I was always a workaholic, Like
14:35
Speaker 1: the thing that I just hate sleep the idea of it,
14:39
Speaker 1: but it feels good, but just the fact that I
14:41
Speaker 1: have to go to sleep. Yeah, And so I didn't
14:43
Speaker 1: mind the work and I love the travel. It was
14:45
Speaker 1: really cool at that age. You know, now I look
14:47
Speaker 1: at all that stuff differently.
14:49
Speaker 2: It's I'm processing this because I'm surprised. I've never heard
14:53
Speaker 2: someone say that before. The idea that they hate that
14:55
Speaker 2: you have to sleep because there's just so much you
14:57
Speaker 2: want to do, but such an I'm just in perspective,
15:01
Speaker 2: you have to stop and sleep. I mean, you do
15:03
Speaker 2: have to stand point.
15:05
Speaker 1: So that didn't bother me. But the mistakes being twenty
15:08
Speaker 1: one and knowing like you know and I'm not some
15:11
Speaker 1: people make billion dollar mistakes, but being twenty one to
15:13
Speaker 1: know and you can make a mistake and it results
15:15
Speaker 1: in we're not going to make two million dollars that
15:17
Speaker 1: we were going to make because you made a mistake,
15:18
Speaker 1: or you didn't handle the negotiation rate, or you didn't
15:21
Speaker 1: make sure information would exchange two million, three million, eight
15:24
Speaker 1: million dollar mistakes being in depositions in junctions because you
15:28
Speaker 1: made a communication mistake. That type of pressure was tough
15:32
Speaker 1: at that young age, but it was an awesome experience.
15:35
Speaker 1: I actually used to go sit in law school classes.
15:39
Speaker 1: A friend of mine was a professor or the dean.
15:41
Speaker 1: He just let me take the classes. But I didn't
15:43
Speaker 1: get a degree.
15:43
Speaker 2: So so terrified, so terrified. I mean, you obviously named
15:47
Speaker 2: a lot of big scenarios that you could have messed up.
15:51
Speaker 2: Were there any particular mess ups or quote unquote failures
15:55
Speaker 2: that you had that really taught you a major lesson?
15:58
Speaker 1: Oh god, I can't. I can't share it. There's one
16:02
Speaker 1: I just can't because it's just not my business to share.
16:04
Speaker 1: But I'm trying to think, you know, this wasn't a
16:09
Speaker 1: mess up. It wasn't my mess up. But actually, but
16:13
Speaker 1: I can tell you. I remember one time waking up
16:16
Speaker 1: and just the gravity of something. I was like, twenty three,
16:19
Speaker 1: I pick up my dad's business manager, I pick up
16:21
Speaker 1: the Houston Chronicle and then it went on to all
16:24
Speaker 1: the other outlets. George Forman sued for fifty million dollars.
16:28
Speaker 2: A lot of money.
16:29
Speaker 1: And I found that in the news and I was like, like,
16:33
Speaker 1: how am I going to explain this? And we won
16:35
Speaker 1: and it was all good because they weren't really trying
16:38
Speaker 1: to sue him. They're trying to sue someone else, but
16:40
Speaker 1: they wanted to like put him in the news as
16:42
Speaker 1: leverage and it turned out great for us. But just
16:46
Speaker 1: like that was that was heavy. Twenty three is very heavy.
16:51
Speaker 2: What does that teach you?
16:51
Speaker 1: Though? That teaches you that businesses businesses cold man, cold
16:58
Speaker 1: and you know, my I used to tell me. He's like,
17:00
Speaker 1: if you have one hundred dollars, he's like, twenty five
17:03
Speaker 1: percent of that's for you, twenty five percent of that's
17:05
Speaker 1: for the irs, thirty five no, forty percent of that's
17:08
Speaker 1: for irs, depending on where you land. And then he'd
17:11
Speaker 1: be like a percentage just for this, and he's like
17:12
Speaker 1: about fifteen percent. You just put that away for lawsuits.
17:16
Speaker 1: So that was the lesson. He didn't even do anything wrong.
17:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, just fifteen percent of your overall and come, it's.
17:22
Speaker 1: Fine, just keep that to the side. That doesn't even
17:24
Speaker 1: belong to you.
17:25
Speaker 2: Oh so you're a business manager and you're traveling the world,
17:28
Speaker 2: do you have any moments of that time in your
17:31
Speaker 2: life that are just so stand out in terms of
17:34
Speaker 2: just sheer Maybe shock values the wrong term, but just
17:38
Speaker 2: shock value, like experiences that were just absolutely unbelievable.
17:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what I'd say, I can think of
17:44
Speaker 1: a long list of people. I never verbilize this, but
17:48
Speaker 1: now that you're bringing it up, Like, the stuff that
17:49
Speaker 1: was really cool was when you meet like Tiger Woods
17:53
Speaker 1: and he's like, George, can I have a picture? You know,
17:56
Speaker 1: I'm just standing watching this happen. I'm like, well, this
17:59
Speaker 1: is weird. And then because or you meet you know,
18:04
Speaker 1: a next president, you know, or the president. I don't
18:06
Speaker 1: think I met an actual president while he was president though,
18:09
Speaker 1: And then you meet God's like Eddie Murphy and he's like,
18:11
Speaker 1: stop the elevator, George, give me a hug. And this
18:14
Speaker 1: is a time when Eddie's still a big star, you know.
18:17
Speaker 1: And the list goes on to these stars allow cooja
18:19
Speaker 1: at their height. You know. There was another one that
18:22
Speaker 1: was like really big, Justin Timberlake. George. This is when
18:26
Speaker 1: Justin was He's still.
18:27
Speaker 2: Justin just He is my top two. Like and I
18:31
Speaker 2: feel like I should ask you this now, but you
18:33
Speaker 2: have the opportunity to eat dinner with one of three
18:35
Speaker 2: people Justin's on my list.
18:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, like cool dude, I was a fan. Yeah, And
18:40
Speaker 1: he's like, George, can I have a picture, And then
18:42
Speaker 1: Ashanti and her mother's bringing it over and John Legend's like, hey, George,
18:46
Speaker 1: my wife likes your kid. And You're like, is this
18:49
Speaker 1: really happening? But no one would understand it because they
18:51
Speaker 1: were like massive stars, even bigger than him. But to him,
18:54
Speaker 1: it was like uncle George, you know it was weird. Yeah,
18:57
Speaker 1: so that was that was fun.
18:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was fun. Okay, you're traveling the word world
19:02
Speaker 2: with your dad and it gets to a point maybe
19:05
Speaker 2: you realize that you need to take a step back
19:07
Speaker 2: from all of this glamour, if you'll call it that.
19:10
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think a couple of things. One was I
19:14
Speaker 1: just remember like feeling uncomfortable at all times. I'm like
19:19
Speaker 1: my own skin, and I was just out of shape,
19:21
Speaker 1: to be honest, not sleeping. Really successful in business for
19:25
Speaker 1: a young guy, right Like, like I said, I don't
19:27
Speaker 1: like to get like people have been a million times
19:31
Speaker 1: more successful, especially if they happen to be happy. But
19:33
Speaker 1: my point is, in terms of my goals, I was
19:35
Speaker 1: super successful. And I remember like I had so many
19:38
Speaker 1: people kind of hanging on if you will, that I
19:41
Speaker 1: flew back home and I was like, I'm gonna go
19:45
Speaker 1: check into a hotel. I checked into a hotel and
19:48
Speaker 1: just stayed there for three days. I was, I just
19:50
Speaker 1: don't want to be around anybody. I don't want to
19:52
Speaker 1: even go home because my home's not my home, and
19:54
Speaker 1: just like I'm just going to be here for a
19:56
Speaker 1: little bit. And then I think I touched base at
19:58
Speaker 1: home changed my clothes and went on to my next trip,
20:00
Speaker 1: and I was like, how in the world does that happen?
20:02
Speaker 1: You know? So that was a moment where I was
20:04
Speaker 1: just like, something's got to change because everybody looked at
20:06
Speaker 1: me like what you got for me? You know, which
20:09
Speaker 1: is fine, Which is fine. I'd like to be that person.
20:12
Speaker 1: But secondly, yeah, I was out of shape. It's three
20:15
Speaker 1: hundred pounds, and I was like, how did that happen?
20:17
Speaker 1: I'd get one hundred pounds from moving to Malibuda to Houston,
20:20
Speaker 1: and so I said, I got to get in shape.
20:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, did you feel awful as well? Did you feel drained?
20:25
Speaker 2: Where your energy levels low?
20:28
Speaker 1: I just wasn't like I was just looking forward to
20:31
Speaker 1: rest for the first time. I think I had ever
20:34
Speaker 1: looking forward to rest, and that's not who I am,
20:36
Speaker 1: you know.
20:37
Speaker 2: Was there a particular moment where that really hit you?
20:42
Speaker 1: You know what? Man? With the weight, I think with work,
20:45
Speaker 1: I just could feel myself losing my relationship with my
20:47
Speaker 1: dad a little bit. And oh, this is a moment,
20:49
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you about the weight. We would sit
20:51
Speaker 1: and look at each other in Saint Lucia on vacation.
20:53
Speaker 1: He never takes vacations but he would just like put
20:55
Speaker 1: it up, put up with it for the family. He's
20:57
Speaker 1: not a vacation guy. So we go on vacation and
20:59
Speaker 1: then you know, we're in the same room. It was
21:01
Speaker 1: like we're at work. We were both tense and what
21:03
Speaker 1: about this? We got to check on that, and I
21:04
Speaker 1: felt bad for him because I'm like, he can't take
21:06
Speaker 1: a break with me in the room and vice versa.
21:08
Speaker 1: But then there's no way I'm going to take a
21:09
Speaker 1: vacation when he's at home working. It's just impossible. But
21:13
Speaker 1: I remember that tension and I was like, that's not great.
21:16
Speaker 1: You know, it was supposed to be able to stop
21:18
Speaker 1: and relax. But I looked at the scale and I
21:20
Speaker 1: think I tried a bunch of diet pills and like
21:22
Speaker 1: some of them may be like really angry and aggressive.
21:25
Speaker 1: And I was like, okay, I can't do that, but
21:26
Speaker 1: I'm two hundred and eighty nine pounds and something hit me.
21:30
Speaker 1: I called my brothers and I was like, yo, they
21:32
Speaker 1: had teased me all my life that I was not
21:34
Speaker 1: a real athlete. There's no proof I was a varsity athlete,
21:36
Speaker 1: even though I was. And so I said, look, if
21:39
Speaker 1: I have one amateur boxing match when you guys shut up.
21:42
Speaker 1: Because I had been next to my dad at HBO
21:44
Speaker 1: championship fights and I saw Lennox Lewis walk by one
21:48
Speaker 1: time and I was like, he's not that big. I'm
21:50
Speaker 1: as big as Lenox. I can do this. That doesn't
21:53
Speaker 1: make sense. And Lenox's coach, who was a guy named
21:55
Speaker 1: Emmanuel Stewart, was like, George, give me your sign. I'll
21:57
Speaker 1: make him a champion. He was probably joking, sure, joking,
22:00
Speaker 1: but I was like, I can fight, and I want
22:02
Speaker 1: to have one amateur fight to prove it, to prove
22:03
Speaker 1: it to myself. Got them on the phone. They said,
22:05
Speaker 1: if you have one amateur fight, you got your respect.
22:08
Speaker 1: I started training by myself, started training for a year.
22:11
Speaker 2: Can you tell your dad no?
22:13
Speaker 1: Not initially?
22:14
Speaker 2: Wow.
22:15
Speaker 1: He had shut down the boxing component of our gym.
22:17
Speaker 1: It was about sixty thousand squiff facility in the boxing
22:20
Speaker 1: room is just a small piece. And I found a
22:22
Speaker 1: trainer from out and he had shut it down because
22:25
Speaker 1: of unsupervised barring. Trainer met me and I just trained
22:28
Speaker 1: every day, and actually I found one trainer. He worked
22:31
Speaker 1: me two hard, so I got rid of him and
22:32
Speaker 1: I found another trainer and a year. About a year
22:35
Speaker 1: into it, my dad heard I'd been creeping in and
22:38
Speaker 1: out of the gym and he's like, you're really going
22:41
Speaker 1: to do this? And I was like, yeah, I'm gonna
22:42
Speaker 1: have my first amateur fight.
22:43
Speaker 2: And he's like, whoa, whoa what are you not? Traveling
22:45
Speaker 2: with him constantly at this point, so constantly, so how
22:47
Speaker 2: does he not realize that you're doing this? And also,
22:50
Speaker 2: I mean I would assume like you're losing weight. Yeah, yeah,
22:53
Speaker 2: he's just like, wow, Son, you're looking good.
22:55
Speaker 1: You know what we talked about. No, no, he noticed,
22:58
Speaker 1: but he just did not want to encourage it. And
23:00
Speaker 1: we always talk boxing all my life.
23:02
Speaker 2: Why do you think he didn't want to encourage.
23:03
Speaker 1: So us talking boxing wasn't weird you know at the time.
23:06
Speaker 1: He didn't encourage me because I think number one, I mean,
23:10
Speaker 1: my dad was always like he's like, man. He used
23:13
Speaker 1: to call me and I met my brother used to
23:15
Speaker 1: call me like, oh jmk jr. I don't know what
23:17
Speaker 1: that meant, if that's even a thing. You know. Yeah,
23:20
Speaker 1: they would be like, oh, you're going to be like this,
23:22
Speaker 1: And they just wanted me to have like ten degrees
23:24
Speaker 1: and like own businesses and like be the president, you know,
23:28
Speaker 1: like had always a lot of big dreams for me,
23:30
Speaker 1: you know, sent me to like every camp you can
23:32
Speaker 1: think of, you know, put a lot of energy into
23:34
Speaker 1: my education. His mantra was, you can be anything, you know,
23:38
Speaker 1: and I'm killing myself to make sure you have every
23:40
Speaker 1: opportunity and or you can just have a career and
23:44
Speaker 1: never have a job and start businesses and all this.
23:47
Speaker 1: And I tell him, I want to go get punched
23:48
Speaker 1: in the face for money, you know, or just punch
23:50
Speaker 1: in the face for free.
23:51
Speaker 2: Yeah.
23:51
Speaker 1: So I think that had something to do with it.
23:53
Speaker 1: And in hindsight I learned as a fighter why he
23:56
Speaker 1: didn't encourage it until he knew that he couldn't stop it.
23:59
Speaker 2: Right, Well, what was that? This says like a spoiler alert.
24:02
Speaker 2: You can't say, Like, in hindsight, I learned.
24:04
Speaker 1: A fast forward. So trained for a year. Tell him
24:07
Speaker 1: in a box. He says, no, you're not. I said,
24:09
Speaker 1: yes I am. He said, I'm going to train you. No,
24:10
Speaker 1: I'm going to make sure we prematch you with an amateur.
24:13
Speaker 1: And I know that they have as many fights as
24:15
Speaker 1: you have, so it's equal. I had zero Nobody in
24:17
Speaker 1: Houston will fight me because of his name, to which
24:19
Speaker 1: he said, why don't you just have a pro fight,
24:21
Speaker 1: because you know the guy will show up for the check.
24:22
Speaker 1: I said yes, he said I'll train you. I said okay.
24:24
Speaker 1: That went on. He said it was going to be
24:26
Speaker 1: for six weeks, went on for an entire year, and
24:30
Speaker 1: I thought, there's two times I was like, this is death,
24:33
Speaker 1: this is close to death. And then he said you're
24:36
Speaker 1: going to have your first fight. And he made me
24:37
Speaker 1: think this guy was going to be like this monster
24:39
Speaker 1: boogey monster. And the guy was like a cream puff,
24:42
Speaker 1: you know, knocked him out and around and after it
24:45
Speaker 1: he would he was too afraid to go out even
24:47
Speaker 1: though the guy was like a cream puff. My dad
24:49
Speaker 1: during the fight, he's dead in the locker room and
24:51
Speaker 1: he about two days after the fight, I said something
24:53
Speaker 1: to him about a infomercial that we we're shooting with
24:57
Speaker 1: the Harrington's actually one of the original shark ting guys,
25:00
Speaker 1: and he was like, don't worry about that. You're ready
25:02
Speaker 1: for your next fight. I was like next fight. He's
25:03
Speaker 1: like yeah. I was like all right, And within three
25:06
Speaker 1: months I was completely out of business completely in the boxing.
25:09
Speaker 1: And about a year into that, so I probably had
25:11
Speaker 1: eight fights maybe year and a half. I remember my
25:14
Speaker 1: phone would go bing, you know the apple sound when
25:16
Speaker 1: you have a text, and my whole head would just
25:18
Speaker 1: go and it would like my head would ring. I
25:22
Speaker 1: get tingles through up my entire body, and little things
25:26
Speaker 1: like that were happening that I had never heard about it.
25:28
Speaker 1: I thought boxers couldn't speak, you know, or the molder
25:31
Speaker 1: skills or someone I have to carry them around. But
25:33
Speaker 1: I know, you get like chills through your body. Weird.
25:37
Speaker 1: A lot of weird stuff started happening. And I would
25:39
Speaker 1: spar like at least one hundred rounds per fight, you know,
25:43
Speaker 1: And I got hit so much in sparring. I get on.
25:45
Speaker 1: I was typically on the better side of it, but
25:47
Speaker 1: I got hit and I never thought like man head injury.
25:51
Speaker 1: And I remember one time going so deep. I'd never
25:55
Speaker 1: been understood what it meant to be depressed. I'm not
25:57
Speaker 1: into that. That's I have to believe, like not depressed
26:01
Speaker 1: and it's not real. It's not depressed and your weak.
26:04
Speaker 1: That was like how I thought. And I remember one
26:06
Speaker 1: time I had a bad sparing session and the guy
26:09
Speaker 1: like cleaned my clock like it was an MMA. Guy.
26:11
Speaker 1: He's just throwing punches from angles I had never seen seen,
26:15
Speaker 1: and my dad was like, yeah, you should probably to
26:16
Speaker 1: take a couple of days off. And I remember for
26:18
Speaker 1: three days, I was so depressed. I like drove down
26:21
Speaker 1: to a hotel in Galveston and just shut the door,
26:23
Speaker 1: shut the windows, and I just like stayed there and
26:25
Speaker 1: didn't move. It was really bizarre, and I was depressed. Yeah,
26:29
Speaker 1: there's the only thing I can think of. Like I
26:31
Speaker 1: was just in a deep, dark, like weird place, like
26:33
Speaker 1: I'm just going to go drive into a hotel and
26:35
Speaker 1: shut myself in the room for three days. And then
26:36
Speaker 1: when I was done, I was like, Okay, I'm better.
26:38
Speaker 1: And the only thing I can attribute it to because
26:40
Speaker 1: just not who I'm not my style is the head injury,
26:43
Speaker 1: you know, and that's one of the symptoms. Shook it
26:46
Speaker 1: off and moved on. So I think knowing that, knowing
26:49
Speaker 1: the I had to teach myself how to speak again
26:52
Speaker 1: after a year, and I'd have to mouth every syllable
26:55
Speaker 1: of every word and learn how to use my tongue,
26:58
Speaker 1: and I'd speak fine now, I think, but I never
27:01
Speaker 1: had to think about it. Attention span. All these things changed.
27:05
Speaker 1: Maybe Sharper I came up with tricks, so people wouldn't
27:08
Speaker 1: realize that my motor skills are different. Maybe I've never
27:13
Speaker 1: used names. I'd use nicknames. I still do that now,
27:17
Speaker 1: But all these things, you know, And you know, if
27:20
Speaker 1: I'm like, if I knew something I could look at
27:22
Speaker 1: a person and think about, I'd like figure out, what's
27:25
Speaker 1: the one thing about them that my brain would always remember,
27:27
Speaker 1: and I would call them by that name instead of
27:29
Speaker 1: their name because I can't remember names, right, and so
27:31
Speaker 1: little things like that. And I know that my dad,
27:34
Speaker 1: knowing that, would not have wanted me.
27:36
Speaker 2: In that right totally.
27:37
Speaker 1: So those are the things I found out that people
27:40
Speaker 1: don't talk about.
27:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think it's an interesting idea to
27:45
Speaker 2: decide one day that you want to put yourself in
27:48
Speaker 2: an environment where someone is literally coming to hurt you. Like,
27:55
Speaker 2: there are so many things you could say. And I
27:57
Speaker 2: was joking with someone about this the other day, but
27:59
Speaker 2: I was like, when I was growing up, I was like,
28:01
Speaker 2: I don't want to be a journalist. You're like, I
28:04
Speaker 2: helped someone punches my brains out.
28:06
Speaker 1: I don't know why, man. I mean, when you put
28:08
Speaker 1: it like that, it's very like, duh, don't do that.
28:10
Speaker 2: Like what was that. Do you even remember I'm sure
28:12
Speaker 2: you do the first time that you actually had a
28:15
Speaker 2: moment where someone was coming at you and you were like, wow,
28:18
Speaker 2: I'm really doing this.
28:20
Speaker 1: So my third fight, I think it was guy named
28:22
Speaker 1: Dale Mitchell, MMA, guy two hundred and eighty nine pounds.
28:25
Speaker 2: How heavy were you when you started fighting?
28:27
Speaker 1: Two thirty one?
28:28
Speaker 2: Oh wow?
28:28
Speaker 1: He punched me right in my throat. Oh like for
28:31
Speaker 1: whatever reason, he wasn't aiming for my throat, but it
28:32
Speaker 1: hit me right below my chin. I'd never been hit
28:35
Speaker 1: there before. After I said, man, this is not what
28:37
Speaker 1: I signed up for. Like hit me in my eye,
28:40
Speaker 1: my nose, but not my throat. And he mopped the
28:42
Speaker 1: floor with me that round and I came back out
28:44
Speaker 1: and I was able to get a hold of him,
28:46
Speaker 1: but hired him as my sparing partner. But that was
28:48
Speaker 1: the moment where I was like, oh, this is real.
28:50
Speaker 1: And then the second time was like the only time
28:52
Speaker 1: I got knocked down off my feet, I didn't fully
28:55
Speaker 1: hit the ground. I caught myself with the glove, but
28:57
Speaker 1: I didn't even notice it. I just looked up and
28:59
Speaker 1: I was like what. And then I had to go
29:01
Speaker 1: back out there and fight and then find out what
29:03
Speaker 1: happened later. So those are moments where I was like,
29:05
Speaker 1: this is real.
29:05
Speaker 2: When you really got into it, your first fight, second fight,
29:09
Speaker 2: third fight, it's still going. Do you feel an extra
29:13
Speaker 2: amount of pressure because of your dad's name in this industry?
29:18
Speaker 1: No, No, I don't feel because I just don't know
29:20
Speaker 1: how much more pressure you can feel. Yeah, I think
29:23
Speaker 1: I feel pressure when I sit at home maybe and
29:25
Speaker 1: think about it. You know, the did just I don't.
29:29
Speaker 1: I think I'm matched out in pressure. There's just nowhere
29:31
Speaker 1: to go. It's like, did you feel pressure to make
29:33
Speaker 1: your business successful? Well? If I didn't, I was going
29:36
Speaker 1: to fully be homeless. So I don't know.
29:39
Speaker 2: You know, Yeah, no, I hear you, all right, So
29:40
Speaker 2: I don't.
29:41
Speaker 1: Really proceed pressure in those Yeah.
29:43
Speaker 2: No, I totally hear you. So let's transition then a
29:45
Speaker 2: little bit into your boxing professionally, your dodge and punches
29:50
Speaker 2: left and right, getting thrown in the throat. When do
29:57
Speaker 2: you start to realize Is it after you go to
30:00
Speaker 2: the hotel and you kind of like turn down for
30:02
Speaker 2: a beat that you're like, maybe I should start to
30:04
Speaker 2: think about what's next.
30:05
Speaker 1: I would never change what I'm doing because of adversity,
30:10
Speaker 1: but love while this is going. This is another storyline.
30:14
Speaker 1: So my dad, that memory had said when he said,
30:17
Speaker 1: I have to train you as a pro. Yeah, he said,
30:19
Speaker 1: and I was happy about it. He said, A requisite
30:21
Speaker 1: is this boxing program, this building where you're training. Because
30:24
Speaker 1: the memory was closed, I had the key. I want
30:27
Speaker 1: you to open it back up. It been closed for
30:29
Speaker 1: almost two years at that point. I want you to
30:31
Speaker 1: open it back up. You're going to be the only
30:32
Speaker 1: boxing trainer. And I was like, Dad, I'm just learning
30:34
Speaker 1: how to do this. He said, that's fine. Whatever I
30:36
Speaker 1: teach you that day, you teach others. And I got hooked.
30:42
Speaker 1: I get this to the gym sometime like because the
30:44
Speaker 1: kids couldn't get there until about two thirty, so i'd
30:46
Speaker 1: get there at two and get there early, be ready
30:48
Speaker 1: for him, and I'd be planning it on my lesson
30:50
Speaker 1: playing because I'm so nervous, you know. And I just
30:52
Speaker 1: teach him whatever he taught me that day, and it
30:54
Speaker 1: just added added builton, and I would do two to
30:58
Speaker 1: like five. He trained me from like five to six
31:00
Speaker 1: thirty hard, and then i'd go from like six thirty
31:03
Speaker 1: to sometime nine at night. And these are people from
31:06
Speaker 1: ages nine to thirty, a lot of high school kids.
31:09
Speaker 1: I had an amateur boxing team, and I remember feeling like,
31:12
Speaker 1: for my first time in my life, I would have
31:15
Speaker 1: to talk myself out of work. Because I love work.
31:18
Speaker 1: But I could be like, Okay, sign for a break,
31:20
Speaker 1: Let's enjoy the finer things. Let's spend some of this money,
31:22
Speaker 1: you know. But in that gym when I'm training people,
31:25
Speaker 1: I'm like, you just got to go home, man, put
31:28
Speaker 1: it down for a second. Go home, go home, Send
31:30
Speaker 1: them to go home. They need rest. I'd have to
31:32
Speaker 1: talk myself out of work, which I've never been in
31:35
Speaker 1: that situation until that point. Right even training boxing, training myself,
31:38
Speaker 1: I was like, yo, can we just stop this ten
31:40
Speaker 1: minutes early? And so I remember telling a friend of mine,
31:43
Speaker 1: if I could do that for a living, if I
31:45
Speaker 1: could find a way to make that eleving, I would
31:47
Speaker 1: just stop professional boxing period, Like I wouldn't even think
31:51
Speaker 1: about it. I didn't think that was the case. So
31:53
Speaker 1: about a year and a half later, what are we
31:56
Speaker 1: like in time right now? Two thousand and eight, Okay,
31:59
Speaker 1: then two thousand and nine, I decided to just take
32:02
Speaker 1: a break from the sport, from more so from a
32:04
Speaker 1: business level, but like a break, like, hey, two months
32:07
Speaker 1: off train and go fight again. I actually did fight
32:09
Speaker 1: again after that. I'm watching an interview by Dave Chapelle,
32:12
Speaker 1: and this is when I was like done with fighting.
32:14
Speaker 1: This is late two thousand and eight, Texas, watching an
32:18
Speaker 1: interview by Dave Chappelle, and he says he's arguing with
32:20
Speaker 1: his father, telling his dad why he wants to be
32:22
Speaker 1: a comedian. His dad's like the odds of being successful
32:25
Speaker 1: like less than one percent. His dad's a professor. I
32:28
Speaker 1: think all his family had educated people. And he said, Dad,
32:32
Speaker 1: if I can make a teacher salary being a comedian,
32:36
Speaker 1: wouldn't that be successful? And his dad was like, yo,
32:38
Speaker 1: you got me. I watched that and I was like,
32:41
Speaker 1: light bulb, teachers in Texas make thirty five thousand dollars
32:43
Speaker 1: a year. If I can teach boxing and make thirty
32:46
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars a year, that would be a success.
32:48
Speaker 1: That was like how my brain works. And I think
32:49
Speaker 1: they make a lot more than thirty five thousand dollars
32:51
Speaker 1: a year. So had this kind of like moment with
32:55
Speaker 1: my father where I was just like, yo, this is
32:56
Speaker 1: not the right type attention. We're successful, you know. And
32:59
Speaker 1: I didn't want to like, once again lose my relationship
33:01
Speaker 1: with my dad over boxing. So I was like, you
33:03
Speaker 1: know what, let me take a breathe and reset and
33:05
Speaker 1: think should I be doing this. Visiting a friend in
33:07
Speaker 1: Boston and he goes second down there, He's like, Yo,
33:11
Speaker 1: come check out this gym. We go work out. He
33:13
Speaker 1: used to be a boxing trainer but never boxed. Best
33:16
Speaker 1: friend from boarding school Boston and met him when we
33:19
Speaker 1: were eleven chubby kids, and we come out and he's like, dude,
33:22
Speaker 1: you should open a Boston gym in Boston. It would
33:24
Speaker 1: crush it. And I was like, yeah, what, And he
33:28
Speaker 1: was like, don't look at me like that because I
33:29
Speaker 1: gave him this weird look because this is like the
33:30
Speaker 1: ninth business idea he's come to me with since we've
33:32
Speaker 1: been kids. And I was like nah. I was like,
33:34
Speaker 1: I really want to do it. And I just never
33:37
Speaker 1: looked back because it was the culmination of all those thoughts.
33:41
Speaker 1: People were paying one hundred and forty dollars a month
33:43
Speaker 1: to belong to it's stinky boxing gym, and Equinox was
33:46
Speaker 1: on fifty six. So I literally never went back. I
33:50
Speaker 1: just stayed in Boston and opened the gym two years later,
33:53
Speaker 1: what did you had? Okay, So I had a jeep.
33:58
Speaker 1: I went to I think it was TJ Max, one
34:02
Speaker 1: of those, and I went in the back and I
34:04
Speaker 1: had a carry on suitcase so cheap. Apparently licensere brand
34:08
Speaker 1: to like Happy Suitcases, and I was like thirty bucks.
34:12
Speaker 1: I remember buying it and I had it. So I
34:14
Speaker 1: had that carry on suitcase full of whatever I could
34:16
Speaker 1: pack in it.
34:17
Speaker 2: And you're a big guy, so it's not like you
34:19
Speaker 2: can really fit a lot of stuff in here.
34:21
Speaker 1: No, you can't, you know that.
34:23
Speaker 2: I mean yeah, I mean I'm sure you can't traveling
34:26
Speaker 2: with a carry on.
34:28
Speaker 1: It's hard as a big guy. And I had this backpack.
34:30
Speaker 2: And so that same backpack, that one you made a
34:33
Speaker 2: lot of money traveling around the road.
34:35
Speaker 1: A new back back sentimental. I still have that carry
34:39
Speaker 1: on and it doesn't it's like the zippers broke mental note.
34:42
Speaker 2: Anyone listening to this podcast that wants to say, George
34:46
Speaker 2: a new backpack for a new suitcase. Oh my god.
34:48
Speaker 2: I used to have one of those north facet backbacks
34:50
Speaker 2: in college.
34:50
Speaker 1: I look stra north face.
34:52
Speaker 2: Someone please send I'm going to George. I got you.
34:56
Speaker 2: We're going after the pod.
34:58
Speaker 1: I slept on AJ's couch for for three or four,
35:01
Speaker 1: probably three months. He told me, travel a little bit,
35:03
Speaker 1: be sure you're sure. I traveled for like a week,
35:06
Speaker 1: came back and I said, I'm sure, and stopping this
35:08
Speaker 1: couch until I could find a roommate and bought an
35:11
Speaker 1: air mattress. And I had the air mattress and the
35:13
Speaker 1: box of air mattress came in and I rode that
35:16
Speaker 1: out until I had no more money and just kept
35:18
Speaker 1: trying to open the gym.
35:19
Speaker 2: Wow, okay, so what's the first thing that happens when
35:22
Speaker 2: you decide that you want to open the gym?
35:26
Speaker 1: First thing I did was I put on my boots.
35:29
Speaker 1: I always ran the military boots. He's like, I got
35:32
Speaker 1: him from like the marine course. The way, I don't know.
35:35
Speaker 2: The second when you look down and pointed at your feet,
35:37
Speaker 2: I was like, are you really a big? Thank God?
35:43
Speaker 1: And the way and I just I don't know. My
35:44
Speaker 1: dad made me and I got used to it. So
35:46
Speaker 1: I ran around the city. I had a list from
35:48
Speaker 1: Google of all the gyms, and I would just walking
35:50
Speaker 1: one by one and took a tour and just learned,
35:53
Speaker 1: studied all the websites, and then then I did a
35:57
Speaker 1: walk from Equinox to the Sweaty boxing gym that charged
35:59
Speaker 1: one thirty and one hundred a month if you signed
36:01
Speaker 1: a contract. And I landed somewhere in the middle because
36:04
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, one mile, they're two miles apart, equidistant.
36:08
Speaker 1: There's this area called the Seaport, and aj had already
36:11
Speaker 1: said he thought the seaport was a good area, but
36:12
Speaker 1: I didn't know what that was. So I come back.
36:14
Speaker 1: I'm like, yo, this area is called the Seaport. The
36:16
Speaker 1: buildings looked like an old like they looked like boxing gyms,
36:19
Speaker 1: and he was like, duh, that's where I said you
36:20
Speaker 1: should open it. And then I would go night by
36:23
Speaker 1: night and I would wait till about five or six,
36:25
Speaker 1: and I would see people from these condos that had
36:27
Speaker 1: been built. It was a ghost town, but there were
36:28
Speaker 1: a few condos and they'd walk through the seaport into
36:31
Speaker 1: Fidai Financial District and then back. And so I was like,
36:35
Speaker 1: there's a demand here. And if people were paying one
36:38
Speaker 1: thirty for a gym, I wouldn't even go to. My
36:40
Speaker 1: parents are from the hood, you know, yeah, I kind
36:43
Speaker 1: of from the myself in many ways, like I'm comfortable
36:45
Speaker 1: in the hood. I wasn't comfortable in that hood, right,
36:48
Speaker 1: and so I was like, all right. Then I got
36:51
Speaker 1: a software called liveplan dot Com called up and I
36:54
Speaker 1: started making a live plan to figure out where break
36:57
Speaker 1: even was because I was I remember learning in business school,
37:00
Speaker 1: if you can get to break even, it's a business
37:02
Speaker 1: worth being in. You just figured out how to be profitable.
37:04
Speaker 2: So live Plan is just literally a planning software.
37:07
Speaker 1: I looked at all the business plan softwares, and live
37:09
Speaker 1: Plan had just started at the time. Apparently. I was like, yo,
37:12
Speaker 1: this is awesome, and I called up La Boxing, which
37:16
Speaker 1: is now UFC. UFC bought them, and I was like,
37:19
Speaker 1: maybe that's just franchise. So I asked them questions. I
37:21
Speaker 1: didn't tell my name, and they were like, yo, we
37:22
Speaker 1: love Boston. Boston has the highest percentage of people with
37:26
Speaker 1: a gym membership in the nation, at twenty five percent Massachusetts. Then,
37:30
Speaker 1: so I wrote that down and they're like, yeah, it's
37:33
Speaker 1: great for this, that and the other, and we're looking
37:34
Speaker 1: for a franchiseing and I was like awesome. So I
37:36
Speaker 1: did more research. Bough that was Massachusetts at twenty five percent.
37:40
Speaker 1: Boston skewed higher than that, and the average price paid
37:43
Speaker 1: for a gym membership was ninety one dollars. That was
37:45
Speaker 1: third in the nation.
37:46
Speaker 2: Wow.
37:46
Speaker 1: So I ran my numbers at the LA Boxing average,
37:49
Speaker 1: which they told me it was like seventy, and I
37:51
Speaker 1: ran him at ninety one. And then I ran him
37:52
Speaker 1: out with the sweaty Boxton gym chargers one thirty. And
37:54
Speaker 1: I ran him at Equinox numbers one fifty six. And
37:57
Speaker 1: I found that right around ninety at five hundre, your
38:00
Speaker 1: members just break even. That could pay thirty k a month.
38:02
Speaker 2: Or innt Okay, rock on, rock on, And.
38:05
Speaker 1: Then I was like, for sure, I'm not going anywhere.
38:09
Speaker 2: What's your dad think?
38:09
Speaker 1: That took about a week.
38:11
Speaker 2: That took about it.
38:15
Speaker 1: He was not so jazzed because this point was like
38:18
Speaker 1: you went through all this beat up. I almost killed
38:21
Speaker 1: you three or four times, you know what they were training,
38:24
Speaker 1: and you're he's like, you're actually getting good, and he's like, man,
38:28
Speaker 1: you hold on for a couple more years. You could
38:29
Speaker 1: have a championship twenty million dollars and you know, and
38:34
Speaker 1: I just didn't want it. I couldn't. I couldn't function
38:37
Speaker 1: the idea of doing something when I already knew I
38:39
Speaker 1: love something so much more. I was like, no, I
38:41
Speaker 1: love this, you know, boxing would be easy, and I
38:43
Speaker 1: end up having one more fight to just like kind
38:45
Speaker 1: of put it to bed by myself. But we butted heads,
38:49
Speaker 1: not but it heads, but we just disagreed, you know.
38:51
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, I love your support, and
38:53
Speaker 1: he's like, how am I going to support that when
38:54
Speaker 1: you have a real boxing career, you know, like you
38:58
Speaker 1: can fight on pay per view, you can do all this,
39:00
Speaker 1: And I was like nah, And so yeah, he wasn't thrilled.
39:03
Speaker 2: In retrospect, when you look back and you realize that
39:05
Speaker 2: you really did follow your heart, Like what did that
39:08
Speaker 2: experience and leaning toward the boxing gym really teach you?
39:13
Speaker 1: You know what? It taught me like this is right
39:15
Speaker 1: and the wrong way to do things. I think the
39:16
Speaker 1: way I handled things that my father was wrong because
39:21
Speaker 1: I didn't I don't know, man. I just finally I
39:24
Speaker 1: was just like, forget it. You don't understand da da
39:26
Speaker 1: da da, you know, And I wish I had just
39:29
Speaker 1: like literally picked up the phone and had a hard
39:32
Speaker 1: conversation with him, like every day of the week until
39:34
Speaker 1: he was okay with it, because guess what, in the end,
39:37
Speaker 1: his point was like, you can make four hundred thousand
39:39
Speaker 1: dollars a year of boxing, You're about to sign a
39:41
Speaker 1: lease that requires you to pay four hundred thousand dollars
39:44
Speaker 1: a year whether you're successful or not. He's like, why
39:47
Speaker 1: would you put yourself under that pressure? So he was
39:49
Speaker 1: worried about my success, and I think drilling down into
39:52
Speaker 1: like learning that and understanding it, I think would have
39:55
Speaker 1: been better and more productive.
39:57
Speaker 2: Did How long did you guys go? Kind of?
40:01
Speaker 1: It was like finally we were just like, let's just
40:03
Speaker 1: not talk about it. You know, let's talk about horses
40:05
Speaker 1: and family and hamburgers literally horses.
40:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, you horse bedding family.
40:10
Speaker 1: No, we we race horses that people bet on, but
40:13
Speaker 1: we don't bet on them.
40:13
Speaker 2: Got it?
40:14
Speaker 1: I probably would, My dad doesn't.
40:17
Speaker 2: Okay, So you guys get over that hurdle of sorts
40:19
Speaker 2: and you're working on opening a gym in Boston and
40:22
Speaker 2: when does it actually open?
40:24
Speaker 1: So started, I moved to Boston two thousand and March
40:29
Speaker 1: twenty twelve, and it opened January first, January second, twenty fourteen.
40:34
Speaker 2: That's a pretty quick turnaround.
40:36
Speaker 1: I thought it was going to take six months.
40:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, how did that feel?
40:40
Speaker 1: It hurt? It hurt. I think in the I learned
40:42
Speaker 1: a lot in the process. You remember all those people
40:44
Speaker 1: that I told you were crowding my house, Yeah they were.
40:48
Speaker 1: Nobody was anywhere to be found. And I remember looking
40:50
Speaker 1: at my cell phone because I had gone from you know,
40:53
Speaker 1: being the man to like not the man, and no
40:58
Speaker 1: one was calling, no one was hit me up. I
40:59
Speaker 1: had Facebook. I was like, y'all can find me.
41:01
Speaker 2: I was going to ask you. So was social media
41:03
Speaker 2: even really a thing for you at this point?
41:06
Speaker 1: It was not like it is now. But I had
41:08
Speaker 1: five thousand friends on Facebook, you know. So it was
41:11
Speaker 1: just weird to see how quiet these get when people
41:13
Speaker 1: don't think you're doing anything. Not having money, when you're
41:17
Speaker 1: used to have a lot of money, it's awkward. Like
41:19
Speaker 1: I had this moment where I had a ten thousand
41:21
Speaker 1: dollars BRIONI trench coat and I checked it in and
41:26
Speaker 1: I I had a ticket to a fundraiser and I
41:30
Speaker 1: couldn't I didn't have enough money to get it back out.
41:32
Speaker 1: I didn't realize you were charging and I was like, whoa, whoa,
41:35
Speaker 1: this is awkward, right, and some please, But I was like,
41:41
Speaker 1: how do I tell them about have any money? I
41:42
Speaker 1: just never they probably would have been okay, And some
41:44
Speaker 1: lady paid for me she saw me get stuck and
41:46
Speaker 1: just later found her. But that and then I remember
41:49
Speaker 1: one time like I'm just like because I can't ask
41:52
Speaker 1: my dad for help, you know, He's like, hey, you
41:54
Speaker 1: have a career, you have a home you can come
41:56
Speaker 1: back to, but not doing that, you know. Yeah, So
41:59
Speaker 1: I'm remember one time scrounging on my chain to get
42:03
Speaker 1: on the bus to get to to work and sent
42:06
Speaker 1: you the office where I agent let me use some
42:09
Speaker 1: of his office space to work with my business plan,
42:11
Speaker 1: and I miscounted. I thought I had more change than
42:13
Speaker 1: I did to get on the bus. I was like,
42:14
Speaker 1: this is it?
42:16
Speaker 2: End of the line.
42:17
Speaker 1: The bus driver let me on anyway. And so it
42:20
Speaker 1: was those moments seeing that guy like be nice to me,
42:23
Speaker 1: and it had nothing to do with my father or me.
42:25
Speaker 1: He you know, he was just like, yo, you's just
42:26
Speaker 1: some big dark dude to get on the bus. And
42:30
Speaker 1: so those moments changed me.
42:33
Speaker 2: Yeah for sure. All right, so you open up the
42:35
Speaker 2: gym January two, twenty fourteen, and now I mean you
42:40
Speaker 2: listed a whole lot of other gyms, so obviously it's
42:44
Speaker 2: doing pretty well.
42:46
Speaker 1: Yeah. So right around about six months out. I literally
42:51
Speaker 1: moved into the gym, and not five months out, and
42:55
Speaker 1: I started pre selling and I would four hundred dollars
42:58
Speaker 1: a pop, first and last, plus one hundred and fifty
43:00
Speaker 1: dollars sign a fee, and we sold six hundred of those.
43:03
Speaker 2: Wow.
43:03
Speaker 1: And I did like five fifty of those myself, and
43:06
Speaker 1: I would just sell, sell, sell, sell, sell, sell sell,
43:08
Speaker 1: because I was like, we're gonna can't. I can't open
43:11
Speaker 1: up paying thirty k, you know. Yeah, And so we
43:13
Speaker 1: opened up Castill Positive and then things have since then
43:16
Speaker 1: business wise had been pretty.
43:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty solid, pretty solid, I mean Atlanta yesterday. It's
43:26
Speaker 2: interesting because you really went from this time where your
43:29
Speaker 2: entire existence went revolved around being there for your dad,
43:33
Speaker 2: doing things for your dad, and then all of a sudden,
43:35
Speaker 2: like you wanted to do things for you, whether that
43:38
Speaker 2: was the weight loss or opening this gym. And I
43:41
Speaker 2: feel like you were so big on supporting him that
43:45
Speaker 2: it must have been really difficult for you to feel
43:47
Speaker 2: like you didn't have his support in return.
43:50
Speaker 1: It was a really weird thing, really weird thing. And
43:54
Speaker 1: it's so funny, man, because yeah, I look back in
43:57
Speaker 1: my entire life, my entire life. It was like like
44:01
Speaker 1: when I was seven, I remember my dad would give
44:03
Speaker 1: me one hundred dollars for straight a's and I was like, man,
44:06
Speaker 1: I got to get that hundred dollars. And I remember
44:08
Speaker 1: one time I came home and I got a B
44:10
Speaker 1: and my mom was like she was counting on one
44:12
Speaker 1: hundred dollars. She was like, you can't do this. Bees
44:16
Speaker 1: are for you know what. And I was like, okay,
44:19
Speaker 1: I'll never do that again. And and so I was like,
44:22
Speaker 1: I got to get them trade a's to get the
44:23
Speaker 1: hundred dollars because my dad's going to be proud of me.
44:25
Speaker 1: And then so on and so forth, and like always
44:27
Speaker 1: just performing at a high level, speaking well or whatever
44:30
Speaker 1: it was because of my dad. But I looked up
44:33
Speaker 1: to my dad and these are all great things, good grades,
44:35
Speaker 1: speaking well, never getting in trouble. And then went right
44:39
Speaker 1: into my professional career managing him, and it was all
44:41
Speaker 1: about making sure like he was successful, but I was
44:43
Speaker 1: successful on the way as well, and then fighting although
44:48
Speaker 1: it was all about me, and it was it was
44:50
Speaker 1: about doing exactly what he told me to do. And
44:52
Speaker 1: so yeah, the minute I'd stopped doing that, And it's
44:55
Speaker 1: so funny, I think it was a minute I started
44:57
Speaker 1: to gain his respect in a good way, but it
44:59
Speaker 1: was just it's weird for everybody, Like what do we
45:01
Speaker 1: do in Monk's life? Is not all about dad, you know?
45:05
Speaker 1: And the good news is I have had three occasions
45:08
Speaker 1: when my dad grabbed me and sent me a text
45:10
Speaker 1: and said it verbally. He's like, man, you did this
45:12
Speaker 1: all on your own. You would have had no other
45:16
Speaker 1: chance to do it. And he's like, you can finally
45:18
Speaker 1: say that you did something no one else helped you,
45:20
Speaker 1: because everybody's the thing. I did it. You did it
45:23
Speaker 1: all on your own. I'm so proud of you. And
45:24
Speaker 1: he's told me that three times, so in hindsight, it
45:27
Speaker 1: was awesome.
45:28
Speaker 2: It's really special that you can recall all three times
45:31
Speaker 2: where he said that to you.
45:32
Speaker 1: Yep, I'm being shouted it.
45:35
Speaker 2: It's interesting to me though, because I feel like it
45:37
Speaker 2: almost makes me appreciate the relationships that I have, whether
45:41
Speaker 2: it's with my parents or with my friends when they
45:43
Speaker 2: say things that like I'm so proud of you or
45:45
Speaker 2: I support you, because I've lost track of that with
45:48
Speaker 2: a lot of the people that I care about. So
45:51
Speaker 2: to think about this idea that your father has said
45:53
Speaker 2: this to you three specific times. It's mind blowing. It's
45:58
Speaker 2: so much.
45:58
Speaker 1: I didn't think about it too. You said it. But
46:00
Speaker 1: it's important to note those things, you know. Sometimes you
46:02
Speaker 1: forget when you're upset with people.
46:03
Speaker 2: Totally. All right, So now we've built a successful business,
46:07
Speaker 2: we're feeling good.
46:09
Speaker 1: What I got off the couch?
46:11
Speaker 2: Got off the couch? Where's your primary home?
46:14
Speaker 1: Boston?
46:14
Speaker 2: Okay? When you when you look back on building this
46:17
Speaker 2: business so far, what would you say has been one
46:20
Speaker 2: of the best pieces of advice that someone has offered you?
46:23
Speaker 1: I'd say, too, I think I hate to give my
46:25
Speaker 1: dad credit because but uh, I don't know why. I
46:28
Speaker 1: just get him in credit, you know what I mean,
46:29
Speaker 1: because I know he's like yep. But I'd say two
46:32
Speaker 1: pieces of advice actually too from two Georgia's One guy's
46:35
Speaker 1: guy named George that ran a large internet company, and uh, anyway,
46:41
Speaker 1: he told me get rid of non nonperformers, get rid
46:44
Speaker 1: of performers. But then he said he'll take his time
46:47
Speaker 1: with nonperformance. It got to get rid of him quick
46:49
Speaker 1: because by the time you notice, other people in the
46:51
Speaker 1: company notice and it affects their not only there the
46:55
Speaker 1: person who's underperforming, but everybody else starts underperforming and and
46:59
Speaker 1: the other reasons, So get rid of them, but take
47:01
Speaker 1: your time, schedule an hour or two for a few weeks,
47:04
Speaker 1: and help that person find a place where they shine
47:06
Speaker 1: with another company if it's not within your company. So
47:08
Speaker 1: that's been great, and typically it's hard, but when you
47:11
Speaker 1: take that extra effort to see somebody into a place
47:14
Speaker 1: where they shine, you actually feel better than if you
47:16
Speaker 1: had let them stay in your organization and faster on
47:19
Speaker 1: their own. You know, people underperforming, like that's the worst
47:22
Speaker 1: thing that can happen to a person in my opinion,
47:25
Speaker 1: and a professional organization and know they're underperforming. Number two
47:28
Speaker 1: is tender loving care. I asked my dad once. I
47:31
Speaker 1: was like, I don't know how to open the next
47:32
Speaker 1: gym because I don't know why people are coming to
47:34
Speaker 1: this one. I was like, I have nicer treadmills and Equinox,
47:36
Speaker 1: you know. I always like, was like, I got to
47:38
Speaker 1: make sure I can get an Equinox customer, not that
47:40
Speaker 1: I knew about the business model. I was like, I
47:43
Speaker 1: have shower, steam room, juice bar, physical therapy, I have
47:46
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty classes a week. I have everything.
47:48
Speaker 1: So when I open the next one, Do I just
47:49
Speaker 1: do everything? It could be a waste. They may only
47:51
Speaker 1: be coming for one thing. And he said, what you
47:53
Speaker 1: may find is that people are just coming for a
47:56
Speaker 1: little tender, loving care. The way you make them feel.
47:59
Speaker 1: He's like, they might just be coming for you. And
48:01
Speaker 1: what he meant by that is the way you make
48:02
Speaker 1: them feel. And he's like, you're trying to replicate energy
48:06
Speaker 1: and a swagger and a vibe. And I was like,
48:07
Speaker 1: as long as you figure that out and people feel
48:10
Speaker 1: welcome when they walk in and motivate it on the
48:12
Speaker 1: way out, you shouldn't worry about opening the next gym,
48:14
Speaker 1: because it's about that, it's not about the treadmill. I'd
48:17
Speaker 1: say those two pieces.
48:18
Speaker 2: Advice interesting, all right, I've got to ask you. I mean,
48:23
Speaker 2: you did just offer me a piece of advice that
48:25
Speaker 2: your father gave you. But I feel like you, unlike
48:29
Speaker 2: a lot of kids growing up, and especially like during
48:32
Speaker 2: those teenage years, I feel like you like look for independence,
48:35
Speaker 2: you try to get away from your parents, but literally
48:37
Speaker 2: during the height of your teenage years, and like as
48:39
Speaker 2: you're becoming like a young man, you are spending so
48:42
Speaker 2: much time with your dad. Yeah, when you think about
48:47
Speaker 2: that time. Is there anything specific that stood out to you,
48:50
Speaker 2: like a lesson that you learned as you were coming
48:52
Speaker 2: of age.
48:52
Speaker 1: There's so many We spent so many hours talking like
48:55
Speaker 1: he made me read like warrant peace when I was
48:57
Speaker 1: like eighteen or something, you know, and we talk about
49:01
Speaker 1: it on our like so many hours, man, But observing
49:05
Speaker 1: how things play out year after year and being able
49:08
Speaker 1: to sit and talk to it four years later with
49:09
Speaker 1: your dad and you guys were talking about it four
49:11
Speaker 1: years before in business. But I would say, if I
49:14
Speaker 1: look back, it was pattern recognition. It's big on that
49:19
Speaker 1: pattern recognition. Taking notes so you can have the ability
49:24
Speaker 1: to recognize patterns and reflect on them and plan for
49:28
Speaker 1: the future. And patience, man, patience, patience, patience, patience. And
49:32
Speaker 1: I'll tell you a funny story that I'll help you
49:33
Speaker 1: remember his take on it and what he passed on
49:37
Speaker 1: to me. His sparring partners. Glad I got to box good.
49:40
Speaker 1: I would have never taken this lesson full circle. He
49:42
Speaker 1: had a sparing partner that would fight. He sparred with
49:45
Speaker 1: my dad, well, my dad was active, and then he
49:48
Speaker 1: stayed healthy enough to be my sporting partner when I
49:50
Speaker 1: was training and he said, your dad is uh. He said, George,
49:54
Speaker 1: you got to watch out for him because mostly when
49:57
Speaker 1: you spar and you box, right it, guy hits you
49:59
Speaker 1: with a good shot and you everybody hits a guy
50:02
Speaker 1: back right away. He said, George, wait two weeks before
50:07
Speaker 1: you get you and you know that that that's something
50:11
Speaker 1: I learned from him, just the patience and you know,
50:14
Speaker 1: if there's going to be any reconciliation, like, don't do
50:17
Speaker 1: it when people know you know, and by the time
50:20
Speaker 1: you decide to do a boxing is different. You gotta
50:21
Speaker 1: get him back, but by the time you decide to
50:23
Speaker 1: do it, you typically find out that it wasn't that
50:25
Speaker 1: important anyway. And the full circle on that is forgiveness.
50:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, you just had a baby, right, Yeah, how does that.
50:37
Speaker 1: Forgiveness?
50:38
Speaker 2: I was going to say, well, like, what do you
50:40
Speaker 2: want to pass on to your forgiveness?
50:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, forgiveness, forgiveness, forgiveness, forgiveness. I mean, my favorite saying
50:47
Speaker 1: is forgiveness is a subtle thread that bonds both love
50:51
Speaker 1: and friendship. And I think without that, who are we
50:54
Speaker 1: without the people around us? And you're gonna have to
50:56
Speaker 1: forgive somebody in your life, especially the people close because
50:59
Speaker 1: they get the ability to hurt you the best. So
51:01
Speaker 1: I think, well, my daughter, it's more about I need
51:04
Speaker 1: her to forgive me. I already know I'm a helicopter
51:07
Speaker 1: dad times ten. So forgiveness I love it.
51:11
Speaker 2: Okay, winding down here the final question. I ask all
51:15
Speaker 2: my guests right now, if you had the opportunity to
51:18
Speaker 2: offer yourself one piece of advice that George who's almost
51:22
Speaker 2: three hundred pounds, he's doing everything he can for his dad,
51:26
Speaker 2: but he is not happy, and he knows that he
51:29
Speaker 2: needs to make a change. What piece of advice do
51:32
Speaker 2: you give that guy? Looking back on that time in
51:34
Speaker 2: your life right now.
51:35
Speaker 1: Cut the cord. Cut the cord, any chord that's attached
51:39
Speaker 1: to you that's holding you back. You know, you thinkure
51:42
Speaker 1: about a big pipe, right and you attach a little
51:44
Speaker 1: pipe on the side and suck a little water out
51:46
Speaker 1: of it, then another and another. You have this big
51:48
Speaker 1: eight inch pipe. But by the time you have all
51:50
Speaker 1: these little hoses poking at the end of that pipe,
51:53
Speaker 1: where your goals are and your dreams are, I'd say,
51:56
Speaker 1: there's nothing left right and that's where your happiness is at.
52:00
Speaker 1: The ability to have some pressure, some force. So cut
52:03
Speaker 1: the chords. Anybody you have to cut the cord on,
52:06
Speaker 1: sit down with them, give them a hug, like love them,
52:10
Speaker 1: put a picture of them on your wall. But if
52:12
Speaker 1: you need to cut the cord and someone who's sucking
52:13
Speaker 1: you dry, you got to do it quick, swift, and
52:15
Speaker 1: I like swift and deadly to me means like, don't
52:18
Speaker 1: saw somebody's arm, I just chop it, cut the cord.
52:21
Speaker 1: And then secondly is look at conflicts as an ability
52:26
Speaker 1: to make all your relationships stronger. It's the shirt. If
52:30
Speaker 1: you can, you're not always gonna nail it. But conflict
52:33
Speaker 1: to me, on the other side of conflict is growth
52:36
Speaker 1: when you face it head on with the goal of
52:39
Speaker 1: ending on the other side friends and family. So just
52:42
Speaker 1: like like get good at resolving conflict, Like there's books
52:46
Speaker 1: on it, and I think those are the two things.
52:49
Speaker 1: Like I didn't know there was a book on conflict resolution,
52:52
Speaker 1: Like I wish I had read that. To cut the chords,
52:55
Speaker 1: resolve conflict, and follow your love, man, follow your path,
52:58
Speaker 1: your dream, your north star. Fast.
53:01
Speaker 2: Now, where's any spoiler alert on where the next EBF.
53:05
Speaker 1: Is going to be? I want one on every corner,
53:08
Speaker 1: every corner, seriously, Like I think a boxing I'm sorry,
53:11
Speaker 1: I want to boxing you on every corner. Okay, so
53:14
Speaker 1: to the extent I can be a part of supplying
53:16
Speaker 1: even just motivation for people to open more boxing gyms.
53:20
Speaker 1: That's what to me, it's all about.
53:22
Speaker 2: I love it. Thank you so much for giving me
53:23
Speaker 2: your time.
53:24
Speaker 1: Thank you.
53:24
Speaker 2: This is dope. Please take a moment and leave a
53:27
Speaker 2: quick review by clicking the link with the description to
53:29
Speaker 2: this episode. We all face multiple hurles in life. I
53:33
Speaker 2: want to hear about yours. Reach Out to me at
53:35
Speaker 2: Emily at hurdle dot us. Connect to the podcast on
53:37
Speaker 2: Instagram and Twitter at Hurdle Podcast. George, where do they
53:42
Speaker 2: find you? Where do they find EBF? Give me the rundown.
53:45
Speaker 1: I'm everybody fights Everything and George Forman the third pretty
53:50
Speaker 1: transparent reach out please awesome.
53:52
Speaker 2: I am at Emily a body another hurdle conquered. Catch
53:56
Speaker 2: you guys next time.
54:00
Speaker 1: To do in my