Latest / Harder Than Life / 36: Simple is Really, Really Hard w/ Greg Scheinman

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36: Simple is Really, Really Hard w/ Greg Scheinman · Harder Than Life

• 0:00
  I'm Kelly Siegel and this is harder than life a podcast about self-love self-awareness business and health We tell outrageous stories and boil everything down to simple practical advice. You can start using today. Let's get living
• 0:15
  Okay, I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but there are no coincidences in the universe. I barely know today's guest. I'm not even certain how we crossed paths, but I might, I just might be the most excited of any guests we've ever had. Greg Scheiman will not disappoint, folks. His Midlife Mail podcast is one of the top rated podcasts in the world. He authored the Midlife Mail No Bullshit Guide to Help You Live Better, Longer, Happier, Healthier, Stronger, and Have More Fun in Your 40s and 50s.
• 0:43
  All this comes while he's the CEO of multiple companies. Ladies and gentlemen, the handsome father and husband, University of Michigan grad, go blue, athlete, investor, and overall bad motherfucker. Greg, it's my honor to have you on the Hotter Life podcast. Hey, Kelly, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.
• 1:03
  I don't even know where to begin. There's so much to you. We're in the presence of greatness. This man is a freak. Let's start off with your daily winning routine. Tell the listeners your daily blueprint to win each day.
• 1:16
  No, I appreciate it. I was actually just writing some stuff down because for the most part, that's what I do is I write things down. I found the number one thing that you can do that most guys in particular don't do enough of is they don't write down enough of what they're doing and what they want to do.
• 1:35
  You know, and one of my rules is like, hey, if you don't know where you're going, you're never gonna get there. So I spent a ton of time writing stuff down. I made these pads for myself. I don't know if you guys can see it. They just say preparation, consistency, accountability. And one of my things is I do, you know, three professional things and three personal things every day, that's it. Do you sell those?
• 1:55
  Not yet. I do not. You know, this is part of, you know, part of the next evolution is again, just trying things over time that things that I've learned from guys that have come on my podcast and life done business with men like yourself, put plans together, try things out. And when it works, we go with it. So eventually, yeah, those are those are coming out as I'm working on a course and some other stuff right now. But that's really interesting.
• 2:19
  really been my thing, which is start writing stuff down, you know, the daily, right all the way out to, you know, the three-year map, the maximized action plan that I operate off of. So would you, would you have a PDF of that? I want that.
• 2:36
  Absolutely. So that is something that I do with my coaching clients. Again, after years of trial and error, what I call kind of my ace principle, aggregate, curate, and eliminate. We aggregate from all the noise and all the stuff out there. We curate it down to what works for us and then eliminate the stuff that doesn't work properly.
• 2:57
  work for us. And I'm not saying what doesn't work for me may not work for you. You know, we're all individuals on it. But from there, you develop that into your personal operating system, what your roadmap works like. And then you just reverse engineer back to, you know, the steps that we need to take quarterly, monthly, weekly, down to the daily. I mean, you know, you don't get to look like you if you're not following a program.
• 3:20
  Bro, you're brilliant. I know I'm saying that because you just resonate with everything I do. So I literally, I steal from everybody. Everything I have. I'm like BASF. I don't make anything. I make everything that everybody has better. That little thing is going to help me tremendously because there's days when I leave work because, you know, I run several companies.
• 3:39
  I have several different hats on every single day. And one minute I'm a personal involvement guy. One minute I'm an IT guy. One minute I'm a father. One minute I'm a brother. So it's, I just, and at the end of the day, I'm like, what did I get accomplished? So if I can just focus, I always focus on three things.
• 3:56
  And it's funny, when you just messaged me your calendar for the day, and you said, show me your calendar and I'll show you your lifestyle. And I almost sent you right back mine. And where was I at before? A longevity health doctor getting my brainwaves scanned to optimize things in my life. So everything you aggregate, curate, and eliminate. Eliminate has got to be the hardest one. Is that what you've seen through your clients, eliminating things? Oh, absolutely. You know, look, I get asked this all the time. It's like...
• 4:25
  what do you do? What do you do to be successful? What does it look like to maximize middle age? These questions. And the reality is it's not what I'm doing, it's what I'm not doing that's made the biggest difference. I think that's really where the truth is. I mean, what I've learned is that the majority of us are busy. I was busy.
• 4:48
  It's easy to over-index and fall into that trap. To do too much, you can over-train. You can over-spend. You can over-eat. You can literally overtime at work, first one in, last one out every day. It's not what I'm doing. It's what I've learned not to do. It's getting better at saying no into understanding what your non-negotiables are. And again, what your bandwidth is...
• 5:14
  to be successful. Because again, how you do one thing, I believe this is how you do everything. And too much of a good thing, as I think we're going up, is not a good thing. So how do we figure that out? That's really a lot of what I love diving into, which is how do we figure out again what really, really works for us? You may be a morning guy or an evening guy.
• 5:35
  You know, you may have a much higher energy level than I do. You may have a greater financial acumen, physical, whatever it is. But, you know, how do we figure out what success looks like for us? That's that's the fun part, man, like figuring out how to live life by design, by your own design and what framework can help you get there. I love it. So literally you brought it up. It's one of my questions.
• 5:59
  I'd imagine you also have core values. So my question was, do you have core values and non-negotiables, which you just said you did? What are they? My core values are what I call my six Fs. You know, a big, big tipping point moment for me was this redefining of what success looks like. You know, for men and myself in particular, what are we conditioned to do? We chase salary and title.
• 6:24
  You're supposed to get up, you go to school, you graduate school, you get a job, then you get married, then you have kids, then you chase what success typically looks like. You go to work, you move up the ladder, you make more money, all of those things. But my core value, what I realized is that didn't do it for me.
• 6:44
  And when I shifted chasing salary and title for what I call my six Fs, family, fitness, finance, food, fashion, fun, and we can get into that, that really became kind of like, hey, that's what success looks like to me. And how do I turn these Fs into Ass?
• 7:01
  And they're always in that order. And those have become my core values. And then combine those with five fundamental rules that I've come up with to transform from mediocre to maximized at any age or stage of life.
• 7:20
  That's what I do. I'm a simple guy. Like you got to break it down. It's got to be simple. You got to talk to me like I'm a golden retriever, you know? And like, okay, I'm good at following orders. I'm good at following a framework. That works for me. Your superpower is making it sound so simple and you explain it so calmly that I feel like anybody can do it, which really anybody can. What was the first step? Go on. Go on. Go on.
• 7:51
  Family, always. Always. Okay. That's the non-negotiable. I mean, if not for them, what am I doing this stuff for?
• 7:59
  Right. So it's just ironic that the next question I have is doing the research and listening to your podcast. I listened to several of my binged on them. I learned a great deal about you, including that your father is no longer with us. And he died at 47. And then you said your life started at 47. I got right. We're 47. Correct. Yeah. What's your story and why does your story matter? Because I know who you are, but the audience doesn't.
• 8:25
  you know, look, I think I'm just a guy. I think the story matters, hopefully, you know, because I'm relatable, transparent, vulnerable, hopefully credible, and as we go on, somewhat aspirational.
• 8:43
  to other guys in similar positions. And I think a lot of what I've experienced, many of us have experienced, and I'm a slow learner and a late bloomer. So this is all about, hey, the middle is messy, but the middle is also the sweet spot. And it's taken me longer to maybe get here than some or even most, but I genuinely believe that, what are we rushing for?
• 9:11
  It's never too late or too early to start getting things right, making better choices. And what I've learned and what I've experienced and what I hope matters, whether that's to one guy listening or a million men out there is that we don't have to live by conformity, complacency, redundancy.
• 9:38
  other rules or norms, we really can create the lives that we want to live. And we get to choose. It's all a choice of what our version of success looks like. And I'll tell you, you said you make it look easy. You know how I'm about it. The reality there, Kelly, is that it's simple. But simple is really, really hard, which is why most don't do it.
• 10:06
  Simple is really, really hard. I heard something. There's nothing proprietary about anything that I do. Give it all away. There's nothing proprietary about anything. Every expert in the world is out there giving things away. If you really look for it and you take it in, what's hard is making anything simple or making anything hard look easy.
• 10:28
  That's what's really hard because you got to do it over and over again. The basics, the fundamentals, the no BS. You know, you got to take that long, hard look and look at yourself in the mirror every day and just ask yourself, like, how do I want to show up?
• 10:43
  And that's what I wanted to talk about. Sorry to interrupt. Sorry to interrupt. I wanted you to talk about there was an incident that happened. So what people are going to say is, oh, Greg, he's a rich guy. He was born. Give him the back story. You were at 47. You weren't, you know, again, I've done my research on you. I don't want to steal the thunder. Talk about what happened in here because we've all been there. And I want to say one thing, and you can steal this. We may be half through our life, but it's just begun.
• 11:11
  For me, it just begun. 100%. Look, that is what happened to me. You know, I, and you said, my father passed away. He was 47 years old. I was 17. I was at the University of Michigan my freshman year. And I had to race to the airport, got the call that it was time for me to come home. He was in the hospital.
• 11:34
  Had to go outside and grab the go bag that I had packed up. Didn't even get a jacket. Freezing cold. Back then, you have to wait for a taxi outside. Hightail it to Detroit Metro. Hop on a Northwest flight. You know, back when there was Northwest Airlines. Fly to LaGuardia. Hop a different cab. Race to the hospital on Long Island. And make it there just as he passed away and took his last breath. I was in the room, you know, for that. And...
• 12:04
  These are the situations I believe that can either defeat us or define us. And for a lot of years, it defeated me. I tried a number of different things. I went into the film industry when I graduated thinking I wanted to have fun and be, live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse. And I was Harvey Weinstein's assistant for almost two years, 30 years before the Me Too era, before telling him to F all. Yes.
• 12:31
  Went on and produced a couple of films and had the honor of dedicating them to my father's memory and seeing that on the screen and then realizing that that wasn't what I wanted to do and wasn't a healthy lifestyle for me.
• 12:45
  And I started a children's sports video company when we got married and had our first son. And sold DVDs out of the trunk of my car for two years trying to build this business before it got acquired by Michael Eisner, who was the former CEO of Disney. And as quickly as we took this up to a 10 plus figure valuation after that,
• 13:08
  It crashed just as hard. Doctors started telling parents not to put their kids in front of the TV and watch videos. All of the big retailers started going under your KB Toys, your Toys R Us, your Circuit Cities, your Borders, all of these companies. And as fast as we were going up and selling DVDs and shipping DVDs was as fast as we came down.
• 13:29
  And I failed there after several years. And, you know, then I had to tuck my tail between my legs and go get a real job for the first time in my life. And I went from taking big risks and big swings to becoming a risk manager of all things, getting into the insurance business.
• 13:50
  and invested in a firm in Houston at the time thinking, wait, a paycheck would be good, maybe a 401k, maybe benefits, anything. I didn't have another big idea and started over completely there and ultimately built a multimillion dollar book of business. The firm grew. I was incredibly fortunate. I was professionally kind of empty,
• 14:13
  You know, are personally empty, but professionally, you know, doing really well. And as we scaled the company and built the company up, I just remember to your question, it was my 40, you know, I was 47. It was my 10-year anniversary with the firm. And I just had a total breakdown in the parking lot of the office building. Like, is this it? Am I going to be pulling into this parking lot every day in a suit,
• 14:42
  this reserved parking spot that all the partners have with an office on the 25th floor overlooking all of downtown Houston, all these clients, a multimillion dollar book of business again, equity in this firm. And is this it? Is this the best I'm ever going to look, the best I'm going to feel, the best I'm going to do? And it's just not fucking enough. It doesn't feel right. And I felt the word I landed is I felt mediocre.
• 15:12
  I felt like I was stuck at that intersection, you know, between, you know, unrealized potential and success and where I really wanted and thought my life was going to go. And that was the age my dad died. So instead of looking at it as the, I said, you got a choice here. I could stop seeing aging as something to fear.
• 15:39
  And I could start seeing it as something aspirational. And I could use this day and this time to release myself into what I wanted to become. And that's what started me on this entire journey. And it's been a three-year journey. I'm 50 now to transform my entire life around. So I'll share with you, and you don't know this about me, is that
• 16:06
  My dad died at 46 and I was 23. So yesterday was father's day. Happy father's day, by the way, I hope you had a great time with your family. It's bittersweet because my father had, was his highest IQ of the family is very brilliant and just chose toxicity, drugs and alcohol to just, he would think things so fast that just the world, he moved much faster than the world and it had to slow things down and,
• 16:35
  You know, 46, I remember I was with him when he died. I was in the hospital room with him, and I went on a, what did you term it, a defeatist journey too for many years. And really, I don't think I came out of it fully. I was functioning in a functioning fog for 20 years. It was 23 when he died, and it was probably 43 when I woke up and said, enough, enough.
• 17:01
  No, I experienced quote unquote financial success and, but was, was making all kinds of mistakes in life and not being fulfilled. And you're kind, you said mediocre. I just felt like I hadn't even lived.
• 17:17
  So that's why I wanted you on the podcast, because what you're doing is what I do every day. And I want to make sure that all my listeners, all my harder than life crew understand that there's not what Kelly's saying is there's a bunch of us out there.
• 17:32
  You know, and I'm telling you, life gets really good. And that's what I want to hammer home because it starts with your ace principle that you broke down so eloquently. You know, the elimination is the big one for me. I just there's certain people that I had to just eliminate their certain behaviors. One of them was drinking. You know, I was a functioning party animal and I had a lot of fun doing it, but it got in the way.
• 18:02
  So I feel you, Greg. I wish that I could have talked to my dad. I wish I could talk to my dad any day. I've done some cool things. I bought a house. I built a house in Florida. And I'm like, man, I just wish I could call my dad up because he had a really unique way of explaining things to me. And I miss those days. So I'm sure you do too. And I feel you really, really strong. So let's hammer home for other people to feel the way we do. You're three years. And oh my God, just put, just realize I started my career.
• 18:31
  what you call the midlife journey three years ago too. Mine started, and I'm gonna send you a book, mine started on when the pandemic hit. I was forced to level up. Actually I wasn't forced, I could have day drank and
• 18:47
  sat and done nothing, but just there was something talking to me and saying, yo, I've been sending you signs to change. You've ignored them all. Now I'm going to put you alone and I'm going to shock the world. I mean, I put in the book, my ex-wife and my ex-girlfriend got together and took my kid. And then my biggest customer in my IT company left. It was like five things in a row.
• 19:17
  And I looked over at my scotch and I'm like, maybe I should have a drink. And I'm like, nah, that's not the answer. And I just slowly, I made a list, your list. And I said, here's the steps we're going to take to do. And I totally started thinking. And then after I was done, went on a 15-month break.
• 19:33
  Winning streak. Like, I couldn't lose. And then now this year it's telling me, all right, now you've got to level up again. And so I feel – so let's really hammer home what these steps are. So I put it in here. I know you're focused on midlife males, but doesn't this translate to all ages and all genders? Doesn't – Absolutely. It's winning, right? Absolutely.
• 19:53
  It is. And look, you can call it winning, call it success, call it low friction living, call it release, call it anything you really want in there. And sometimes the big buzzwords and all that stuff kind of frighten me because they come with a salesy type thing or they come with, as you said, like, oh, well, this guy has done this or this guy has done that. And I can't see myself in that. And I got to do...
• 20:21
  So I really try to stay clear of that and say, okay, what's real? What's truthful? What have I experienced? What do I want to share and am I able to share out there? And try to be, again, as relatable as possible because I genuinely believe this and I know you do too. Look, if I can do any of this stuff, anybody can.
• 20:44
  I said that a thousand times and people get, people yell at me about that. Like don't discount what you did, but I do believe that I am. I grew up a poor kid in the ghetto.
• 20:56
  So if I did this, why can't anybody? So I agree with you. You are fabulous. Keep going. Sorry. Just say anybody, anybody can. And we are continuing to still live and learn as we go. We are succeeding each day. We are making mistakes each day. We are learning from those experiences and starting again and continuing over and over again.
• 21:26
  Two things I want to kind of elaborate on. One of them, when people always ask me, how do I start? That's the biggest thing. They're always just afraid to start. There's never, again, I'll tell you this, there's never a perfect time. There's never a great day to start a business, to get help. It will never be ideal. Wait, there is. Today. Yesterday is the best, but today will do. Exactly. That's what I always say. Listen.
• 21:52
  The time is always now. The right time is today. Today is the day you start. And it has to start simply. Because if we focus and fixate on outcome, I get why you want to be a great husband, why you want to be in great shape, why you want to make a lot of money. Those are outcomes. And you can set an outcome. But we got to focus on the actual actions. And there's one way to start. And there's
• 22:17
  And I call it my better one or better two principle. If you've ever been to the eye doctor and I've got pretty bad eyes, I got LASIK on my 30th birthday. It's held for 20 years. It's just now starting to go. But if you ever go to an eye doctor, they put that thing in front of your eyes called the four opter. They flip the lenses around and they go better one or better two. It is that simple. The purpose of this entire exercise is to gain clarity.
• 22:42
  They put the lenses in front of your eyes and they flip them around and they go better one, flip them better two. And you just answer the question. And each time they flip them around, better one, better two, better one, better two, they dial in your prescription. And what happens? Now you can see clearly. Every day we are faced with hundreds, thousands of choices. Hey, do I roll out of bed in the morning and ignore my wife or do I give her a kiss and not take her for granted? Better one or better two?
• 23:11
  Do I go through the drive-through and shove my pie hole full of fried, processed fast food, or do I eat a healthier meal? Better one or better two? Do I go for a walk today, or do I sit on my ass for another 30 minutes scrolling Instagram? You can literally ask yourself this question all day long, and I promise you, if you start making the better choice the majority of the time, the majority of your life is going to get better.
• 23:40
  And that adds up day in and day out. Not perfection, but one better choice at a time. You're drinking seven Diet Cokes a day?
• 23:51
  Drink six, better one or better two, then drink five. You're smoking a pack of cigarettes a day? Cut it down to 19, 18, 20, better one or better two. And these little daily victories, they stack up, they add up, and they equal over time a maximized, improved lifestyle. So that's just one. You don't have to go any further.
• 24:17
  I know what you did. You just radically changed everything because that's what I did and we're just like each other. I went just like this. Everything's changing as we know it. You see, I couldn't do that. Oh, really? I couldn't do that. I couldn't go, you know, to me, you go zero to 100, you blow the engine. You go 100 to zero, you fry the brakes. Again, I'm a middle guy. Middle is messy, but middle is the sweet spot. I got to figure out what the rhythm and the cadence is.
• 24:46
  So I couldn't radically change. You know, putting the bottle down, getting out of shape. No, it had to figure out for me kind of, again, what the right rhythm and what the right harmony and cadence really looked like. And that came down to these five rules. One, knowing what's important is what's most important. First question you got to answer. And for me, that was my family. Family, fitness, finance, food, fashion. That became the six Fs, what success looked like.
• 25:17
  Two, you mentioned this in the beginning, you got to have a map. If you don't know where you're going, you're not going to get there. Maximize the action plan, write it out. I write mine three years down the road. What does my life look like in three years? Three, aggregate, curate, and eliminate. We touched on that. Get it down. Four, this morning you reposted it. Show me your calendar, I'll show you your priorities. If you can't physically show me your calendar every day and it doesn't match and align with one, two, three, and everything else.
• 25:48
  It's not happening. What we schedule gets done. And then the last one, which is the most important, number five is grace, gratitude, and latitude. We are way too hard on ourselves. We think we have to radically change and it has to happen overnight and we can do all these things. But it has to happen when you're ready, as you're ready, at your own pace, at your own pace.
• 26:10
  and in a way that you can set yourself up for success, not for failure. And it can't be Kelly's way or Greg's way or Jesse Itzler's way or this guy. It can be some of each one of those things, but it's gotta be yours.
• 26:24
  So you have a coaching, what does, you have a program that we go to, gregscheiman.com, is that where they got to go to sign up? Yeah, you can go to midlifemail.com, which is really more about the coaching and what's going on with Midlife Mail as a media company. Download my free PDF, book, podcast, weekly newsletter, everything I try to give away, you know, for free. And then there's the coaching program, which I work with guys one-on-one across the country. Yeah.
• 26:53
  to work with them on building out and designing exactly what we just talked about. What does your personal operating system look like? What does your plan look like? Let's figure out who you are, what life is going to look like for you, and then really the tangible, quantifiable, and specific actions that you're going to take and we're going to take together to get you where you want to go.
• 27:16
  Guys, you got to head over and follow him. He's brilliant. And the reason why it's brilliant is because I do all this, and I love it, and it works, and it provides a very freeing, peaceful life. Greg, we're going to be friends for it. I wanted to put this. It'll be in the show notes, but Greg Scheinman. It's at Greg Scheinman on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and it's spelled, obviously, Greg, S-C-H-E-I-N-M-A-N.
• 27:45
  So follow him if you don't already. Brilliant. And you have such a knack of saying it, make it sound so much easier than what I did. I was in Key West, Florida, and I was drinking every day, and I said, I'm done. And I just walked away. No programs. I said, no.
• 28:05
  It's time to take my fitness serious. Boom, seven days a week working out. My uncle said to me, you know, obviously my uncle jumped in when my dad died years ago and tried to be my father and did the best he could. But he said, I've never seen somebody go from one extreme to the other.
• 28:20
  Just like that. Now, I don't recommend it, I've told everybody, do not. That's why I think your message is a thousand times better than me. Because when I quit drinking, I sat on, I guarantee you I was in withdrawals. I sat in a 220 pound ball of muscle, crying and emotions that I didn't even frickin' know I had. You know, all this, it wasn't until recently that I dealt with my dad's death. And it wasn't recently that I dealt with the physical and emotional abuse that I experienced when I was a child.
• 28:49
  But you can't do it until you clear out some of the other garbage that's going on in your life. I was numbing every day with a scotch and didn't even think of it. So I want everybody to follow you, follow this program. And you know what? Just real quick, because I like to eliminate people that aren't in alignment. What does the coaching cost? I mean, a ballpark so people know what to expect.
• 29:15
  Like you, extremely, extremely transparent. Ask me a straight question. I'm going to give you a straight answer about anything I put on my body, in my body, what it is about. It is $9,000 for the initial 90 days, so effectively $3,000 a month. And one of the newer things that I am doing is I'm actually going to see my clients now
• 29:34
  Direct to kick it off. What we are doing is we're adding an in-person full day. I just recently added this because we were having so much success with a full day in-person workshop where yeah, my clients pay me to come in. These are typically, look, six, seven, eight figure guys.
• 29:49
  that bring me in right now. And we do a full day workshop to kick it off. We design the maximized action plan. We go over the operating system. We build it all out. And then we work over the next 90, 120, 180. And most of my clients now over the last couple of years have been with me, you know, because we don't graduate from this stuff. You know that.
• 30:09
  We keep going, but it's a $9,000 initial 90 day investment. And I see 10 clients at a time. So you can do the math. We have the system that works. I do my podcast on Mondays. I do my newsletter on Fridays. I see my clients Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And that's part of my personal operating system and how this is continuing to grow. And it allows me to give back as much as I possibly can.
• 30:36
  over-deliver to my clients and hopefully over-deliver to all these guys out here with the additional content, services, book, speaking, podcast, newsletter, everything that I want to continue to grow and expand under the Midlife Mail brand.
• 30:53
  I want people to understand that in context. That's nothing for a seven-figure guy, but $9,000 to optimize your life. I can make $9,000 in one minute if my life is optimized. And I've done it because I'm clear and focused and you have a plan and you're actually going to plan it.
• 31:14
  Greg, that's cheap. So thank you. What is the, is there a monthly after to do follow-ups? What's the follow-up after the initial 90 days? Yeah, another great question. I spent 20 plus years in sales as an entrepreneur and everything else. I don't do contracts. I'm not in sales anymore. You want to continue? We continue to go. Same rate, same month. Can't stop anytime you want to. Mm-hmm.
• 31:35
  I have clients that go from every week. We go after a while, we go to every two weeks. I've got clients now that we're doing monthly check-ins. I'm about to take 10 guys to Breckenridge at the end of the summer that have been clients of mine for a while. And we're going to spend a weekend having some fun talking about our goals, our reviews for six months, 12 months down the year, where we are on our maps and continue to help and lift each other up. But I wanted to touch on one thing.
• 32:01
  One, do I think it's cheap? Look, money's money. But I think there's two things. One, there's expenses and there's investments. Expenses are when you go and you buy these books, you buy these courses, you follow everybody, you spend money, and you get no return on your investment. You don't utilize it. You don't do it. That's an expense. We've all done that. I'm guilty of that. I'm guilty of that.
• 32:23
  so much self-help that I'm not doing anything at all. I'm just buying and consuming and taking in. I'm not producing anything. The investment, we expect a return on. You know, that's the key. You know, watching somebody do push-ups is not as effective as doing push-ups. And I could tell anybody, I could tell you to do all these things. We can coach towards this. But the guys that are involved in this really are willing to do the work. And that's where it's an investment. And that's where it really returns. So the accountability part is, yeah, it's got to cost something.
• 32:52
  Anything one. So where is that line between kind of, there's no skin in the game. This isn't any pain. I could drop this money on the ground and not show up for any of the calls and it wouldn't fucking matter. Or this has got to sting a little bit. So look, I've had guys I've also turned around with and said, clearly this is not enough for you because you're not making the call. So you know what? Use it or lose it. And now it's 20 grand. I've had other guys that I've said, I'm taking you on for zero.
• 33:19
  Because you're a winner. You want to win. You're not there yet. We're going to get you there. But you're genuine and you're sincere and you're going to do this. So, you know what I mean? You got to set kind of a baseline and be upfront with it. But again, you know, there are exceptions to every rule. Some guys need to, you know, get hit harder a little bit and some guys need a little warmer, fuzzier approach. And some of us, you know,
• 33:42
  Just they need some generosity and others need some greater accountability. If you know what I'm saying, it's all it really just depends. Every body is different. That's what people ask me. How do I get big like you? Like, you know, and it's just consistency and discipline.
• 33:59
  And that's the answer to everything, consistency and discipline. Over and over. We could do the same workout every day, same regimen, same foods, we could do it every day for the next year. And you know what? We're both gonna look different too. We'll look like the best versions of ourself,
• 34:14
  But again, everybody is different in how they do everything. It really is, is you do it too and you love it. It's the framework. It's our system that we find and define and work within that makes us the best version of ourself. That I think is where it really, really gets interesting. And that's where we can hang out. That's where other guys like us can all hang out.
• 34:38
  I love about you. You could see it in your eyes. In your eyes, you can see that there's just happiness. And I just, I can feel it through the video. And I tell you, I'm building an impressive war chest of coaches, for lack of a better word. Because I don't, my desire, speaking, speaking,
• 34:56
  author and podcasting. I don't want to coach. I cannot, I just, I can't articulate it simple. It's, it's, it's black or white for me. There's, there's no gray area. It's, did you work out today? There's I'm Yoda. There is do or do not. There is no try. It's like, uh, as soon as I say something, you know, it's going to happen. And, and I don't be before. And I'm not saying that I got take, I get brutalized on social media for it.
• 35:23
  Why do you work out at 430 in the morning? Because that's what works for me. I'm not telling you to work out at 430. I'm saying to work out every day. Whenever you want to do it, do it. You know, and then I get brutalized over testosterone and I get everything. It's like, you know what? Y'all aren't my people. I don't care. And I tell you what, I've done so much work on myself that I really don't care what people think.
• 35:45
  But I'm going to keep putting good out in the world and I can feel it and see it in your face. And I'm going to put you in my war chest now. So I'm amassing some amazing people in this space that I can send people to because everybody reaches out. I got 18 messages this morning already. How do I look like you? How do I get success like you? Do the work that I do. Do the work day in and day out. And there is no days off. I don't take a day off. That's the difference, though. That's the difference. You can tell them we could all go down our lists.
• 36:14
  And for all intents and purposes, you are a coach. People are turning to you and looking to you for advice, for experience, for you to show them the way and what to do. Now we're back into...
• 36:28
  Are you really going to do it? Are you going to listen? Are you going to push through the hard times? 4.30 may be your time. Okay. 9 a.m. may be my time at 50. Could be 6 p.m. before work, after work. Again, it doesn't matter. We can give you all of the answers where they get the, you know, hey, there are things I do at 50 that I never thought that I would do.
• 36:50
  in my life. You look great, man. I got your skin tone, everything about you. Look handsome as can be. And I'm not just saying that and you're brilliant. I want to touch on that. We just said, what, what do you do? Why won't people do the work? Why is it so freaking hard? In your opinion.
• 37:08
  Like, this is why I'm a bad coach because I, it's non-negotiable. I say I'm going to go to the gym, go to the gym. That's not the only thing I do. I have a whole routine that's probably similar to yours. You're the only person I've seen that does more than I do. Like, you lay out your things. I'm like, this guy is insane and I love every part of it. You lay out all your things.
• 37:31
  Diet, all of your supplements that you take the next day, you probably lay out your clothes. I do a lot of this, but mine is so mindless. I've done it so many times I don't even have to think it. It's so buried in my subconscious that right when I wake up.
• 37:46
  I walk in, I do a frigging fist bump in the mirror. I say I love myself. I do a meditation. I do journaling. I head to the gym. All my gym clothes are just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Before I even am conscious, I've got a workout in, a video. I've done half of my stuff and most people aren't even up. So I can't teach that. I hit the ground. I want to win. I can't teach it. You can, but why won't? That's why I won't coach because I literally, I can't. You don't do the work. I just go, I can't help you.
• 38:16
  Well, that's part of it too. I mean, that is, listen, that is part of it. Now, I don't know, more or less, I don't believe everything you see out there. Let's peel back some of the layers on the onion again. I'm incredibly simple. I really am. A lot of what you see me doing and what I put out there are the same things over and over again.
• 38:37
  I'm very simple with what I put in my body and what I put on my body. There's a select few things that I think work. Again, back to that aggregate, curate, eliminate concept. I am overwhelmed with a lot of what even I see out there. I don't follow a lot of people on Facebook.
• 38:54
  on social. I've curated a lot of that down. I even want to get better at it. You could take something different every single day. There's a new trend, a new something or whatever. I really believe in the basics and the fundamentals of really what works and start with science and start with a smart plan. Before you start buying supplements and drinks and anything and following keto or paleo or Kelly's thing or my thing or whatever, go hire a nutritionist.
• 39:23
  or a dietician, and get your blood work done, and know what your body responds well to and what it doesn't. You know, guys want to jump into exercise. They're 40, 50-year-old guys with kids and wives and expenses and everything. They haven't done anything in six years. I said, go get a physical first.
• 39:39
  Then go get some life insurance so we don't kill you. Okay, here. And you'll leave your family destitute. Like you got to cover the bases and go in the right order. You know, I think very simple. Drink a lot of water. I take, you know, five grams of creatine every day. I take one packet of athletic greens, you know, some electrolytes, and I'm pretty much good to go. Do I take TRT? Yes, I take TRT. Did I start at 49? Yes. Am I 50 now? Okay.
• 40:07
  Was that nine years starting at 40 of getting my blood work done and watching levels year after year and following stereotypes and questioning should or should all. We go through the same evaluations as everybody out there. We got the same insecurities, if not more so. Many looks like us has a ton of insecurities too. We're covering for something. We're swapping one addiction for another. We're constantly questioning, constantly look. I mean, anybody who's doing the stuff that we're doing.
• 40:38
  is because we really know the alternative. It could be bad. We could be doing bad things, bad hobbies, bad behaviors, bad habits, or we could swap those for better ones. And you can again, over index in both directions. So what I offer to people, whether it's as a coach and as an example or gleaning into my life is again, like figure out with somebody that you trust
• 41:08
  and that invests in you and that you invest in to help you determine again what success really looks like for you. And then get after it and then shut it down. Be ruthless about putting the blinders on after that and just go execute. Just keep doing those things. And as you said, when they're working, keep doing more. If they're not working, that's when we got to look to maybe
• 41:35
  Do it. Invest in the people, not the things, I guess, is what I'm also really getting at. Invest in the trainer. Invest in the coach. Invest in the wealth manager. Okay? Invest in the dietician. All of these other things before you go racing to stores or following influencers or buying all kinds of shit that you don't need. Like, really, that's the differentiator right there. Smart people will help you become smarter and better.
• 42:04
  You say all the same things I do. I got to be in your presence soon, man. I was supposed to be in Houston tomorrow, but I couldn't fly out there for my daughter's going to camp. When you're in, Tommy, you got to hit me up. And when I'm down there, I'm going to hit you up. I just us two together probably would have a little fun. Basics and fundamentals. I say it over and over and over again.
• 42:23
  I still do the same. I don't do Pilates. I don't do. I do pushups, sit ups, crunches. I do frickin barbell bench presses, the old school things. And funny, you were talking about what I do is, you know, as you if you read my heart of the life book, the reason why I'm so big is because my stepfather used to frickin physically abuse me. And I'm like, nobody's ever going to abuse me again. And I make sure of it.
• 42:47
  Um, but it got, I became addicted to it and now it's, if I don't work out, my daughter's like, dad, get to the gym. You, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's just ingrained in me. Like, uh, so I love, I love that habit. Um, what I, we're getting up against it and I'm going to fly through some questions. You just said it. So divine success in Greg Scheinman's terms.
• 43:11
  Six Fs. Family, fitness, finance, food, fashion, and fun. Keeping those in balance. And what I mean by that, and I'll be breathing, family's always my number one, my wife and my two kids. That's what I do everything for. That's the North Star. Fitness is really health, overall health and wellbeing. That's mental and physical. And what I do, for me, five days a week. Finance, it's not about making...
• 43:35
  Whatever you do, it's really about having enough to do what you want to do, when you want to do it with who you want to do it with for as long as you want to do it. Whatever that looks like to you, man, that's cool. Again, I'm a simple guy. Like you see it like, okay, I'm a simple guy overall. Food is really nutrition. Just care and be intentional about what you put in your body. I'm an 80-20 guy. 80% of the time I eat clean, 20% I'll do whatever I want. I don't want to get hit by a bus and not have had a cheeseburger in six years. Doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun, you know, for me.
• 44:04
  Fashion, what I really mean is style, not about being on the cover of GQ or Esquire or anything, but what do you wear that makes you feel confident, that makes you feel like you? Because it's all about how we perceive ourselves and how we want to be perceived by others. So be intentional with that. And then fun...
• 44:22
  Most guys are not having enough of that. And I wasn't, or I certainly wasn't having enough of the good, clean, real fun that makes my life a whole lot better. So that's what success looks like to me. It's pulling all of those things together in harmony. You're definitely successful and you're killing it. I'm real proud of you and I'm glad I met you. How long have you been married? Oh, man, 22 years, 25 together. Yeah.
• 44:47
  Congratulations. Where'd you meet her? You of M? No. I met my now wife at the Sky Bar of the Mondrian Hotel in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, when I was in the movie business and I was staying in this hotel trying to sell a movie. We were holding screenings. Back then there was no Netflix, no anything. You had to literally hold fucking screenings and try to sell one territory at a time. My now wife was at the bar
• 45:12
  at the Sky Bar, and I thought I just met a really hot blonde for the night or for the weekend. So, if you would have told me that I would be married with kids living in Houston, Texas, 25 years later, I would have told you to bet the under because that's never going to happen, but here we are. So. What's the tattoo? Is that your dad's death on your inner? Yeah. So, 11692, which I think you saw under my arm, that is the day that my dad passed away. Yes. Yes.
• 45:41
  Wow. Mine's my dad's May 16th. So it was, um, it was on mother's day. Imagine that. My, his mother had to bear it, bury him. Terrible. What's what single project or task would you consider the most significant accomplishment to date? Not including your children. My book. If you would have told me that I'd be an author,
• 46:06
  Again, another one I would have told you to bet the under. You know, and look, there have been a few. If you had told me that I could produce a movie and it would be on the big screen and you could still find it on Netflix and, you know, today, I would have told you no chance. If you would have told me I could go from selling DVDs out of the trunk of my car to being on a private jet with Michael Eisen, I would have told you that's never going to fucking happen.
• 46:26
  If you would have told me that I could put a suit on and be in the insurance industry for 14, 15 years and survive and also thrive and end up selling the firm, I would have told you that's not going to happen. And if you would have said I could sit in my backyard during a pandemic and write every day and that anybody would give a shit about what I wrote, much less turn it into a book and buy it, I would have said you're out of your mind.
• 46:53
  You're magnificent. So you can do it. Anybody, again, can do it. And I will say to people, how do you write a book or how do you do that? And you think all these things. Let me tell you something. One word at a time. One word at a time. And two, I don't even write. I don't know how to type. I literally just talk. And I use Otter, this app, and it then just transcribes everything. And then I look through the transcriptions and I throw 80% of it out because I think it's awful. And then somebody else will read it and they'll go, no, don't throw that out.
• 47:21
  And you got to share these things and not be afraid to fail and not be afraid to be embarrassed or humiliated or humbled by any of it. Because otherwise I would have thrown all of these ideas and all this shit in the trash. Right?
• 47:37
  again, we're such an alignment. I wrote my book during the pandemic too. I had nothing else to do. So all I was doing is I still have the notepads. I have these same notepads where I just wrote down what my thoughts were and it turned into a book. Same thing. And you know how many guys I turned to that I really emulate as well? And what do they do? We're talking, whatever. And they pick up and they show me. And there's so many similarities, again, about how successful people do things, regardless, again, of what their widget or their vocation or their...
• 48:06
  of their thing is. And the book really came from writing these newsletters that went from a tree falling in the woods, basically, to thousands of people subscribing to the newsletter, to recording 200 conversations with amazing men like yourself, to then a buddy of mine who owns a publishing company saying,
• 48:27
  We're going to do a book. And I'm like, I don't do a book. I don't know. I don't write. I don't do anything. Like, I don't do any of this stuff. He goes, you already have the book. It's all of these newsletters and all of these conversations. And I'm like, what? He's like, yeah. And I'm going to lead you down this path. And he, my friend Naren, who owns Amplify Publishing, which is one of the most amazing independent self-publishing companies out there, guided me through this entire project and made it happen. It was, it was, it was unreal. Yeah.
• 48:58
  Also too, somebody said, if I would have, everybody said, do you drink alcohol? I'm assuming you don't. So here's the, I do not say that I don't drink alcohol. The reality is alcohol has really worked its way out of my life. I don't recover well from it at all. So I really don't crave it. I have swapped mornings and workouts and healthy stuff, you know, for, I just don't feel great. So I've never declared myself sober. I've never gone to rehab, but your story landed with me. I was absolutely...
• 49:27
  functioning alcoholic from the outside looking in, you know, everything looked fine, but I was the do anything good was worth doing to excess. I was the drunkest guy in the room for years and years and years. And now I really, I really don't, but every once in a while, you know, I'll pour a shot of silver tequila, you know, and, and, and, and sip it for a while or, or I'll have a beer with a steak or something, but really it's, it's very infrequent at this point.
• 49:55
  I just, I take, I take non-alcoholic, let's say I had two non-alcoholic beers. So I get the stuff without it. I'm not an alcoholic. I just choose. I like those very much. They're very good. They try the Coronas. They just released these Coronas. They taste just like Corona. It's my drink when I used to drink. I just choose not to. I don't like the way I feel the next day. I can't get a good workout. And ever since I gave it up and it was an accident. I just said, I'm going to take 90 days off. And then I took another 90 days off and I go, I think I'm just done.
• 50:23
  So that's me too. It's worked its way out. And every once in a blue moon when I do have that beer, have that tequila, it's almost that reminder that I don't really need this and I don't really enjoy this anymore and I feel much better when I don't. So I've got a fridge now with athletic brewing and best day brewing, non-alcoholic beers in it. I like that stuff too.
• 50:46
  And otherwise, no, look, I'm like a water and coffee, you know, coffee in the morning, water guy, electrolytes, you know, that's simple. All right. We got about 10 minutes left and I got five more questions and they're all like about you because I want to get to know you and I want the listeners because I just, I'm already just enamored by your, by everything that is you. So let's, let's fire through these so we can, so everybody can understand who you are and what makes you tick. What's the best advice you've ever received?
• 51:18
  Slow down. Be patient. Thank you. Like God sent you today to talk to me. Sometimes that's why I love these podcasts. Sometimes it's literally me sitting here in awe learning. What's the worst advice you've ever received? Yeah. Speed up. You got to get there faster. God, I love you. What's your biggest fear? Yeah.
• 51:47
  Letting down my kids. How old are they? 19 and 16.
• 51:53
  19, the college, where, where did you go into school? So my oldest Auden, who's still sleeping in the next room. He doesn't go to work until four. He's working nights this summer, afternoons and nights this summer, a little bit. So he gets up a little bit later, works out with his buddies and then goes to work. So he's, he will be a sophomore at university of Colorado and he's in the business school. Auden, that's a really nice name. Thank you. And.
• 52:18
  And our 16-year-old Harper, these are two boys who have kind of names that can go either way. And I don't know where we decided to come up with all this stuff, but they don't get any coffee mugs or license plates in the stores with their names on them because they're more unusual. My name is Kelly, bro. What are you –
• 52:38
  It's a good point. So yeah, our 16 year old, Arbord, he'll be a junior in high school. He actually is a, he's a basketball practice right now, gets up, drives himself there every morning. Um, and yeah, we're getting ready to go to Israel. Uh, in July, he's playing basketball over there for a couple of weeks. So we're going to go watch him play. You're so fascinating. I, I, I gotta meet this family. I have a 14 year old daughter. Um,
• 53:03
  And that was, I think God gave me her to calm me. What did you say? Slow me down a little bit. Yeah. I have a theory that like, yeah, God gives us what we can handle. Wait, do you see it? And she's just, thank God I made all these changes because she's not into boys. She's not into drinking. She's not into drugs. So she's a good kid now, but she is looking like her mother every day, hotter and hotter. And I'm like, oh no, why did they have to give me this just to?
• 53:30
  Well, I'm not sending my boys to your door. I know that much. Okay. Well, I like you. I know they're good boys, so I would trust you. Nice Jewish boy. She was bat mitzvah last year. So yes, I would approve that without even seeing them. Love them already. If you had all the money you needed in life but had to work, what would you be doing? Exactly what I'm doing now. Love it. Love it. This is the first time in my life that I can absolutely say that with certainty.
• 53:58
  that I do it for free. And I'm fortunate enough right now to do these things that I do because I get to do them. I don't have to do them. So that's- You should see how your face just lit up. This is why you need to go over to his website and sign up for this program and spend the nine grand. It is, oh.
• 54:17
  You, I, I, I, that's why I love having guests like you on because I do it and people think I'm crazy. You do it and they listen. So I got to saw, I got to slow down and soften it. So, um, when you were down, which I probably think is never, what can you think of that will make you smile? First of all, I'm down every day. I did. I want people to know that.
• 54:38
  Juicy. Do tell. And I mean that sincerely. Look, I'm in the middle of writing a piece right now. I'll show you this first. I'm in the middle of writing a piece right now entitled, I'm the guy who kills himself, but not really.
• 54:53
  And there is a massive problem out there right now for men. And mental health is a real thing. And I have been to too many funerals in the last couple of years. And I've heard too many stories of men who by all intents and purposes are successful from the outside looking in, that are leaving beautiful families and careers and everything behind. And I get it. This is what I'm right at. I get it.
• 55:21
  because I know how hard it is. Is this from the fentanyl or is this from suicide? What do you see? It's from suicide. It is from suicide and it is from this feeling that their best days are behind them and not in front of them.
• 55:39
  and they don't see a way out. And again, they're chasing salary and they're chasing title and keeping up with the proverbial Joneses. And it is hard. It is fucking hard. So- I'd love to read that. To those guys that are out there, man, and it's coming out, like, I get it. So when you say like, you know, down, I'm down every day. There's something that doesn't go well every single day. There is something that doesn't feel good every single day.
• 56:07
  You invite somebody on the show and they say no. You go on a show, you say something you don't think sounded great. You book a retreat to go to, it's never the perfect time and you're on both sides. I need to go, I don't wanna go. You check your bank account balance, I'm down every day. There's something every day. And I think it is how you work through it and you persevere and who you surround yourself with and when you get comfortable
• 56:37
  being open about it and transparent and vulnerable and not being afraid to ask for help. And I am the guy who didn't for so long. You push the boulder uphill, uphill, uphill until it basically, you know, you think you're going to get it down the other side and it's going to roll and everything is going to be off. But no, most of the time it rolls back and crushes you. Best advice. That was the best advice of the whole podcast. Do it on your own.
• 57:01
  Love it. We have three more questions and the next guest just arrived. And I want to, I'm so sorry that we booked so tight. I just love this conversation. We'll go on forever. We're going to have you on again. Tell us something you believe in that almost nobody agrees with you on. Never miss a Monday. Everybody's out there with never miss a Monday. Get on attack the week and never miss a Monday. And then I miss every fucking Monday. Okay. Okay.
• 57:26
  I miss everyone. I don't work out on Monday. It's Monday right now. I think, yeah, it's Monday right now that we're doing this. I don't see clients on Monday. I do fun things like talk to guys like you. I walk my dogs. I ease into my week. Almost nobody agrees with me. They attack the week. They attack Monday. So you hear never miss a Monday. I miss every Monday. I love that. That's creating intentional peace. Next question is if you could create one law in the universal law, what would it be and why?
• 57:58
  Great question. Be kind and agree to disagree. We have lost the fundamental ability to agree to disagree. Greg, you're fire. How can I personally support you? You're doing it. I mean, just the opportunity to have these conversations and to share and to learn from you as well. This is how we're doing it, man. This is how we're all doing it.
• 58:28
  God, I love you. I can't wait to see you. Who's the next guest? I got a question for you. How can I support you? Who's the next guest? I'm curious. The chef from New York and Miami, Chris, I got to ask him how to say his last name. He reached out to us and he's changed his whole life through sobriety. I like showing people that alcohol and drugs, the toxic...
• 58:55
  crutches that we have are not good for us. It's, it's the first thing you got to eliminate. I'm sure you probably, you probably know that. Listen, they're yelling at me to wrap this up. So I'm going to wrap it up. Please rate and share this podcast. Also, I do my best to respond to all the comments on all social platforms. So if you want to see more of something or less of something, leave a comment. Each and every episode is sponsored by National Technology Management, the easiest and best IT company to do business with delivering peace of mind with technology every day.
• 59:22
  Visit trustntm.com for more info. Until next week, be harder than life. Greg, I love you. Thank you for your time. You too, man. Thank you, Cal. I appreciate it. Thank you for listening. Please rate and subscribe to Harder Than Life, and let's take this to the next level. Get connected at the links below.