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The Danny Trejo Blueprint: Turning Your Worst Chapters Into Podcast Fuel · Your Mic

• 0:00
  You know what's wild?
• 0:01
  A guy who was shooting heroin at the age of 12
• 0:04
  and robbing people as a teenager,
• 0:06
  now owns taco shops with his name on the sign
• 0:09
  and has more film and TV credits
• 0:11
  the most actors will see in three lifetimes.
• 0:14
  Not because he hit his past, but because he used it.
• 0:22
  Today on your mic,
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  we're gonna talk about how the ugliest parts
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  of your business, your career, your life, and yeah,
• 0:29
  the face plant moments in your podcast journey
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  can become the very thing that makes your show untouchable.
• 0:37
  Not in spite of the mess, but because of it.
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  Let's start with the receipts.
• 0:41
  Danny Trejo grew up in Echo Park LA.
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  By age 12, he was addicted to heroin
• 0:48
  and by his teens, he was dealing and robbing,
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  bouncing in and out of Juve and prison
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  for more than a decade on charges
• 0:54
  that included drug dealing and armed robbery.
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  He did time in places like San Quentin and Folsom,
• 1:01
  real deal violent institutions.
• 1:03
  Inside, he didn't become a model inmate.
• 1:07
  He became a boxing champion in the prison system.
• 1:09
  The guy you don't want standing across from you and a ring.
• 1:12
  Somewhere in all that chaos though, he hit rock bottom.
• 1:17
  He got clean through a recovering program found faith
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  and started helping other addicts get sober.
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  When he got out, he was nowhere near famous.
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  He was a former armed robber with prison tats,
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  doing counselor work and odd jobs,
• 1:30
  trying to stay sober and keep other people alive.
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  Years later, he gets a call from a guy in a movie set
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  who's scared he's going to relapse.
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  Trejo shows up to help.
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  Someone on set notices the tats, the boxing background,
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  the this dude is obviously not acting energy
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  and asks him to train an actor
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  and then to stand in front of the camera.
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  That leads to runaway train,
• 1:55
  then heat from dust till dawn,
• 1:58
  con air, machete,
• 2:00
  and the ridiculous number of rolls
• 2:02
  where Danny and his real lived in Bindahal look
• 2:07
  is exactly what directors want.
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  He doesn't sanitize the past.
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  He sells the truth of it.
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  Then he does it again with food.
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  He goes from robbing restaurants
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  to opening Trejo's tacos in 2016.
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  Have you been there?
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  I've never been there.
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  Then he expands to multiple locations
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  and sister brands like Trejo's coffee and donuts
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  and Trejo's cantina,
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  even jumping across the Atlantic
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  to open and London.
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  What's up with that?
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  I'm in Houston.
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  We need one in each town before London.
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  Come on.
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  Anyway, reporters literally quote him joking
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  that 50 years ago he was on his way to the gas chamber.
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  And now he's an international restaurant tour.
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  His line over and over goes something like this.
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  Everything good that's happened to him
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  traces back to helping someone else.
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  That's the blueprint.
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  Take the worst parts of your story.
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  Stay clean, help people,
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  and keep showing up until the world realizes
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  you're not playing a role.
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  So what does this have to do with your podcast?
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  Everything.
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  Trejo's quote brand is built on the exact stuff
• 3:17
  most people would bury in the backyard
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  and never speak of again.
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  Think about it.
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  Addiction, prison, violence, scars,
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  but that's what makes him unforgettable.
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  That's what makes his restaurants more than just tacos.
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  Your business might have its own version of this.
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  The launch the tank to almost bankrupted you,
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  the partnership that exploded in public,
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  the product that flopped so hard,
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  your team still refuses to say its name.
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  Most founders, they want a power wash that history
• 3:49
  and pretend they were strategically pivoting.
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  I remember talking to Evan Carmichael,
• 3:53
  world famous entrepreneur one day,
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  and he called it, showing the wards.
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  Most people don't want to show the wards,
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  but here's the move.
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  What you're ashamed of is probably
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  what your audience will trust.
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  In other words, they'll trust your wards.
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  Now, back to Trejo.
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  He walks into a room and when he talks about sobriety
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  and violence and bad choices,
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  nobody thinks this guy read a blog post.
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  They know he lived it.
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  When he talks about robbing restaurants
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  and now owning them, it's not just some cute metaphor.
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  It's a straight line from then to now.
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  That's the same energy your podcast needs.
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  If you want to hit it like a gut punch
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  instead of a LinkedIn carousel,
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  and Lord knows we don't need another bland LinkedIn carousel.
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  So instead of obsessing over polished thought leadership,
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  tell the story of the quarter where
• 4:46
  you missed every revenue target
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  and what had to die inside of your ego to fix it.
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  Talk about firing the wrong client
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  or getting fired by the right one.
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  Drag the skeletons out from behind your funnel
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  and put a mic in front of them.
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  In other words, show the wards, show them all.
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  Not every episode should be a confessional.
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  That's not what I'm saying.
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  But if your feed reads like an AI generated business textbook,
• 5:12
  you're leaving the only true proprietary asset
• 5:14
  you have, your scars off the table.
• 5:18
  And if you like some help crafting a killer show,
• 5:20
  grab the speak podcasting roadmap in it,
• 5:23
  you'll find all the tips, tricks and tools
• 5:25
  need it to host your industry's favorite show.
• 5:28
  Get it at speakpodcasting.com slash free resources
• 5:32
  that's S-P-E-K-E podcasting.com slash free resources.
• 5:39
  Now, let's talk specifically about your podcast.
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  Like, really, really narrow in on it.
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  You probably have episodes with embarrassing download numbers.
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  I do.
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  You probably have interviews where you overtalk the guest
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  and hated yourself for it.
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  I do.
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  You probably have solo episodes
• 6:00
  where you sound like you're reading a ransom note.
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  Eh, I maybe do?
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  Well, that's your prison yard.
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  If you keep deleting everything that isn't perfect,
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  you're robbing future you of the receipts that prove you earned it.
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  So here's how to use the quote unquote,
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  bad parts of your show.
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  Mind them for patterns.
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  Go back to the worst performing episodes
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  and actually listen.
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  Where do you lose energy?
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  Where do you ramble?
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  Where does the guest light up and you miss the follow up?
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  Take notes, not just shame.
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  Build formats out of failure.
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  Did a random rant episode accidentally blow up
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  compared to your scripted ones?
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  Start a recurring segment based on that chaos.
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  Did a technical meltdown force you to do an unedited solo monologue
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  that listeners actually loved?
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  That's a signal.
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  That's not an accident.
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  Tell the story in show.
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  In a new episode, say it out loud.
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  Episode seven, garbage, almost quit after that.
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  Here's why I didn't, and here's why I changed.
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  That's it.
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  That's what Trejo would call walking back
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  into his old cell in San Quentin decades later,
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  praying, acknowledging where he was and where he is now.
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  Use your worst episode as the proverbial before picture.
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  Keep it live.
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  Put it in your newsletter with a note.
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  Start here if you want to hear how bad I was.
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  Then listen to last week.
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  Everything in the middle is the work.
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  We just got specific, like really specific.
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  Now, let's zoom out for a second.
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  One of my favorite writers of all time, Robert Green.
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  He calls it your life's task.
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  The thing your life is quietly, relentlessly pushing you toward.
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  The work that only you can really do.
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  One of my other favorite writers, Paula Cuelo, author of the Alchemist
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  calls it your personal legend, your unique path.
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  The one that, when you commit to it,
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  makes the universe conspire in your favor.
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  Trejo did not wake up one day and say,
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  my personal legend is to be the guy who gets killed
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  in a hundred movies and sells tacos.
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  No, although that would be a strange vision.
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  What he did do was he got clean and stayed clean.
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  He made helping other addicts his north star.
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  He showed up when a guy on a movie set
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  needed help staying sober.
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  He said, yes, went asked to train an actor.
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  Yes, again, went asked to step in front of the camera.
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  He took the fact that he once robbed restaurants
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  and turned it into, now I own them.
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  And used that as a story to inspire people
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  and to build a brand.
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  You can call that God, the universe conspiring,
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  whatever works for you.
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  But none of those quote unquote conspiracies happen
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  if he says no to the phone call.
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  If he decides, my past is too dirty,
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  I'll just keep my head down.
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  Your podcast is where you practice saying yes
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  to your life's task in public.
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  Look, you don't need the whole mission nailed down.
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  You need a mic, a point of view,
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  and the guts to talk about what actually hurts.
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  Because here's the uncomfortable truth.
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  The thing you least want to talk about on your show
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  is probably the thing that will make people
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  build their week around your next episode.
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  Let's get tactical.
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  For the next 90 days, if you want to tray hostile arc
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  for your podcast, minus the felonies, of course,
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  here's the playbook.
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  One, name your worst chapter in your notes app.
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  Write down the three ugliest truths
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  about your business or career you usually avoid on air.
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  A botched lunch, a public burnout, toxic leadership season,
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  no euphemisms.
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  Two, pair each with a lesson you've actually learned.
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  If you burned out, what systems did you build afterward?
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  If you lost a partnership, what boundaries do you have now?
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  If you pivoted, what data did you ignore the first time?
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  Three, do three episodes, build a mini series.
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  Episode one, it could be something like
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  the time I almost shut it all down.
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  Episode two, the client I should have fired sooner.
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  Episode three, what my worst launch
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  taught me about my best offer, something like that.
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  Start each one with the unvarnished story.
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  End each one with the specific practices
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  you use now because of those moments.
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  Four, create a recurring prison yard segment.
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  You don't have to call it a prison yard segment,
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  but once a month, do a short episode
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  where you talk about something that felt
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  like punishment at the time, but became training.
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  The deal that fell through, the speaking gig that bombed.
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  I've had those.
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  The episode with 10 downloads, I've had those in worse.
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  Treat it like rounds in the ring.
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  Five, invite guests for their cell to set story.
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  Steal the Danny Trejo shape.
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  Where were you at your lowest in business?
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  What did you build out of that specific failure?
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  How did that show up in your brand today?
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  Listen, you're not collecting success stories.
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  Those are cool, but what I want you to do
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  is collect rap sheets that turned into resumes.
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  Six, and this is the final step.
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  Anchor it all in service.
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  Danny Trejo says the good in his life
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  traces back to helping other people get clean.
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  Your version is this.
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  Before you hit record on your podcast, ask,
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  who does this help specifically and how?
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  If the answer is, it makes me look smart, then you're off.
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  If the answer is, it'll save someone two years
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  of making the same mistake.
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  You're on the right side of the mic.
• 12:03
  Danny Trejo walks into San Quentin decades after leaving.
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  Steps into the cell he used to live in and praise.
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  Same concrete, same bars, different man.
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  Your podcast can be that kind of full circle moment.
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  Every skipped upload, every cringe episode,
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  every failed show you quietly deleted.
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  I've had those, trust me, I've had those.
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  More than my fair share, more than I'd like to admit,
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  but that's not proof that you're not cut out for podcasting.
• 12:32
  That is your training montage.
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  It's what Alex Hormosi would call the rocky cut scene.
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  That is your prison boxing record.
• 12:40
  You do not need a clean past to build a powerful show.
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  You need a dirty one.
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  You're willing to speak up about
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  with brutal clarity and a commitment
• 12:51
  to serving the person who's still stuck
• 12:53
  where you used to be.
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  So here's your homework.
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  Yeah, I'm giving you homework.
• 12:58
  Before you go chase a new mic, a new logo, a new intro,
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  sit down with the ugliest part of your story
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  and outline one, just one episode
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  where you tell it straight
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  and then show the listener exactly what you built from it
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  because you're just that damn tough.
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  Hit record.
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  Don't wait for permission.
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  Don't wait to be forgiven.
• 13:23
  Turn your rap sheet into an RSS speed
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  and let the universe conspire around someone
• 13:29
  who finally stopped pretending their wounds weren't real.
• 13:33
  And if you found this episode useful, please share
• 13:36
  with the podcast host in your life
• 13:38
  who needs to hear this because it might just help them
• 13:42
  keep their mic hot.
• 13:44
  Thanks for listening.