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100: 100 Conversations On Personal Growth & Success · Harder Than Life

• 0:04
  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. Wow, 100 episodes. What a journey it's been. When I first started the Harder Than Life podcast, I had one simple goal, to create a platform where we could share stories of overcoming adversity.
• 0:29
  pushing through challenges, and ultimately living a life that's harder but more fulfilling. It hasn't always been easy, but each conversation, each guest, and each episode has brought something special to the table. We've laughed, we've cried, and we've learned so much together. This podcast started as an idea, but it's grown into a community and a family, one that's driven by resilience, growth, and commitment to becoming better versions of ourselves. As I look back on these 100 episodes, I'm filled with gratitude.
• 0:57
  for the incredible guests who've shared their stories, for the listeners who've supported this journey, and for the lessons that have shaped not only this podcast, but my life as well.
• 1:06
  So as we celebrate this milestone, I want to take a moment to reflect on some of the most impactful episodes we've had so far. These top 11 clips capture the essence of what Harder Than Life is all about. Pushing through the pain, finding purpose, and living with passion. Here's to 100 episodes down and many more to come. We love you. Be awesome, be kind, and be harder than life.
• 1:29
  You started an ad agency, Radical, in 2018, and you've stored five years over $4 or $5 million. That's a great freaking start. And I can guarantee. Yeah, we're over eight figures now in total revenue.
• 1:47
  Nice. Nice. So that won't, that doesn't suck. And that's actually a great story. Five years and eight figures. Bam. So why does everyone need to be aware of their personal brand, even if they're not trying to be an influencer or have any interest in making money digitally? So I'd look at your brand and it's just fantastic. So I want to know, talk about that. You know, what's interesting about personal branding is when,
• 2:15
  It's the word alone. I mean, we all like everybody that's kind of in and out of the industry cringes a little bit when they hear it, you know, personal branding. It's, you know, like everybody rolls their eyes a little bit, but the irony is, is it's not about you when you're personal branding. It's actually about everyone else. And what do I, here's what I mean. You're building a legacy.
• 2:34
  Do you want to look back? We have this rare opportunity now with social media and smartphones and all these devices and things to document what you know, what you believe, and what you're good at.
• 2:46
  And I firmly believe that whether you want to make a dollar from it or not, I think most people want to leave a legacy. They want to know that they touched people, they had an impact on people, or that their kids, their wives, their family down the road have a record of their beliefs and what they did.
• 3:06
  And so it's really about building authority and trust and leaving a legacy and a documentation of that, that I think. If like we put people, 10 people in a room. And we could advance, we had a time machine, we could advance forward. And the people that did and the people that don't, I think you would regret it if you don't. If you don't document, if you don't leave that legacy. And it's not about.
• 3:34
  you know, flexing in front of a Lambo. It's about really showing the side of yourself that may seem private, but could impact so many people.
• 3:47
  I love that. I saw you post on that very recently and I was like, this man is brilliant. I never thought of it like that. And it's funny, I have a buddy that works in a big ad agency in Chicago, fraternity brother of mine. And years ago, before I quit the naughty water, he said, buddy, I love you. You gotta look at your brand. He's like, your brand is, you're drunk.
• 4:10
  And I was a successful drunk. And it was just that I was doing what you did. I'd be partying with customers, man. I was good at it. People loved me. And, you know, the party would, happy hour, closing a deal would turn into all night, which would turn into all weekend. And then I got to...
• 4:26
  So I was like, ah, you know, that's crazy talk. You know, this is 10 years ago. I'm like, ah, whatever. And then four years ago I made the change. I was like, Ooh, okay. I see what you're saying. You know, my daughter's 13 or 14 now. And you know, it says a lot about who you are and what your character is. And we did, I told you that we just shot 50 videos and there was some on my boat in Florida. And it's like,
• 4:48
  feel weird, but it's who I am. I really literally I suggest if you I said this in the intro, if you haven't seen Ryan's material, his content is beautiful and brilliant and you get a real good so far of what I'm seeing is this is that's who he is, man. He's
• 5:05
  He's just genuine, authentic, down to earth guy. Go check out his socials. They'll be in the show notes. And he really is that person. And I tell you, you influenced me to to include more. No, I mean, that means a lot coming from you. And so like I but I want to say this, like.
• 5:28
  You get to set the table before you even have dinner. So here's what I mean. So you get to know, people get to know you. They get to like you. They get to see. And you don't have to look. I am the most unsocial social person you know. I show about 20% of my life.
• 5:46
  Not because I'm hiding the other 80%. It's because I found the balance in a system for showing and showing my real self and giving everyone a taste of who I am and what I do. But I don't show every moment. But what I do is people know me before they even meet me. And that opens so many doors of opportunity, whether that's a dollar today or a person I get to meet tomorrow. It's just setting the table because, look.
• 6:15
  Someone's going to Google you or look you up or research you, no matter who you are, what you do, when you meet someone, when you come into contact with someone. And do you want someone else to control the narrative or do you want to control it? And so I like to control the narrative and I like to coach others to control it.
• 6:37
  I launched a book because if you Google me back in the day, you'd pick up frickin. I got arrested for selling drugs at college. So I wrote the book and just told it all out there. It turns out I was really good at sales. I started very early. But no, you know, what overcoming adversity is what I'm all about. I was always myself, you know, I mean, I think we all went off deep, you know, like.
• 7:00
  It's like my whether good or bad, like as they say, everything in moderation, including moderation. I think Abe Lincoln said that. And I'm I'm really good at moderating my moderation.
• 7:15
  I am not. I go literally, it is zero to a hundred and I go at 150 miles an hour. I love it. But my life is fantastic. And you'll, you'll see it in the videos. I go to, but I can like, I don't know. I might be fooling myself, but I think to find, I get, I get too far on the other end. I can, I seem to be able to pull myself back. We'll see. You are so humble. I love it. I love it. Talk about you and, and that shame a little bit and how low you felt and, and, and,
• 7:45
  What motivated you? Because there's so many people listening to this right now. There's a lot of male and female listeners that listen to the Harder in Life show are sitting here going, oh boy, oh boy. So talk a little bit about that terrible feeling because pain is a hell of a motivator.
• 8:01
  Your pain is a hell of a motivator and shame is debilitating, deeply debilitating. And shame is a contraction in our bodies and a contraction in our minds. And what we'll often do with shame is hide from the world or at the very least mask it. And we often mask it with aggression and tendencies towards violence or big energy.
• 8:27
  to seek control because we feel so out of control, we feel so vulnerable. And ultimately, the more shame we feel and the less we tap into our vulnerability, the more narcissistic we become, right, or shades and expressions of narcissism. A lot of people think that narcissism is about control and it's about dominance and it's about forcefulness. And it carries, depending on which kind of narcissism, it carries those characteristics, but ultimately it's a response or reaction to a fear of deep vulnerability.
• 8:56
  It's not just a fear of vulnerability, it's an inability to be with one's own vulnerability because often we've been shown that our expression doesn't matter and we've been humiliated or we've experienced rejection or we've experienced abandonment or humiliation. As a result of that, we've had to develop a survival or social survival strategy or coping strategy and it often comes in the form of that dominance and control over others and forcefulness over others. Not the only way, but it seems to be the society that we live in because we live in such an individualistic society.
• 9:26
  And we live in such a society where we're highly competitive with each other as well. And so it's almost like the survival of the fittest socially and physically and economically and all those things, right? And so sometimes the propensity to move towards that behavior can deepen. But so many of us just hide from the world. I've had experiences in both where I've really, really hid from the world and been very withdrawn, very contracted, very shy. And then I've been attempted to be very big in the world and
• 9:53
  very loud and controlling and it's a false bravado. You know, it's just to deflect from my insecurities. And that's tough, man. It's tough to not have anyone to or think that you don't have anyone
• 10:08
  to actually go to, to share that load with, to share that burden with. And that's what so many men particularly are missing that. They're missing people that they can share themselves with. And people are just missing people that they can share themselves with and be seen in non-judgmental and compassionate ways and be affirmed in their pain and not confirmed in their pain where, oh, keep being in your pain, keep being the victim. No, no, no. Just to say, hey, I empathize with you. I hear you. I'm here with you. I see you.
• 10:34
  Because most people aren't seen and they don't feel understood. And so they're going to contract in the world because they don't feel safe to be seen. Because again, they've had this very dense experience of when I've been myself, it hasn't gone down well. So I'll just pull back from the world. And that's better.
• 10:51
  But it's not because what that does is it evokes more of that in others as well because you become untrustworthy. So people are like, well, if you're not going to be open, then I'm not going to be open. And for someone to say, hey, I see that you're not open, but I'm going to still be open, means that that person's done a deeper level of inner work, right? And so, which is very possible, of course, but it just becomes more difficult to attract that and bring that into your life. That's what I just said. Shame and vulnerability is, is, woohoo.
• 11:20
  hard. You have to do some serious work on yourself to, to, to be vulnerable. Can you tell us a bit about yourself and your journey with God? There's so much to you.
• 11:30
  Well, you know, Kelly, I was raised by a preacher. My mom and daddy were pastors. They had me in Jacksonville, North Carolina. 24 hours later, they had me in Airstream. We were traveling and he was preaching. So I was raised around God. I was raised in a very strict religion. I could wear pants, could cut my hair, all that kind of stuff until I was like 15. That's why I'm such a rebel now. Yeah.
• 11:54
  I had a Mohawk for 25 years. Just like, you're not going to tell me. I can't do. And I also, because of that, ran away, really, got really rebellious and got married really, really young. Left Bible school to get married in the middle of the night. And that marriage lasted 18 years. But.
• 12:19
  I had fought so hard for it because I was raised, if you get divorced, you're going to hell on a slip and slide. So I really had Kelly in my head. God was a mean God. And I was, there was so much that I couldn't do to level up so that he could use me after all my failures. I was the only one that could keep a marriage. I was the only one that was nay-naying and not pray-praying in my family, you know. And so. There they go.
• 12:48
  Listen, I mean, I was like, I was, I was, I was, God really had to, had to have a lot of grace for me. He did. But 18 years after I got married, we ended up walking through a divorce and I lost everything and had to move back in with my mom and daddy at 36 with my two sons, Morgan and Lincoln, who are now 27 and 29. That was one of my questions. 27, 29. Okay. Yeah.
• 13:11
  And I was so devastated. And I remember laying in my bed at my mama's one night, lost my $500,000 house, lost my Mercedes, my Navigator, was driving a, I call it my knockoff Bentley because it was a 300 Chrysler. And it had me sit on the side of the road overheating every day. Every single thing that could go wrong in my life was going wrong.
• 13:34
  And really what happened, Kelly, was God let me hit rock bottom to find out who the rock was at the bottom, which was Jesus. And he was like, I'm going to show you that I got off of that throne and onto that cross 2000 years ago just for you. And you're going to walk through some hell because I, Kelly, I do believe sometimes got to wreck your spirit to save your soul.
• 13:53
  Sometimes he'll let things in your life go terribly wrong so that you fall flat on your face and you can get up again because he's like, I need you to work for me. And I'm laying in my bed one night and I said, God, take this pain away from me. And I fell in my spirit, Kelly. I can't take it away. You got to get up and walk away from it.
• 14:14
  You got to walk away from that depression. You got to walk away from the anger. You got to walk away from being messy. You got to walk away from going back and trying to give CPR to dead situations. I'm here to help you, but you got to get up. You got to go to hell and come out on fire. And that's exactly what I did. I started shifting the narrative of my life. And at 38, 39, you know, it was like in that season, Kelly, I would never, I would, if people ask me all the time, what would you change? Nothing.
• 14:43
  There's not one single thing that I would change, Kelly, because I believe that you and I today, we can walk into a room and never even open our mouths. And just the mere atmosphere of our presence shifts an atmosphere because we've both been crushed by our own storms.
• 15:00
  our storms got us where our choices got us where we were but god is the kind of god that will turn your scars into stars man he will turn your scars into stars he does it he he turns your wounds into wisdom man and here i am so chris had this company in this event we ended up becoming partners so i ended up starting to do this event with him and one of my i think it was it was either the first or the second time i think it was the first time i did unfair advantage live with him
• 15:29
  And I was so, I had imposter syndrome. Like, here's my boyfriend who was a professional speaker. It was his event. He was the face of the company. He's running this thing. And here I am like, who is this girl? Like coming up on stage behind him. I remember I stood like, you look at any of the photos from that event. I mean, stands like four or five feet behind him. And I would only talk if I felt like I had a reason to talk. I was so nervous. Yeah.
• 15:53
  And there was a point in the event where he was going to sell his backend offer. And I volunteered to be the person to make the pitch and make the offer from stage. And at that time, I didn't know that it was an actual...
• 16:05
  skill to be able to sell from stage, which it is a skill that you need to learn how to do. And people study this skill of pitching from stage for years and years and years. And there are experts that are amazing at this, at this very difficult thing to do. And I was like, how hard can it be? I'll just read the slides and I'll just sell the damn thing. It's no big deal. I got it. So I didn't prepare. I didn't practice. I've got these slides. I don't even think I read them. And I go on stage and I start doing this pitch.
• 16:34
  When I tell you I shit the bed, like it was so bad. You know when a comedian's bombing and everyone feels warm, comfortable in the room and like no one knows what to do? Everyone was frozen. I tripped over my heel. I couldn't read what was on the screen. I said the price wrong. I didn't even know what the offer was. I was just not prepared. What a lesson in preparation, by the way. But anyways, so I do a terrible job. And at the end of the pitch...
• 16:59
  The whole thing was that we were going to have these gift bags on stage. And you say to the audience, okay, everyone that wants to sign up for the program, come on stage and grab your gift bag. And what we envisioned was everybody coming on stage or lots of people rushing the stage, grabbing their gift bags, so excited to join. Everyone needs to know that the whole point of this is that, like the only way that Chris was making money on this event was if he sold stuff, like if he sold this program. So everything was riding on this. I'm like, all right, everyone come up and get your gift bag.
• 17:29
  Nobody moved. No one. No one moved. And I'm standing up there and I'm like, oh my God. I look at Chris. He's like, his face is frozen. All of our team members are like, oh my God. One of my team members comes on stage and she goes, please sign up.
• 17:45
  It was more than fine. So I'm in tears. I go back into the green room and everybody else goes to lunch and I'm sitting there thinking, I'm like, Jen, you need to either leave and never come back or you need to do something to shift your energy right now because you can't go back on stage like this. It was probably one of the most mortifying moments of my life because everything that I thought to be true, I'm not good enough, imposter syndrome, all of it was actually manifested. It was there. I am not good enough. This is terrible.
• 18:14
  So I knew the only thing that I could possibly do to get back to me was, was to dance.
• 18:23
  And so at that time, these events had no dancing, no music. If you go on Instagram and you look at our events now, everybody dances all the time. It's become part of our ethos. But then no one danced. It was like a regular business conference. But there was a guy that was playing music in the back of the room. So after lunch, I go up to the guy and I'm like, well, we come back from lunch. I want you to play this one song. I want you to play it really loud. I want you to play it all the way through. And he looked at me because I was the one that just bombed on stage. And he was like, really? Like he was like, okay, okay.
• 18:50
  All right. Rolls his eyes. And I'm like, okay, cue the music. And he starts playing the song. And I just grab the mic. I'm like, I have nothing to lose. And I'm like, all right, everybody, get on your feet. And I make every, and I start dancing. And I'm just like, I'm like, come on, come on, come on. And everybody in the room starts dancing. People are dancing on the tables. They're dancing on the chairs. They bum rush the stage. The whole energy of the entire room ships. And everyone is having the time of their life, including me.
• 19:17
  And all of a sudden I went from the girl who was petrified to be in front of my boyfriend, who didn't think she was good enough, to being in the pocket and doing the thing that I knew that I did best, which was dancing and getting an energy in the crowd and making everybody feel seen and make everybody feel special.
• 19:33
  And after that dance party, the whole energy of the event shifted. We ended up making over seven figures in that event. We brought back the crowd. And now every event that we do, one of our famous things, whether it's on Zoom or in person, is our after lunch dance party. And at first, the thing that we do, it's part of our super connector vibe. And it's what makes us special. But the lesson, the lesson was you're going to mess up.
• 20:00
  especially if you're not prepared, you're going to mess up. And so I did after that promise myself that I was going to become one of the best salespeople for a stage that there is in the world. And I believe that I did that because I was never going to go back up there and fail ever again. However, the real life, like you can mess up, you can fail. It's how you come back from it. It's how resilient you are. And it's how can you
• 20:20
  come back and get in the pocket, do what you do best. Because whenever you do what you do best and you bring your uniqueness to any situation, you will save the debt. Because the only thing that makes you different and makes you stand out from everybody else and makes people want to truly connect with you is the stuff that only you possess is the realness, the vulnerability. And so when I got up on that stage and I danced after failing, everybody was bought in again and everybody was having fun. And so was I.
• 20:49
  What is your story? Why does your story matter? Because if I didn't, I just learned about you. If I don't know about you, my audience doesn't. So let's introduce the heart of the life audience to Dan Martel.
• 21:00
  Yeah. I mean, today people know me as the, you know, I've, I've won entrepreneurial awards. So I was named top entrepreneur in Canada. That's where I grew up, it's where I'm from. Um, you know, I've invested in 60 plus companies as an angel investor in the tech space. I run a hundred million dollar, um, essentially holding company where we buy software companies. Uh, I run the largest CEO coaching group for software CEOs. Like my whole life I've been the software guy built
• 21:30
  Um, but where I started, you know, and I think this is where we connect on that level. It's like, I, I grew up in a really challenging spot. My mom was an alcoholic. I'm the second oldest of four. My dad wasn't around very much. He was in sales and ended up getting addicted to drugs when I was 13. I started hanging out with guys twice my age, learning stuff I should never been learning and got to a place where ended up in a juvenile detention twice. Yeah.
• 21:56
  And the second time I was so adamant that I didn't want to go back that I had stolen a car and I had a handgun sitting next to me. And I told myself if the police stopped me, I was going to point the gun and have them take my life. And I ended up on a routine roadblock, just took an exit off a highway and the police were checking driver's license and insurance and everything.
• 22:17
  I pulled over and when they asked me for my stuff, I just took off. And I got into this crazy high speed chase going way. I mean, the fact that I didn't crash sooner, but I ended up in this neighborhood and I saw an open garage door and I thought maybe I could, you know, hide out, close the door and, you know, run out the back. You know, maybe I've watched too many cop movies, but I ended up coming into that driveway with so much speed. It wasn't even wearing my seatbelt and I smashed into the side of the house.
• 22:45
  And I could hear the police getting closer and I went for the gun. And for whatever reason, it got stuck and I kept pulling on it, pulling on it. And the cops grabbed me, threw me in the back of the cop car. And that was the beginning of a complete transformation. I ended up in an adult prison for six months and...
• 23:08
  It was a guard named Brian that literally changed my life. I got in a fight and got put in a hole for three days. And on the third day, Brian opened the door and told me to follow him. And when we were walking back to the unit, we actually went past the guard unit or past the cell block into the guard unit, which I'd never been in. And he sits me down and he says to me, he goes, what are you doing here?
• 23:35
  And I go, what do you mean? I mean, you know, I got in a fight with Kirk. And he goes, no, not that. He goes, what are you doing in this place? And I was like, well, I got in a high-speed chase and guns. And he goes, he goes, Dad, I've been working here for almost 10 years. And I've seen a lot of kids come through. And I got to tell you, you don't belong here. And in that moment, Kelly, there was just like,
• 23:56
  this belief that he had in me that I definitely didn't have in myself. I thought I was less than nothing. I thought I was a piece of crap. I thought I had zero self-worth. I mean, my whole life I was just getting in trouble. And here was this guy telling me that like, he thought I was better. He's like, I watch you do your, you know, try to do your classwork and stay out of the prison politics and just like stick to yourself. And,
• 24:19
  He goes, I just don't understand why somebody like you is in this place. And that, that seed got planted and I was fortunate enough. And about a month later I got released to a rehab center that, that literally saved my life. I did 11 months in a therapeutic community and it was there that I kind of built my personal value, like my self worth. Um, I understood my emotions. It was just a really beautiful place. And, um,
• 24:47
  helped me rebuild the relationship I'd lost with my family, my brothers, my sisters, my parents. And it was at the end of that program, I was helping Rick, this maintenance guy, clean out one of the cabins because it was built on an old church camp. And I discovered this old computer and a yellow book on Java programming sitting next to it.
• 25:06
  And just followed the book. And so it's so crazy now because like this is my world. But I just I followed chapter one. And in about 20 minutes, I got the computer to say hello world. And I got hooked. Like software became my new addiction. And honestly, entrepreneurship became the personal development program that I needed in my life. And that's just what I've been doing my whole life. And the biggest thing I'm most proud of the business success. Cool.
• 25:33
  you know, the, the private planes and the supercars are all fun, but you know, I still, to this day, I was just there four weeks ago talking to these kids and I've been doing it for 20 some years, 26 years now, just sharing my story and I always make a commitment to them and I don't, I can't make this to everybody, but to the kids that go to this special place, if they get out, stay sober for a year and reach out to me, I'll help them make their dreams come true. And that's, that's what I'm here to do. And then, yeah, my whole life on the internet to try to help people that are on their journey. And,
• 26:03
  That's who I am. In this grand scheme of things, my dad comes to me. This is about to lose the house. And I just remember him crying and be like, I always remember that Scoggins never get ahead. They always just get by. Okay. So I want you to hold that thought in your mind for just a second. Fast forward all the way to being back in this Jeep Grand Cherokee with Steve after asking me the first question. And then he asked me the second question.
• 26:30
  He said, Stephen, do you want to learn to think like me or do you want to continue thinking like your father? So if the truth about success or achievement or blessings or fulfillment or happiness or joy or mercy is tied up into how we think, then if we don't have other people to help us understand how to think differently or how to think better, we will never achieve those things. Well, that's why you're here. And if you think about it, that's,
• 26:59
  So many programs, those limiting beliefs in your head. Your dad just said that, that, that every time you tell me that story drives me crazy. It's so someone thinking like that, you know, you heard my daughter at dinner last night. What do I say to you? Yeah. You are a seagull and you are unstoppable. Unstoppable. That's right. That's why I love you.
• 27:17
  Well, and she won't, she won't know the benefit of that. Like she won't fully know the benefit of that for another 10 years. Yeah. She thinks it's cute now. Yeah. She, you know, she's kind of, that's being gooberish kind of like, you know, you know, but she's, it's seeping in much like Steve Myrick stuff seep into me over time. I shared with you guys at dinner last night, two, two other little byproducts of that story. The first of which is a few years ago, I did a DNA thing.
• 27:39
  And then that DNA thing through ancestry and all whatever, you know, I figured out where I was from and I was half Viking and Scotch Irish and, you know, Norwegian and all this kind of cool stuff. 100% badass. I, you know, I don't know. I don't know how many five foot five badass Vikings there are, but Hey, you know, I'll take it. But no, so we go, you know, but the interesting thing about that was is I could not find in 400 years another Scoggins that had managed to become a person of influence and a person of affluence.
• 28:09
  I like that. And if you take those two things, put them together side by side, it's all directly correlated to Steve Myrick, Susan Batts, which AKA Mama Wama, I'm sure we'll get into this. You read the book. Yep. And then one or two other people along the way that really poured in. Do not go into her. Cause she's hit some great. Yeah.
• 28:30
  Yeah, she's amazing. Unfortunately, neither one of those people got to see everything. They passed away before. They're watching. Yeah. They're watching. And the second thing was, other than the 400-year thing, when we were discussing stuff over dinner last night and just having a good old time to catch up with friends and hang out with your daughter and whatever, we had a blast, but we also realized that the journey to get here
• 28:56
  is often very difficult and people give up along the way. Whereas the journey to stay here actually becomes more meaningful.
• 29:04
  in that you have a better appreciation of influence. You have a better appreciation of affluence. You have a better appreciation of what healthy boundaries are and healthy self-esteem is and a better chance at worth and all kinds of stuff like that. Well, everybody sitting at that dinner of Sands, my daughter, of course, has been through some shit. Yeah. And you could see light bulbs going on and everybody's head like, oh, oh. We're going to dig right into this a little deeper. Your book starts off,
• 29:34
  You even revert back several times to this, to the overpass where you were contemplating taking your life. I was within seconds of taking my life. I was going to say, that's the question. How close were you to actually doing it and what stopped you? Yeah, so I was within seconds of it. You have to understand what led me there. So hold on, let's set the scene again just because that long winded is. You have this kid who grew up real rough.
• 29:59
  He's made it in life and he got a little bit of bad news and almost talked, talked about, you know, ending it. Well, yes, the rough upbringing, a rough up and down kind of like, uh,
• 30:14
  construction environment. Steve Meyer gives me a chance to build a business with him. I do very well, very quick. My character, my integrity was not ready for, to wear the mantle of what that was. That led me into a toxic relationship, which led me into tens of thousands of dollars in debt, which then led me to ultimately becoming, getting seriously depressed, anxiety ridden, stuff like that, which then led me ultimately becoming homeless. Yeah.
• 30:39
  for a time, for a season. Grace, just to say again to read, this is a highly successful man right now. He's being modest. He's very well off financially. So to hear the backstory is a privilege. So thank you for being vulnerable. So when you stopped running and you actually had to sit in your shit and surrender, talk about that because you,
• 31:05
  So many people do what you did. I've done it. I did it for years. I'm really struggling. Not struggling. I'm working on right now surrendering and allowing everything to happen for me, not to me. So talk to me about you sitting in your feelings and surrendering and how that actually led you to where you are today. Well, I didn't. I can't sit here and say, oh, it was this.
• 31:32
  beautiful space and everything was wonderful no it was a shit storm um i actually remember um my life was spiraling out of control and um
• 31:50
  I wanted it to be different. I promised myself that it would be different, but every day I would wake up and I would make that promise to myself that today is the day that it's going to be different and I'm going to change and something I'm going to, it's going to be better. And I couldn't get a grip on it. And I felt so helpless and so hopeless.
• 32:20
  And I remember it was my daughter, my oldest daughter, she was having her cello concert. And I remember thinking, okay.
• 32:34
  I got to get it together because I'm going to show up at her concert like on point. And especially in front of my ex-husband. Right. Like I was like, I'm going to do a good job. And anyway, I saw my ex-sister-in-law who I don't even like to say ex-sister-in-law because she's still like a sister to me. I love this. This.
• 33:02
  my ex sister-in-laws. I love them. Um, they've saved my life. I love them. And, um, but I saw them and the next day I got a text message that said, Hey, can you meet us at Starbucks? And I was like, yeah, do you, are you okay? Do you need help? Now,
• 33:26
  I knew it wasn't about them. It was about me. But I was like, do you need help? And they're like, no, yeah, no. Can you meet us? And I met them at Starbucks. It was 7 o'clock in the morning.
• 33:45
  And I don't think, Kelly, I don't think I've shared this ever before on a podcast, but I met them at 7 o'clock in the morning and they said, you reek of alcohol. I was like, well, what do you mean? Have you been drinking? I said, no, I haven't. I said, well, you've got so much in your system.
• 34:11
  You reek of it. Do you want help? And I just burst into tears. And I was like, I need help. I just, I need help. And you know what?
• 34:28
  That was brave on them to reach out to me because they could have thought, well, I don't want to wrap the boat. I don't want to risk the relationship. They saved my life. They were there to give me my, uh, one year old birthday cake at a, uh, Oh, I'm not supposed to say recovery meetings. No, you could say I, I'm a big proponent of AA. I, first of all,
• 34:58
  I thank you. Thank you for being so vulnerable. It's courageous and, and it's bringing me, bringing us closer together and your audience is going to love you. Uh, they would, I hope they're watching to see your eyes and how they glossed over and how authentic and genuine all of that was. So you touched my heart and thank you. I love that. I, I, I just adore you. Um,
• 35:27
  So yeah, I'm gonna take a two second interlude and say, I quit drinking four and a half years ago, coming up on five years ago, cold turkey, I didn't go to A, I should have gone to A. So kudos for you doing that, kudos to your sister, your ex-sisters-in-laws, because that is, I had a conversation this morning with somebody about it. It's not easy. So, and kudos to you for accepting it. Most people deny it.
• 35:54
  and say I don't have a problem, I got it under control, but you surrendered and went and now look at you. You have the ability to tell people they're wrong or to go to hell and they ask you how. And it's very polite and I admire that about you.
• 36:13
  I'm going to learn from you. This is why I wanted you on the podcast, because I'm going to suck your energy. I'll tell you something about that. I think that this idea of conflict, I think that too many men, they go at it like almost like two lions. Okay. Okay.
• 36:38
  If I'm in the room with a guy who thinks he's more powerful than me, I will always let him, watch me, I will always let him come up here and I'll come down and serve the guy. And this is a very common thing when you start to do well, that a guy wants to show you what he's got. And so he'll come up here and...
• 37:02
  I never try to go higher or hit him like another lion. I'll come down and serve him. And I get that from the Bible. So, you know, Jesus himself, with all his power, served people. So when you serve people, then what happens is that God's divine strength stays on you in an unusual way. And I walk in divine strength.
• 37:31
  speechless. You said something, and I'm going to deviate from my questions because we were talking about Grant Cardone, and you said something about being human versus something else. What was that? It wasn't dehuman. I think probably that we have to be human beings, like beings in the moment, fully present, fully feeling, fully alive instead of human doings.
• 37:59
  And so you see that by my style. I got a lot going on, but you would almost never know it because I'm so in the moment. In fact, like when we go to lunch, you'll notice I will not pick up my phone one time. Because why would I ask you to take your time, go to lunch with me, and I'm texting a bunch of people. I just don't do it. I'm in that moment.
• 38:29
  Where did you learn that? They say President Obama was the best at that, making you feel like you're the only person in the room. And that's an art. And it's something I'm working with. This is why I love you. I'm going to learn so much from you. I learned it by watching people. So as a kid, when you're the youngest, there's a lot of observations. So you're down here. Everyone's living up here because they're older than you.
• 38:55
  And I would watch my sister's friends, my brother's friends, my dad's friends, my mother's friends. And I would pick up on these personality types and see things that really kind of flowed with me and things that did not. And the things that flowed with me was when I would see like really kind men.
• 39:20
  And then as I got older and I started traveling the world at age 20, I'd get around some very powerful men and they would never brag about it. They were like super good to people. And that did a lot to and for me. Like I remember just quickly being in Sweden and I was hanging around this guy who was a heart surgeon. And he had this amazing house in Gothenburg, Sweden. I was only 20 years of age.
• 39:49
  And he invited me to lunch after seeing me speak and just treated me like, you know, like I was a heart surgeon. And I said, I'm going to become more like this guy. So that was part of it. The observation. How do you forgive somebody when they're not sorry? Common question.
• 40:07
  Somebody being sorry has nothing to do with you forgiving them. You loving someone has nothing to do with them changing, with them being more conscious. They don't even need to feel remorse for you forgiving them. Nobody else can affect your capacity to be loving, to be conscious, to be wise, to be free. And it's hard work, but...
• 40:31
  You know, everybody listening and I, you know, my sense is you are, you have your own forgiveness story. If you have been forgiven, you know how healing, invigorating, golden that is. There are lots of us who are, who have forgiven people who we thought were unforgivable, right?
• 40:50
  it changes your life completely. You grow up, you become powerful, you move on, you think more creatively, you sleep better at night and the people you forgive, they can be dead. You could have a conversation with them. You gotta be careful with arrogance and forgiving. Right? So like a lot of us will walk in, this is like forgiving, uh, newbies. Uh, you know, we'll walk in, do a conversation literally or figuratively and be like,
• 41:15
  you know, hey, I forgive you for what you did. And there's a kind of arrogance to it. It's like, my forgiveness is really making it clear. You messed up. And I'm an awesome person for forgiving you for messing up. And you know that when you're in that mindset, that you are secretly wishing that they would like super fess up, and you want the fess up.
• 41:41
  There's actually merit in that. We have to practice forgiving. It's like we're kind of playing with this, you know, forgiving is a virtue. It's a soul quality. We're trying to figure out what forgiving is. That's a great place to start. It's not perfect forgiveness, but this is cool. It's better than not forgiving somebody. Well, I found that forgiving and everything I've read is forgiving of someone else is for you.
• 42:02
  And for the longest time, Danielle, and you're bringing this stuff out of me, but I'm telling you that the longest time all I wanted was that I'm sorry. And then the moment I truly forgave them for my own benefit, I didn't need that sorry. Don't want it. Don't care. Doesn't matter to me. Does that make sense?
• 42:23
  Yes, that is. I think that's an almost universal experience of you don't need it back. You're so expanded high on the love. You become so much more conscious. You just don't need it. You're full of love. You are self-conscious.
• 42:38
  fulfilled. But let's go back to the forgiveness is for you, not for the other person. Okay. So we'll just get like super esoteric right now. If we're all one, if we all come from the same source, then forgiving is also for them.
• 42:54
  And what if, like, I think you can have either motivation and it'll get you to the same somewhat more enlightened place. Like, you know, you could set out to forgive your folks because you know that you really love them and you're grateful that they helped you get to the earth. Thank you for being the vehicle for me to have this experience. I forgive you. You have, you got a rough life.
• 43:19
  You're off the hook and you will have that forgiveness, euphoria, become a more expanded person. Or you could go in and just say, I love myself so deeply. My job is to create a sane, free, healing life for myself. I cherish myself. I forgive either way. Either way gets you there.
• 43:40
  For me, I didn't come from a good family, but a good family is going to come from me. That's why I broke the chains immediately. I just had to. I went violent. What we're describing here is what you call unselfing. So would you share with the listeners what unselfing is?
• 43:57
  Unselfing is deprogramming yourself. It's you stop being obsessed with all the small self stuff. So you really start to question who you are. Do you need the stuff? I used to really love personality testing.
• 44:12
  You know, I'm an INFJ, I'm a four on the Enneagram, on the Myers-Briggs, I'm my strength finders, this is me, you know, all that. I'm an introvert, I'm a Gemini, I'm a CEO, I'm a mother, I'm rebellion, all the things. And I realized, like I'll use the introvert label as an example, I started to realize that a lot of those labels were actually holding me back. That I was using being an introvert as an excuse to like,
• 44:41
  not go to the party or, you know, need extra time to recharge by myself. And then I just thought, well, what if I'm not an introvert anymore? I might actually talk to more people at the cafe, at the party, at the gig, you know? So I just think I want to be less of the late. I want fewer labels. I want fewer labels because then I can be more free. Then I get to learn maybe all these other things and all these additional things.
• 45:09
  I could sit down and talk to you for hours. I just, I just, ooh, you're beautiful. I wanted to say I'm human and I love you is what I wrote when you were saying that. So those are my labels. I'm really sorry to keep going back to the book, but guys, go out and get on Amazon, How to Be Loving. Midway through the book, this thing lit my soul on fire, but midway through the book, you wrote every emotion is trying to get our attention.
• 45:37
  I believe this wholeheartedly. Most people turn to ignoring said emotions, even turning to masking said emotions with distractions and all the other things. What do you have to say about that? Do you want to start really deep or do you want to go start shallow?
• 45:53
  Uh, you're the expert at this stuff. I understand really deep, but I don't know what all the listeners are doing. So I would say make it. We're going to cut. We're going to cover it all. Let's start with, with light. We'll go shallow. Your happiness is trying to get your attention because it's good for your brain. Wants you to do more things to make you happy. Your sadness is trying to get your attention. Wants to be listened to. Wants to be validated. When we...
• 46:16
  to demean or repress our emotions, it's like more clutter in the basement. It's more kind of watery energy that's going to flood out somewhere. It's like you're sad and you keep telling yourself you're not sad and you shouldn't be sad and you don't have a right to be sad. You're going to get depressed. You're going to get worse.
• 46:33
  If you're anxious and you get down on yourself for being anxious, you're going to get more anxious. That anxiety escalates into panic attacks. Okay, so all of that content, just call it content, is your little mind babies. You create the stuff, you create the happiness, and you create the fear, and you create the sadness, and you create the bliss. And it wants you to pay attention to it. Okay, so let's just pause there. Got to pay attention to your emotions. But you're the driver of your emotions. You're the parent of your emotions.
• 47:01
  Like the Buddhists will often say, your thoughts and your emotions are just the clouds in the sky and you are the sky. You hold it all. For me personally, I think when it comes to what actually doing the work means is it's not just about a self-awareness. That's the first fucking step. Having self-awareness is great. But how many times have we spoken to people that are like, I know that this isn't good for me.
• 47:23
  But I still do it. And you're like, okay. So it's not about self-awareness. But what it really is to me is it's understanding that all of us have experienced trauma. Every single person on this planet, whether it's big T trauma or little T trauma, we've all experienced some sort of traumas. And so often, especially when it comes like people don't think that it manifests in other ways. It does. It manifests relationships. It manifests in personal and friendships and career, everything. But we see it more often in relationships because it's the closest mimic to our parents.
• 47:53
  And so personally, my journey was I had a narcissistic father and a people pleasing mother. So it was very textbook. We grew up in a home with a lot of abuse, with a lot of like verbal abuse, a lot of like hitting and soap in the mouth and a belt. Like it was just my sister and I talked yesterday where we were like, it was just a lot of darkness. Like we don't remember ever really being happy as a kid or, or, or excited.
• 48:13
  And so those were how I created coping mechanisms and I created core beliefs of I wasn't good enough and I wasn't worthy. So I had a self-esteem that was shot. By the time I started dating in adulthood, I was just dating my father over and over and over again. And I didn't understand how that was going to manifest. And it was so wild, but I started dating men that were just an exact replica. And when I realized it was when I had married my father, exact same situation, and we broke up, that was the time where after I said...
• 48:40
  enough is enough. I have to be the common denominator. It can't be everybody else. And for me, that was my beginning of doing the work. So I had the awareness, but then what the fuck does that mean? What are you doing the work for me? It really is that you are bringing in a multitude of different modalities. So you are taking the awareness and then understanding what does your body look like when you're dysregulated? Because when you're dysregulated, you're coming out of a space of not safe. And that's why sometimes we'll say things or act in ways that we're like, wow, this doesn't feel like me. Right. Because you're
• 49:10
  then we move into, okay, well, where's that in my body? How is this feeling in my body? Starting to connect with your body. When have I felt this before? How is this feeling? I think a lot of people, they don't want to do the work because they don't want to see those shadow parts. They don't want to see that little inner child that needs you because instead it's, oh, just let everybody else come save me. Just, I just haven't found the right guy. That's all. It's just not the right person. When it's like, no motherfucker, it's you are not saving yourself. It's not that everybody else is going to do this for you. And so for me, really what doing the work
• 49:40
  acknowledging those parts of yourself, facing those parts of yourself and healing through them and supporting those parts of yourself that need you more than any, they need you more than they need any other person.
• 49:50
  Long story short, I overdosed on heroin when I was 23 years old, July of 2004. And I thought that that was the end. I was like, this is too much. I've been doing this for over a decade. I saw my life flash before my eyes. Like, I can't do this anymore. This is it. This is the final straw. And about four hours after that, I was doing it again. And so that's when I kind of made a decision that I was just going to
• 50:20
  die. I was just going to do it until I just actually overdosed and died or someone killed me or, you know, I got into too much trouble and, you know, whatever, something bad, catastrophic was going to happen. But I didn't think that I had the power or the strength to get sober.
• 50:37
  And then one morning, August 2nd, August 1st, the morning of August 1st, I blacked out. I'd been up for days. I blacked out. I wanted to kill myself before I blacked out. I do remember that. And that's like crazy to think. Like I wanted to kill myself all the time.
• 50:57
  Like at the end there, I was fighting constantly. I was getting into fistfights. I was 86, every single bar, south of Houston, north of Delancey, east of Allen and west of Essex. It was a whole chunk of New York City that I couldn't even go into because of how bad I was in terms of my anger. And I wanted to die. I looked at myself in the mirror, I remember, and I said, I hate you so much. I hate you more than anything in the world.
• 51:26
  And that was the conversations that I was having with myself. And then I blacked out. I woke up 16 hours later. I still had a job. I slept right through work. My boss, who I love, who became a massive component of my change of what life means today, he took me aside after I came to work. I was like, dude, I'm getting sober. I'm getting sober. I'm sorry. He's like, you're fired.
• 51:53
  You're fired. Can't do this. I can't like, I cannot watch you die on my dime. I can't, can't watch you die on my dime. This is too much. I know what you're doing. I know what you're doing. I can look, I see in your eyes, you're dying. You're dying. And, uh, and I hear you're dying from other people and I can't watch you do. I begged him for my job. I said, ah, Frank, I am getting sober. I promise you I'm getting sober. I know this is the time for me. Please give me another shot. And he said, you can come to this restaurant.
• 52:23
  at eight o'clock in the morning and clean it with the porters for 30 days. That's it. If I find out you have a sip of alcohol or a fucking single, anything that would be considered a drug or alcohol, if I find out about it, you're fired. That's it. You're done. You got to get sober. You got to be here at eight o'clock in the morning, clean the restaurant. And that's what I did.
• 52:46
  And I called a friend who was like an older sister to me when I was, you know, using years ago. And she used to take me in when I was down and out. And I knew that she was sober and she was dating a guy that was sober that I kind of knew. And he showed up about an hour after I called her. And I had this support system like very quickly come and want to help me. And this guy, Marcus, was a Muay Thai kickboxing dude.
• 53:16
  And I had no idea what Muay Thai kickboxing was, but I knew that it was, I was like, that's cool. Like, you know, I thought getting sober was going to, you know, for me, it was going to be like hanging out with fucking old people in libraries. I thought I'd never was going to meet another woman, you know, that was attractive again. I thought I'd be like, you know, caught in a church basement and it just couldn't be more from the truth. I met some of the coolest people very, very quickly that really wanted to help me.
• 53:42
  And they introduced me to fitness, which was at that time Muay Thai kickboxing and nutrition. They taught me how to eat and they basically wrote a life plan for me. And that life plan looked like this. You know, they stay one. They had me meet them at a sober meeting. They too. They had me meet them at a sober meeting and told me to bring some clothes that I can work out in. They took me right to the Muay Thai Academy after the meeting.
• 54:13
  And they sat me down and they said, look, dude, we're going to help you. And we're going to write a plan for you on paper that you're going to follow if you want to change your life. And it's simple.
• 54:27
  But you got to commit to it. And we're not going to chase you. The way the plan is going to go is you're going to wake up as early as you can in the morning, every morning. And you're going to roll out of bed and you're going to get on your knees and you're going to ask God for help. And we don't give a fuck if you believe in God or not. We don't give a fuck if you're religious or not. We want you to ask God for help. And the reason why we want to ask God for help is because, my friend, you do not know how to ask for help.
• 54:51
  You not asking for help has gotten you into this situation. So we want you to start asking for help. And then right after you get on your knees and ask for help, we want you to stand up and make your fucking bed. And then right after you make your bed, you're going to go into the bathroom. You're going to take a piss. You're going to brush your teeth. You're going to wash your face. You're going to put on your contact lenses. You're going to put on a pair of running shoes.
• 55:11
  And you're going to go for a walk or a run. It could be a block. It could be fucking 10 miles. We want you to move your body first thing in the morning. Right after you get home from that, you're going to have a big bowl of oatmeal because we want you to start putting positive shit into your body that's easy and accessible.
• 55:28
  Right after you have that big bowl of oatmeal, you're going to go to an AA meeting. You're going to do that. And right after you go to that AA meeting, you're going to meet us here at the gym at 12 o'clock. And we're going to kick your fucking ass. And we're going to teach you how to be a man. We're going to teach you about integrity, honesty, commitment, discipline, and how to get back up.
• 55:47
  And that's the most important one, how to get back up. You need to learn how to get back up. And then right after you train with us for a couple of hours, you're going to have chicken and broccoli for lunch. You're going to go take a nap. You're going to go to work in the evening. You're going to have chicken and broccoli for dinner. You're going to go to bed as early as possible. And you're going to rinse and repeat.
• 56:09
  And that's what I did. And I haven't had a drink since. And I've been living that life basically almost to a T from waking up early, hitting my knees, asking for help. I do a bunch more shit in the morning now.
• 56:28
  having oatmeal in the morning with a bunch of things that I've now made a business out of. You know, I have chicken and broccoli typically for lunch almost every day and some other protein and veggies and a little starch, you know, for dinner. And, you know, I go to bed as early as I can and wake up as early as I can. And my life is fucking awesome. Thanks for listening. The highest compliment that you can give us all the hard workers that make this show possible is to rate and share.
• 56:54
  all episodes, especially the ones that you feel that impact and resonate with you deeply, or to someone who it might help. It helps with the algorithm and helps with all facets of the show. Thank you again. Be awesome. Be kind and be harder than life.
• 57:16
  Please rate and share this podcast. I'm active on all social platforms and love to hear from my Segal supporters. Each and every episode is sponsored by my company, National Technology Management, the easiest and best IT company to do business with, delivering peace of mind with technology every day, even simplifying cybersecurity. Visit TrustNTM.com for more info. Until next week, be harder than life.