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Damon West: If We Lose Hope, We Lose All | E52 · In Search Of Excellence

• 0:00
  Damon West: No one can put in your work for you. No one can.
• 0:02
  Damon West: You have to take action in your own life, no one can take your action for you. These are the things you have to do every single day. And if you don't do it, no one's going to do it for you. You'll never know what you could be in life for never get ahead, if you're not willing to put in the work. And that is the preparation part. People want to talk about this thing called the overnight success. There's no such thing, Randall because life is a long time to live. People don't see what you do, right?
• 0:23
  Damon West: Well, they don't see you get up early in the morning. For years and years and years to get to this life you have today. They just see the glitz and the glamour of it and they want that you got to do want to put in the work
• 0:37
  Randall Kaplan: speechless because the story is amazing. I can't imagine mentally going into prison thinking I'm gonna get the shit kicked out of me every day to protect my body to protect what happens in the shower. To protect all these things. I have a good friend who went to prison for doing something stupid in a lot of cases. People just make one mistake and do something stupid.
• 0:58
  Randall Kaplan: And there they go. They ruin their life. This guy has a family his kids doing a 10 year sentence.
• 1:07
  Randall Kaplan: It's gonna miss his whole kid's childhood. It's It's very sad.
• 1:10
  Randall Kaplan: Take us through one day you're playing hoops and what happened out there and how that also changed your experience in prison.
• 1:19
  Damon West: Six weeks into prison, Randall. This is a great question you're asking because this is going to play into a lot of what? What I think culturally goes on in this country. And I think this is something everybody can take with them. No matter who you are, what race you are, whatever. Six weeks into prison, it took me first of all, it took me two weeks to get through the white gangs. They tapped out after that. They sent the black gangs just like Jackson said it would be Randall. And everything in that prison is about race six weeks into prison. I get up on a Monday morning.
• 1:48
  Damon West: The only thing I haven't used at this point is my athletic ability. And remember from earlier and we talked about how great of an athlete I was blessed to be growing up and a man sports in prison is a very big deal. I've avoided the rec yard up to this point because the rec yard is one of the most intimidating places on the license Birdman, the rec yard Randall. Every sport was segregated by the color of your skin. Mr. Jackson said prison was all about race. The dude was spot on that rec yard. The most segregated place I've ever seen before or since every sport by the color of your skin, sand volleyball, whites and Hispanics only. No blacks are well handle.
• 2:28
  Damon West: All the races could play handball. But if you wanted to play doubles or partner up with somebody to play a game, your partner had the same skin colors you you couldn't mix the races out there. The White said same thing just like you see in prison movies. Everybody in prison wants to push that out.
• 2:43
  Damon West: Everybody wants to lift weights and all the races can lift weights. But you want someone to spot you, someone to work out with you. Your partner, your spotter has to be the same skin colors you you can't mix the races out there. You can't even sit down and eat a meal on the license built in with someone of a different race. You can't sit at a table with someone of a different race and break bread.
• 3:02
  Damon West: That's how serious race is out there. That Monday morning, six weeks in the prison. I faced my fears. Remember, Jackson says fears aren't real but danger is real. I faced my fears and some real danger that Monday morning and I go out to the rec yard. I pass up all the sports that day.
• 3:22
  Damon West: And I had just straight to the basketball court. Now, Randall, who do you think runs that basketball court? I'll tell you it's the blacks. It's the brothers and they run it. No white boys allow the basketball court. But I grew up in Port Arthur man, I've been the only white guy on the basketball court many times growing up.
• 3:35
  Damon West: I've got to get myself in this game. The problem is because the color of my skin I can't get involved in a basketball game.
• 3:42
  Damon West: But man, I've been watching these guys play for a couple of weeks. And after every game they play, they're gonna do this thing called shoot for teams.
• 3:51
  Damon West: That means the first guy that makes them a free throw needs to be a team captain. And then just keep going to a two guys make a free throw. So I've thought to myself, You know what, that's how I'm going to get to this game. So I'm watching this game on Monday, Monday morning play out so lopsided game one what teams win way over the other team. I get on the side of the court where I know the game is going to end. And man as soon as the last basketball goes to the last basket for the last point that I shot when I went and went to lunch over there and I fell into basketball and wrapped it up like a fumble drill football.
• 4:21
  Damon West: I come up and I got this basketball in my hand. And man the entire basketball courts suck up around me just to see if angry black faces and they are pissed, man.
• 4:30
  Damon West: They're like give us our ball back white boy if you lost your mind, and random my voice is squeaking a crack. Oh my man I want you to Frito today I'm gonna shoot my shot. Man.
• 4:38
  Damon West: They're like Dude, we're gonna kill you today. You're not shooting anything man. You've lost your mind why boy.
• 4:43
  Damon West: Biggest dude out there man. This this blood from Houston named J blood. T blood gets up in my favorite job was a massive do Randall I think he's gonna knock me out but he's not getting this ball. Man. I'm I can't let this ball go. He gets up in my face.
• 4:55
  Damon West: He says you know what, white boy? He said get up on the line, and shoot your shysters.
• 5:00
  Damon West: Man, I hope you can make this basket why boy, man about that time the basketball court party, the free throw out appeared Randall the free throw line looks like the equator thing was huge man. And I'm stepping up to this basket. This is just a basket. Man. This is the normal free throw. But in your mind, this is where fear starts coming in. I've got to, I've got to calm myself down. And one of the things I told myself right there, when I played college football, there was a coach. He said this the sentence, the sentence always stuck with me it was 20 letters. 10 words, it was one of the most powerful sentences I've ever heard in the English language. It was an action statement. And he said this, he said if it is to be, it is up to me. If it is to be it is up to me. And then I repeated that my head said a quick prayer, breathe in and breathe out. And I'll let my free throw go. Nothing but net. I'm a team captain man. Today but steps up Jim what makes his shot he's a team captain, too. So we stepped back. We're gonna, we're gonna pick our teams. Now. I'm gonna pick my four guys. He's gonna pick his four guys. So we can play a little five on five, right? Wrong. It's not a one man. My own teammates don't want me out there. And this is basketball in the life sentence building of a maximum security penitentiary in Texas. There is no referee out there. There's no such thing as a foul. You can punch kick, scratch, bite, poker, whatever you want to do.
• 6:15
  Damon West: There's no guard in the tower that can save you on this.
• 6:18
  Damon West: You're on. You're on. I'm on an island out there. That first day that Monday, I've got a blackout and a busted lip. But I survived. The next day, Tuesday morning, I look at myself in the mirror. And so I look I get been hit by a truck. But you know what I like looking at that guy in the mirror because that guy in the mirror face those fears yesterday. And it gave me the courage to go out there. The next day. I tell people all the time I do things I'm afraid of so I can do things I'm afraid of. The next day I out there and I'm playing basketball those guys. And man they they make sure I'm gonna be on the court now at this point and no one coming back every day they pick me first in every game and Randall. I'm not first pick caliber on the basketball court man. I'm like eighth or ninth pick. I'm really not that good in basketball. But these guys want to make sure I'm going to be out there because they're going to punish me. I learned two things about adversity that we're going to record. I learned that adversity is never as bad as you think it's going to be.
• 7:06
  Damon West: And you are always capable of way more than you think you are.
• 7:10
  Damon West: Because as human beings we can allow overthinking to get in the way of overcome. And that week on the wreck er, I overcame all of those fears. And after six days of playing basketball, those guys on Saturday, J Blige comes up to me, the guys are circling around me after the game we played wreck was over.
• 7:27
  Damon West: Give us as you know, a white boy. He said you pull some off out here. We've never seen any bike well before. He said you took everything we had. You gave it back when you could and that took guts. But you never once got racial with us the entire time. He said listen, white boy.
• 7:43
  Damon West: You don't have to worry about the blacks. Arrest him in your prison. You're good with us. And that was it man. The violence is finally over the threat to my physical states was gone. Like I say, I had to figure out how to be a coffee bean at that point because inside I was becoming the egg.
• 7:58
  Randall Kaplan: Mental health is such an important issue in today's climate. People have been suffering for a long time used to be you didn't talk about it. But today you're hearing all these stories about kids killing themselves. problems that people didn't know about. I have a very close friend whose son killed himself a couple of weeks ago shot himself in the head his funerals on Friday. No clue whatsoever as to why parents are beside themselves kid of the perfect kid never complained loved his parents gave him a hug every time he walked in the door. Never had a single bad moment with a family or friends was while white work was in college. Did you ever think about committing suicide while you were in the cell thinking you're never gonna get out?
• 8:47
  Randall Kaplan: You've really fucked up your life forever. No one's gonna like you. You have a life sentence and what's your message to all the people out there who are really suffering mentally and are thinking about committing suicide?
• 9:02
  Damon West: Yeah, no, I did. And first of all, it's horrible.
• 9:05
  Damon West: What you just said I've got a I've got a stepdaughter. It's horrible to even just, I mean, there's lots of different ways to be in prison. Randall.
• 9:12
  Damon West: Physical prison is the easiest prison to get out of mental spiritual, emotional prison, that prison that your friends are probably in right now because of their son's suicide.
• 9:22
  Damon West: That's the toughest kind of prison to be in my hearts and prayers go out to them and it's horrible. I'm thinking about killing myself. You bet. It was right. It was the weekend before the basketball game. on that Monday morning when I went up to the rec yard. The Friday before that, I got jump I've been jumped by four guys it was bad.
• 9:45
  Damon West: I got my got my ass kicked really bad. And it broke me because that was the whole point of what they're trying to do.
• 9:51
  Damon West: They're trying to break you and then when they try to break you, they want to break down the person you are and they can use you up. And when I mean use you up in prison I mean every cent So the word use a human being up. That is prison man. It's a very predatorial environment.
• 10:03
  Damon West: And Friday, before that basketball game of the rec yard, they broke me. I was done.
• 10:13
  Damon West: Saturday morning I woke up and I had my plan. I was going to go to church that started while I was going to be Catholic masses Saturday morning and after mass, I was going to come back to my cell and hang myself an hour I had it figured out. I knew how to hang the sheet off the bed.
• 10:27
  Damon West: Off the top bunk and so I go to the go to the servers in chapel service that Saturday morning.
• 10:36
  Damon West: I'm standing there by 200 inmates just facing forward. I get a tap on my shoulder. And I look down and the top of my shoulder is his volunteer chaplain. They miss D. Doucet.
• 10:47
  Damon West: Miss D is about 80 Some years old, little bitty lady with a cane like Yoda, and she hits you with a cane. Miss D comes up to me that day, she tapped me on the shoulder. She says Mr. West, can you come to my office need to talk to you? So I'll go to her office with her in the middle of the church service.
• 11:03
  Damon West: She sits me down her office. She said Mr. West, what's wrong with you today, I can see that something's bothering you. And immediately ran, I'm thinking to myself, how the hell does she know something's wrong? I mean, I'm in a prison, man.
• 11:13
  Damon West: Something's wrong with everybody inside. You're right. We're all dealing with intense personal struggles. This is a prison. But she picks me. So I loaded Misty.
• 11:20
  Damon West: I tell her everything is going on a crime crime breakdown and told her I said can't take it anymore. Ms. D, and I'm going to check out and I told her I was going to kill myself. And Steve was really calm. She said, uh, you can't you can't kill yourself, Mr. West, she said, because you can't give up on God. Man, the minute she mentioned God, I got so mad random. Oh, my God. What do you mean, God? How can God create a place so wicked and evil and sinister, has this prison of sitting in right now. She's calm, completely calm. She says you're not the first person to get angry with God. But she was she said, The Bible's full of people that got angry with God.
• 11:59
  Damon West: She said, but they all came back to God, because they learned the secret to faith. And I might miss D. I really need to know what that secret is. She said, Here it is. She said if you're going to pray, don't worry. And if you're going to worry, don't pray. She said you can't have it both ways. She said, you're either going to let God do his job or you're gonna try to do his job for him. He said she said you're gonna let God throw the car and you're gonna drive the car. She said the last time you drove it. You parked it inside of a maximum security prison. So choose who gets those keys today, but choose wisely.
• 12:35
  Damon West: She tells me what she's learned about suicide over the years because she is in a maximum period prison. A lot of men kill themselves in a in a prison environment like that. She said what she learned about suicide is that when you subscribe to a world that is seemingly hopeless, and she said seemingly, is the key word because nothing is ever truly hopeless as long as you have faith, right? She said but when you get sucked into the seemingly hopeless world and you can't see the road, the reality is the world around you get into an unreal place where there's no hope. And when you live in a place where there's no hope anything including suicide is a viable option. And that's what she's doing that she's pulling me out of this seemingly hopeless world because Randyll human beings have to have hope if we lose hope we lose it all.
• 13:23
  Damon West: You ever seen the
• 13:26
  Randall Kaplan: movie Shawshank random amazing movie?
• 13:28
  Damon West: One of my favorite great, great movie so right now I'm in the process of working on trying to turn the change agent my life story into a Netflix limited series or whoever buys it. I'm gonna be three season type deal with the screenwriter.
• 13:42
  Damon West: mazing screenwriter out there in LA where you are. His name is David Aaron Cohen. David Aaron Cohen. He wrote Friday Night Lights he wrote the American underdog Kurt Warner movie so we were talking about you know, Shawshank and I was like hey you know what I was Shawshank I don't think a lot of people watch Shawshank and they think it's a movie but and to do frame which is okay it's a correct answer there's no right or wrong answer here. But when I watched Shawshank I don't think it's a movie about Andy do frame it's red Red's character is narrating this thing. Morgan Freeman's character is narrating and he's talking about this guy and you do frame Tim Robbins character.
• 14:19
  Damon West: But now that I've been in prison when I watched Shawshank I don't think the story is about a new friend at all. I think it's read story Morgan Freeman's character and here's why. Because red is dead. Red was long ago a dead man inside that prison because he gave up hope you also hope Randall he had no hope anymore.
• 14:39
  Damon West: Remember when Brooks got out of prison after like 50 years and he goes out in the last about two weeks and he hangs himself.
• 14:44
  Damon West: He writes a letter back to the boys and Shawshank to tell them that he couldn't make it up there. Read turns to Andy and he tells Andy I'm an institutional man and I don't think I can make it out there either. He even says to Andy, he says the words Hope is a dangerous thing.
• 15:00
  Damon West: That's why no, this is read story because when you when you feel like hope is a dangerous thing, you're in a very bad place. But what did he tell read? And he told read, get busy living or get busy dying. And that's what read did. He got busy living reds telling the story about this guy he made to do frame that came to Shawshank Prison and saved his life saved the lives of a lot of other men.
• 15:25
  Damon West: Because even after he escaped, what did they do? They sit around all day and told stories about Andy. It's read story.
• 15:31
  Damon West: It's read story about the guy that saved his life because they brought hope back to his life.
• 16:27
  Randall Kaplan: Let's come back to the suicide question that I presented you before. We're talking about people that are older in general, you're in prison, you've lived a life hardened criminals, once they get there. Talk to me, what's your advice to the people out there who have never been to prison who are suffering in their own mind, and are not in extremely difficult physical positions, but are in very difficult mental divisions?
• 16:50
  Randall Kaplan: What's your message to them, if you had one minute or less to talk to them speak to them right now as if they were right in front of you.
• 17:01
  Damon West: You have to give up this idea of control. This is the biggest thing for me to get where I am today, this idea of control. We don't control many things in life, there's only four things you control. Rather you control what you think. You control what you say. And you do control what you feel what I mean is do you tell people about your feelings? Do you talk about what's going on inside you. And lastly, you control what you do is your actions. These are the things that you do that people see what you think what you say, what you feel and what you do.
• 17:28
  Damon West: That's really the only four things you have control over. If you will give up the other control of all this, they won't around you because you can't you can't change that, you will start to gain back your sanity and your sense of proportion.
• 17:40
  Damon West: And the world around you. Your sense of proportion is everything. Because we are disproportionate. And as people when we feel like we control those other things. And when we feel like we control those other things that we can't do anything with it, it beats us down. And we get this feeling of like, of hopelessness. And the other thing I would tell them is like, once you step back, and you start applying your time to things you can actually change because your time most precious resource you have once it's gone, it's gone for good. All the money in the world won't buy one more second, this stuff called time. Once we are focused on the things we can control, we have to be able to apply perspective to the days around US perspective what a bad day looks like. Because too many times and I'm saying this from experience, we can get sucked up in our days that aren't going well and think maybe this is terrible. This is bad. What if we really step back and ask ourselves? Is this really a bad day? Because, you know, by my definition, a bad day is days, someone dies, a marriage fails, a job is lost a child is hurt or killed, like you were talking about your friends get. Those are bad days, man. Most of your bad days aren't that and if we can step back and apply that perspective, you can pull yourself out of that real quickly and say, You know what, despite what's going on right now, this is not something I can overcome, because overcame that.
• 19:02
  Damon West: And now upon perspective and a lesson of what I've overcome in life, it's like traffic, Randall. Some days you sit in traffic, and it drives you insane drives you crazy. Been there done that. Then there's other days you sit in traffic and it didn't bother you at all.
• 19:13
  Damon West: Is it the traffic? Or is it you?
• 19:18
  Damon West: It's always you. It's always you and how you see this situation around. Work on how you see the situation on
• 19:28
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• 21:22
  Randall Kaplan: How did you get over your fear?
• 21:27
  Randall Kaplan: And then the hope you had that something positive was gonna come out of that where the odds of success were probably one in 10 million.
• 21:35
  Damon West: Yeah, man, this is a crazy story. And for all you people out there that work in sales or you know, a sales environment, or you got a sales team. This is for you. And your anybody that's got to grind it out every day and the people out there that we say you got to, you got to eat what you kill.
• 21:54
  Damon West: This is for you. So January 12 2017, I've been out of prison for 14 months at this point. By all metrics, I am a success in life. I got a job working at one of the most prestigious law firms in Texas. You know, I've got my life back together sorts of I'm starting to rebuild my name. But I've got this dream of sharing my story with college football programs, Randall because I played college football back in the 90s. And I know that I can impact these student athletes lives. But the problem is, I don't know any college football coaches. They don't know me. It's been 20 years since I've taken a stab at college football. But a buddy of mine in Houston calls me up on January 12 2017 14 months out of prison. It's in the middle of the day. He says hey Damon tonight, in Houston, Texas is the bear O'Brien Coach of the Year War. They're gonna name the best college football coach in America. He said the eight best coaches in the country are going to be in this room tonight. I'm going to extra press pass, if you want to go he works in the media. And then I'm like, You better want to go. So I drive the 90 miles from Beaumont to Houston after work all that Tim.
• 22:57
  Damon West: And I get to the Toyota Center.
• 22:57
  Damon West: He sneaks me in, he hands me a press pass tells me I'm a mom.
• 23:01
  Damon West: So there I am in that room that night. All the best coaches out there. I'm on the floor. And I'm walking up to all these coaches.
• 23:07
  Damon West: I mean, USC, Wisconsin, Penn State, PJ flag, they're all there. And I go up and shake the hands of every one of these coaches and I give them this elevator pitch that I've been practicing for an hour and a half on a 10 minute drive over there. And man, every coach I've meet that night, slammed the door my face, Randall, everyone hope man, it was a no, no, no, don't call us. We'll call you it was a bloodbath. Randall. In one hour. I've been told no, seven times. Seven of the eight coaches have told me no, that's a no every eight minutes, Randall. I'm in the corner of the Toyota Center. And I'm licking my wounds. I'm feeling sorry for myself. I've just pissed through the room in one hour. And the voice in my head is telling me go home. It's over. Man, that was a dream way too big. You failed at that. You know, but you know what I quit doing a long time ago, Randall listening to myself. And you shouldn't listen to yourself either. Because the voice in your head can be fear. It can be all kinds of different things.
• 24:01
  Damon West: You don't know where that voice is coming from. So instead of listening to myself, I talked to myself I do it all the time. And I'm in the corner Toyota Center and I'm telling myself no damage. You're not going anywhere. The last coach in this room is going to tell you know your face before you walk out that door and Randall the last coach in the room. Hardest guy to get to in the room. His team had just beat Alabama two nights before for the national championship. Everybody wants a piece of this man's time. But I'm telling myself, you survived prison Damon, you survived something way worse than this.
• 24:31
  Damon West: Now my perspective perspective, what a bad day looks like man, no matter what's going on inside until you understand this is a prison. I made it through that and we'll make it through this.
• 24:40
  Damon West: So I stopped Dabo Swinney around that room that night, and I look like a nut man. I mean, I'm hiding behind fake plants. I'm hot behind people. Every conversation devil has out there every Congress read I think at some point security may take me away. Man, I finally get my chance up pounce on Devo. I've gotten blocked off he can't go anywhere and for about a minute and I'm talking 90 miles an hour given Dabo my pitch of why she bring me in to talk to his team manager a minute of speaking I come up for air devils like dude, you got a card on your song. So I given this little business card I had made up he snatches it up he says I'll check you out. And he's gone.
• 25:16
  Damon West: Gone. It's a no. Looks like a no feels like a no. But you know what I felt okay about Randall that no, because I left it all on the field that night and that's what we tell people when they're younger playing sports we aren't. We leave it on the field. Sometimes you're going to come up short, but give your best effort. Sometimes you win.
• 25:36
  Damon West: Sometimes you lose. Or in sales, sales man we knock on every door. We make every call and that's the end of our day. Or as Mr. Jackson said, you don't have to win though. You don't have to win all your fights. But you do have to fight all your fights and that night I fought all my fights Randall. I went at home and slept like a baby, I forgot all about that night. Four months later, I'm working the law firm. And I get an email from the director of football operations at Clemson University. Got a mic do it.
• 26:03
  Damon West: Mics do we might do he his email says, Hey Damon. Coach Sweeney mentioned award show in Houston.
• 26:10
  Damon West: He'd love to have you come talk to the team. Do you have August 1 open? Dude might do. I got every first open. I got nothing going on in my life in 2017. So man, August 1 2017. I go speak to the Clemson Tigers, the defending national champions of college football. And when I get done with my presentation on night, devils got me up against the wall and that was a very high energy guy and he's in my face. He's like Damon, I've never heard a story like that before in my life. I've never seen my players respond that to a speaker. He said, Have you been to Alabama yet? And I'm like, No. Dabo I've been to Clemson man. I haven't been anywhere dude. He says I just texted he said I'll just text Nick Saban from the back of the room. We'll see what happens.
• 26:50
  Damon West: The next day I landed in Houston for my trip to Clemson turn on my phone. I've got a voicemail on a text message from the director of football operations at Alabama. We'll see in Tuscaloosa in three weeks, you're on just like that random Dabo Swinney is kicking open the biggest doors coach football, he didn't stop there either. Man, Kirby smart started calling me Lincoln, Riley, all these coaches in America, they're all calling my cell phone, because Dabo has given my number out.
• 27:14
  Damon West: But the real magic in my life happened one year after my presentation to Clemson It was August of 2018. I was still working in a law firm, but I don't work at the law firm anymore. And I'm an entrepreneur now. But I was still working the law firm, and my cell phone rings. And on the other end of my cell phone is a guy named John Gordon, one of the biggest motivational speakers and author in America. He's on the other end of my phone and I follow John every day on Twitter for my inspiration and just the energy bus guy. So my John, dude, I know who you are, how do you know who I am? He said Dabo Swinney, he said, I just got done speaking to Clemson's football team and Dabo briefly office to tell me your story. He said, Daymond The world needs the coffee, the message, let's deliver this to the world. He said, Well, you write a book we'll be we'll call it the coffee bean. Randall, the coffee bean comes out the next summer, the summer of 2019 becomes an instant bestseller not just here. All over the world. It's in almost every language in the world, Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, French, Italian. But it all goes back to that one night, Houston, Texas on January 12 2017. When I'm in the corner of the Toyota Center, licking my wounds, feeling sorry for myself, and the voice in my head is telling me leave. But Randall, if I walk out that door that night, we're not having this conversation today. And the world doesn't have the coffee bean message.
• 28:29
  Damon West: And I tell people all the time, don't give up. Don't give up for the miracle happens. Don't give up before your Dabo Sweeney moment, always ask the question, because the only question you know the answer to is the one you do not ask. That's a no every time.
• 28:42
  Randall Kaplan: One of the elements of my success has been I'm always the most prepared person in the room has a concept called extreme preparation, you've talked a little bit about preparation and your success.
• 28:49
  Randall Kaplan: How important is preparation or extreme preparation, preparing more than anybody else, to our success?
• 28:58
  Damon West: It's it's extremely important. And if you can learn to do that, if you can make that a way of life, you're going to far exceed people, especially these days. One of the things I tell people all the time that if everybody prepared, you worked as hard as I did, the competition to get to the top would be so stiff. I mean, we'd be so almost disabling the competition would be if everybody worked as hard as I think I do to get to the top preparations, everything you have to be willing to put in the work. Here's the deal to about that right now. No one can put in your work for you. No one can. You have to take action in your own life, no one can take your action for you. These are the things you have to do every single day. And if you don't do it, no one's gonna do it for you. You'll never know what you could be in life or never get ahead, if you're not willing to put in the work. And that is the preparation part. People want to talk about this thing called the overnight success. There's no such thing, Randall there's no such thing as an already success. Because life is a long time to live. And you have to get up every day people don't see the backs of people don't see what you do random they don't see you get up early in the morning for years and years and years to get to this life you have the day, they just see the glitz and the glamour of it.
• 30:02
  Damon West: And they want that you got to be willing to put into work. What are
• 30:06
  Randall Kaplan: the three to five elements that we need to be successful.
• 30:13
  Damon West: You need to have the mindset of a servant leader you have to be Oh, you have to be willing to serve other people.
• 30:19
  Damon West: And this comes from being vulnerable. You need to be a vulnerable person. Vulnerability is a strength vulnerability gets a bad rap in life. So the mindset of a servant leader being willing to serve and being vulnerable would say that's one.
• 30:31
  Damon West: Another thing is being able to communicate with people which means you need to learn how to listen. Listening is one of the biggest things in the world because listening. Everybody wants to feel like they've been heard Randall it's the most fundamental part of communication. And once a person feels like they've been heard now they feel like they're on your team. They feel like they're part of something bigger now. They'll do things in life.
• 30:49
  Damon West: They wouldn't normally do because you're when you're part of a team, you'll sacrifice your work harder, you put in more hours, you'll do things to help the team succeed. But that has to come from listening to what other people are saying. And communication is key. And the last thing is, well, it's what we just talked about. It's being willing to put in the work, get to outwork everybody around, you got to be willing to put in the work, don't get complacent, don't rest on your laurels. And laurels are like the awards and the certificate you receive receiving life, the things you're doing, they're good. What I mean by that is, you cannot live in the rearview mirror.
• 31:22
  Damon West: There's a reason why your windshield is bigger than your rearview mirror and the vehicle ran out. Because you need a lot more space to look forward and do look backwards. You have to get out of the rearview mirror, you can't live your life look in the rearview mirror either.
• 31:35
  Randall Kaplan: In Search of Excellence, how important is it to give back and Q spend a few minutes talking about the coffee being foundation of some of the amazing things that you're doing, including being the only one of the history of mankind to do something that you've done through that foundation?
• 31:51
  Damon West: Yeah, I think it's extremely important to, to give back because to whom much is given much is expected. In my life, Randall, there can be no doubt that there are not many stories like mine, seven years out of prison. I've only been out of prison seven years man in the stuff that God is doing in my life. I simply all the time, man, God doesn't said Bush is on fire. He says people on fire.
• 32:13
  Damon West: And I'm one of those people, man just burning with what's going on in my life. But the secret sauce and all that is that I wake up every day with this one prayer that I say, and whatever religion you are out there, and it's I'm not here to like, I'm not here to convert anybody to a religion. But I'll tell you the prayer that I pray and you can plug it into your religion because it doesn't matter what religion you are for this. In AAA, we say Go Go find what blows your hair back, right?
• 32:37
  Damon West: This is a prayer I say every day, God put in front of me what you need me to do today for you.
• 32:45
  Damon West: And let me recognize that when I see it, amen. That's it. I don't want to miss whatever that one, whatever those things are. And in my life, whenever I was in prison, I watched all these guys that have children out there in the free world. And it's the same story. Every time my son or my daughter is going down the wrong road, I'm in prison, they're going to be in prison one day, or my son or my daughter wants to play a sport or do something like take dance, whatever we can afford that because I'm in prison. And I thought to myself, Randall, if I ever get to a place in life, where I can fix that, for any kid, I'm going to do that because children can't pick their parents. And that's the thing about life. You know, in America, if you have an incarcerated parent, you're more likely to be incarcerated yourself. So my foundation that I created to be a Kauffman Foundation, one of the things we do is we connect children who have an incarcerated parent with any extracurricular activity they want to do, whether it's a girl that wants to take dance, a boy that wants to dance or karate lessons judo, you know, sports like baseball, so like softball, whatever. Any child in America that has an incarcerated parent, we will provide up to$2,500 a year, a scholarship for whatever activity they want to do. And it could be you know, we have a little girl that we picked up wanting to play the guitar. So we got we bought our guitar found our guitar lessons and found ways for her to get to and from her lessons. I just want kids to be connected to something bigger than them. So they don't have to go down that road. And they don't have to be excluded from things in life because the choices that their parents made. One of the things I did when I got out of prison Randall is I went back to school, I got a master's in criminal justice. And part of this was amazing because I Yeah, and I wanted, I wanted to be taken more serious, because I knew that academic credentials could could help do that. I didn't realize at the time that I would become a professor at the University of Houston downtown, teaching a class called prisons in America.
• 34:29
  Damon West: Randall. This is insane. I'm the only professor on the planet to teach your prisoners class that lived in prison. Imagine the perspective that my students get about what the inside of a prison is like, because I never got to leave. You know, you have a lot of prisoners classes that are taught by former correctional officers, foreign wardens, former law enforcement officers. And that's good. I'm not saying those are bad classes. But I can tell you some stuff about prison that not even they get to experience in prison.
• 34:56
  Randall Kaplan: Before I finished today, I want to go ahead and ask them our open ended questions. I call this part of my podcast, fill in the blank to excellence, you're ready to play.
• 35:03
  Damon West: Let's go Let's roll.
• 35:05
  Randall Kaplan: The biggest lesson I've learned in life is
• 35:08
  Damon West: that the power is inside you, not the world around you.
• 35:11
  Randall Kaplan: My number one professional goal is
• 35:15
  Damon West: my professional goal is to be able to spend as much time as possible instead of prison and rooms of addiction.
• 35:20
  Randall Kaplan: My number one personal goal is
• 35:24
  Damon West: I guess I got those backwards. Let me start off and say my number one professional goal is is I don't know my number one personal goal. Let's keep going. Number one personal goal is to be the best servant leader, husband and stepfather that I can be
• 35:38
  Randall Kaplan: my biggest regret is
• 35:41
  Damon West: Who am I my biggest regret? One of my biggest regrets is that I haven't. I haven't been able to there's John Gordon He's been my mentor.
• 35:51
  Damon West: I think everybody needs a mentor and coach in life. I think it's one of the most important things John has been mine. And business wise, my biggest regret is I didn't start my email list. When I first started out doing this, John Gordon told me on day one back in 2018, when he called me capture every email, you can, and I didn't start doing it until this year, which is we're recording in 2023. I'll have five years of emails on the table.
• 36:16
  Randall Kaplan: The one thing I've dreamed of doing for a long time, but haven't is
• 36:21
  Damon West: the one thing I've been doing for a long time, but having is going to law school.
• 36:27
  Randall Kaplan: It's not too late.
• 36:29
  Damon West: I can't become a lawyer in the state of Texas with a felony. But there's no guarantee that that will always be on my back
• 36:35
  Randall Kaplan: is Jerry Jones, the owner and general manager of the Dallas Cowboys going to let you suit up for one game and take one snap so you can beat the NFL record for the oldest person ever to take a snap in the NFL?
• 36:47
  Damon West: Are there this darkness Dak and I became business partners last year for the television series. That's production company 4k Productions is the one producing with Lionsgate. And that question, he's letting me go out and throw passes with COA among those guys. And he just met Dak was blown away my arm. I'm 47 years old. So I've got about 18 more months before I'd be the oldest player to ever take a snap. I think George Blanda was the oldest guy to ever do it.
• 37:13
  Damon West: But uh, I don't know. We'll see.
• 37:13
  Damon West: Hey, you know, I asked the question because I always ask the question.
• 37:19
  Randall Kaplan: If you give me one person in the world, who would it be?
• 37:23
  Damon West: They have to be alive, alive or dead alive.
• 37:26
  Damon West: Alive one person alive. Who would it be? Warren Buffett
• 37:34
  Randall Kaplan: my guess is if you call out a year the art of master the cold call I bet the likelihood of you calling Warren Buffett and him taking your call I get is very very high. So two in 1 billion years when you were in prison getting sentenced the flashbang grenade going through the door feelings of suicide lifestance You're never gonna get out? Did you ever dream of being where you are today motivating and improving the lives of 10s of millions of people? I my guess is before you're done. Daymond you're gonna be influenced the lives of 100 million people. And you're making? I'm guessing millions of dollars a year. Could you ever envision in a billion years you'd be where you are today?
• 38:19
  Damon West: Absolutely not. And I tell people this man plans and God laughs Because man when I was in that prison cell, you know that one thing I never thought it was it was possible for a guy like me to be married.
• 38:30
  Damon West: I had laid my prison bunk and I thought to myself, There's no way someone is ever going to love me after all the mistakes I made. And if I found that person, there's no way their family would love me right? None of that none of that can be true because there's fear there's fears are in your head. And I met this woman in Kindle Romero.
• 38:49
  Damon West: She has a daughter named Claire Romero, this my stepdaughter to this day. Kindles family is like my own family. Now my mother, my father is still alive. And I've got my father in law mother in law that love me. And you know, when the first time she brought me in to meet her parents, her dad looked at me said, man, it sounds like you made a lot of a lot of really shitty decisions in your life, he said, but she paid a hell of a price for the choices she made. He said, I'll tell you what man. Sounds like you're on the right path. Treat my daughter. Well, we'll be great. And man, he's one of my best friends to this day.
• 39:18
  Randall Kaplan: The one question you wish I'd asked but didn't ask is
• 39:23
  Damon West: what happened to Mr.
• 39:23
  Damon West: Jackson? Tell us. I found him.
• 39:31
  Damon West: It took me seven years to find this guy. And the reason why it was so hard to find him said Mr.
• 39:34
  Damon West: Jackson is not his real name.
• 39:36
  Damon West: That's the name I gave him for the sake of the story. The only name I knew this guy by was Muhammad. And because that's when guys go to prison. They convert to Islam. They give up their government name. Muhammad cashes. Clay cashes. Clay went to prison in 1960s. He walks out of prison as Muhammad Ali. So the only name I know this guy buys Muhammad. And I finally found him because an inmate the Texas Department criminal justice wrote me a letter. And he said fine, James Lynn Baker, and you find Mr. Jackson. So I went on the search with a private investigator to find James Lynn Baker. We found him and he was the right guy, but he was dead. He died almost six years ago of an opioid overdose.
• 40:11
  Damon West: He was a drug addict, just like me, Randall never got help, though. I wouldn't found his family after that. I said, Hey, I want to honor I found his three sisters Misha Vaughn seelen, Vanessa Baker, and I told them I want to honor your brother. I'm gonna start a scholarship at his high school that he went to whatever high school it was, ends up being Dallas and Lincoln High School.
• 40:31
  Damon West: And so I put $10,000 Every year into a trust for the James Lynn Baker, the second be a coffee bean scholarship. So that one little boy or one little girl that graduates from his high school that grows up in his neighborhood in the inner city of Dallas. We'll get a better chance at life through education because these two guys had this chance encounter in Dallas County Jail in the summer of 2009. So yeah, man, I I finally found Mr. Jackson.
• 40:54
  Randall Kaplan: You're an incredible guy Damn. And as I said, at the beginning of this podcast, your story is truly incredible and beyond inspirational without a doubt, has positively already influenced the lives of millions of people. And as I said, I bet before he all said and done, it probably could be in the billions. I hope every single person listening to this podcast or watching this podcast will go out and buy all of your books. I have one behind me. I'm giving it to all my 35 summer interns this summer and all of my kids and I'm sure it's gonna change your life. I'm very grateful for you to sharing your story today.
• 41:25
  Randall Kaplan: Thank you very much, Randall,
• 41:29
  Damon West: and thank you for the opportunity man and for your technical team that are on this call right now. They're gonna hear this. Thank you for working through all the issues. We wanted to get this done and get it done fast and we got it done, which is like mazing Opportunity and Diversity. It's what I speak about Randall I go around speaking all over the world to companies, groups, teams, organizations, corporations, about finding the best version of yourself inside of the diversity.
• 41:53
  Randall Kaplan: Take care of God bless you, honestly, man.