505 Justin Baldoni: Redefining Masculinity and Overcoming Ego

"Ego exists so that we can overcome it." - Justin Baldoni If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes, video, and more at http://lewishowes.com/505 Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 505 with actor, director, and social entrepreneur, Justin Baldoni. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:34Lewis Howes?

  "Try not to become a man of success, rather become a man of value." Albert Einstein. I'm so excited for our guest today. His name is Justin Baldoni. He's an actor, director, and social entrepreneur focused on creating and affecting positive change. He is best known for playing Raphael in CW's award-winning phenomenon, Jane the Virgin. And in 2012, Justin created the most-watched digital documentary series in history, My Last Days, which has gone on to help raise over $1 million for various families and charities, and has directed documentaries, commercials, music videos, and films through his compassion-fueled production company, Wayfair Entertainment.

• 1:18Lewis Howes?

  So pumped to connect with him today. We dive in deep, guys. Some of the main things we'll cover are how Justin threw a carnival for the homeless community in Los Angeles. Also, how to use your audience for the maximum good. The balance between our lower and higher nature, and where ego comes into play here, this is a powerful part, guys. The connection between being relevant and owning our self-worth. Mmm, dang, this is gonna be good. And also how Justin's definition of masculinity has evolved over time as he's now become a father. I am pumped. Get ready. Make sure to take down notes. Share this with your friends.

• 2:01Lewis Howes?

  LewisHowes.com/505 as it's about to go down. Before we dive in, I want to give a shout out to the review of the week. This is from the Freddie D. over on iTunes.

• 2:16Lewis Howes?

  Who says, "I was introduced to Lewis's podcast a little over a year ago. While I was skeptical at first, it's simply one of the best podcasts out there. The diversity of guests, the interviews, and what's impressed me is Lewis has gotten better as an interviewer himself." Thank you so much. "I'm impressed with the energy he brings to every podcast and inspired me to start my own. A must-listen for anyone who's lacking motivation, needs a kickstart creatively, or has a desire to learn, because that's what Lewis brings." So, Freddie D., thank you so much, my friend, for being the iTunes Review of the Week. And if you guys want to leave a review and be a potential review of the week,

• 2:57Lewis Howes?

  then make sure to leave your review at iTunes.com and search "The School of Greatness Podcast." All right, guys, get ready for an incredible interview and episode with the one, the only, Justin Baldoni.

• 3:14Lewis Howes?

  Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness Podcast. We have the man, Justin Baldoni, in the house. Good to see you, brother.

• 3:20Speaker 01

  What's up, my man?

• 3:21Lewis Howes?

  How you doing?

• 3:21Speaker 01

  I'm so happy to finally be here.

• 3:22Lewis Howes?

  I'm pumped, man.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  We've talked about this for so long.

• 3:24Lewis Howes?

  I'm pumped. We got connected through, well, originally, I think Rain mentioned you when I had him on, which was probably about a year, year and a half ago or something. Then, we had Andrew Grammer on, and he mentioned you as well. And then, you reached out to me, I think, on Instagram.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:42Lewis Howes?

  And I missed it. And then, I think Aubrey texted me.

• 3:45Speaker 01

  I was like, "This guy, this little guy." He gets so many DMs. I was just at the bottom with all these fan mail, all these girls that are like, "Oh, I love you."

• 3:54Lewis Howes?

  But then our mutual friend Aubrey Marcus connected us or told us to connect.

• 3:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:00Lewis Howes?

  And finally made it happen. So, I'm glad we made it happen, because I think I first heard about you when you were doing the Skid Row event, which you do a carnival.

• 4:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:09Lewis Howes?

  Every year for homeless on Skid Row. And I think you had a thousand volunteers show up for more than 2,000 homeless people. And what do you do with that? What is that?

• 4:17Speaker 01

  Yeah. This year, we actually had 2,000 volunteers show up.

• 4:19Lewis Howes?

  2,000 volunteers.

• 4:20Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, the Skid Row Carnival, by the way, I love that that's how we're starting this conversation.

• 4:25Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  Because that is one of my favorite things to talk about. So, yeah, I had a crazy idea three years ago. To throw a carnival for those who are experiencing homelessness. Like a festival? Yeah, it's like, you know, a carnival, if you think about what a carnival really is, it's like, it's a traveling event that comes through oftentimes towns that are, you know, that are not doing that well, where there's not a whole lot of activity happening, where the people kind of need inspiration and they come through, it's a pick-me-up. And they come through and they're, the whole idea of the carnival is like, bring joy for a day, or a week, or however long. And, uh, Skid Row doesn't have anything like that, man. You know, we have fifty-seven thousand homeless people in LA.

• 5:11Speaker 01

  Really? And I think only five to ten percent are on Skid Row.

• 5:17Speaker 01

  But it all started nine, about nine years ago, um, I started going down to Skid Row to celebrate my birthday. Uh, because I didn't have a lot of friends, I've never been like a birthday guy, I was never, I, I don't drink, so I was never, "Let's go to a club," and like, "Let's go, come celebrate me," right? It just, it always felt weird to like invite people to come out to celebrate me. And that's my own thing, I got my own baggage around that. It's probably, uh, it has to do with being young and not having friends. So, nobody would come to my birthdays anyways. Yeah, yeah. So like, as I got older, I felt weird about having them. So, I decided to, to go down and have my birthday on Skid Row, so I'd invite friends and we'd make, we'd make like, you know, little bags of food, you know, we'd start with like six or seven people

• 6:00Speaker 01

  and we'd pass them out and the goal was always, like, we're not gonna put a, we're not gonna put a dent in the homeless, you know, epidemic, or stop people from being hungry, but if we could go down and connect with twenty or thirty people and let them be seen, then like, that was a day well spent. And it comes, you know, I'm a, I grew up in the Baha'i faith, and in the Baha'i faith, we're told that our work has to be our service. And that the whole purpose of life is really being of service to humanity. And this was my way of being of service on a day that was normally about me. Flash forward, seven years, um, more and more friends started coming.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  I kind of got my feet. You started getting friends. I started making real friends, like, you know. And they're like, "Hey, what are you doing here?" You know, and it grew from twenty to thirty to forty, you know, to sixty people. And then, um, when Jane the Virgin hit and I fell back into acting, uh, this kind of idea of like, you know, mini-celebrity started to happen and suddenly, and you know how it works, like, suddenly you do something. That the industry thinks is kinda cool and then you would get more friends, right? Or there's more people that wanna be a part of it. Yeah. And so for me, the question was, well, how do I take that illusion of popularity? And turn it into something that's good? And one day I was driving and I just was like, let's throw a carnival. And that was all it was. Just an idea. So it was an idea and I just called everyone and said, we're throwing a carnival. Wow.

• 7:17Speaker 01

  Um, so, uh, so basically what it was the first year was, it was about seventy-five of us. Um, coming together and it was, it's all about one-on-one connection. So people would line up, so our friends who are experiencing homelessness would line up outside of this, uh, this parking lot. And all of us would line up and we'd have like food and we'd have carnival games and we'd have clothing sections and we'd have toiletry sections and book sections and feet washing and these things the first year. But it was really about taking and creating an experience for one person. And it was both for the person who's experiencing homelessness and also for our volunteers. Who are giving. Who are giving because it works both ways and you know that as a teacher, you learn more than a student. Yeah. Um, and there is no teacher in this situation.

• 8:00Speaker 01

  The whole idea was let's come together and for four hours, let's not be able to tell who's homeless and who's not. Who's sick and who's healthy. Who's black and who's white. Like can we all just be one human race for three or four hours? And that's exactly what it turned into. We had a dance party. Everybody was doing like the Macarena and like the electric slide and everybody's dancing. And we realized after that first year that there's something really here. Flash forward to this coming, this last year in January, we had two thousand volunteers show up. Wow. Before the carnival started, the, uh, the local police told us we are already over capacity. So we had to ask five hundred volunteers to leave. Holy cow.

• 8:42Speaker 01

  Because it makes no sense to have a carnival for those experiencing homelessness if they can't get in. Yeah. Um, but what we found was that the capacity for young people in this city that wanna be of service is, is massive. They just haven't had an outlet before. So. The Trojan, uh, the carnival is really a Trojan horse of sorts. We want to bring in and make volunteering sexy and cool. But really, it's a way to say, do not forget about these souls that are in your backyard that every single night don't know where they're gonna sleep. Or have to sleep next to the rats, or have to drink themselves to sleep because they're sleeping on the pavement. Do not forget about these kids that live in these housing, um, units where there's,

• 9:25Speaker 01

  you know, next to, next to cocaine addicts and, you know, and prostitutes and pimps. Like, there, there is a whole population of people down there that are forgotten. And this is a day that brings us all back together so that we remember. And we had medical professionals, we had legal services, we had the DMV handing out ID cards. We had Starbucks trying to, you know, teaching people how to do interviews so that we could get people off the street and do jobs. Um, you know, and we served 4,000 people that day. And really, it's about teaching them and empowering them through the gift of vision and sight to, to, you know, hopefully get off the street one day. So it was pretty cool and, uh, and we're gonna be launching a winter version of the carnival this year. Yeah. So we're gonna do a winter, we're gonna do a winter wonderland. We're gonna...

• 10:10Speaker 01

  I, I had another crazy dream is I, I wanna bring real snow to Skid Row.

• 10:15Lewis Howes?

  Shut up.

• 10:16Speaker 01

  And I wanna let kids experience real snow. And I wanna have a Santa that looks like them. Um, cause I think that's really important. And this year, the volunteers will be elves.

• 10:25Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  And I want all the kids to have presents. You know, because they don't get to experience like these days that we all take for granted.

• 10:32Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 10:33Speaker 01

  So that's something we're working on this year.

• 10:34Lewis Howes?

  Are there a lot of kids down there?

• 10:36Speaker 01

  There's a, there's an insane amount of kids.

• 10:38Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 10:38Speaker 01

  It's, it's unbelievable how many kids there are. Yeah, there's a lot. And they sleep in, and there's kids that sleep in tents, man.

• 10:46Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 10:47Speaker 01

  You know, I met a, I met a father the other day who was, uh, in Beverly Hills singing, um, trying to make money that he takes back to his two young boys that sleep in a tent with him.

• 10:57Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 10:58Speaker 01

  Cause he couldn't get into a shelter because a lot of the shelters are for women and children. And you can't let it a man because unfortunately, there's been a lot of

• 11:05Lewis Howes?

  Sure, sure.

• 11:05Speaker 01

  Issues around that. So him and his two kids were sleeping on the street. Um, and he was just trying to get up. He recently got off. We checked back in with him, but yeah, there's a lot of kids.

• 11:15Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, that's cool, man. There's not many people who are Once they get an audience who are giving back in a big way. So I think it's really cool.

• 11:21Speaker 01

  What's the point of an audience?

• 11:23Lewis Howes?

  It's true.

• 11:24Speaker 01

  I always ask that question. What is the point of having all of these people that are looking at you? And looking to see what you're gonna do next, if you're not gonna do something good? What the hell's the point?

• 11:35Lewis Howes?

  I agree.

• 11:36Speaker 01

  Like, I just, I mean, and you get it, but in general, I just like, I look at these people that have millions and millions of followers. And again, I'm not judging, but I'm just like, oh, the potential, the potential that exists.

• 11:47Lewis Howes?

  To make an impact.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  To make an impact because our world is hurting so badly.

• 11:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 11:52Speaker 01

  Anyways.

• 11:53Lewis Howes?

  Well, that's what I love about your, your account and your page. I was looking, we were looking at this earlier. If you guys follow.

• 11:58Speaker 01

  The Instagram?

• 11:59Lewis Howes?

  Yes. Follow Justin Baldoni on Instagram and you'll see he's got 90% of the people that are Are following him are women, which blew me away.

• 12:08Speaker 01

  We were just, uh, we were just laughing about that.

• 12:09Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, but the, the cool thing is every post has a meaning to kind of be thought provoke woman, maybe not everyone, but lots of them I'm looking at right here have a meaning. To get people to think differently and have a different conversation about their relationships, about Their parenting, about their health, about their body image, about their spirituality, about their mission, their work, their service. And I think that's what I love about you and what you're up to in the world is that everything you do is meaningful. Again, obviously there's some fun posts on there or whatever, but it seems like there's always a question. There's always something that's like, okay, are you thinking about your life this way?

• 12:44Speaker 01

  It's intentional, yeah.

• 12:45Lewis Howes?

  I think it's really cool because you have a platform that's Yes, you're, you're trying to make money and thrive and achieve things and you've, you're an actor on shows and director and all these other things, but You're also trying to create a platform that gives back, which I think is really powerful. A great example. Why do you think 90% of your following is women? Besides the fact that you're extremely attractive.

• 13:08Speaker 01

  Uh, I think.

• 13:12Lewis Howes?

  How come men don't like you?

• 13:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's been something I've been asking myself since I was a kid. I've been asking myself that since I was a kid. Uh, do you not like me, Louis?

• 13:21Lewis Howes?

  I do like you.

• 13:22Speaker 01

  Okay, good. So we're good. I feel good about that. Cause you're really manly.

• 13:26Lewis Howes?

  I'm curious though, why don't men follow you?

• 13:29Speaker 01

  It's really interesting. Uh, look, I think my, my Instagram grew on accident. It was not an, that was not intentional. Um, I didn't really know, I'm not really savvy when it comes to social media. I post far less than I'm, I'm told by people that are looking at my socials, like you're doing this all wrong. You need to be doing this way more and this and this and this and I, it's never been that, it's never been that thoughtful in that way. It hasn't been manipulative in that way. It's been intentional in what I say. But I haven't really, um.

• 14:00Lewis Howes?

  Did it grow from the show?

• 14:02Speaker 01

  So it's, I think it's a combination of, it grew from the show. Um, which again, that's a big reason why it's a lot of women because Jane the Virgin is pretty, is, is really aimed at women. It's a feminist show.

• 14:11Lewis Howes?

  Got it.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  So it's aimed at women. Um, I, it also started growing when I started to be intentional about the messages to my wife and my daughter. And I think that, you know, men like, men follow really manly men, like men follow men. I think they want to be more like, they follow men that like, you know, have their shirts off and are super ripped and they're like, here's my diet and, you know, get 25%, get 25% off this product and like, I'll hook you up. They follow super hot chicks that wear nothing.

• 14:45Speaker 01

  They follow, you know, then, and then they follow like the guys that drive, you know, fly around the country in their private planes and like, have like, you know, they're on yachts with like chicks that are wearing nothing and they're like, this is the life, you know? And I think that there's a part of men that want to live that way. And my social media is a little bit different.

• 15:02Lewis Howes?

  It's like you and your daughter.

• 15:04Speaker 01

  It's me like, what's up? This is, this is me and my daughter before daycare. But uh, but I don't know. So when I proposed to my wife, uh, you know, six years ago now.

• 15:17Lewis Howes?

  It was like an epic proposal.

• 15:18Speaker 01

  It was, they called it that. And then other people called it the worst thing ever. But it was a gift from me to my wife that we eventually put on YouTube reluctantly. Um, we actually put it on YouTube after we were married. A lot of people propose to their partners and then before they're, they just, this is, it's done. They said, yes, it's on YouTube. Let's go on Ellen. Like it's, it's kind of like this thing that's, it's like a goal, right? It's like, if I can have the best proposal ever.

• 15:43Lewis Howes?

  Most epic choreography, crazy stuff.

• 15:45Speaker 01

  Then maybe I'll become famous and it'll be great. And, um, we did not want that. Um, and so we in fact.

• 15:51Lewis Howes?

  Even though you guys are both actors.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  Well, and that was the thing is, and, and it was interesting because I, you know, it was kind of before social media was massive and I didn't want to be the proposal guy. I wanted to be known for my work and I was really directing. I wasn't even acting then. I was only directing. I'm going to get back to the man question. Um, so after the proposal went viral, um, men started coming up to me and thanking me.

• 16:16Speaker 01

  And, but it was a quiet thank you. It was like a, hey man.

• 16:22Speaker 01

  I cried last night.

• 16:24Lewis Howes?

  You're right.

• 16:24Speaker 01

  Uh, you know, that was awesome. And they were like fist bump me, but they were, uh, they were almost embarrassed to tell me. And generally men come up to me and they're, and they're like, yo, my girlfriend showed me your stuff. Or there's this barrier between them being okay, being vulnerable with me. Cause it's not the norm. So it always has to do with their girlfriends or their wives or their daughters. And I find that really interesting. So I think that men are a little hesitant to follow because you can see who you follow. Like I can, I can look and see who you're following. And I think that men want to like be more manly and here I am not, you know, look, I was, I was an athlete. I was a great athlete, you know, I'm in decent shape, like.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  For all intensive purposes, I fit a stereotype of what a man would look like. But I don't talk about the things that normal men talk about. I think that men are a little sensitive around that because we're so afraid of like, God forbid, someone thinks less of us, or someone thinks this, or my men, my, my boys think that I'm weak, or whatever that is. So yeah, so that's a long answer to you.

• 17:27Lewis Howes?

  When did you start? How come you don't have the conversations? Or how come you have different conversations and share these other things, these vulnerable or more real or just authentic things that are happening in your life? How come you share those things? And when did you start putting that out there as opposed to this is me with my shirt off and rolling backstage or, you know, in my trailer.

• 17:47Speaker 01

  So funny too, man, we talk about this because I, I could probably double my audience if I did that. And that's something that when you're, you know, when you're on our side of the business. I mean, look, followers equal revenue to a certain extent, because at the end of the day, yet we are in a business.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  So, so it's a, it's a moral choice for me to do it this way. I think that like I'm a, I'm a seeker of truth.

• 18:14Speaker 01

  Truth is everything to me. Honesty is everything to me. Integrity is everything to me. And I think I grew up feeling like I was living in a world where nobody was being truthful. And even early conversations with my parents, I have the best family, like my mom and dad are the best. But even they struggled with having real uncomfortable, authentic conversations. And I was a very young kid growing up. And I was always wanting to like burst through that, that like glass facade. Whether it was friendships, or whether it was family, or whether it was anything. And at one point, I think in my twenties, it was like that. It was like that feeling, you know, it's like when the Hulk kind of like becomes, it's like this, like he rips off his clothes.

• 18:58Speaker 01

  That's how I felt about the world. And I was like, why isn't everybody, why, why are we not communicating? Why are we not saying what we really believe in? Why am I not telling you how I actually feel? Why? And I couldn't figure out an answer. So I just kind of went on my own journey to, I'm just seeking truth in everything that I do. Like I, you know, in my faith.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  Bahala, who's the founder of the Bahá'í faith, says to ornament our souls with honesty. Right, like a Christmas tree ornament, like, and that the foundation, the foundation of all spiritual virtues is truthfulness. But yet, that's the thing that we lack the most, right? And you can't build anything on something with a weak foundation. You can't build anything, but yet we enter into relationships and transactional relationships of all kinds off of a misrepresentation of truth. So like, you enter a relationship from the start, if you're not honest, that's not gonna work. Yeah. You enter a friendship, if you're not honest, that's not gonna work. And honesty has so many varying degrees. When I think about honesty for me, it's just, I wanna be honest in every situation.

• 20:04Speaker 01

  Cause we're only here for a short amount of time. We're not here for that long. So what's the point of not being honest? If I have a feeling, why would I not talk about that feeling? When the time is right, of course. There's always a time and a place. It's not just, "Let me just be honest all the time about everything." You know, and I've been exploring this with my daughter, who has no filter. She's two. She's turning two on Tuesday. She has no filter. So when she feels something, she must cry. She must yell. She must throw a tantrum on the floor. Cause she doesn't have that, she doesn't have years of learning how to repress those things. But, she also gets over things instantly. It happens and then she moves on. She cries, she yells, she screams, she throws a tantrum in the middle of Whole Foods.

• 20:48Speaker 01

  And thirty seconds later, she's the happiest child in the world. She felt it, she experienced it, she released it. I think we just need to find a balance, as grown men, as grown women, as adults, of how do we like, take these things in that we feel, and then, when the time is right, allow ourselves to experience them, to talk to each other, to talk to men about things that we're experiencing. And to just be a seeker of truth in general. And I do think that Gen Z, millennials, to a certain extent, that's why so much of the media landscape is changing, because we are seeking truth. We're tired of all the crap we see in the media of telling us we need to be this way, or look this way, or feel this way.

• 21:26Speaker 01

  We want authenticity. The problem is that now millennials and Gen Z are in charge of the media. So now what we're gonna start having, and what we're experiencing, is the illusion of authenticity. Which is fake. Which, which, which is not real. It's filtered, right? So you have like, "Oh, that's, oh yeah, I love that commercial, that's real." But it's a commercial.

• 21:49Lewis Howes?

  Or you see some of the most followed, uh, people on Instagram. It's all photoshopped or it's.

• 21:54Speaker 01

  Oh, don't get me started on that.

• 21:56Lewis Howes?

  Filtered in other.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  It's right.

• 21:57Lewis Howes?

  Physical ways.

• 21:58Speaker 01

  I just found out that they had apps that retouched your Instagram photos. I was like.

• 22:02Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 22:02Speaker 01

  Excuse me?

• 22:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a real thing evidently.

• 22:05Lewis Howes?

  Or they just go to the doctor and retouch everything.

• 22:07Speaker 01

  That's another thing. That comes, but that comes down to body image and security. And again, I don't judge any of that.

• 22:12Lewis Howes?

  Sure, sure.

• 22:13Speaker 01

  But I just think that there's a, for me, it's just that I just believe in truth and openness and vulnerability because we're all humans having the same experience. So why aren't we sharing it? Right? We spend too long dividing ourselves based on what you're feeling or this, or this is the other, and this person's black and this person's white, which again, these are real things, right? But why aren't we sharing our experiences, our experiences as those people so that we can then start to build compassion and empathy and relate to each other?

• 22:46Lewis Howes?

  Wow, man. I love it.

• 22:47Speaker 01

  Sorry, I'm, I'm, I'm not supposed to talk this much.

• 22:49Lewis Howes?

  You are.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  Am I supposed to talk this much?

• 22:51Lewis Howes?

  This is your show.

• 22:51Speaker 01

  This is your show.

• 22:52Lewis Howes?

  No, this is your show. You're the expert.

• 22:54Speaker 01

  Let's talk about you.

• 22:56Lewis Howes?

  Well, let's talk about, uh, you know, I wasn't going to dive into this this quickly, but I think we're on the topic of, of manhood and masculinity. Where do you feel like is your biggest challenge to step in the man you've always wanted to be? Is there something you're challenged with right now that you feel like you still get to overcome or embrace to help you become a better version of the man you want to be?

• 23:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. I don't think there's one thing. I think there's an endless number of things that I'm challenged with.

• 23:25Lewis Howes?

  What's the biggest?

• 23:29Speaker 01

  You know, I think the, one of the biggest challenges for me is the control of my ego.

• 23:37Lewis Howes?

  It's hard, man. Got all these followers, all these likes, all these opportunities, TV shows. Billboard, weren't you up on a billboard recently? I think I saw or something.

• 23:45Speaker 01

  Thank God I didn't see it if I was.

• 23:46Lewis Howes?

  I think you're up on Sunset, a big billboard, are you?

• 23:49Speaker 01

  Justin. Yeah, I don't think, yeah, must have, that must have not been real at all, ever.

• 23:54Lewis Howes?

  I think it was you with, uh, Jay the Virgin.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  It was probably, yeah, one, me, one of seven people.

• 23:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I was a three, maybe, but yeah.

• 23:59Speaker 01

  Um, but I think that, uh. I think part of our journey as human beings is the is the balance between our lower and higher nature and learning how to control it, right? So you obviously have spirituality, religion, divinity, uh, things that are designed to help us come into our higher nature. And then you have everything else in the history of existence that's attacking our lower nature.

• 24:24Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, our ego.

• 24:25Speaker 01

  And our ego, that whispering voice is strong. It's really strong. It's it's strong in men. It's strong in women. It starts with children. Um, and, uh, and for me, it's definitely always been my ego. And my ego can also be something that cripples me because when my ego is hurt, or when it's bruised, or when it feels attacked, then I don't function from my higher nature. I function from my lower nature. And that happens in all sorts of ways. And then, of course, there's the idea of success, which is relative, right? Because it is a, it is a never ending journey.

• 25:00Lewis Howes?

  Search.

• 25:01Speaker 01

  Because there's no such thing as true success. Like, what, when would you be successful enough? When you're George Clooney? Okay, George Clooney, are you successful enough?

• 25:09Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 25:10Speaker 01

  There's something else he wants, right? Find me someone who's happy with their success. You can't, but you can find me someone who's happy because they're content with where they are and what they have because they're grateful. Um, so success is also interesting because where I am, so much of what I do also is dependent on other people validating it.

• 25:30Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 25:31Speaker 01

  So.

• 25:31Lewis Howes?

  Coming to watch it, buying a ticket, whatever it is.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  Exactly. And then, and then especially in our town and this, in this business, um, relevancy is like the delta that is everything. So.

• 25:43Lewis Howes?

  Are you afraid of that? Not being relevant?

• 25:45Speaker 01

  I'm not afraid of it. What's interesting is that I've mostly never been relevant. The fact that even anybody wants to hear what I have to say is interesting and really cool. Um, but what I am is aware of it. So I'm aware of the fact that I have a short window called Jane the Virgin that is interesting to people. After we're done in five years, I might not be relevant.

• 26:05Lewis Howes?

  Who knows?

• 26:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, who knows? So I look at it like I have this amount of time to say what I want to say, and then maybe no one's going to want to hear what I have to say again. Unfortunately, that's just the way it works. You have your 15 minutes and then it's on to somebody else. And the other night, we were just talking about, you know, my wife's shooting a movie right now, and she's shooting a movie with a woman who was nominated for three Academy Awards in the 60s.

• 26:28Speaker 01

  And we know when you get nominated for Academy Award, your name is everywhere, right? But I had no idea who this woman was. Wow. She had experienced tremendous success. She's in her eighties now, right? So you just look at like, you know, the, the chart of, of being in the moment and feeling success and then getting to a place where you don't, you no longer have that. And, and then you have to realize that, well, do people not care about me? Because I'm not doing a, a podcast with Lewis. Hmm. Does that mean I'm not valuable to the world? Hmm. Does that mean I'm not, am I not relevant to anybody just because I'm not relevant to the media? Hmm. Or to the world that, or to social media right now? If I didn't have any followers, would that be a reflection of my self-worth?

• 27:13Speaker 01

  So these are things that are important and they, they affect us on both sides of the spectrum. They affect us when we don't have any success, when we're trying and we're struggling and we're like, we're, you know, we're getting off the ground. Striving to be relevant. We're trying to be relevant, which is, which is really something that I struggle with. Cause it's like, are we trying to be relevant and like, and why are we doing that? Or are we just fulfilling our purpose and it's going to happen? So on one side you have that struggle and then on the other side, when you have it, you have that struggle because then you have the fear of losing it. And then you have to decide, and this is where the ego comes in and this, and this is something that I battle with, is am I doing this out of love or am I doing this out of fear? And if I'm doing it out of fear, then I'm doing it from a place of lack because I'm, I'm afraid

• 27:58Speaker 01

  that I'm going to lose it. I'm afraid that if I don't do it right, that someone's not going to respond or I'm not going to get enough likes or this many people won't watch my YouTube video. Hmm. Or whatever it is, or, you know, and the same thing goes for writing a television show and being on a show. So, so your ego creeps in everywhere. Your ego creeps in in relationships and mine creeps in in my marriage. Right? It creeps in absolutely everywhere. And so one of the struggles that I, I think will always have is figuring out the balance between a healthy ego and an ego that's managed. And for me, I've, the only way I've found to be able to manage my ego is through spirituality. Hmm. And it's through prayer. It's through commuting with God and really it's through service.

• 28:42Speaker 01

  Because the second year of service, the goal is to take yourself out of the equation. We have a phrase we like to call, we call it secret service. Would you still do it if nobody knew you had done it? And that's, and that's kind of your measure. Like it, it's service if you will do it and you don't care if anyone knows. So oftentimes I'm, I'm gonna go do something. I will practice intentionally not telling anyone I did it. Cause that's a, it's a muscle. Like we go to the gym, we work out. We don't go to the gym and work out just because it's fun. It sucks, but we need it. The same thing goes for service. The same thing goes for spirituality. It goes for, you know, whatever, whatever it is we do.

• 29:23Speaker 01

  So yeah, so it's a practice. It's, it's like, it's building the muscle that fights the ego. Cause the ego, you know, the ego is strong. Christians call it the devil. Some, you know, in some ways like it's, it is the devil. It will take us down to places that you never ever want to go to.

• 29:39Lewis Howes?

  Unless you're using it for a bigger purpose to serve others, I guess, or serve something else.

• 29:43Speaker 01

  Yeah. And you can use, yeah. And you can, and your ego can drive you. I mean, there's a reason we have it, right? It's a necessary evil. If none of us had an ego, we'd be living in utopia and there'd be no reason for us to, like, why are we here? There'd be no reason, but why are we even alive, right? We're alive to experience a journey, to start somewhere, to go through hardship and eventually hopefully to learn lessons and come out on the other side. So if there's no journey, like that there's no ego, if there's no taking us into the darkness, then there's no light, right? So ego exists, I think, so that we can overcome it.

• 30:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. I think if we're living in service every day, whether it's, you know, I do a lot of little acts of service. Little acts of service where no one knows about, where I'm just opening a door for someone.

• 30:24Speaker 01

  Don't tell me.

• 30:26Lewis Howes?

  In general, I'm not telling you specifics. But I think also just smiling at people down the street is an act of service. As opposed to having your head down and being disconnected. I think showing up with an open heart is of service. And those are the things, I have a battle with this sometimes because we, uh, I'm going to announce it. We build schools for kids all around the world who need support, right? And I, I've always been like, I never want. Pencils of promise. Yeah. And you know, I remember when I first got into it, I was like, I don't want to let people know. Cause I don't want to be like, have my ego involved. Like I did something. Then someone told me one time, they were like, you're doing a disservice by not letting other people know because you're not inspiring other people to do the same thing.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  There's a balance, right? And that's, and that's the struggle. And that's a struggle that nobody talks about. Because I can go do this Skid Row Carnival. And not tell anybody. And have a carnival with myself.

• 31:18Lewis Howes?

  Right, exactly. Or you can say, hey, we're doing this.

• 31:21Speaker 01

  But how many people can I affect? The challenge becomes, and this is again, it's controversial, but you can look at a lot of these proclaimed, uh, life coaches and spiritual guides and pastors. Um, you look at people that are in positions of power where their job is to influence and help people become enlightened, inspire people. And you can see how quickly that can become self-serving.

• 31:50Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely. When everyone's looking at you.

• 31:51Speaker 01

  Because everybody then is looking at you.

• 31:54Lewis Howes?

  Everyone.

• 31:54Speaker 01

  And what happens is we forget that the only reason you're there is because you were a clear channel from God to them, right? So then as a man, we suddenly go, oh.

• 32:05Lewis Howes?

  It's my idea.

• 32:06Speaker 01

  It's me, right? I had this carnival idea. Well, the truth is dude, the idea came through me. That absolutely was not my idea. It was just crazy enough that I did it.

• 32:16Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 32:16Speaker 01

  So that's where it can get dangerous is we start to think it's about ourselves. So even service is a test of the ego, right? So it's like, how do you stay pure and true and honest and authentic in service? It's knowing and it's checking that like, yeah, you're going and building those schools. You might build five schools and not tell a soul, but you get on the sixth school, you're gonna go tell everybody because you need the money to go build more schools. The challenge is when Lewis becomes more important than the school.

• 32:46Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely.

• 32:46Speaker 01

  And that's why it's important to have friends that are like right in there with you, that check you, like your boys, like I know you have here, like your account, you know, your best friends, for females to have their girlfriends or guy friends, I mean, whatever, to always kind of keep us authentic and grounded. Because it'd be very easy for me to make this Skid Row Carnival about me.

• 33:05Lewis Howes?

  Right. I'm the creator of this thing.

• 33:07Speaker 01

  I did this thing. But the, but what we realized through the process, and by the way, I tried at one point to not make it about me, is that it needed me.

• 33:15Lewis Howes?

  It needs a spokesperson or a someone.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  It needs an entry point, a story. It needs something to galvanize people. And I was okay being that, but it comes at a cost. Let me tell you why. I don't get to enjoy the carnival like everybody else.

• 33:29Lewis Howes?

  You're making sure it's all working out and everyone's in their place.

• 33:31Speaker 01

  I'm doing interviews, or I'm doing this, or I'm making sure it's running. But all I desire, honestly, is I want to sit down and wash people's feet. Three years I've done the carnival, I haven't gotten to wash one person's feet. And that breaks, and it breaks my heart.

• 33:45Lewis Howes?

  Carve out thirty minutes.

• 33:47Speaker 01

  That's the goal, that's the goal, but by the time I, and by the time, and again, it's something that we've, that we're working on. But, so my carnival experience isn't the same as someone else's. However, my experience is necessary. But the second it becomes about me, the carnival will die. The nonprofit will die, because that's not what it's for. And that's where the ego comes in. So all these likes, all these posts where there's now instant feedback. It's like, oh, great, they got five thousand likes in two minutes? I did something right, I better do that again. That's the ego. Versus, I'm happy that people responded to that. Right? And we don't have that healthy dialogue with ourselves right now, because we're so like minute to minute with our phones.

• 34:31Speaker 01

  Anyways, that's a long answer to your question. Yeah, we could talk about this forever.

• 34:34Lewis Howes?

  You did a, you did a project, you have to tell me what it was called again, where you interviewed people who are about to die, right?

• 34:42Speaker 01

  My Last Days.

• 34:43Lewis Howes?

  My Last Days.

• 34:45Lewis Howes?

  How many people did you interview? And what was the biggest lessons you learned about these experiences?

• 34:52Speaker 01

  So My Last Days was a documentary series that started on YouTube.

• 34:56Speaker 01

  It aired, actually, on Rain's Soul Pancake channel on YouTube. It was their first show.

• 35:01Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 35:01Speaker 01

  And everybody said it was crazy. No one will ever watch, choose to watch a show on YouTube about people that are dying. And I, from the beginning, fought everyone and said, it's not a show about people dying, it's a show about people living.

• 35:17Speaker 01

  Because we are also afraid of our own mortality. That we don't know that it could actually be one of the greatest gifts ever to become friends with it and to be aware of it, um, so that we can start to live a purposeful life. So the show was really my attempt at holding a mirror to an audience to say, you are going to die. But what are you choosing to live for now? What are you choosing to do with your time today? And it's something we don't think about. So if you wake up every morning and you don't know if you're going to live tomorrow, you're going to live your day differently. And so I wanted to go find people that had this mentality that were told they were dying and were making a conscious, intense choice, intention isn't even a word, a conscious intention to live in the present

• 36:02Speaker 01

  and to, and to truly experience their lives. So I did the first season, I did seven episodes of the show on YouTube. We had no money. I lost my house. My house went into foreclosure while I was shooting the show. I built my company Wayfair from the, um, living room of that foreclosed house. Because I quit acting to focus just on this show. And basically pay and make no, you know, pay for the show with soul pancake and make no money. And it was the best thing I ever did in my entire life because for one full year I got to be of service to build relationships with these people and to create something that had never really been done before. An inside look at life told from the eyes of people who were dying.

• 36:46Speaker 01

  And the seventh, the last episode of that season was a young, young man named Zach Sobiak. He was 17 and he had osteosarcoma and he wrote a song called Clouds. And, uh, Zach said in his My Last Days that he wants everyone to know that you don't have to find out you're dying to start living. And that documentary went on to be one of the most watched documentaries online ever. It's been seen 20 something million times. His, uh, his song hit number one on iTunes and, uh, and we've raised nearly a million dollars or over a million dollars for osteosarcoma from the song and from the success of the documentary. And now we're shooting the show for CW. So, um, now we're shooting season three and season four right now

• 37:32Speaker 01

  of My Last Days, which will air once a year as a three night special on the CW. So we've, so, so to date, I've done about 20 documentaries of people who are dying. And I would say the thing I've learned the most, to go back to your question is, um,

• 37:49Speaker 01

  Is to not sweat the small stuff.

• 37:52Speaker 01

  And to really tell the people in your life how you feel about them.

• 37:59Speaker 01

  And to just be present. And I think that goes back to my kind of mission statement of being a seeker of truth and wanting to know truth. Because when you find out you're dying. And I'm sitting across from you and you're choosing to give me your most valuable asset, which is your time. I know you have three months to live and here you are with me for three days. You've just given me a significant percentage of your life. And when we sit down, there is no room and there is no time for inauthenticity. There is no room for bullshit.

• 38:34Lewis Howes?

  Keeping anything back or hiding anything.

• 38:36Speaker 01

  Are we allowed to say bullshit on this?

• 38:37Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 38:37Speaker 01

  There's no room for bullshit.

• 38:40Speaker 01

  It's all here. Because their intention is to leave something behind for their family. And to say something to the world. And it's been one of the hardest experiences of my life. I've lost very close friends because again, these people become family. They're all on my phone. Two of them, two of my friends from the last season of my last days are struggling badly right now. Claire has cystic fibrosis and she has a sepsis infection and my friend Jessica has got brain cancer and her lymph nodes are attacking her and she's waiting on her results from her MRI and this is a constant thing. And my wife and I struggle with this a lot. Because we've invited this into our lives, which causes us to reflect on our own mortality all the time. Which is a good and a bad thing.

• 39:24Speaker 01

  One, you walk around being terrified because you know how precious life is and on the other hand, you're in the moment and you're saying, I'm gonna live.

• 39:33Lewis Howes?

  Fully.

• 39:34Speaker 01

  Fully. You know, and you imagine if we did that, right? It's like, what are the things in your life that you're waiting to do that you're not doing? Who are the people in your life that you're waiting to call that you haven't called?

• 39:45Speaker 01

  When you find out you're dying, from my experience of watching these people, then those things are gone.

• 39:51Speaker 01

  Suddenly, it's not about seeing how many likes you got on your phone. But it's about posting something that makes people feel a certain way and it's about having a conversation with people that you love.

• 39:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 40:00Speaker 01

  So like, I've seen these human beings transform and, and, and become like, they're like gurus. You know, and it's amazing what, it's amazing that like, being on death's door, what that can do to your, you know, to you becoming like a pure channel.

• 40:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 40:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's powerful stuff.

• 40:18Lewis Howes?

  Hmm. How can people find that or watch it online? Is it online right now still?

• 40:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, so you can watch, you can watch last season of My Last Days on the CWTV.com, the CW website. And you can watch the first season where Zach's episode is on SoulPancake.com.

• 40:32Lewis Howes?

  Cool, cool.

• 40:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:33Lewis Howes?

  And how has getting married and having your first child giving you a new perspective about being a man? Your purpose, your mission?

• 40:45Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 40:47Speaker 01

  It's a good question.

• 40:48Lewis Howes?

  So being married and fatherhood, how has that changed anything, your perspective about being a man?

• 40:56Speaker 01

  You know, I, um,

• 40:59Speaker 01

  I used to think, I went through a period where I was mad at my dad. Cause I didn't think that he was manly enough.

• 41:07Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 41:08Speaker 01

  I didn't think that my dad taught me enough how to be a man.

• 41:13Speaker 01

  And, uh, because I didn't learn how to camp or fish. I didn't learn how to like,

• 41:19Lewis Howes?

  Hunt.

• 41:20Speaker 01

  How to hunt, didn't learn how to fight. Um, I didn't learn those things. And I took that into my marriage a little bit. Wanting to, wanting to like, struggling with my identity of masculinity. Because my dad was, my dad was a businessman. Um, who made financial mistakes, like I watched him make mistakes, but, uh, and I think when I was younger, I judged that. Cause I saw my, we grew up part-time in Oregon and I saw like all their, my, my friends' friends were camping and hunting and fishing and like, you know, they're like masculine dads.

• 41:56Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 41:57Speaker 01

  My dad was on the phone.

• 41:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  My dad was doing business.

• 41:59Lewis Howes?

  Making sales calls or whatever, yeah.

• 42:00Speaker 01

  But he was also showing up to all my soccer games. And he was also there for my wife, or for, for my mother, who's his wife. Always there for my sister. Um, and so I, I kinda grew up grappling with this and when I got married, um, I realized how much he actually taught me.

• 42:18Speaker 01

  And that my dad was the exact definition and example of what it is to be a man, in my opinion. Because marriage taught me that there is no such thing as a perfect happy ending. That there is no such thing as a perfect marriage or a perfect relationship. That love doesn't just happen to you. That it's actually a choice that you make daily. And you can wake up and choose to not love the person you're with and choose to not find them attractive that day. Or choose to be annoyed at the way they answered that question or the fact that they didn't do the dishes or have your or do the or do your laundry.

• 42:59Speaker 01

  Or you might not have a conversation that you might not be able to have a conversation with the person you're with that day. Because there's just nothing to talk about. So you can choose to not love the person. Or you can make a conscious choice to focus on the good and to love the person. And to me, that's what being a man is. And that's what my dad taught me that I didn't realize until I got married. And then I watched him constantly wake up and choose to love my mom. No matter how crazy she was. My mom is a my mom is the best woman on the planet, but she's nuts. She's a Feng Shui master. She's an artist. She's a free spirit. Like she lives in another dimension. And but it's the greatest thing ever. Everyone loves my mom.

• 43:40Speaker 01

  But he woke up every day and he made a choice. They never got divorced. They got they went through difficult times. And he told me that he chose to love my mom. And when I got married, it like hit me, like it really hit me. How much we have to be proactive in love and in relationships and friendships. And how much we have to choose our own happiness and choose to be present and vulnerable and hold space for the person that we're in a relationship with. And I didn't realize that before I got married. And the same thing goes for my daughter. Because what happens to a man when you enter a marriage and then when you have a child is then suddenly you don't become,

• 44:24Speaker 01

  you're not the most important person in the relationship. Suddenly, you know, you're not gonna be number one, right? Your child becomes number one. And your wife is your number one. And she was, and then you have a child, then your child's your number one. And then there's this whole other thing, and then you have to really check your ego. And being a man is about learning how to balance all those things and still wake up every day and choose. Because it's very easy to choose to not be present. It's very easy to choose to just be like, yeah, okay, you got it, baby, you go do that thing. But it's harder, it's a harder choice to choose to show up every day in love. And while also providing for a family, while also trying and working on all these things and struggling and going through your life tests

• 45:08Speaker 01

  and all the things that we all go through as human beings, it's part of our experience.

• 45:10Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 45:11Speaker 01

  But it's that choice, that choice that my dad taught me that I really learned when I married my wife. And that is, it's not perfect, there's no such thing as perfect. But you can choose, you can choose your perfection, you can choose your love. And it's important and it's crucial to any successful, happy life or marriage to choose that happiness.

• 45:33Lewis Howes?

  I agree, that's powerful, powerful lesson he taught you.

• 45:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, he did.

• 45:37Lewis Howes?

  You're not angry at him anymore.

• 45:38Speaker 01

  No, and it's so interesting because, you know, and I struggle with a lot of things with our parents because I think that we all do. And that's part of life is healing half of the trauma that you went through as a child.

• 45:50Lewis Howes?

  Exactly, yeah.

• 45:51Speaker 01

  But as I've been on my journey to re, to kind of to redefine what it means to be a man, I've realized that my father was exactly the man that I needed him to be. And he never, he never ever strayed with his love for me or with his love for my mom and for our family. And he always showed up. And my idea of what it was that I thought I needed was not real. And he was everything that I needed. So my dad was the exact definition of what I feel masculinity is. And I didn't realize it until I went on my own journey. And I, uh, I hope he's listening now. And I'll make sure he does.

• 46:35Speaker 01

  Cause I think it's really important that he knows that.

• 46:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:39Lewis Howes?

  That's cool.

• 46:42Lewis Howes?

  What do you think's missing in your life right now to get you to the next level for your career? Your marriage, your relationship with your daughter?

• 46:51Speaker 01

  I don't, I don't think, I don't think anything's missing. I don't look at life that way. I don't think anything's missing. I think if I were to think something was missing, then I'd be looking at my life from a place of lack.

• 47:08Speaker 01

  I choose to look at life from a place of abundance, but not in a, not in the way that I think a lot of people do. Like this think it and the universe will provide for you.

• 47:18Speaker 01

  I just think that God gives us everything that we need when we need it, even if it doesn't look the way that we want it to.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  There's a quote, Bahala says, "Nothing save that which profiteth them can ever befall my loved ones."

• 47:32Speaker 01

  And it's this idea that nothing that happens to us, happens to us, except that which will benefit us or profit us. And what I have in my life right now, I've worked very hard for. Is it perfect? No. Am I where I want to be? Of course not. Cause I have an ego and I'm a man. Right? And I can see like right over there, there's a nicer house. And that guy's got a nicer car and that guy's got more success and more money in the bank. And Louis has a book. I want a book. Louis has a cool podcast in this room. I want a podcast. We, I can do that all day long, forever. But I don't think that abundance comes until we are content with what we have

• 48:16Speaker 01

  and grateful for the opportunities that we've been given and are, and are detached from the outcome. And, um, and in my faith, that's a big part of it. You know, in my faith, we talk a lot about dying to the world. This idea of being so detached from all these things, these transitory things, that it doesn't matter if we have nothing or if we have everything. Right? Because, because, uh, there's another great quote, uh, Bahala talks about how poverty is followed by wealth. And then wealth is followed by poverty. Right, and eventually in the end, we leave with nothing. So what's the point? So, the only thing missing for me, um, I'd like to pray more. I'd like to make more time to, to pray more and be more intentional with my prayers.

• 49:02Speaker 01

  And I'd like to do better with balancing the time I spend working versus with my family. And I'd like to do better at shutting off technology at certain points. Um, and it's gonna be harder, it's gonna be harder with two kids.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  And I'm learning how to, I'm learning the battle of the fight between technology and success and money, because it is, it's a form of income, but also the line between family and being present and making sure I have time for my friends. Right, so that's, that's a tough line that would, that can be blurred in our business.

• 49:34Lewis Howes?

  How you gonna do that? How you gonna manage it all?

• 49:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, it's something I struggle with now. I mean, that's why, that's why, that's what I was saying was it's, it's not something that I would say is missing, but it's something I'm working on actively. I have a quote here on my arm, says where there's love, nothing is too much trouble and there's always time.

• 49:51Speaker 01

  And it's a quote from Abdul Baha, and to me, this is my reminder, always. Is that, when I start something with love, then I'll always find the time. And the things I love the most are my family and my friends, of course. And I love my job, I love what I do, but that's, that's transitory, it's not, this goes back to the ego thing, like if I am not relevant in a couple of years, I will be okay.

• 50:13Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 50:14Speaker 01

  I'll be okay.

• 50:14Lewis Howes?

  Your ego might be a little hurt.

• 50:16Speaker 01

  Sure it will, sure it will, but it's nothing it hasn't dealt with before, and guess what? I had my moment, even if it wasn't as big as someone else's moment. What else do I need?

• 50:24Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 50:25Speaker 01

  Right, it allowed me to get a home for my family, to take care. Like, I've gotten a chance to do amazing things. I'll be okay, and if God wills that I stay relevant to a certain extent, then I'll continue to be of service with what I have. But to me, that's, that's what it's all about. And then finding the time and the balance between family and work, as long as your intention is pure. Right? The person that you're with knows your intention is pure and they know that you're working for your family or you're working for the betterment of humanity, then there'll be a middle ground and you guys will figure it out together. It looks different for everyone. For me, I just need to be intentional about it.

• 51:00Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. You're, you're working a lot about redefining manhood. I see you talking about this a lot. You're working on some other projects, but we don't need to get into, which I, I don't think you've made public.

• 51:11Speaker 01

  We can talk about it.

• 51:11Lewis Howes?

  Okay, yeah.

• 51:12Speaker 01

  We can talk about it on, we can make it public on your show.

• 51:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, you've got a, you've got a project you're working on called, uh, The Men's Room.

• 51:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:19Lewis Howes?

  And you're talking about redefining manhood and I think that's why we connected because Aubrey wanted us to, to meet and we're talking a lot about the similar things.

• 51:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, you got a book coming out about it.

• 51:28Lewis Howes?

  I do, the masculinity, yeah, I'm excited.

• 51:30Speaker 01

  You're gonna sign the copy for me today, right?

• 51:31Lewis Howes?

  I will, yes, yes. Um, but why are you so committed to this message of redefining manhood masculinity and sharing it so much and so passionate about it? Why? That topic, why now?

• 51:44Speaker 01

  So, I point a lot of things back to my faith as you can, it's, for me, it's my foundation. It's the, it's, it's the soil from which everything in my life grows.

• 51:56Speaker 01

  We're told explicitly in our faith that we are moving out of an age where masculinity, the toxic masculinity that we're used to, the, the ruling by force and power. Um, we're moving out of that phase into, into an era that will be more feminine in nature.

• 52:16Lewis Howes?

  Your faith talks about this.

• 52:17Speaker 01

  Our faith talks about this, out of necessity. Because it's very clear where we will keep going if we continue on the path that we're on.

• 52:28Speaker 01

  Because ruling by force and oppression.

• 52:30Lewis Howes?

  It's very destructive.

• 52:31Speaker 01

  It's destructive and these are the things that are wrong with masculinity. And, you know, and again, if you think about,

• 52:40Speaker 01

  if you think about the qualities that man has, you know, that we think about, strength, power, like, reason is one that, which is, I don't know why we, we get. Um, but you think about these things that we place on men, you think about things we place on women. Compassion, empathy, kindness. Right? Well, Jesus, don't you think we need more of that?

• 53:01Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:02Speaker 01

  It's just so simple. Right? I know a lot of very analytical thinkers that before they make a decision, they weigh the pros and the cons. Use real simple chart. What are the pros? What are the cons? If I date this person, what are the pros? What are the cons? Right? What do you think about our world? And you line up all the qualities that men are known for and all the qualities that women are known for. I would argue that if you shifted them around and you had the women qualities leading and the man qualities supporting, we would have a much healthier, happier, more fruitful, equal world. It's that simple.

• 53:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:38Speaker 01

  As a man, uh, I think it's my job.

• 53:43Speaker 01

  You know, when I had that moment of kind of shedding my skin of like all my old clothing, right? Getting rid of the mask that I've been living in.

• 53:51Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  And going after truth. I realized I was kind of this middle ground between both. Right? So I look like what a man should look like.

• 54:00Lewis Howes?

  Got the beard shredded.

• 54:02Speaker 01

  Now I got the beard, not as shredded as I want to be, but that's a different topic. Uh, but I look like what a man might look like. But in many ways, I act like a very feminine man. Um, which is again, it's, it's what, it's a label that society's placed on me, right?

• 54:19Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 54:20Speaker 01

  And maybe that's my mission. Maybe my mission is to be in the middle. To show that moderation and balance could be a good thing. Like what's wrong with being in shape or, you know, appearing manly and having a beard or having, you know, clothes, cool clothes and a beautiful, like what's wrong with that? And also being open and willing to be vulnerable.

• 54:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 54:43Speaker 01

  And having compassion for people and, and doing things, not just for yourself, but for others and like talking about the empowerment of women, like, can you have both? I also think that we're, I think it's a, we're living in a time where it's, it's not just, it's not just important, but it's needed, it's needed in like a, an urgent way.

• 55:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 55:04Speaker 01

  Like we're going down a dark path.

• 55:07Lewis Howes?

  Um, we is in the world.

• 55:09Speaker 01

  We is in the world. We is in the world.

• 55:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 55:12Speaker 01

  I mean, you can say what you want about America, but I would say that I, I would argue that in general, we're, you know, the world is not in the best shape.

• 55:20Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 55:20Speaker 01

  Um, I, I would, I believe that if women were ruling our planet, we wouldn't have hunger. How could like mothers, like women that have been mothers, understand what it's like to have a child cry because they're hungry? How could, how could we let millions and millions of people around the world not just cry, but die because of hunger? They wouldn't let it happen. I believe that. Might be controversial, but I believe that.

• 55:50Lewis Howes?

  Do you think if women were ruling, let's just say, the world, would they shift into a more masculine points of views?

• 55:57Speaker 01

  Well, I think, I think there just needs to be balance. I think that, first of all, I'm not saying women are without egos.

• 56:02Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 56:03Speaker 01

  Right? And I'm also not saying that women are not masculine. So there's a whole, because there's no, like, women can absolutely have masculine qualities. There's nothing wrong with that. Just like men can have feminine qualities. I think we need balance.

• 56:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:16Speaker 01

  And I think right now, we need men to start having the kind of conversations I'm praying that we start having, so that they can be open to empowering women. I'm not saying that men just need to roll over and not be leaders anymore.

• 56:29Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 56:30Speaker 01

  And say, okay, you think you can do it better than me? Take it. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that we need to start having conversations that open up the hearts of men, that allow men, and give them permission to be vulnerable and to be open and to start to exercise some of these more perceived to be feminine qualities, so that they can also start to see women as equal.

• 56:50Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  And not just, and, and, because at the end of the day, look, I'm a, I'm a feminist, right? But who's holding the glass ceiling? Like, it's one side of the, it's, it's important to do the work on, for feminism. But until men are doing the work that support women, how is the glass ceiling going to be broken? Like, we're just gonna either force women to become more masculine, so that they can break through it themselves, or we can do it with them. What seems easier, right? The shortest distance between two, two points is a straight line. So why don't we just work together? So my work with men is simply about opening up hearts and creating conversations so that we can all just simply realize that like, we can do it together.

• 57:32Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 57:33Speaker 01

  Why did God create man and woman? For it not to like, like, where was it ever said that women are not equal to men? Right, and where was it ever said that like men have to be a certain way? And that's change, I believe that's changing. So with what my faith teaches me,

• 57:51Speaker 01

  with what I'm seeing and witnessing, with the conversations that I'm having independently with men, I see that there is a desire and a thirst and a hunger for men to be vulnerable and open up, and it's happening in silos all over the country and the world. My intention is just to make it more mainstream and to have that conversation in a bigger way.

• 58:09Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 58:09Speaker 01

  That's really all, because men, we need role models. I mean, who did you have? Who did I have, really? Like, athletes?

• 58:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, Schwarzenegger.

• 58:17Speaker 01

  Schwarzenegger, and then, and God bless Schwarzenegger, Schwarzenegger's awesome. But what are the examples of masculinity? This is a guy who cheated on his wife with his maid and had a child out of wedlock. Right? Like, is that a good role model? Like, if we're just thinking, if we're stripping it down all the way, he's made amazing business decisions. He's done a lot of good in the world.

• 58:34Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 58:35Speaker 01

  But I'm talking about straight up, who do you want your child or your son to grow up to be like and emulate?

• 58:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 58:41Speaker 01

  And who are those men? Now, there's nothing wrong with doing that and then coming back, because I also think that masculinity is about redemption. And it's to, it's okay. It's important for men to have those experiences and to screw up and then to come back and say, "I screwed up. I'm sorry. I was wrong. I learned from my mistakes. That will never happen again." That's a part of masculinity.

• 59:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, because we're not going to be perfect.

• 59:04Speaker 01

  We're never going to be perfect, and we can't hold ourselves to perfection and then, and I, I will always fail if you think I'm going to be perfect. But we still need role models.

• 59:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 59:13Speaker 01

  We need role models that are open and honest and vulnerable and that are willing to, if they've made those mistakes, to come back and say they did. And this is what I learned from it, so I can teach you instead of just living my, living the perception of what you think I am in my perfect life.

• 59:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I think a role model for me is actually someone who's made a big mistake and come back and owned it and then said, "Here's what I'm committed to creating moving forward."

• 59:33Speaker 01

  And that's being a man.

• 59:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 59:35Speaker 01

  At it, like, to me, I would, I would say that that's part of redefining what it means to be a man. I love having, one of my best friends, and he's probably the one guy I go to when I really need advice. He's been married three times. Cheated on his first two wives.

• 59:51Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:52Speaker 01

  He's got, about to have his fourth kid. Has had tremendous hardship and struggle. And I know that that man has true wisdom.

• 1:00:00Lewis Howes?

  He's been through it all.

• 1:00:01Speaker 01

  Because he, he's been through it all, and guess what? He's open, he's vulnerable, he has a healthy sense of shame for what he's done, and he wants to make sure that his friends don't repeat his mistakes.

• 1:00:09Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:00:10Speaker 01

  That's a man. Right? These are the men that we need to strive to be like. It doesn't mean we have to be perfect.

• 1:00:15Lewis Howes?

  It doesn't mean we have to.

• 1:00:16Speaker 01

  And it doesn't mean we have to go that far either, right?

• 1:00:18Lewis Howes?

  And we don't have to look for mistakes to get into.

• 1:00:20Speaker 01

  No, no, no, you don't have to look for mistakes, but it's about where, like in our own lane, can we learn from the mistakes that we've made? And then help each other, right? Because there's a brotherhood.

• 1:00:30Lewis Howes?

  Having a communication, open communication with one another where most men in general, again, aren't freely sharing their fears, their pains, their concerns, their.

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  Why do you think that is?

• 1:00:42Speaker 01

  Why do you think, I'm gonna flip the, I'm gonna flip the table.

• 1:00:44Lewis Howes?

  I think it's a level of comfort, you know, they don't feel comfortable sharing their vulnerabilities because they don't want to be judged or they don't want to be, uh, you know, known as not man enough, or they don't want to feel like made fun of by other guys, you know, just not being accepted. I think it comes down to, is someone gonna like us? You know, are they gonna love us for who we are? And do I need to have a certain mask on for them to like me?

• 1:01:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:07Lewis Howes?

  A certain level of, I know enough, or I'm smart enough, or whatever it is. It's fricking scary putting yourself out there, you know, it's really scary. So, but I think the more you do it, the easier it becomes. And whenever you have a problem, you don't like hold it in, you just say, shoot, I need to talk to my buddy and be like, hey, man.

• 1:01:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:23Lewis Howes?

  You know, my, my buddy Matt, who you met, you know, we'll go on runs and I'm like, this is what I'm going through. I'm going through a struggle with my relationship or, you know, with one of my family members or whatever, something in the business and just having someone to share and connect with and be like, did I really mess up? Am I messing up like horribly right now or?

• 1:01:41Speaker 01

  And you're so lucky you have that because most men don't.

• 1:01:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:44Speaker 01

  And most men go at it alone.

• 1:01:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:46Speaker 01

  And they think they can't share it with anybody. So, and they don't go on runs with anyone. They go on runs by themselves and they try to figure it out themselves. And they don't have that accountability. They don't have someone to look at them objectively and say, yeah, I don't know if that was the right move. Did you think about how that made her feel? Or like, what are you doing with your? Family member. They don't have that. Men don't have that because we're so uncomfortable. Like just having real conversations.

• 1:02:13Lewis Howes?

  Create it too. We have it. The opportunities are there. We don't create it.

• 1:02:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, that's why we're more comfortable talking about like football or sports or.

• 1:02:22Lewis Howes?

  Making money.

• 1:02:22Speaker 01

  You know, like men get together to watch sports and to root on whoa and you know.

• 1:02:27Lewis Howes?

  Talk about girls.

• 1:02:27Speaker 01

  Talk about girls, locker room talk. You have that stuff, but how often do we get together to just check in with each other and see how we are?

• 1:02:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, that's why I think it's cool what you're you're doing with the men's room to be able to have these conversations and then hopefully inspire.

• 1:02:40Speaker 01

  More conversations.

• 1:02:41Lewis Howes?

  Groups of men around the world to be like, hey, maybe we can create our own men's room.

• 1:02:44Speaker 01

  That's exactly the point of the show.

• 1:02:46Lewis Howes?

  Together, whether it be two, two guys, eight guys, 20 guys and just having conversations. You know, I love these. There's different men's groups in LA. I don't know if you've been invited to any of these.

• 1:02:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, I have. Yeah.

• 1:02:56Lewis Howes?

  You know, some of them are like Christian based or faith based or whatever. And I think that's really cool. Doesn't matter what it is, how it's based, just having open conversations.

• 1:03:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, having an open forum.

• 1:03:06Lewis Howes?

  Like once a month, they get together and they have bring in a guy speaker to talk about a topic. And I think it's powerful. To be able to, even if you need that once a month to go somewhere. You know, even if it's comfortable for you once a month, at least start there.

• 1:03:19Speaker 01

  You have to.

• 1:03:20Lewis Howes?

  And then try to incorporate, you know, daily in your life if you need to.

• 1:03:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, because you can't just sit with it. When you sit with it and you just, you know, it becomes cancer.

• 1:03:28Lewis Howes?

  It does. It does. Um, I appreciate this conversation, man. I'm really glad. I'm really glad you came on and I want to ask a few final questions. Before we get to the final questions, where do you like to hang out the most online where people can connect with you? And learn about everything you're up to. Obviously the show, you've got a lot of documentaries you're doing, you know, everything.

• 1:03:47Speaker 01

  I think.

• 1:03:48Lewis Howes?

  Your company site, all that.

• 1:03:49Speaker 01

  All my social is the same. It's at Justin Baldoni. So Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat.

• 1:03:54Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  Twitter.

• 1:03:56Lewis Howes?

  Most active on.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  I'm most active on Instagram and Facebook.

• 1:03:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:00Speaker 01

  So come hang out and.

• 1:04:03Lewis Howes?

  He needs some more guy followers. So any of the guys listening.

• 1:04:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, you've got exactly 50% men and women, which is beautiful. And that's, and that's a, that's a beautiful world, but that's a beautiful testament to you, man. That's amazing. So you're, you're equally attractive to both sexes and that's fantastic.

• 1:04:18Lewis Howes?

  I try, you know?

• 1:04:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're doing a good job. But yeah, so, uh, so yeah, come, uh, come hang out, man. Come on, man.

• 1:04:24Lewis Howes?

  And women.

• 1:04:25Speaker 01

  And women.

• 1:04:27Lewis Howes?

  I think, uh, yeah, you'll have a lot of people have a lot to learn when they follow you, so.

• 1:04:31Speaker 01

  And I have a lot to learn from them.

• 1:04:32Lewis Howes?

  Absolutely. Um, and then your website, uh, if people want to learn about, uh, Wayfair.

• 1:04:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, my company, we are wayfair.com.

• 1:04:40Lewis Howes?

  We are wayfair.com.

• 1:04:41Speaker 01

  We are wayfair.com.

• 1:04:42Lewis Howes?

  Create content of purpose, purposeful, intentional content.

• 1:04:45Speaker 01

  Our joy is, uh, our, our goal is to create disruptive inspiration and that can be joyful, that can be painful, that can be all kinds of things, but we want you to feel something and then do something. And, uh, yeah, we're doing all kinds of cool stuff right now.

• 1:04:58Lewis Howes?

  I love it. I love it, man. Um, final few questions for you. Am I missing any of the questions you want me to ask? No? Okay. See, I'm incorporating them since you asked before. Um, this question is called the three truths. And we're going to tie it in two ways. Imagine this microphone is connected to the entire world. Hmm. It's right now and they all, everyone's put headphones on and there's 60 seconds. You get to share your three truths with the world. And everyone can understand you in English.

• 1:05:29Speaker 01

  Oh man, I should have prepared more.

• 1:05:31Lewis Howes?

  Right? And, um, from all the lessons you've learned from, again, growing up to creating content, to being a father, having a child, to everything, um,

• 1:05:45Lewis Howes?

  what would you say are your three truths that you would share with the world?

• 1:05:53Speaker 01

  I'd say my first truth

• 1:05:56Speaker 01

  is that our life is not our own. Your life is not just yours. It's shared. And I think that we are here for a very short time. There's a analogy in my faith that talks about the journey of the soul. And in the span of the journey of the soul, of how long the soul lasts, the time we're here on earth is like a bird flying through one end of a birdcage to the other. It's a millisecond of how long the journey of our soul is. So do not spend your entire life living for yourself. There are five billion people on this planet and you have a unique gift

• 1:06:39Speaker 01

  to be of service and to contribute to the betterment of mankind in a way that only you were destined to. So that's my one.

• 1:06:50Speaker 01

  My second.

• 1:06:54Speaker 01

  Is to become friends with dying.

• 1:06:59Speaker 01

  To make death an ally. To be scared of it. And also have it motivate you. To live in the present. To live purposefully, to live truthfully. And to not procrastinate. Because none of us know our end date. But we all know that we have one. So.

• 1:07:19Speaker 01

  Being aware that you are mortal. And that you are not immortal. Is my second truth.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  And my third truth. Is.

• 1:07:32Speaker 01

  To not be afraid to love. Because love is the foundation. Of life itself. I think love is the secret of the universe. The thing that scientists will never find that is actually what's holding. The molecules and the atoms together.

• 1:07:55Speaker 01

  And that everything in this entire world is made with love. And to not run from it when it comes to you. And to learn. How to always have it be active in your life. And have it move through you. And to look in every situation for a way to love. And that can look like a lot of different things. It's not just romantic love. It's friend. It's strangers. But love is a feeling and is a way of being. I think is something that if we all remembered.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  The world would look a lot different. So those are my three truths. Which I've never thought of until you just asked me, so I hope that was okay.

• 1:08:38Lewis Howes?

  They're powerful, man. They're powerful. Well, before I ask the final question, I want to acknowledge you for a moment. For redefining what it looks like to be a great man. Because I feel like you're setting a great example on a daily basis from. The actions you take, the words you speak. And how you show up. Your way of being, your love for men, for women, for the planet. Is infectious in a positive way. And so, thank you for leading the way. Thank you for having the uncomfortable conversations. Even when it may not be the popular ones. And for having a beautiful heart. That spreads to so many people. I think you're doing an amazing job, so acknowledge you for that. Uh, thank you. And thank, well, and thank you for seeing me. Of course.

• 1:09:23Lewis Howes?

  That means a lot to me, brother. Of course, man. Thank you. Final question. What is your definition of greatness?

• 1:09:31Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:09:33Lewis Howes?

  Humility.

• 1:09:36Lewis Howes?

  Justin Baldoni. Thank you. Thank you, man. Appreciate it. Appreciate it so much.

• 1:09:42Lewis Howes?

  There you have it, my friends. If you felt this was powerful and inspiring, make sure to share this out with your friends. LewisHowes.com/505. I try to connect with as many people who share it out over on Instagram Stories or your Instagram page. Just tag me @lewishowes and make sure to tag Justin Baldoni as well, so he can see who is listening and the response that it's getting for him also. Tweet at us @lewishowes, Facebook @lewishowes. Get this message out there. If you're a fan of him, if you're a fan of this message, please share it. That's what helps us spread the message of greatness. And the only way we grow is if we create something powerful for you.

• 1:10:21Lewis Howes?

  It's meaningful to you, and then you share it with your friends. So, thank you so much again, LewisHowes.com/505. You can watch the full video interview there as well, and all the other highlights and resources that we talked about in this episode are at those show notes. And in conclusion, the great Albert Einstein said, "Try not to become a man of success, rather, become a man of value." I encourage you to be a human of value, whether man, woman, or anything you like to call yourself, you are a human being. I love you, I appreciate you, and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.