Terry Crews On Healthy Masculinity, Strength Through Vulnerability & True Power

In today’s episode, we explore masculinity—both toxic and healthy. Overcoming obstacles. How to confront your past, own your path, and ultimately step into your truest power and most self-actualized self. Our guide for this journey is star of screens big and small, Terry Crews. You may know him from films like Idiocracy and The Expendables. Or from his starring turn in television shows like Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Everyone Hates Chris, America’s Got Talent or one of his many other projects. Terry’s latest book, and the focus of today’s conversation, is entitled Tough: My Journey To Power: a memoir that chronicles the trauma, challenges and unhealthy social programming he faced—factors that led to anger, addiction, selfishness, entitlement, and the many problems those dispositions invite. Today Terry shares his journey—warts and all. The visually inclined can watch the magic transpire on YouTube. As always, the podcast streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Pick up Rich’s lates book VOICING CHANGE Vol. II HERE. For full show notes and to read more about Terry, go HERE. Enjoy the show! Peace + Plants, Rich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Rich Roll?

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• 1:06Terry Crews?

  Most addictions thrive in secrecy. The secret is the killer. Let me tell you, my best advice, period. Find someone you love and trust, and tell them. When I started to voice that I had an addiction, I started to voice what the pornography thing was, and I started to talk. It's like exposing the germs to sunlight. It loses its power. Slowly but surely, it takes the power away from it. So, anyone who's going through this, the more you find someone you trust that you

• 1:47Terry Crews?

  can share these things with, it slowly starts to just... I like to say it shrinks, and it gets cleaned out. But, the secrecy, man, oh, everything grows in secret, dude. You lose total control. That's one reason why I'm so vulnerable, because I don't want any secrets. I just don't. I don't want anymore. I tell the whole story, and, man, I'm in control.

• 2:22Rich Roll?

  The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the podcast. Today, we're going to talk about strength. We're going to talk about power, but not the physical kind, the mental and emotional kind. It's a conversation about masculinity, both toxic and healthy. It's about overcoming obstacles, how to confront your past, own your path, and ultimately step into your truest power and most self-actualized self. Our guide for this journey is star of screens Big and Small, Terry Crews. You may know Terry from Idiocracy, The Expendable movies, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Everyone Hates

• 3:04Rich Roll?

  Chris, America's Got Talent, or one of his many other projects. You're also likely familiar with Terry's insane physique, his incredible charm, but beneath it all is a guy who's actually endured a litany of uncommon hardships and really struggled immensely for the better part of his life to control his relationships, his image as a tough guy, his experiences with racism, all of which led to this destructive spiral and ultimately a path forward, a path that has given him a new perspective and a new life altogether. Terry is an incredible guy and a powerful storyteller.

• 3:47Rich Roll?

  This conversation is pure gold and it's coming right up, but first.

• 3:59Rich Roll?

  Okay, so there's so many layers to Terry Crews. Among the many things you may not know about him, in addition to the fact that he is a former NFL linebacker, a lifelong artist, and also an accomplished furniture designer, he's also an author, and his latest book out this week is entitled Tough: My Journey to Power, in which he illustrates how he faced trauma, a ton of obstacles, unhealthy social programming, all factors that led to anger, addiction, selfishness, entitlement, and of course, all the problems that those dispositions invite, and overcame them through embracing help.

• 4:38Rich Roll?

  Acknowledging his weaknesses, allowing himself to be vulnerable, tools that he leveraged to achieve true conscientious toughness and now beautifully shares to motivate and empower others. Today, we cover it all. Terry was remarkably frank, incredibly generous with his time. This conversation again is just fantastic. Can't wait for you to hear it. So let's do it. This is me and Terry Crews.

• 5:10Rich Roll?

  Well, you've got a lot going on. I appreciate you taking the time to do this, especially on Saturday, man. I'm excited for you. The new book is coming out, lots to talk about. And, you know, to kind of kick things off, I was thinking about how to approach this conversation with you and thinking about what this show is about. And I talked to lots of different people across, you know, a multiplicity of specialties and expertise. But if there is one kind of core theme, it's transformation. Like, how do you weather obstacles? How do you persevere and grow and evolve and share what you learned along the way, like in service to other people? And as much as anybody that I know, you truly embody this ethos, not just, you know, in the many pivots across the course of your

• 5:52Rich Roll?

  life and the many challenges that you faced and overcome, but this, you know, this transparency that you have around expansion into self authenticity and how you show up in the world in service is really the heart of kind of what I love to talk about and what you're all about. So I'm really excited to talk to you today.

• 6:11Terry Crews?

  Thank you.

• 6:13Rich Roll?

  So why don't we start with, you know, the subject matter of the book, which is really this journey from what we could kind of, I mean, this term is played out, toxic masculinity, but this journey from being sort of the embodiment of toxic masculinity to this person who could be characterized as very much self actualized in many ways. I mean, we're all on our journey. We all, there's always, the more you grow, the more you realize how much more there is to grow.

• 6:38Terry Crews?

  That's right.

• 6:39Rich Roll?

  But why don't we start there and, you know, maybe talk a little bit about masculinity and how you're thinking about it.

• 6:46Terry Crews?

  Yeah, you know, and you're right in the regard that the phrase toxic masculinity has been played out. It's just, right now, it's been so overused and misrepresented and all this stuff. But now the phrase that I like to use is abuse of power. And You know, one thing for me, you know, in growing up, to give you some context and some background is that, you know, I grew up in Flint, Michigan in 1968, that was when I was born, and, you know, Flint, Michigan was Palo Alto. It was the premier, young, vibrant city. General Motors was the number one corporation in the world. It was the

• 7:28Terry Crews?

  Google of its generation. So everyone was, was doing very, very well, and they made a lot of promises, a lot of promises to the citizens, to the families. And I mean, you could go there. My father moved up from a little town in Edison, Georgia, that was the only 300 people, and he moved up to join the factory, like most of my family did, on both sides, from my mom's side and my father's side. They all came up from Georgia because of the promise of all these jobs and all this stuff. And, and so there was a lot of hope. There was, I mean, my, my early, early days, it seemed like the city was growing and big events and all this stuff. And, and then all of a sudden, when

• 8:09Terry Crews?

  I turned around nine or 10, you know, the, the late 70s, things started to change. And I mean, very, very quickly. And, you know, the auto industry was going down, the, the foreign cars started to come into, into play, into the picture. And a lot of people don't remember this, but I do. There used to be like small smoke stacks going up around the city. And what they were doing was burning foreign cars in the lots. Like, if you brought a Toyota into the city, and people would surround it and burn it in effigy.

• 8:42Rich Roll?

  Wow. I'm from Detroit, so I know, you know, I know that vibe. Like, you, you ain't driving a foreign car.

• 8:48Terry Crews?

  You remember that.

• 8:48Rich Roll?

  I think it's still that way in Detroit.

• 8:50Terry Crews?

  Oh, yeah. I mean, it's, it's wild. I didn't see a foreign car until I joined the NFL and moved out to LA. And I was like, that's a Mercedes. Wow. Like, that's a BMW. You know what I mean? Because it was just crazy. But on top of this, on top of these small changes that were happening, there was things going on in my house. My father was extremely abusive. One of my earliest memories, like, when I was four or five years old, I remember my father knocking my mother out, you know, right there in the living room.

• 9:24Terry Crews?

  And I can't describe the helplessness I felt because, you know, um, my, my father was a giant. I mean, he had these big giant, my hands are big, but he had these big calloused giant man hands. And he would walk around the house with this boom, boom. You know, the way he walked and the way he moved and the way he did everything, it was just, it was like watching a giant in this force. And when he would hit my mother and I saw her on the ground, I was like, got it. That's the rules. We run it. Men run it.

• 10:01Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:01Terry Crews?

  And this is the lesson I had as in regards to masculinity. It was like, yo, you control everything. Um, he controlled our household. Um, it wasn't a thing where, you know, I felt the love of my father, but I felt the possessiveness of my father. I felt like a, it's something he owned and he owned his family. And it was a, and he made sure that we, it was a little bit for him, for him, he'd rather be feared than loved.

• 10:31Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:31Terry Crews?

  You know, and he never really gave any bit of, he never really showed any, any what, what would be called vulnerability.

• 10:41Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:41Terry Crews?

  It was always solid hardcore. This is the way I am. This is, you know, everything was military like and brutal in judgment, you know, um, which it was, I mean, I, I literally, I, I remember just holding my breath when he was around.

• 10:57Rich Roll?

  On top of that, you have the alcoholism and you talk about in the book, the morning dad and the night dad.

• 11:03Terry Crews?

  Yes.

• 11:04Rich Roll?

  Trying to connect with your dad in the morning, but that fear when he would pull up in the driveway at night, not knowing what you were going to get and all of that. But I also appreciated in the book how you painted a broader picture of who this man was, rather than just kind of characterize him as the abusive alcoholic. Like this was a guy who like, despite everything, would put himself together in the morning, would polish his shoes, was trying to find some modicum of pride.

• 11:32Terry Crews?

  Yep.

• 11:32Rich Roll?

  In this factory job that he had. And this idea that a lot of the, you know, quote unquote, toxic masculinity aspects of, of who he was, were driven by a sense of powerlessness when the factories were drying up and the jobs were going away and all of that. Like it's more nuanced than just saying. He was A, B, and C.

• 11:52Terry Crews?

  Exactly. And, and listen, the thing is, my dad made it. Like, from where he came from, it was a thing where, wow. Like, he, he was a symbol of pride. Um, it was, everyone who was back home was like, man, you did it. Um, his father, once I got into my past and I learned, and it took me, listen, in the course of writing this book, I found out more about my past than I ever knew in my fifty-four years on earth.

• 12:24Rich Roll?

  Right, that's, that's maybe my favorite part of the whole book, when you, when you trace that later in the book.

• 12:29Terry Crews?

  It's so special, it's so amazing, because, you know, one thing I learned is, his father, you know, was on a chain gang in Georgia, in the heat, in a hundred degree humidity of Georgia. He committed a few crimes and was convicted to, you know, serving on a chain gang. And he, as a child, had to pass his own dad on the school bus to wa, to, you know, knowing that his dad was out there tied to other prisoners, working on the roads. And I'm like, these are the kind of things that would drive a man to drink.

• 13:02Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 13:03Terry Crews?

  You know what I mean? These are the kind, that's the kind of pain that he could never articulate, that he couldn't understand. And his father died when he was seventeen years old, and he never got over it, you know? Because his father basically abandoned the family. And so when you're talking about this kind of deep, deep thing, and this is another thing. And I got in trouble a little bit about this, you know, early on, especially on the internet. But my dad needed his father. And a lot of times, you know, I know my purpose on earth, you know, and, but what's wild is that I've had people tell me that fatherhood is not necessary. And I'm, I'm going, but you wouldn't say that about motherhood, you know?

• 13:46Terry Crews?

  And I'm telling you, from my own personal experience, I needed my dad. And they go, well, no, you know, that is, if two parents love each other, it's all good. And, and then what was happening is, uh, especially in the black community, you know, the, the issue of, you know, there being no fathers. Is directly tied in to a lot of the problems that the community has. I mean, you know, black men are 6% of the American population, yet make up more than 40% of the homicide victims.

• 14:20Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 14:21Terry Crews?

  Which is unreal, which is a problem, which is what you would call a catastrophe. And I think there are parallels to the fact that the fatherlessness in that community, in our community, it ties into the violence. It ties into when you don't have a dad around, you go right to the gangs. You go right to those vices. You go right to all those things because you do need, you need someone to guide you, to show you what being a man is like when we're talking about masculinity.

• 14:56Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 14:56Terry Crews?

  That's the question.

• 14:58Rich Roll?

  And also, the epigenetics of generation after generation repeating, you know, like sort of patterns that don't work and kind of calcifying this idea of what it means to be a man because they're repeating the patterns of their father, even if that father was present in the household. Like in your case, who was your model for how to be a man in the world? It was a guy who was completely locked down emotionally.

• 15:21Terry Crews?

  That's right.

• 15:22Rich Roll?

  But I appreciated the attempt to try to understand him as a guy who was also caught between the white world and the black world. Like he was too advanced in the factory to be accepted by, you know, the guys on the floor, right, who are predominantly black.

• 15:38Terry Crews?

  Yep.

• 15:38Rich Roll?

  But he wasn't quite in the C-suite to be accepted by the white guy. So he had his own like kind of identity crisis that he was trying to navigate simultaneously.

• 15:46Terry Crews?

  You know, a lot of people just, what is really, really hardcore in his walk was that here he was, he was trying to make it and he felt like he was doing. The right thing and then what was crazy is that he was ridiculed by his peers just for advancing. Which is another problem, you know, and and then when you advance, the people who, you know, kind of hold the key to your future wouldn't accept him completely. Simply because he was one of the few black foremen in in the place. So you had tons of white foremen all around and they would go on up the ladder.

• 16:29Terry Crews?

  He being a black foreman kind of was stuck in his place because he wouldn't he wouldn't get invited to the inner parties. Or the inner sector, you know what I mean? And then the blacks who were on the floor were just like, oh, he's a sellout. And what's wild is that there's a phrase that blacks use, you know, to describe what they would call, you know, people who sell, black people who sell out and it's a coon. And they look at you capitulating to, you know, the white world in order to be accepted. And what you're doing, you know, you're doing what you have to do to make it. And that's a hard role and he took these things personally. And I'm a good thing is I'm smart enough and and have learned enough to know to let that just, you know,

• 17:13Terry Crews?

  for me, you know, these kind of insults are just like, okay, that has more to do with you than it does with me. But back in that time and that period, there wasn't that kind of introspection. You know, I mean, it was just like, why am I not being accepted by my own people, you know? And and he was very angry.

• 17:30Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 17:31Terry Crews?

  It just created this really toxic anger.

• 17:33Rich Roll?

  So you have this unhealthy role model in the household. Meanwhile, the jobs are drying up, there's white flight, the gangs are coming in. So you go to school and you went to Flynn Academy, which was like kind of the best place for you to go, right? But not a lot of great role models there either, right? A lot of temptations, I mean, you could have easily, like, there's so many inflection points in your story and in your life. I mean, you could have easily gone down a dark alley with the whole gang thing.

• 18:01Terry Crews?

  Yeah, yeah, I mean, I I have, because now, on the flip side, um, my mother was extremely religious.

• 18:09Terry Crews?

  Which is a whole nother

• 18:10Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 18:10Terry Crews?

  Aspect.

• 18:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's a whole other section of the book.

• 18:13Terry Crews?

  It's right. I mean, I, I, we, we deal on all these topics and I kinda was right in the middle of all this stuff with the religion, you know, I was not able, allowed to go to secular movies, listen to secular music, dance, go to, uh, play sports. I was, everything I ended up doing and being in my life, I was not allowed to do as a kid.

• 18:36Rich Roll?

  But we're about the same age, so we both remember well that first experience of going to Star Wars.

• 18:42Terry Crews?

  Yes.

• 18:42Rich Roll?

  And for you, that was like this transgressive act.

• 18:45Terry Crews?

  Yes, and I begged. My mother was not going to let us go. Um, the religion that we were in was, it was so strict and so shame-based and everything was just, the thing is you could go to hell at any moment. That was the through line. Like, anything will send you to hell. Okay, so going to a movie, oh no, you're gonna go to hell, you do that, you know? And I begged my mother and she wouldn't let me go. And we were just like, and I, I couldn't, cause you go to school and you hear people talking. This is the days when a movie was four-walled. So a movie would be in the theaters for a year.

• 19:22Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 19:22Terry Crews?

  You know, like now, it's like, it's out in three weeks, you know what I mean? But it would be in the movies for a year, two years, and it would be, and, and still be out. And I would hear the kids in school just, oh, Star Wars. And then they'd be talking about different parts. And I'm like, oh my God, I just gotta see this. And the anticipation and the, and the, just, I just wanted to see it so bad. And my aunt, thank God, she came through and she said, and my mother's name is Patricia, she said, Trish, you gotta let these kids see this movie. You know, like, I'm gonna take them, okay? Is it, can I take them? And she just broke, like, alright, go ahead. And I said, and it changed my life forever. I'll never forget that drive in, seeing, watching that

• 20:02Rich Roll?

  We all remember that.

• 20:03Terry Crews?

  The John Williams score hit, ah, you know what I mean? It was it.

• 20:07Rich Roll?

  So how does your mom square, like, what you're doing now with that, like, mindset?

• 20:12Terry Crews?

  Well, my mom passed away, uh, 2015, um, but she also

• 20:18Rich Roll?

  She was alive long enough to?

• 20:20Terry Crews?

  Yeah, she left the church. She left that version of what the church was. Um, when I was Probably in high school. And she went to a less restrictive version of Christianity. But I like to call it a cult. I mean, it was, it was very cultish in all its ways. When you're talking about rules and, and all this stuff. So she kind of moved on from that and grew into loving what I was doing. You know, what's wild is that she kind of saw the light as we moved on and, and I got more popular and started doing things she started to understand. But she loved what I did at the end.

• 21:01Terry Crews?

  One thing is she always, always loved entertainment, like always.

• 21:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you're talking about she had the subscriptions to all the magazines.

• 21:09Terry Crews?

  Exactly.

• 21:09Rich Roll?

  People magazine and all that kind of stuff.

• 21:11Terry Crews?

  Well, I, I worked hard to rectify, like to try to figure out what that was. Like, we can't go to the movies, but we love the movies. We can't do this, but we love this. And, and it was, so I used to read her people and entertainment magazines and the whole thing. And one thing we did together, though, was we would sit and watch The Carol Burnett Show. I'll never forget, every Saturday night. And it was the highlight, highlight of my life. Because, first of all, I'll never forget, my mom had, was nursing a black eye that my daddy gave her. And she had like this, it was some frozen peas or something on her eye. And we would just sit and watch Carol Burnett and laugh and laugh.

• 21:54Terry Crews?

  And then after it was over, I would repeat some of the skits and, and she would just laugh at me doing some of the skits, the Tim Conway and Harvey Korman and all this stuff. And I'll never forget that. I mean, even to this day, I view that as my first step in what I'm doing now, was the attempt to make my mother laugh through all the pain she was going through.

• 22:16Rich Roll?

  Well, there's this split in who you are for the better part of your life. Like, on the one hand, you're this alpha athlete who, guy who's going in the weight room, trying to get big and strong, to deal with what's going on at home and to deal with the sort of social stratification of, of school. But at the same time, you're a kid who's sensitive and likes comic books and is really good at drawing and art, which, you know, creates this tension in like, who am I? Who is Terry Crews? And how am I showing up in the world? Like, these two things kind of at war with each other.

• 22:48Terry Crews?

  It was at war. And what was wild is that,

• 22:53Terry Crews?

  You know, I remember, you know, having to fight my way into school. It was, you know, the gangs, the drug dealers, the people that were around me were always looking at me suspiciously. They would say things like, you talk white, you know? And I'm like, what is that? And what was happening is, remember, I was kind of sheltered is what it was. I mean, I was religious and I was in this thing where it wouldn't allow us to do anything. But so I would go into my hole and I would draw and draw all day. I mean, I would draw what I wanted to see, you know? And it was an introspective, very nerdy world. I became this nerd, but then when I came outside, I was always challenged on it.

• 23:36Terry Crews?

  Like, oh, man, you this, you know, back in, back in the day, they called you a square, you know? And it was like, what? And but then athletics coded black, coded hardcore. So I said, all right, so I have to be that, you know? And I knew that I had to be big, strong, fast, athletic, and they would leave me alone. You know, it's like I knew when I got some traps that they would think twice about. They'd go, well, he's probably going to do some athletic stuff, so they leave him alone. But the skinny kid, he had no, no choice. They would beat him up. It would be crazy, it would be violent. They used to beat up my brother. He was, he was smaller than I was. He's my half brother.

• 24:19Terry Crews?

  And I remember these gang members threw him in a rose bush and he was just hurt. We went home and he was in tears and I was just like pulling him out of it and like, but they didn't mess with me.

• 24:30Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 24:31Terry Crews?

  But that coded black and it coded hardcore. You know what I mean?

• 24:35Rich Roll?

  But it's almost like this shield, this armor that you built around yourself simply to protect that artist within you.

• 24:43Terry Crews?

  Yeah.

• 24:43Rich Roll?

  So he could still, you know, do his thing quietly without being bullied or taking the task.

• 24:51Terry Crews?

  I always knew that I was what you would call weird, you know, in that respect. Cause people were always, you know, you, they would just tell me, man, you weird, man, you know? And I'm, hey, you know, whatever, I don't, I would just kind of blink it off. And but, and this is another thing is that I would. I would fake it, you know, a lot of my acting ability, you know, one thing I used to do is dumb down. It was, oh man, I don't know what y'all talking about, man. What you doing, man? Yeah, you know, and you just learned to mirror the lingo and the mirror. I would mirror people so that they wouldn't be suspicious.

• 25:29Rich Roll?

  Right, like just get along to go along.

• 25:31Terry Crews?

  It was get and then go home and then all of a sudden find somebody who, or even be at school and find somebody who had, we had the same, you know, interests. And it was like, oh man, I could go all in on this, you know what I mean? And it was funny because even when I met my wife, she said, I thought you were the biggest nerd and I saw you with your friend and you talked a whole different way. And I was like, ah, that's, that's kind of how I've been doing my whole life. You know, I knew, because she was like, you were, I'm here, I'm thinking you're this nerdy black guy. And then I turn around and you're with, you're these guys, your friends, and you're talking all cool. And I was like, it's like two people. And I was like, yeah, it's had to be that way my whole life.

• 26:11Rich Roll?

  But this, this idea blossoms into this notion that this is the case for all men. Don't all men have two lives? The secret life that they hide from everybody else? And then the way that they show up in the world?

• 26:22Terry Crews?

  That's right.

• 26:23Rich Roll?

  That's just the way it is.

• 26:24Terry Crews?

  It is, I believe that, I believe that. That was definitely the case for me.

• 26:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So without any kind of healthy role models for yourself as a young person, you strike this vow with your friend, which I think is super interesting. It's, it's almost like a survival tactic, like, hey, no one's showing us the way. Like, we gotta help each other out.

• 26:42Terry Crews?

  I mean, I remember coming to my friend, my best friend in the world, his name was Darwin. And I said, hey, man, I said, dude, no one is telling us anything. And we had nothing but questions and we would try, we would ask.

• 26:57Rich Roll?

  But the men, the men wouldn't give it up.

• 26:59Terry Crews?

  They were literally, you gonna find out. Hey, let me tell you something, you gonna find out on me, you know? And you're like, oh, man, what? And it's like, dude, I'm 11, can you please just give me some clues? And then what was wild is that we would get all this erroneous information. Like what, the things they did volunteer was like, hey, man, look, what you want to do, you want to take these, these girls, tell them you love them, get the draws and then bounce. And I was like, but. What if you do like them? No, no, you don't love them, you can't love them. And you're like, what are you talking about? Like, cause I had this vision of actual love. Like, I mean, at the picture, like even in the movies, like there's people fall in love though, right?

• 27:43Terry Crews?

  And they're like, no, man, what you wanna do? You gotta have like four or five and you gotta keep them on, and you gotta always keep them on a leash. And then call them and then don't call them back. I mean, and the whole phrase was called game. And it's still talked about even now, you know? And it was like, you gotta have game to run this thing. And then you can have all these girls, you gotta have ten. And the more you had, the more of a man you were. And I was like, wow. And that's, again, the message of what masculinity was, was that you were a pimp. And that's what I grew up with. And it was like, but I was like, but I don't.

• 28:23Terry Crews?

  I just, you know, and I had a really, really hard time because I said, I don't really wanna lie to people. But, and then I escaped into porn. And that was the only, cause my parents, my father to this day has never had a conversation with me about sex, ever. And my mother was so religious, she was like, are you having sex? And I'm like, no, no, I'm not. I don't, don't do it. I'm trying, listen, you know, you go to hell, right? And you're like, okay, back to hell again. You know? Um, and so I totally avoided that conversation. But so everything I learned was at nine years old, when I went over to my uncle's house, opened up his chest, and it was full of pornographic magazines.

• 29:08Terry Crews?

  And, you know, a lot of people, you know, what's wild about that is that everybody says, well, you know, pornography is great, you know, it's totally acceptable when people are over eighteen, the whole thing. But I don't know anybody that ever encountered pornography at eighteen.

• 29:24Rich Roll?

  No.

• 29:25Terry Crews?

  I, you know, you always encounter it in school or whatever. Someone's showing you and you're like six, seven, eight, nine. I mean, and it's damaging. It's damaging.

• 29:35Rich Roll?

  It really is. And we grew up in a time where it was, you know, in a box that your friend's dad had in the basement somewhere or buried in the woods or some shit like that. And now it's like ubiquitous and so readily available and unlimited. And it's fucking crazy.

• 29:53Terry Crews?

  I can't, listen, man, the thought of what kids are possibly looking at right now, it's since, it's since chills down my back. Chills. And, cause I know what path it set me on. And again, man, you know, people have said, I don't think you can be addicted to pornography and the whole thing. But, but my problem was is that, hey, man, if day turns into night and you're still watching it and you say you don't want to and you keep doing it, I don't know what else to call it. But I found even as a young kid, what happened is when I discovered it, it took all my problems away. I mean, I was, when I opened that magazine,

• 30:37Terry Crews?

  I didn't even know what I was looking at, mind you. I didn't even know how to have sex. But I just knew, oh my God, this is mind blowing, you know? And I was totally numbed out. And I forgot about the violence. I forgot about my dad and I forgot about the religiosity. And then what would happen is I would get shame. And you feel like, oh Lord, I know I'm going to hell. I'm going to hell. And so you would say, I'll be good. I'll be good. And I became a performer. I became this person who wanted to keep peace in the house. I was going to be the best, most Christian kid. And I was going to be the best, most great kid for my dad, you know, and do whatever he says, right?

• 31:18Terry Crews?

  But I had no say of my own. Like, what I wanted was always fourth thing down the line. You know what I mean? And I was taught that, like, literally, like, it don't matter what you want. You know, you better listen to what we're saying. You better listen to what's going on here. And so the neighborhood had pull, the gangs had pull, my parents had pull, but I had no voice.

• 31:40Rich Roll?

  Right. And you're just trying to keep the peace and keep everyone else happy. I mean, it's classic child of alcoholic stuff. And what's interesting about your story is like, you've never drank, right? Like, you saw your dad, you're like, I don't want that. You don't do drugs. But, you know, maybe you got the gene and it just got expressed through porn, right? And it was that way. I mean, alcohol would have served a similar purpose of just numbing the pain and allowing you to escape, but then creating, you know, external circumstances that weren't so good, which leads to that shame spiral. But ultimately, because you're not dealing with what's causing that internal pain, you're always going to go back to it.

• 32:18Terry Crews?

  That's right. I mean, I shudder to think, had I been involved with gambling, um, I just, I'd go, oh, my God, like, I would have been, I, I tell them, if I had ever been like a drug dealer, I would have been the worst, you know, it, I'd have been Nino Brown, I'd have been, you know what I mean? Like, I'd have been Tony Montana, and it would have been, I just do everything to that level. You know what I mean? Like, it's very extreme. I, I didn't even go to a football playing school. I ended up in the NFL. You know what I mean? It's just, I'm very, very-

• 32:49Rich Roll?

  A whole crazy story in and of itself.

• 32:50Terry Crews?

  Yeah, I, I'm, I'm just, I have no, what I say, I go 100 and, and I have no half-speed button. You know what I'm saying? It's kind of like, I'm either all in or I'm out.

• 33:03Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 33:04Terry Crews?

  Um, and that's the way it's been. But it happened, like, it, it works for me when it's a good thing and when it's a bad thing. Oh, my God.

• 33:13Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 33:13Terry Crews?

  It can tear up everything.

• 33:21Rich Roll?

  Well, I want to put a pin in the whole pornography thing and return to that because I want to talk about the recovery piece there. But as we're working our way through this story, you make this pact with your friend Darwin. You're going to tell each other what you find out in the world. But you do have, like, there are a couple mentors who show up. You have this teacher at Flint Academy who kind of changes your life.

• 33:43Terry Crews?

  He does. First of all, there were two people. One was a coach and one was a teacher. My teacher was my art teacher named Mr. Eichelberg. And he believed in me when I didn't believe in myself. You have to understand, like, for me, especially in Michigan, there are two Michigans. There's like the white Michigan, there's the Ann Arbor.

• 34:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I'm from the white Michigan.

• 34:07Terry Crews?

  Yeah, you know what I mean? There's Traverse City, it's gorgeous, it's pretty, they're by the water. And then there's Detroit. And there's Benton Harbor, there's Flint, there's Muskegon, you know? I mean, cities like that. And what happens is, I didn't, I remember people talking about the Cranbrook Academy of Art. You know? And there were no black people there. You know what I mean? Not when I was a kid. It wasn't-

• 34:34Rich Roll?

  But Cranbrook is like the epic private school in, like, kind of near Gross Point.

• 34:38Terry Crews?

  Exactly. And it's very white, very-

• 34:41Rich Roll?

  It has this incredible arts program.

• 34:43Terry Crews?

  Oh, incredible. No, beyond belief. And I, but I said, "I'm not going there." Like, that's not going to be me. I couldn't see a way in, right? And, but, I loved to draw. And I just was, I loved doing my thing. And Mr. Eichelberg looked at me and he, he literally grabbed all my stuff. He said, "Terry, he said, "This is the best work I've ever seen." He's like, "Hey, man, you, I'm the teacher and you're better than me. You could teach the class."

• 35:12Rich Roll?

  How old were you at the time?

• 35:13Terry Crews?

  Oh, I was, shoot, 10th grade. I was probably in 10th grade, 14 years old. And he says, Ben, you, he said, you have tremendous talent. And I was like, thanks, thanks. And what I would do is back in the day, you know, when the drug dealers took over, I mean, all the, the crack epidemic was hitting hard. It was like through the eighties and then hip hop was coming along with it. So what I would do is I would make all these sketches of like Mickey Mouse as a drug dealer, you know, uh, this kind of stuff. And they were print T-shirts.

• 35:44Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 35:44Terry Crews?

  And that was like, I would get $25 for a T-shirt. My T-shirt would be all around the city because everybody grabbed it. And you see him, he'd have the cell phone and the, you know, all the stuff and the accoutrements to feel, you know, the Fila shoes, the Nikes and you, you kind of ghettoize these characters. And that was one thing that I did to make money and kind of do that. And I, I thought that's the pinnacle. Like that's all the art's going to be doing for me.

• 36:08Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 36:08Terry Crews?

  He took my art, photographed it, basically put it all into applications to all these places and got me a scholarship to Interlockin Arts Academy, which is one of the most prestigious arts academies in the world. Like Larry Page, the founder of Google, went there along amongst everybody.

• 36:30Rich Roll?

  Jewel went there too.

• 36:31Terry Crews?

  Oh Jewel.

• 36:31Rich Roll?

  I've been there, it's incredible.

• 36:32Terry Crews?

  It's, it's, it's life changing. And I, he said, Terry, he came up to me, he said, Terry, I, I, he said, I want to, I want to give you, I got something to tell you. He said, and I was like, what do you mean? He says, I got an announcement. I got you a scholarship, one to Interlockin and to Western Michigan University. Because he had, by that time, I was around, you know, I was right before my senior year and he had got all that stuff for, you know.

• 36:59Rich Roll?

  Just did it for you.

• 37:00Terry Crews?

  And did it.

• 37:01Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 37:01Terry Crews?

  And I didn't even, I didn't even know.

• 37:03Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 37:04Terry Crews?

  And he was like, that's how good I believe you are, man. And you got it. And I just shook like, what in the world? And I, it changed my life, dude. To this day, it changed my, I remember when I go to, went to Interlockin and out of about 500 people, 500 kids that were there for that summer session, it was about six black kids, you know? And so. And I was part of the arts department, the arts program. And so they, they had this curator from the University of Cincinnati come. And I had, they said, you know, big on competition. So they were like, draw two drawings and put it on the board, but don't put your name on it. So I put it on the board and it was amongst this whole wall full of everyone's drawings. Right?

• 37:49Terry Crews?

  And they asked the curator, which one was the best? And he went all the way around the room and he said, that one. And it was mine.

• 37:58Rich Roll?

  Hmm.

• 37:58Terry Crews?

  And then he said, so what's the next best? He went all the way around, around the room and went to my other one. And that's when it hit me. The moment it hit me and people were clapping and they were like, well, that's Terry. And that's when I realized, wow, like I am, I'm as good as anybody. Like it, cause I didn't believe it, you know? I was told, but that was the moment I was like, there is something here. Like that, this is special. This is something that I can count on. Like this is, this is something I, I could, I have to invest in, you know? And it changed my, my, my trajectory because again, I spent so much time hiding my art. I spent so much time trying not to be a nerd, you know?

• 38:43Terry Crews?

  It was like trying not to be that guy. Cause I would get super excited, but oh man, I got these ideas, man. And they would look at me like, all right, like, who do you think you are? And I was like, okay, let me just, all right, don't worry about it, you know?

• 38:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 38:56Terry Crews?

  Even family members.

• 38:57Rich Roll?

  From like a who do you think you are culture too? Like, don't get so high on your own supply.

• 39:01Terry Crews?

  Totally. Totally. I mean, you have to understand, even my family members were like, who do you think you are? Relax. My father was straight up to, hey man, the white man only gonna let you go so far. That was his, that would, you could put that on a T-shirt. You could have that as a mantra. We might as well put that in a frame.

• 39:19Rich Roll?

  That was his lived experience.

• 39:21Terry Crews?

  That's it. White man is only going to let you get so far. So stop asking. Like literally stop. And I just couldn't stop. I, after I had that interlocking experience and I saw what I could do, I said, I'm not gonna stop. I'm not gonna stop asking.

• 39:38Rich Roll?

  So you end up at Western Michigan. You get this scholarship, an art scholarship to go there.

• 39:43Terry Crews?

  Yeah.

• 39:44Rich Roll?

  The question then becomes like, why didn't you just go full in on the art thing? And instead you're like, I'm gonna play football.

• 39:50Terry Crews?

  Because it was only $500.

• 39:55Terry Crews?

  Now, understand, you could go to college back in nineteen, what, in nineteen eighty seven, you could go to college for three thousand dollars. You could, and you could work and go to college and for three grand, you would pay all your tuition, do your whole thing. Over the years, it turned into a hundred thousand dollars. But back then, the concept of you working and going to college was, was pretty much

• 40:18Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 40:19Terry Crews?

  Normal.

• 40:19Rich Roll?

  So you started to come up with twenty five hundred bucks.

• 40:21Terry Crews?

  You can't work and go to college. Yeah, I paid, I paid a hundred thousand dollars for my daughter's school. I was like, where's she gonna get a hundred grand from? You know what I mean? It's like, she can't do that. So five hundred dollars went a long way, but it wasn't enough to pay for everything. And my mother went into, they went into debt. My father was resisting the whole time, like, man, you need to do something else, go to vocational school, whatever. I was like, look, I want to go to college and the whole thing. And she was like, look, we only have enough money for one semester. Actually, she said, one year, we'll pull together one year. That first five hundred dollars helped the first semester. I can help with the other semester, but after that, and what happened is I didn't get a scholarship that first year. And I begged, I said, just give me one more semester.

• 41:06Terry Crews?

  Now, you have to understand too, my brother and sister were lacking and I asked for everything. I literally was asking everybody to contribute and it was selfish. It was like, I can do this, but I need everybody to contribute. And they, and it became with a level of resentment. You know what I mean? It was a little bit like, hey, man, why should we put all this into just you, you know? But I was like, I, I'm worth it. I, I promise I'll make it worth it. And they did one more semester, I got a scholarship.

• 41:38Terry Crews?

  And that was, let me tell you, that's the one moment I found out and knew that no was negotiable. You know, like, as long as you just keep going, eventually you're going to get what you want if you just don't stop. And that was a big, big moment for me, getting that scholarship. It was, it was incredible. But I, but I still had a lot of, and this is what's so scary, and I write about it in the book, it's just I had a lot of entitlement. Tons of autonomy, because this is another thing. My mother viewed religion like it was a magic wand. You know what I mean? It was, you know, we name it and claim it, you know? In Jesus' name, I command my bills paid. But you do nothing.

• 42:22Rich Roll?

  Not a lot of action.

• 42:23Terry Crews?

  Nothing.

• 42:23Rich Roll?

  Just faith.

• 42:24Terry Crews?

  To get those bills paid. Like, I demand, in Jesus' name, I'm gonna lose a hundred pounds. And die of obesity. And, but they wouldn't, the lifestyle would never change. Nothing would ever, so, you know, Jesus became the fairy godmother. And I, I saw this and I was like, but why don't, like, and I realized that I needed to combine, I realized later that I needed to combine the talk with the action. But up until that point, I was still a little bit of that same, like, name it, claim it. Like, hey, Jesus got me this. And so I was super entitled. Like, I didn't really wanna work. You know what I mean?

• 43:07Terry Crews?

  It was like, everything, it was out of my control. You know what I mean? And I, I basically, you know, was expecting a handout in a lot of ways. And my whole attitude was just a mess, man. Like, to the point where I wouldn't work. You know, I, I, after I got the scholarship, I felt like somebody owed me. I had a lot of resentment to the school, even while I was playing. Because I was like, you're about time, you know? And it was, it's weird how these little, what you would call victories, could actually be the thing that keep you from true success. You know what I mean?

• 43:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, from an outsider looking in, it looks like you get this scholarship, it's not enough. So you had the wherewithal to say, I'm gonna walk onto the football team and turn this into a scholarship and then turn this into an NFL career. That requires a lot of action, right? And a lot of self-belief.

• 44:05Terry Crews?

  Right.

• 44:06Rich Roll?

  But that doesn't get done unless you're committed, because the odds are stacked against you.

• 44:10Terry Crews?

  Yep, yep. I have to say, even with the NFL, this is another thing about the NFL, which was really eye opening. You know, you think it's discipline, but it's not. It's, you know, someone's telling you when to wake up, they're telling you when to eat, telling you when to work out, they're telling you when to practice and tell you when to go to sleep. This is why so many athletes have problems when the career is over because there's no one to tell you this stuff anymore. It's not self-discipline. It's the discipline that someone else is telling you to get everything done. But you're not going to succeed unless you know how to do this yourself. It's just not going to happen.

• 44:54Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 44:55Terry Crews?

  And I was left without knowing any of that.

• 44:58Rich Roll?

  I mean, your story of transcending that into an even, you know, bigger career is so the exception. And, but, you know, most guys, we think of NFL players, they're ballers, they're making cash, they're living large. Most guys have your experience, which is every week they're vying for their job, you're getting traded, you're on five or six teams for maybe two years and then you call it a day and it's over.

• 45:23Terry Crews?

  And you're broke. Most, most NFL players go broke probably within five years of having that NFL career.

• 45:30Rich Roll?

  And how are you ever going to recapture that, you know, kind of excitement about how you're living your life? Nothing's going to replace that.

• 45:39Terry Crews?

  That's the mistake. See, and that's what's so crazy, I think, is that can you imagine being 30 years old and the best thing that was ever going to happen to you has already happened? That's nothing but depression right ahead. It's nothing but depression in the future. There's no, nothing to look forward to. And then, not only that, you fucked it up. And people do not hesitate.

• 46:04Rich Roll?

  And your whole life for 15 years before that was all about getting to that place. So there wasn't a lot of bandwidth for even thinking about anything outside of that. The fact that you had this gift as an artist and something that you were cultivating all along the way and using as a, as a means of survival

• 46:18Terry Crews?

  Yep.

• 46:19Rich Roll?

  is, is unique and unusual.

• 46:21Terry Crews?

  Yeah, I would go back in the locker rooms once I got cut and I would ask the star players if they wanted their portraits painted. And I would, I would get like five grand a painting and I would do three paintings and I would get 15 grand and that would get me through the off season. You know, we were poor, man. But when I told, let me, the biggest story that I tell that was my super wake up call. You know, my, my best friend to this day is a guy named Ken Harvey, who used to play with the Redskins. I was his backup. And when I moved to LA, he helped us move to LA. He gave us a loan and he actually, I wouldn't even call it a loan. It was a gift. He was like, just go on out there. I, I believe in your talent.

• 47:03Terry Crews?

  He knew I was a good artist and he was like, go on out there and make your way. And I didn't come out to LA to act. I was actually trying to get behind the scenes. I saw myself as a creator. I mean, I was trying to do that whole industrial light magic thing. If I was a special effects artist, I had my portfolio in at Disney, at DreamWorks. Yeah. You show them the, you show them the drug dealer Mickey Mouse? Yeah. Not that one. To get a cease and desist letter. Uh, yeah. I, I definitely didn't show him that one, but it was in the portfolio. Okay. But what was crazy is that, um, I thought, man, this is gonna be my way. I can, I can actually draw my way into Hollywood. And then Toy Story came out and all hand drawn animation was over overnight.

• 47:47Terry Crews?

  I remember submitting my, my artwork for Prince of Egypt. That was one of the last hand drawn animation movies done. And then when Toy Story hit, bam, it was over. So, but I had this pride and entitlement still. And I was going through depression because football was over. It didn't end the way I wanted to end. You always have these lofty goals and I was done. We were in this really, you know, terrible duplex. Just trying to make ends meet. I had no money. I was broke. My wife, and this is the thing, my wife, the whole time was like, you need a job. And I was like, come on, I'm, you know, I'm a, I'm a pro football player. It's gonna look crazy. I'm not gonna be just doing anything, right? And so I kept asking my friend for loans.

• 48:30Terry Crews?

  A Ken was giving me a loan and what was happening, he would give me, he was a gold bug and he would have all this gold bouillon. Some financial advisor had told him to put money in gold. So it wouldn't, you know, back then it was, it was, that was a big thing a lot of players were doing.

• 48:45Rich Roll?

  You got like a stash of bars?

• 48:47Terry Crews?

  Yeah, it was coins. He would have these rolls of gold coins and they would be stashed around the house. You know what I mean? And that's the new, back now this cryptocurrency is the big deal. But back then it was gold bouillon. And people were always, you know, they were advising people to have some of your money in gold and some of your money in this. He would give me like a stack of coins and he would say, hey, man, whatever the price of gold is that day, turn it in. And each coin was like 300 bucks. So he'd send me like five or six coins and that would get me through the month. But come six, eight, six, seven, eight months down, I'm still asking for loans, right? And we were going broke, man. And I mean, when I say broke, we were digging in the couches for like this money for milk.

• 49:32Terry Crews?

  And it was like, and my wife was like, why don't you get a job, man? And I was like, yeah, but it's gonna work. Cause I still had this fantasy of something's gonna come save me, like a Mr. Eichelberg with a scholarship or this and this, or again, Jesus is gonna save us. You know what I mean?

• 49:49Rich Roll?

  Don't you know who I think I am?

• 49:50Terry Crews?

  And I, without me working at all, I was using my mother's technique, right?

• 49:55Rich Roll?

  Claim it.

• 49:56Terry Crews?

  And then one day he said, man, no more loans. Oh, okay. Okay. Now, when your voice gets all high like that, you know you're doing something wrong. I was like, oh, okay, okay. Cause you know you overstepped, you know, oh my God. It was the first moment of like, he just pushed back. And I hung up and I was like, how the fuck is he gonna, fuck him. My whole attitude was like, he's supposed to be a friend and he's supposed to help me out. And I'm saying, he knows I'm out here, he knows I'm struggling. What the hell, man? Fuck you.

• 50:33Terry Crews?

  And then this little voice came to me like, hey, man, why are you mad at the only person who helped you in the first place?

• 50:41Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 50:42Terry Crews?

  I went, my family didn't give me any money. Nobody else gave me, he's the one who actually was giving me money. I wasn't angry at anybody else who told me no, I was only angry at the person who actually hooked me up.

• 50:54Rich Roll?

  Right, which is related to resenting Western Michigan for giving you a scholarship.

• 50:58Terry Crews?

  You see what I mean?

• 50:59Rich Roll?

  Weird thing.

• 50:59Terry Crews?

  It's same thing. Imagine if you, if you just gave ten dollars to some person every day and all of a sudden you go, that's it. There we go, what the, where's my, where's my ten bucks? That's where I was at. And I was like, I didn't, I didn't deserve that. I never earned it. It was something that was a gift. And he was like, no more. And it hit me, man. I said, I'm wrong, man. But remember, remember, my wife was telling me this the whole time, but because I was a man and because I viewed myself as more valuable than she was, all her advice was secondary. It was as if my kids were telling me something.

• 51:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 51:39Terry Crews?

  And because I came at it as this attitude of what masculinity is, you're supposed to already know. So any, you know, what your wife is saying is

• 51:50Terry Crews?

  she was telling the truth the whole time. But it's so crazy, I would listen when Ken said it. It hit me. Another man told me. I was like, oh damn. And so the next day, I got up like four thirty in the morning, went to this place called Labor Ready. I'll never forget, it was in North Hollywood, five in the morning, I show up with drug addicts, halfway house guys, you know, straight out of prison, trying to make it, whole thing, homeless. And I show up and what they do at Labor Ready is give you a job for the day and you get paid at the end of the day. And they sent me to this place called White Cap. And it was somewhere, I, I forget, I think it was somewhere in, in the valley, right?

• 52:35Terry Crews?

  Some valley somewhere. And I would go in there and hand me a broom. Now, let me tell you something, man, I thought I was gonna pass out. I said, if I start sweeping, I was like, man, I was in the NFL. I think now I got this broom in my hand in a factory and I'm like, oh, I think I thought I was just gonna fall to the ground. All of a sudden, I took that thing and man, I remember tears just welling up like, this might be my life. This might be where I'm at. How did I fall so low? How did I get from the NFL and all the promise of the artwork and the then and then

• 53:12Terry Crews?

  and the scholarship and I'm sweeping the damn floor in a factory. But this is the craziness about it. It was so wild. I started sweeping and all of a sudden, I felt an energy. And I remember people were like, man, hey, man, you look a little familiar. I was like, man, you don't know me. And I pulled my hat down a little, a little further and I kept sweeping. But I got new energy because I was actually, for the first time, doing something about my situation. Whereas before, I was just sitting and wait.

• 53:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 53:50Terry Crews?

  And I was like, oh, my God. And so I was like, let me get in the corners and let me, let me do this job. Because another thing is, the resisting work is the hard part. But embracing work, the day goes by like that.

• 54:05Rich Roll?

  Well, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I got it. I mean, it's, it's interesting that you were able to like, do that math quickly. Like, generally, it takes a lot longer before you kind of are lured into a place of surrender to it. But that acceptance, like, I'm gonna be a worker among workers, is an act of humbling yourself. But that's the place where you can begin to grow. I mean, this is like a big, you know, you're sober now. Like, you understand, like, that that peace, that acceptance and that humility is so important to growth, right? Getting over your own, you know, self aggrandizement and idea of who you think you should be and how people are supposed to interact with you is a really beautiful

• 54:47Rich Roll?

  thing, right? And I, and as you're telling that story, I'm thinking about your dad polishing his shoes. Like, you have so little agency. It's like the surrender, the serenity prayer, right? Like, there are so few things that you have control over. But you know what I have control over? I have control over how I conduct myself with this job today. And I can do it with a sense of gratitude and pride. And that's gonna make it worth it.

• 55:09Terry Crews?

  Oh, man. There is a poem. That I heard that I just love, it says, um, and I can't pronounce the name of the guy who wrote it. It's, I'll massacre it, but it goes, it says, I slept and dreamt of joy. I awoke and realized life was service. I worked and I'm behold, service was joy. And I was, wow, whoa, that's it. That's beautiful. It's so beautiful. And I went, that's what was happening. And I did that eight hours. I went back, got my check. It was like sixty-four dollars.

• 55:54Terry Crews?

  They took out the taxes. I had forty-eight dollars. I put twenty dollars in the gas tank. I gave twenty dollars to my wife for groceries and I had eight dollars in my hand. And I said, I will never be broke again. Because you know, you say it takes a while, but it happened. It kind of cracked that egg when I walked in there. The fact that I actually got in the car that morning and went in was, you, it's like, that's the egg cracking. Mm-hmm. The sweeping was when it started to sizzle. You know what I mean? But I had, because I was been months not moving. But that, I mean, I broke through that thing because I thought everyone was gonna look at me and everyone's gonna judge me and nobody cared.

• 56:39Terry Crews?

  No, because they're thinking about themselves. Exactly. No one is thinking about you. You know what I mean? No one even knew me. And that was this, this obstacle, this huge like wall that I felt like I had to climb. And I realized, nobody gives a damn about where I'm at. So how long did you do that for? Oh, man, probably a, a week, a week. And then, well, I, I went and applied for another, because once I broke that, I went and applied at another place called Western Staff Services. And then I got a job being a, I was filing all the papers that fell over in the Northridge earthquake at the Veterans Administration. I was like, this is better than sweeping. Right. And so, but I was, I was a filer. And so I did that for a year.

• 57:24Terry Crews?

  Uh-huh. But I didn't have to do the hard labor stuff. But let me tell you something, man. As I started to go and I started to, I said, okay, we're here. This is my life now. And I started to grow. I started to grow. Now, mind you, there was still a lot of things I didn't get right. But I started to understand the entitlement piece. It was like you are not owed anything. And I started to say, you have to work for this. You know, this is not a, you gotta understand that that religious mindset was actually like a lottery mentality. You know what I mean? We just keep playing God. We keep rolling on God. It's gonna hit for us one day. You know what I mean?

• 58:03Terry Crews?

  And you're left with nothing. But I realized I can do something. Like you said, it was the Serenity Prayer, the things that I can control. Control it. You know what I mean? But for a long, long time, I thought I couldn't even control what happened to me, like myself. I couldn't, like, if the wind went right, I was going right. And when it went that way, I was succumb to that. And I realized I could walk straight. I could really, really handle my own business in myself. And then I started doing security for the movie sets. And let me tell you something, I loved that gig. It's wild when I look back, the first movie I ever did a security for was a movie called Man on the Moon with Jim Carrey, Danny DeVito.

• 58:46Terry Crews?

  Milos Forman was the director. And I was standing in, I'll never forget, in my cast security shirt. And I would iron my shirts and get batteries in my flashlight. And I would work out and make sure that I looked great. And, and I was like, I'm in the movie business.

• 59:02Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 59:02Terry Crews?

  I'm in the movie business. You know what I mean? It was so, and, and I was like, I'm on a set. I'm on this whole thing. And that was the really wonderful thing. And I was happy, man. Like, I'll tell you this. I'll never forget being like, this is my life now. I got settled to this is what it's going to be. And I had no idea what was in store for me.

• 59:25Rich Roll?

  So you weren't casting your, your gaze on some goal and like working in your free time to move forward on that? Or just like, this is where I'm at and this is what it's gonna be?

• 59:36Terry Crews?

  But let me tell you, I was working on my free time because what I would do is while I was standing there, like doing that stuff, I would write scripts. I would write down ideas. I would go to the library because I couldn't afford to buy the books. I would buy books on Hollywood. And when no one was around, because sometimes they would have me watching areas that they didn't want mess with. So there was nobody. So I would just read the books all day and just stand there and read the books.

• 1:00:01Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:02Terry Crews?

  And just learn about the business and learn about all this stuff and.

• 1:00:06Rich Roll?

  But was it still about being an artist in the business? Or was the idea of being an actor starting to creep in?

• 1:00:11Terry Crews?

  Artists.

• 1:00:11Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:00:12Terry Crews?

  Artists. Never an actor. Never.

• 1:00:13Rich Roll?

  But you had that experience on set for Training Day.

• 1:00:16Terry Crews?

  Right.

• 1:00:17Rich Roll?

  Right?

• 1:00:17Terry Crews?

  It was.

• 1:00:18Rich Roll?

  Which is pretty cool.

• 1:00:18Terry Crews?

  But listen, this is even freakier. I was security on a movie called End of Days with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

• 1:00:24Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 1:00:25Terry Crews?

  Jeff Dawn, who is Arnold's makeup artist, was walking on the set and he was, he came up to me and I was a security guard and I was like, okay, extras go this way, you know, crew is over here. He looked at me, he said, hey, man, you ever act? And I went, oh, no, sir, that's not me. He was like, dude, he said, you got a great look, man. You need to, I'm serious, you really need to try it. He said, I'm a makeup artist. I do makeup and I'm Arnold's guy. I'm here to tell you, you got a great look. I thought he was hitting on me. So I was like, oh, thank you, sir. Extras are this way and crew is that way.

• 1:01:03Terry Crews?

  Thank you very much. Flash forward one year later, I'm an hired actor on the movie The Sixth Day with Schwarzenegger. I go into the makeup trailer, there's Jeff Dawn, and he says, wait a minute, you look familiar. I said, you told me a year ago.

• 1:01:22Rich Roll?

  That's fucking crazy.

• 1:01:23Terry Crews?

  That I should be acting. And here I am. He said, holy shit. Like, I'm making people rich here. He said, you're kidding. Like, you can't even make this up.

• 1:01:34Rich Roll?

  No, that's crazy.

• 1:01:35Terry Crews?

  You can't.

• 1:01:35Rich Roll?

  And you had the, the security gig that came full circle too, right?

• 1:01:39Terry Crews?

  Right. Listen, man, when I look at.

• 1:01:43Terry Crews?

  Every opportunity, it's kind of like, you realize if you wrote this stuff, it would be contrived, you know what I mean? It's, truth is stranger than fiction in every way. And my thing is, you know, from being a security guy and acting, because we were broke and a friend of mine, because I was bouncing, I had like three, two or three jobs, I would do the security gig, you know, I would bounce. And a friend of mine was like, hey man, there's this audition for this one show, you should try it. And I went home and I said, you know, so many, I asked my wife, I said, so many people telling me I should try this acting thing. She said, why not? She said, just go. And I went and I got it. First thing I ever auditioned for. The Battle Dome thing?

• 1:02:26Terry Crews?

  Battle Dome, which was American Gladiators on steroids. Okay, and this is where all the football stuff, everything played out. And my first time as an actor. And now I got the gig and I'm like, I don't know anything about what acting is, right? So I did what I- Careful what you ask for. Let me tell you what I did. I did what I did when the kids would talk about Star Wars and I would go home and start drawing it out and think about what it is, even though I hadn't seen the movie. What I did was create a character that I said, I don't know how to act, but I know what I want to see. So what I'm going to do is be what I want to see. How would I like to be seen? Like if I was watching, what would I do?

• 1:03:12Terry Crews?

  And I became the breakout character. I became this guy named T. Money, who was this bad guy from the hood and the whole thing. And I was just vicious and mean and I would never let the contestants see me. Because it was a game show where we fought. They put me in a cage, set the end zone fire and rotate the cage. And I would just wrestle three contestants in a row and it was bloody. I mean, we would leave bleeding every show. It's this metal, skin on metal. It was pre MMA, so there was no ultimate fighting, no one knew anything about that. But man, if you look at the clips, it was one of the most brutal. The, the log line for the show was real competition, real pain. And that's all you need to know.

• 1:03:56Terry Crews?

  That's it, right? And if, and we, man, we blasted people. But what was happening is I was learning how, it was like grand theater. It was a lesson. It was a whole thing like I was, and let me tell you, I can't tell you the nerves. They would put me behind a wall and every time the wall opened up and the worry, we would come out. And every time I felt like throwing up every time because I don't know what I'm doing. And I wanted to run out of there, but I was like, what am I gonna run to? What am I gonna run to? I'm gonna be back to security? Back to sweeping floors? I said, hell no. And I had to go. I had to push. It was the thing where you've walked halfway across the country. What are you gonna do? Turn around? You know what I mean? Like, you gotta keep walking now.

• 1:04:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that imposter syndrome. I mean, because you don't have, you still have never really done any kind of formal training, right? And you have that story of working on The Expendables where you have that same experience where you have to kind of reckon with yourself like, how am I gonna show up for this?

• 1:04:55Terry Crews?

  Let me tell you about that. What was wild is because the sense of entitlement creeped back up. I'd already done a few movies, done some things. I end up in The Expendables. And I felt I wasn't getting used enough. Like, I'm thinking I'm excited about being an action star. And I'm sitting in my hotel room. And all of a sudden Sly and everybody, they're going on the set and doing the thing.

• 1:05:18Rich Roll?

  Everyone else has done like thirty action movies.

• 1:05:21Terry Crews?

  Right, and I haven't either.

• 1:05:22Rich Roll?

  Been the leading man for like their whole adult lives.

• 1:05:27Terry Crews?

  This is how, this is how insidious the attitude of entitlement can be. It doesn't matter. It sneaks right in. Someone gives you a little bit, all of a sudden you're like, why didn't I get the whole thing? It's so pervasive. But I was sitting in my hotel room. And I was so mad and I would go on and I was, I was like, man, instead of just being grateful. I said, you know, I'm gonna say my line. I'm gonna go home. I got an attitude and it just crept in and all of a sudden again, man, it's that little voice.

• 1:05:59Rich Roll?

  Which is insanity, given that, given that you've been given this gift to be in this movie.

• 1:06:04Terry Crews?

  Insanity. And it's a little, the little voice, the same voice that told me about Ken and like, why are you mad at him? It was like, hey, man.

• 1:06:15Terry Crews?

  You got this opportunity of a lifetime. What the fuck are you doing? Like, man, go in there and do your best every time. Who cares? And so what I did, it hit me. I said, man, you're right. Like, all that alone time, which I'm very thankful for, really helped with the introspection. Because what happens is, if you've got too many people around, too many crew, they can really talk you out of your dream. They can really mess you up. You're like, yeah, you know what? You should be. Why are you not the star? You know, and you get those wrong validating opinions, and you're off. And that crew will take you right out. And I was alone. And I went to work the next day, and I was thankful.

• 1:06:58Terry Crews?

  I said, man, just, I don't care what I'm feeling. I said, I'm gonna get everything I got. And I walked in, I said hello to everybody. And I was like, what's the lines? And I started to improv and do. And Sly was like, man, hey, man, I like you, man. I'm gonna put you in over this day. You're gonna save my life in this movie. That's what he told me. And I totally changed what happened in that movie. That experience changed because of my attitude change.

• 1:07:29Rich Roll?

  Right, so he ends up rewriting the ending to make you the hero.

• 1:07:32Terry Crews?

  It was, dude, and I couldn't believe it. And I realized that was so, like, that was another lesson. Same lesson like when I got my scholarship. It was that lesson that like, wait a minute, man. You can change this thing. Your attitude can never, ever waver. You have to have, you can't let entitlement creep in and steal what's yours.

• 1:07:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah, gratitude being the antidote to entitlement.

• 1:07:59Terry Crews?

  Exactly.

• 1:08:07Rich Roll?

  I mean, you've spoken a lot about gratitude, how, you know, you're the most grateful person. But gratitude is a practice. It didn't come to you easily early. So how do you make sure that you're on top of your gratitude?

• 1:08:21Terry Crews?

  You know, I basically, you know, you look at your results. You look at where you are. You look at what's happening. You know what I mean? And one thing is, I always can, this is one thing, even like writing a book, journaling. I would, used to write my top 10 goals down every day. And I did that for probably 15 years. So I had, you know, the Franklin planner. You remember those?

• 1:08:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:46Terry Crews?

  Uh, I have tons of those, those stacked up. And what helps me with gratitude, I go back to 2001, my Franklin planner, and look at those top 10 goals. And I did them all, like way exceeded them. Like, and then I go back to 2005 and I go, I did all that. And then I go into 2008, I did all that. And it's so, it, it fills me with the gratitude that I'm supposed to have. Cause you know where you were and what was so amazing at that time. Like if I could only make a million dollars a year. You know what I mean?

• 1:09:25Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:25Terry Crews?

  And you go, wow, wow, I've gone way past. You're like, holy God.

• 1:09:32Rich Roll?

  Right. It's a weird thing. Like, I'm really interested in this. So, you know, in my own case, like it's wild that I'm sitting across from you and then I get to do this thing. And it's not anything that ever found its way into my version of the Franklin planner. So it's this tension between, yes, you want to set goals for yourself and you want to work hard and show up and be diligent. But also you have to make space for the miracle because you can't imagine what your life could possibly be, right? Like you have to hold that tension with the goals that you're seeking a little bit loosely. So you can make space for stuff that you can't even predict for yourself. And for me, it always goes back to the inside job. Like, how much am I working on myself?

• 1:10:17Rich Roll?

  Where are my blind spots? Where are the things that, you know, I could be more grateful? Or, you know, work on some other area. And it seems completely disconnected from whatever goal I'm seeking in the external world. But all I know is that when I'm doing that, when I'm engaged in that process, that's where I'm sort of taking that insurance policy out on greater possibility that I can't quite fathom.

• 1:10:40Terry Crews?

  Exactly. You know, and I had to find these challenges, like, cause you get complacent.

• 1:10:48Terry Crews?

  And it's the comfort zone. And there was a time as an actor, you're like, you're gonna get hired. It's all good. And you're gonna be on a sitcom or some sort of show. You'll be the fourth lead and you'll be like, and you can just live that life. You know, you'll be that guy on the CSI or whatever.

• 1:11:05Rich Roll?

  Brooklyn Nine-Nine for the next twenty years.

• 1:11:07Terry Crews?

  Right, or another version of that. You could just do, but this is the thing. I was like, there's more. And I felt too comfortable. And it made me weird because I was going, I don't like complacency. Because I'm a little, I started to study it and start to look at it. And it was like, man, you're getting a little, like, it's almost like getting chubby. You know what I mean? Where you're like, I'm just eating the same thing. I'm not really, I said, I need a challenge. I need something that's gonna excite me. So I started, I forced myself into hosting. Forced by, like, you gotta understand.

• 1:11:45Terry Crews?

  Two hundred and forty pound muscular big guy was not the first guy you would think of as a television host.

• 1:11:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but you got the charm and the charisma and the smile and the teeth and the whole thing.

• 1:11:57Terry Crews?

  Well, now.

• 1:11:58Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:59Terry Crews?

  At the time, people didn't, were like, does he? I know him from, everybody hates Chris. I know him from, you know, this kind of thing. But, and so I remember going in and doing an audition for Who Wants to be a Millionaire? The daily version of that. And let me tell you, I could tell you that it was actually a failure. Okay? That was not a good look. Because here I was on a game show, the daily version of a show that'd been on TV for years. And I'm this character who talked way too loud for the daytime audience. Hey, how you guys doing? Yeah, yeah. So I overcompensated. And it was a little much for that audience. Because they're, you know, the people were like, I'm drinking my tea and he's screaming at me. Stop screaming.

• 1:12:43Terry Crews?

  All the notes were like, stop screaming, you know? And here I was, and I would do this daily thing. I did three hundred and sixty episodes in a year of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? While I was doing Brooklyn Nine-Nine. So I would fly to the East Coast, do the show and then do like, we would do almost seven episodes in a day. Like, ba ba ba ba ba ba ba all day. I was exhausted. Then fly back and go right to Brooklyn Nine-Nine. But I said, I have to get this like, like it was hook or crook. I said, I'm going to learn this and they gave me an opportunity to do it. And let me tell you, it didn't go well because they fired me the first year. I mean, when the year was over, they were like, we're gonna,

• 1:13:26Terry Crews?

  and they went with Chris Harrison. I had to understand. I was like, oh, man, it just didn't work. So there I was. I said, I gave, I put my heart. I had actors are like, why are you doing this? They would come up to me and they would say, Terry, like, man, you could be doing this acting. Why don't you do some more movies? Why don't you do that? I said, but what I saw was the future. I saw, I got tired of waiting to be picked. And I said, if I learn this skill, then I don't have to be, I could choose, I can choose. You know, there's not a lot of people, like, when you look at big stupid stars or people, they just charm, doesn't mean you can host. It doesn't mean you can do all that stuff. It's a whole nother thing. I said, I have to learn this. And man, what was so wild, and to this day, this is to your point about leaving

• 1:14:10Terry Crews?

  room. I'm hosting the number one talent show in the world with fourth year. And I look at this like, this was never on the list. I didn't know it would go this far. I was just trying to secure a future, hopefully do some things and, you know, that would allow me to pivot in different ways. But never did I see this.

• 1:14:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's crazy.

• 1:14:34Terry Crews?

  It's crazy. It's the biggest show in the world.

• 1:14:37Rich Roll?

  And I gotta tell you, you know, I will admit to being somewhat dismissive of the whole host thing. Like, ah, come on, that's not like real acting. That's not, you know, they're reading off the prompter and the whole thing. But I just had to host an all day conference in Miami. I do a fair amount of speaking. I was like, how hard can it be? You know, and I go there and I'm like, holy shit, like, I'm responsible for holding the energy for this group of, you know, this huge auditorium of people for like an eight hour stretch. Like, I better get my shit together. Ended up like rehearsing for eight hours, wrote a 35 page script and, you know, had to go out in between each speaker and come up with jokes on the fly and figure out. And I ended up leaving that experience, A, with just a huge amount of respect.

• 1:15:21Rich Roll?

  For how difficult that job is and how specific that skill set is and how different it is from typical public speaking and also any other kind of like performance oriented thing that I'd ever done. But also, it's completely thrilling. Like, it's so gratifying. Like, because you are like, you have to have these people in your hands, you know? And if, when you're in your kind of flow and you know that you're firing on all cylinders, it's a pretty cool thing.

• 1:15:46Terry Crews?

  Let me tell you, you know what I like to call it? They give me the keys to NBC.

• 1:15:51Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:51Terry Crews?

  I get the keys.

• 1:15:52Rich Roll?

  I mean, it's the biggest show, it's the biggest show in the world.

• 1:15:55Terry Crews?

  Wait, and it goes ding ding ding, and you have NBC in your hand. There's only you, and everyone's looking at you. And it's like, those doors open, you walk out, and you are representing everything. You're representing 30 Rock, you're representing Simon Cowell, you're representing every act, you're representing the show Me, it's been on for 17 years. And you have it in your hands. And it's like, oh, and it reminded me of the NFL. You know what I mean? It was that thrilling, like, the ball could go anywhere. Poop, and it's live, by the way, live, so anything can happen.

• 1:16:35Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:16:35Terry Crews?

  You know, I'll never forget, the prompter goes out, it happens. You still have to keep the show going, and you have to explain the rules and other, because it's rules. There's things that people want to try to win money, you can't miss it. You misinterpret it, people get sued, it's crazy. It's that pressure, and then the prompter goes out, and you still have to know what you're talking about. And when, and it's like, oh my, and dude, I would go home, I'm exhausted. Every fiber of my being is exhausted, and I'm happy. Like, I just played in the Super Bowl.

• 1:17:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:07Terry Crews?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:17:07Rich Roll?

  Yeah, because you're the glue. I mean, the panelists have to weigh in on the acts, but they're not responsible for keeping the show moving.

• 1:17:15Terry Crews?

  Not at all.

• 1:17:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:16Terry Crews?

  No, they, I go to them for an answer, I give them a question, but then I, I'm responsible for bringing an act out, introducing these guys, explaining the rules to the public. And I am, and it's so thrilling, I can't, like you said, dude, and then you think, the place is full of, you know, probably, what, 6,000 people in Adobe? And then you turn around and say, no, that's, it's really 100 million people watch. That kind of thing is like, holy, yeah.

• 1:17:44Rich Roll?

  We had Oz Perlman in here the other day. Do you remember him, the mentalist? Who ended up, I think he ended up third, maybe five years ago or something like that? Do you remember that guy?

• 1:17:53Terry Crews?

  No, he, yes, yes.

• 1:17:55Rich Roll?

  He did the mentalist.

• 1:17:55Terry Crews?

  Yes, the mentalist, yes.

• 1:17:57Rich Roll?

  He was pretty cool.

• 1:17:58Terry Crews?

  Dude, we got some great.

• 1:18:00Rich Roll?

  I know, it's unbelievable, the, the quality of talent and all the, all the stuff that you get to see.

• 1:18:05Terry Crews?

  But I'm gonna tell you this, every act that comes through reminds me of me. It reminds me of being in Flint, Michigan, dreaming of being somehow involved in entertainment, you know, no matter what it is. And everybody had huge, huge obstacles to get to that point. Huge. And a lot of people say, well, you know, yeah, who hates a sob story and whole thing? But there's not an entertainer that doesn't, because it's all rejection.

• 1:18:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:34Terry Crews?

  All of it. You just have to find ways to deal with your rejection. So I look at these acts and I'm their bodyguard, I'm their protector, I'm the person that gives them what they need on the way out. And then I'm the person that counsels them when they come back out from the, the audience, you know what I mean? And it's like, if it doesn't go well, I let them know that this is just the beginning. And if it goes great, I let them know, you gotta come back next week with more. You know, it's just, and it reminds me of me. And also, the people that are successful, I really, really try to pull something that, and learn something from them.

• 1:19:13Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:14Terry Crews?

  You know what I mean? And it's just a beautiful relation. I learn a lot doing that show, man. Because you meet so many different people and it's one of the highlights of my life. But it really, really was one of those things that I had to get out of my comfort zone. I had to find something new. And, and I'll be honest with you, I don't know what's next. I've been designing furniture.

• 1:19:36Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:19:37Terry Crews?

  And my wife is like, why are you doing this? I'm like, I don't know, I just, I need a challenge.

• 1:19:42Rich Roll?

  You gotta feed the artist, though.

• 1:19:43Terry Crews?

  I have to.

• 1:19:44Rich Roll?

  Are you painting still?

• 1:19:45Terry Crews?

  I'm painting, I'm, I'm drawing, I'm sketching, still designing. I'm in the fourth iteration of my, my, uh, collection with Bernhardt. But there's something else coming. Like, I, right now, I've been challenging myself to do, you know, more dramatic things. Um, you know, I did a, on, um, a show called Tales of the Walking Dead, which is not funny at all. Um, I love that challenge. I see myself doing, but this is another thing, man. Writing these books and being so vulnerable and putting my story out there is like moving from fiction to nonfiction is what I like to say. It's literally the next step, what I feel

• 1:20:26Terry Crews?

  in my career is beyond being an actor, but being a person of interest, you know, where let's talk about things together, you know, because this is another thing like being a host. It's almost like being able to have conversations with people and learn from people and tell your story is the only way we're going to get by problems. This is why you and I are sitting here right now. It's because this is nuance. And what we are witnessing right now is the death of nuance. No one is talking. Everyone is screaming at each other. Just look at any daytime talk show. It's all yelling at each other. And at the

• 1:21:11Terry Crews?

  end of the day, it's like, you know, we showed you, pow, you know, mic drop, and we'll see you tomorrow. And I'm going.

• 1:21:18Rich Roll?

  It gets the hits, it charges the dopamine, but ultimately, everybody as a human being has that deep desire for connection and for nuance. And I think that's a big reason why, you know, podcasts have grown in popularity. People would tell me all the time, like, you gotta make these things 30 minutes. Like, who's gonna listen to you guys banter on forever? But, you know, it's been quite the opposite, because I think people are starving for it, honestly. It is, it is, you know, our version of the campfire. And we need that campfire if we want to solve our problems. And the solution to our problems lies in appreciation of nuance. And you can only get to the nuance when you take the time

• 1:22:02Rich Roll?

  to sit down and calmly, you know, talk through stuff that I think is important, you know? And we haven't even gotten to like, the main thing that I want to talk to you about, which is, like,

• 1:22:13Rich Roll?

  D-Day.

• 1:22:14Terry Crews?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:14Rich Roll?

  You know, you being this really successful person who on, you know, from an exterior view, had it all going on. Inside, you're a very different person. Ultimately, you have this, this bottom, this reckoning, that becomes a catalyst for all the growth and the expansion that you're able to kind of exude and speak to now.

• 1:22:35Terry Crews?

  Look, you know, this is so crazy and it hit me so hard, you know, that there I was, I was extremely successful. I mean, living a life, living a dream. Like I said, going through my Franklin planner and realizing I hit every last one of my goals. And I was miserable. And my family was miserable.

• 1:23:01Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:23:02Terry Crews?

  And no one liked me. And I said, that can't be it. There has to be another level of success. And, and what I discovered is that, you know, I wasn't real. I, um, I had created an image. I had created Terry Crews, you know, with a restricted, you know, TM trademark. You know what I mean? It was like, it wasn't real. And, but everybody loved it. Everybody loved it. It was so good. It was so pure and amazing. Everybody loves Terry Crews. Oh, but my wife knew. I knew. Because this, the problem is, I, I never told my wife about my pornography addiction.

• 1:23:48Terry Crews?

  And back in 2010, we had a day called D-Day. And it was wild because that's the day I confess to basically going to a massage parlor, getting a handjob, and cheating on my wife 10 years earlier, which was back in 2000. And, um, but I vowed when that happened, I mean, it was probably the darkest day of my life because that's where my addiction had brought me.

• 1:24:17Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:24:17Terry Crews?

  And I was just like, man, I never thought, again, it's just like those good goals that happen. You're like, I never thought I'd be here. But those bad habits brought me to, I never thought I would be here. And it was the hardest. I just vowed I would never tell anybody. I vowed. That's my secret to take to the grave. I'll never say.

• 1:24:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah, the big fear being if you actually told your wife who you were, that she would leave.

• 1:24:44Terry Crews?

  And let me tell you the biggest trick about that and the biggest lie. And the thing is, is that what we're really searching for is intimacy as men. Again, I'm not going to speak for women, but I know for me.

• 1:24:57Terry Crews?

  Intimacy is what I need. But the problem is if you never tell who you really are. You can never find true intimacy. And this is where you could be as a guy going from sexual experience, just sex, sex, sex, sex. And never finding anything that's meaningful. Because you're not revealing who you are. You know what I mean? And it's like, I had this image that my wife had married. And what she thought was her life, but it was really not. And she, but she was always suspicious. So she would always ask me, and I remember because of my guilt, I would start an argument. Um, just to get out of.

• 1:25:40Rich Roll?

  Distractions.

• 1:25:41Terry Crews?

  Right.

• 1:25:42Rich Roll?

  And suspicion is bred from lack of trust.

• 1:25:44Terry Crews?

  And that kind of running, oh my God, look at that. And I'm out of here.

• 1:25:50Terry Crews?

  There was a wall and every time I use pornography. It created a wall between us. Now this is the thing. And you know, it's different if two couples are into it and they want to do that whole thing. Well, then there's your transparency right there. But to be hiding something is a whole nother matter. And the way I like to phrase it sometimes, because guys a lot of times don't understand. They feel like, man, you know, I remember we're guys, so you know, we enjoy looking at women. You know, what can it be or kind of problem? But the thing I like to say is imagine if, um, if your wife was taking money from another guy and didn't tell you.

• 1:26:33Terry Crews?

  What?

• 1:26:34Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:26:35Terry Crews?

  Immediately guys go, what are you talking about? Just imagine if some guy was giving your wife money, here's a thousand dollars or two thousand dollars, and you find out for three years, she's been taking money from another guy. Well, we didn't have sex, we didn't do anything, but you know, you know, I'm a woman, I need money. Guys would be like, hell no. No, not if you're gonna be, you know, you consider yourself my wife, or you, no, we're not gonna do that. In fact, that's unacceptable. In fact, what are you doing? And the flip side is exactly how your wife feels.

• 1:27:18Terry Crews?

  It's like, why are you getting that from someone else? I was supposed to be that. That's what at least was my wife's attitude. And just to help people kind of frame the picture, I had had this thing where I was more valuable than the women in my life, simply because I was a man. First of all, sports culture told me that. Black culture told me that. Uh, male culture told me that. Everything in my life said, it's your way or the highway. Hey, man, I didn't love my family, I owned my family. And you're supposed to do what I say. I wasn't really listening to you. It was blah, blah, blah.

• 1:28:01Terry Crews?

  But a true equal can come to you, and you have to respect what they say. A true equal can challenge you on your beliefs and on your moves and say, mm, I got a problem with that, Terry. But I wouldn't even allow that, because you're not an equal to me.

• 1:28:18Rich Roll?

  So what was the reckoning? How did that change?

• 1:28:21Terry Crews?

  Well, first of all, she left. When I told her, because this is the thing, D-Day went like this. What is it I don't know about you, Terry Crews? Is what she asked me. Because, and I was on the phone with her for like two hours, just like. But she's like, there's something, you're something you're doing, I don't know. It was, again, you see that that woman getting some money, you're like, where'd you get that? Sometimes, you know, two and two equals four, it's not adding up, thumbs up. And I just, I was tired, I was tired of lying, I was tired of being done. I was, I was actually done with the relationship. I was done with the marriage.

• 1:29:05Terry Crews?

  It was one of them things like, why, why even keep putting up with this? Because first of all, Hollywood didn't care if I lose my family. I'd get more movies, they'd be like, hey, man, good, you got no wife to come home to, you can do three more projects.

• 1:29:20Rich Roll?

  And she's the only one challenging you.

• 1:29:22Terry Crews?

  Only one, only one, because Hollywood doesn't care, porn, shoot, no big deal. It's like, in fact, we'll get you some girls. And I literally was done with my marriage, because I was feeling like, again, back to entitlement, but also not appreciating, not, no gratitude for what she's done. But I had moved into this, I'm Terry Crews, though. Because that's the image. And I got, I told her. And she just, I can't, like, to me, I was like, what happened 10 years ago? And to be honest, I was a little bit like, where are you gonna go?

• 1:30:03Terry Crews?

  Like, I'm Terry, you know, I got all this, I'm doing good, oh, man. The attitude was horrendous, horrendous. And I, and she was just like, I can't believe. Like, to her, it happened the same day. But to me, I'm like, it was 10 years earlier. She said, I'm done, she said, don't come home, don't, and I said, okay, I won't. Fine, I said, go, I said, you know, I can just go find another woman like that, so, you know, whatever you want to do, you can do, and she was like. I hung up and my marriage was over.

• 1:30:42Terry Crews?

  And then that same damn voice, that little voice, the one that talked to me way back in the day about Ken Harvey, the little voice that was talking to me all this time. They said, man, what if it's not her? What if it's you? I was like, no, it can't be me, can't be me. Look, first of all, I'm doing everything I'm supposed to do. I'm successful. I'm successful. I have done this, this and this. And the fact that, look at where I came from. I'm a black man. I was poor. I made it all the way up here. I did all these things. In fact, I got a high sex drive. You know what I mean? So, you know what I mean? I, I got, I got a little more testosterone than an average man. I mean, I had.

• 1:31:25Terry Crews?

  I had totally made that thing up. And that was all in the image. And all of a sudden it said, but it's you though. And the question I used to frame, I would frame the question about all this stuff. I would ask my, you know, like, I would think about my wife and I'd be like, why didn't she believe me?

• 1:31:50Terry Crews?

  And in an instant, that question changed to, why am I lying?

• 1:31:56Terry Crews?

  Same context, but one was blaming her and the other one was like, this is me. I'm lying. I've been lying the whole time. You did lie. Like, you, you could, you could say you weren't, but you were lying the whole time.

• 1:32:15Terry Crews?

  And then I knew, I said, man, I'm in trouble. Like, I started to have a crisis. And when I say that, it was like, I didn't care about Hollywood anymore. I didn't care about, like, at first it's like, I'll just keep moving and I'll just give, do more movies. But then you're like, but I don't care about doing movies. It was a crisis. When I say a crisis, it was like, I don't care about anything.

• 1:32:39Terry Crews?

  I'm done. Like, I'm a farce.

• 1:32:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it feels like porn opened up the door, but what it really was, was like an existential reckoning with the fact that you've been living some version of a double life for a very long time until it just became so unsustainable and exhausting that you had to confront it.

• 1:33:01Terry Crews?

  First of all, that's the way all these things work, all these vices. You know, some people make so much money, they can gamble until they can't, until they're taking the house. Some, they drink all day until you get, your liver can't take anymore.

• 1:33:20Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it works until it's not working anymore.

• 1:33:22Terry Crews?

  Until it's not working.

• 1:33:23Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:24Terry Crews?

  That's what my friend Steven Tyler said, he said, "All addictions work until they stop working."

• 1:33:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:29Terry Crews?

  Uh-oh.

• 1:33:30Rich Roll?

  And then they don't work for a while until they reach your pain tolerance. And you're probably a guy who can deal with a lot of pain, right? So as the elevator's going down, the excuses start to stack up until it just becomes so unmanageable that you have to like throw your hands up and give up.

• 1:33:45Terry Crews?

  You know, the thing about excuses thing, man, and I learned it's funny because excuses are valid for a minute, but then it's like an expired credit card, man. You're running around and you keep trying to plunk that thing down and you get declined. You know what I mean? It's kind of like, every excuse does not work. And, well, listen, when I got declined by my wife, I put the credit card down like, "Hey, here you go." And it's like, no, that's expired, man. But responsibility gives you a whole new credit limit. Like, the minute you start taking responsibility, you start to build that credit back up. You start doing all this stuff. So I went, and I went to counseling.

• 1:34:27Terry Crews?

  And now, this is another thing, is in black culture where I grew up, you did not get therapy. It was seen as you can't cure crazy. If you're crazy, can't cure it. You know, every family had an uncle that they would lock in the basement, or somebody upstairs who just wasn't all together.

• 1:34:47Rich Roll?

  And you just go to church and pray about it.

• 1:34:49Terry Crews?

  That's it. You pray about it and you just, you got a demon. That was what it would say, "Someone's got a demon." And that was it. And I, but there was no cure. And if you get that mumble jumbo and you all of a sudden, you're gonna be more confused. And how I learned this is that what was so crazy is my father went to a psychologist to deal with his alcoholism. And the psychologist killed himself. I was a teenager and I was like, that's it.

• 1:35:17Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 1:35:17Terry Crews?

  That you're right. He jumped off a bridge and I went, yeah, they're all crazy. And I said, and so I had this, and I was a, this thing like, I'm not gonna get near that. And but that was the moment where I said, I went to my, I called my friend in the middle of D day. And he said, man, he said, I don't, I can't tell you're gonna get your wife back. But you need to get better for you. Now, it was a strange concept. I gotta explain this because everything I did was to get something. Like every bit of work, every bit, I was doing good so that I can get money or working hard so I can get this, working.

• 1:35:57Terry Crews?

  But there was never a realization of doing, of getting, of just doing something for your own sake. Just being good to be good.

• 1:36:07Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:36:07Terry Crews?

  Just to be better because that's again, that's internal. That's something that's, it was always external rewards. But he said, you need to get better for you. And I was like, what? You know, I would do whatever to get sex or do whatever to get money and but it didn't work.

• 1:36:24Rich Roll?

  Even the working out, even all of that was so you could front or show up and look a certain way.

• 1:36:29Terry Crews?

  Yes. And it was again, you worked out so you could show people I'm not to be messed with. You know, that kind of thing. Or that was back when I was young. Or and then you show out to so just show how great you are. You know what I mean? But but just to do it for me anyway. And I went to, I went to rehab.

• 1:36:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:36:52Terry Crews?

  First day in rehab, I was like, oh, I got, dude, I'm in the wrong place. This is not me.

• 1:36:56Rich Roll?

  Where did you go? Did you go to like Meadows or someplace?

• 1:36:58Terry Crews?

  No, I went to a place called Psychological Counseling Services in Phoenix, Phoenix, Arizona. Uh, and I'm sitting in that room with about 10 other people. And they're all talking their issues and I'm going, and the whole thing, it was a little bit like, this was the same thing like going to Labor Ready. Where I was like, everybody's gonna care, everybody, but everybody had their own damn issues that they had to deal with. And so, and I was thinking, everybody's gonna know it's me and everybody, but I said, damn it, I gotta go. And listen, and I did not go to get my wife back. My whole thing, I really knew my marriage was over. I just said, I'm just gonna have to try to get myself

• 1:37:42Terry Crews?

  together. And when I did, and after the first day, I was like, this is not me. And then all of a sudden, they were like, hey, man, was your dad an alcoholic? I was like, yeah. And so was your mom very religious? I was like, oh, how'd you know that? And wait, and they started reading my mail. Like, it was all these things that started to come down. And I was like, oh, my God, that is me. This is me. And it just, dude, it changed everything. Like, I went on this journey, and I still, and I'm still on it, for 12 straight years. I probably, like, every time I'm in the gym, I have an audiobook going

• 1:38:24Terry Crews?

  about cognitive therapy, about thinking, about thinking, about reexamining all the things you know. There's one book that I love, it's like, You Are Not So Smart. It's a book that totally revamps the way you think things are, and they're not. And then there's another book that followed it called You Are Now Less Dumb. That's the graduate. Yeah, yeah, it was so good. And I was, so I started to think my way, my way through life, instead of, because remember now, women, this is one way that I think women can tend to be a lot smarter than guys, because they, they don't push their way through

• 1:39:06Terry Crews?

  things. They have to think their way through life. You know what I mean? So, they know, they're, they're just a lot more intuitive. Whereas, hey, man, within the male culture, if you got the biggest bench press, you run the business. You don't know anything about inventory, you don't know anything about that. But if you're the strongest guy, they, everybody treats you like, this is where the, if you're super tall, you're a basketball player, you are the king of the world. Right. And that's the way, those are the operations, that's the way we operate. And I had to start thinking for the first time, for real, about who I want to be, where I'm at, and what was happening in that whole course. I had to raise my life, like, totally dump truck it, man, like.

• 1:39:50Terry Crews?

  I started all over from the beginning and um I went on a 90 day sex fast.

• 1:39:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:57Terry Crews?

  Like and I'll never forget because we went 75 days the first year and we and I and my wife was willing to you know come back in and I would think she's like well we don't have she said I'll let you back in and the whole thing and and we'll be good but I the next year it always got me I said we went to 75 I said we gotta do it again.

• 1:40:18Terry Crews?

  So the next year I went on another fast and I made it the whole 90 days. Because I said it was so important to me because this was the thing man remember I had let my body and my my my these things overcome what I wanted to do so if I wanted sex I would get it if I wanted to eat I would do it if I didn't because I was like I have no control. But I said I said I have to control these things like and if that means fasting these things and so I actually have not haven't ate breakfast for 12 years. I had been intermittent fasting.

• 1:40:53Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:40:54Terry Crews?

  Since.

• 1:40:55Rich Roll?

  We're gonna get into that but like yeah that practice of of I mean it's really

• 1:41:02Rich Roll?

  it's powerful and empowering because it puts you into contact with the truth of the behavior like you it's not until you you stop doing it that you realize that you you start to understand the reasons why you were doing it like that you were doing it to check out emotionally or to act out or to serve some kind of you know internal fucked up need that you have because when you're in the process of doing it it's so normalized. Right like I know I went to treatment and back in 98 and it was suggested to me that I take a year celibate after leaving treatment. Because my relationship with the opposite sex was so convoluted with my alcoholism.

• 1:41:44Rich Roll?

  Because I was so insecure around the opposite sex everything was like a mess and the only way to get clear was to put that distance between those two things for an extended period of time and it was so empowering because then it's just you and you and you gotta deal with that shit. Right and there's no escape from it and I learned a ton and then when the year ended I met my wife and that was that.

• 1:42:08Terry Crews?

  Hey man.

• 1:42:09Rich Roll?

  You know.

• 1:42:09Terry Crews?

  Well you know that's how I felt. I felt like I met my wife. After that, that was so crazy. We've been married for 20 years at that point. And going through that, I felt like I met my wife, which is nuts. That's funny you would say that because, you know, you know, there was a time in our lives, man, when we were 12 and you have a crush on a girl, whatever, and you pull a flower out. You weren't thinking about sex. I didn't even know what it was. I just was like, all I could think about is like, I appreciate this girl. I appreciate who she is just for, she's beautiful because she's just her. It was beyond what her body looked like. And then it was just like,

• 1:42:53Terry Crews?

  I, there's a feeling of care, like, I care for you. I want to see you win. I want to see you succeed. And it had nothing to do with sex. And that's exactly what I felt for my wife at those nine, with those 90 days. It became, our conversations started to talk about, it, it wasn't about what was gonna happen at the end of the convo. You know what I mean? Because it's funny how over the years, with porn and different things, it was like, all right, well, you know what that means. We had a good convo. Now you gotta do something for me. It was the tip for tat.

• 1:43:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:43:32Terry Crews?

  And, but there's no, but when you have a real conversation with no expectations or all this getting, but it was all giving. Dude, it was a whole nother level. And it allowed our relationship to be rebuilt.

• 1:43:49Rich Roll?

  And beyond that, you start to reckon with your anger and with all of these other, you know, we started this conversation talking about unhealthy masculinity. It really helped you unpack all these other aspects of your life and, you know, traumas that you experienced as a young person to, to, you know, get whole with all of that. I mean, that's really the broader message than just, again, it's like the porn that brings you in the door.

• 1:44:15Terry Crews?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:16Rich Roll?

  But ultimately, the gift was so much more expansive.

• 1:44:19Terry Crews?

  Again, I, the phrase I use is cracking that egg. You can't, it starts to spill. Or you you hit that first domino, you know, and the dominoes just keep going, you know, it was like, oh, my God, like.

• 1:44:33Rich Roll?

  The road gets narrower.

• 1:44:35Terry Crews?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I, I mean, I was very violent, man. I mean, there's a long list of people who Terry Crews has knocked out. Okay. Um, which was crazy. It, I start the book out talking about a time in Pasadena. We were headed to the, the longest yard wrap party and this guy, I felt disrespected my wife while we were waiting for a car. And man, I put him on his head on the concrete, dude, like, it was overkill, you know, in every sense of the word. You know what I mean? It was like, whoa. And the police came and

• 1:45:17Terry Crews?

  it's a crowded, you know, bunch of people. It was Christmas, people were Christmas shopping. It was so it was packed in downtown Pasadena. And man, um, thank God, thank God. This man, this, this older white man came out of the crowd and said, I saw this whole thing and they were just waiting for their car and they were bothered by this gentleman. So, but the police came with their hands on their guns, ready to arrest somebody. And my wife was shook. She was like, Terry. And we went home after all that. And she said, you have to promise me you'll never do that again. You have to promise. She said, I'll be okay. But you have to promise me. And I was like, what are you talking about? I said, I'm a man. Like, this is what men do. This, I said, first of all, I can't make that kind of promise.

• 1:46:02Terry Crews?

  Because when somebody needs their ass whooped, I'm, I'm gonna be there to deliver it. Because I had no problem with that. You know what I mean? I mean, but dude, she was like, Terry, he said, imagine, this is on the, on the, like, at its, at the minimum, we could get sued and lose everything. And at the maximum, the police could shoot you.

• 1:46:23Rich Roll?

  Going to jail. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like, it's a couple of things. I mean, first of all, this is how the book opens. So you open with a pow. Um, and short of the white guy telling the white cops that. They should be going after the other black eye, not you, the black eye. I mean, that's a whole conversation right there, right?

• 1:46:42Terry Crews?

  Yes.

• 1:46:43Rich Roll?

  But also, it's impossible to read the first few pages of your book and not think about the whole Will Smith thing. I mean, the parallel between that episode and what the world just witnessed, you know, is pretty spot on there.

• 1:46:57Terry Crews?

  Listen, man, it was so crazy. I got calls out of the blue from everybody who was involved with me writing the book. They were like, it's like you wrote this, like you knew it was gonna happen. I was like, man, I was Will Smith. That's all I could say. Talking about empathy. I mean, first of all, I did way worse than what Will's done. Okay?

• 1:47:21Rich Roll?

  You just didn't do it in front of 100 million people.

• 1:47:24Terry Crews?

  Right. It just wasn't on camera. But when you look, listen, you know what?

• 1:47:29Rich Roll?

  Because the thing in the incident that you share in the book, what really tipped it over is when, is when the aggression was directed at your wife, not at you. That's what, that's what really set you off.

• 1:47:39Terry Crews?

  Totally. I mean, and I was like, you're gonna die today. Like I said, it was overkill. It was to the point of like, I could have killed this guy. I mean, when you put somebody on their head, on the concrete, a lot of things can happen.

• 1:47:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:54Terry Crews?

  And it wasn't, she just was shocked at the level of violence.

• 1:47:58Rich Roll?

  So then what is, you know, what is the, the message with Will Smith? Or like, what do you take from that? Or what is it that you want to say about how that went down?

• 1:48:06Terry Crews?

  First of all, I'm gonna tell you this, and this is, this is the overall message for me, is that there was many, many times I was Will Smith. But the time that saved me was the time I was Chris Rock. And my agent put his hands, literally grabbed my nuts in a crowded party, a Hollywood party. Again, it's, it's no different than the Vanity Fair party, or anything, or a big Hollywood event, Adam Sandler's party, the head of the motion picture department at William Morris Endeavor, this guy, Adam Bennett, gets high. I don't know what he's on. First of all, I know drunk. This wasn't drunk.

• 1:48:50Terry Crews?

  He's licking his tongue out at me. He's acting all crazy. I'd never met him before. I heard about him. Uh, he's Sly Stallone's agent. He's Eddie Murphy's agent. He's Sandler's agent.

• 1:49:01Rich Roll?

  Head of the motion picture department.

• 1:49:03Terry Crews?

  Head. The man. Okay. The number one agency in the world. And he comes over to me and I'm like, I stick my hand out like, how you doing? He grabs my nuts and with my wife right next to me in a crowded party. And basically, I'm the only black guy in the party, by the way. Everybody else is Hollywood royalty, right? I pushed him back like, what are you doing, man? I push him into other people. It's so crowded. I'm like, get away from me, man. What are you, hey? He's laughing. He comes back again. I push him again. And I'm like, what are you doing? What the fuck are you doing? I'm getting angry just thinking about it all over again.

• 1:49:48Terry Crews?

  And he starts to laugh.

• 1:49:53Terry Crews?

  Now, I think, is there other people in on this? Like, here I am, the only black man in this party.

• 1:50:03Terry Crews?

  And other people are there. Other people saw it. There are people who would never say anything, but they were right there. And they were all looking like. And I thought they were in on it. You start to think, am I the joke here? Y'all making, like, was this planned? Because it's just too bizarre. Is this jackass or something? And y'all think this shit is funny?

• 1:50:27Terry Crews?

  And I said, I'm gonna kill this dude. Now, that's the next thought. I was gonna put my fist through this guy's head.

• 1:50:35Terry Crews?

  And all of a sudden, I went,

• 1:50:39Terry Crews?

  I don't have to do that.

• 1:50:42Terry Crews?

  I don't have to do that anymore. And I looked at my wife, and you're talking about years of therapy already. Where, you gotta understand, in the black community, if someone was to call you nigger, the rule is to destroy them. Like punch them, bite them, don't. Because if you don't, you quote unquote, let them do it.

• 1:51:05Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:51:07Terry Crews?

  So, the whole rule is that. But the, but once you examine that whole thing, I had to examine it and I said, but there are no niggers. There's no such thing. Am I a nigger? No. So, it's not an insult. In fact, I can just let it go and count it to ignorance. But the problem is, and where the real problem would lie, is if I really felt I was a true nigger. All the insecurities, all that stuff would pop up and then I would attack. Same thing here. I said, I'm not interested in this dude. This is not anything I want.

• 1:51:53Terry Crews?

  So why would I get even get up? Why would I have to kill this man? But I did have to do something. And I remember looking at my wife and she said, she looked at me, I grabbed her hand and we left the party. We got in the car. Now, mindset, I'm trying to tell you, I had a thought of driving right back through the club, like Terminator, you know what I mean? And, but I went home and I couldn't believe I was degraded, dehumanized. It was emasculation of the highest degree. Because here, this was my own agency. And then I didn't know who was in on it. Like, that was another thing. I was like, is this Sandler's thing? Is this?

• 1:52:38Terry Crews?

  You know, I mean, you know, your mind just starts to race.

• 1:52:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:41Terry Crews?

  Like, what is happening here? That's an assault.

• 1:52:44Rich Roll?

  What's, what's interesting, I mean, look, we all, we all read about this and are aware of kind of what happened on some level. But in the book, like, I don't know how many pages you devote to it. It's like 15 pages. I mean, you go through the whole thing and I learned much more about how it all transpired. And, and one of the really interesting aspects of this story is like not knowing who to trust, like. Can I tell my manager? Can I tell this other agents at the same agency? What is the head of the agency gonna say or do or not do? And it's just all, you know, basically the peril with which you have to, you know, figure out what the right moves are because your, your career and your future is on the line, depending upon what you say or don't say.

• 1:53:28Terry Crews?

  But think about the Academy Awards. Chris was all by himself. Nobody ran over to him. He was standing there, totally beat up. Face still red, still stinging. And no one went over to him. They went to Will. They went over there to Will and said, are you okay? Are you all right? No one checked on Chris. That's where I was. I'm sure Chris was like, who do I trust now? Where am I? What the hell was that? But imagine had Chris fought back.

• 1:54:11Terry Crews?

  It would have descended into chaos.

• 1:54:14Rich Roll?

  Oh, my God.

• 1:54:14Terry Crews?

  It had been the end of Hollywood as we know it. And I think he saved everything. See, that was that measure of composure for him to even joke about it, for him to just keep his cool and just relax in that moment. I thought, that's tough. Like, that's the essence of true toughness. Again, the joke, should he have said it? No, I don't think, it was a bad joke. It wasn't even funny. But he didn't deserve that. He didn't deserve that at all. And, but I can tell you this. I was Will at one time. Were you out of control?

• 1:54:58Terry Crews?

  And wait, all that had to do, that was going on in Will. Like, that was going on in his, you saw there was more going on there than that joke.

• 1:55:08Rich Roll?

  Oh, of course.

• 1:55:09Terry Crews?

  You know what I mean? It was like watching this man.

• 1:55:11Rich Roll?

  It's like the Zapruder film. You could break this thing down.

• 1:55:15Terry Crews?

  But that was me. Like, all that stuff that's going down, I didn't beat that guy down for disrespecting my wife. It was something else. You don't pick a guy up and slam on his head on the concrete for that. It was something in me and have anything to do with him. And there's many, many times I would just smack people and do stuff because I had this inner anger that I did not control. And it's so vicious and so crazy and insidious and it sneaks up on you at the lea- like, I promise you Will did not plan that out.

• 1:55:50Rich Roll?

  Of course not.

• 1:55:51Terry Crews?

  Okay.

• 1:55:51Rich Roll?

  It's like going into a blackout.

• 1:55:55Terry Crews?

  Blackout. And you knew when he was like, get yo' my wife's name out your fucking mouth. I mean, we were all like, holy, this dude is lost. He's having a meltdown. But I knew that guy. That was me. You couldn't calm me down after stuff like this. And this is where my wife had to come and say, look, man, if you ever do this, man. And see, then I have to tell everybody because what was wild, because in my community and black community, they were like, you should have knocked the guy out.

• 1:56:25Rich Roll?

  Sure.

• 1:56:26Terry Crews?

  That's the rule.

• 1:56:26Rich Roll?

  And you know, you're like the prototype alpha. How could this happen to you? I mean, there were a million takes on this whole thing.

• 1:56:34Terry Crews?

  But can I ask you this? Would you have believed my story had I had knocked the guy out? I don't think anybody would. I just, you're at a party, Terry Crews knocks out the head of the motion picture department because he what? Terry probably had some drinks.

• 1:56:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:55Terry Crews?

  He probably did. I don't drink. They'd be like, oh, no. Yeah, right. Yeah, you just decided, maybe they did something you didn't like. But there's that mean thug Terry we've been waiting on. Because I got a whole record of you beating up people.

• 1:57:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah, conversely, what would have happened had Will Smith walked on stage and just said, hey, Chris, you know, I love you, but that was out of line. You know, and just handled it with composure. He would have been this unbelievable hero.

• 1:57:27Terry Crews?

  Imagine me to put it in his acceptance speech.

• 1:57:29Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:57:30Terry Crews?

  Like what Chris said about my wife, man.

• 1:57:34Terry Crews?

  You know, it was over the line. But I'm here to accept my ex- yeah, and it would have been a hero.

• 1:57:40Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:57:41Terry Crews?

  But let me tell you what Hollywood's about. And this is where me and Hollywood have always been at odds. The head of William Morris Endeavor told me he could get away with it. I had a private meeting with him. I tweeted, it's all in the book. And I said, hey, man, you don't get to molest the clients and go to work the next day. He said, yes, he can. And he said, what I'm gonna do is take his title and suspend him for 30 days. And I said, man, hey, man, you gonna give him a vacation? What are you talking about? You can't molest the clients. What are you doing? Dude, it was the same as the standing ovation for Will. And I went, I said, dude, what are you talking about? I handed him a letter.

• 1:58:23Terry Crews?

  I grabbed his letter that he wrote demanding that Mel Gibson be kicked out of Hollywood. He wrote it for the Huffington Post for anti-Semitic remarks. I said, look, you said Mel Gibson needs to be kicked out of Hollywood forever for these remarks. But anti-Semitic remarks, as reprehensible as they are, they are not illegal. What your man did is a crime. And you're telling me it's different? And he said, it's different, Terry. I couldn't believe it, dude. I, I just said, and that's the rule. See, the rules of Hollywood is call it out until it happens to you. You know what I mean? Cancel anybody else but us?

• 1:59:08Terry Crews?

  No, no, not at all. Cause we meant well.

• 1:59:13Rich Roll?

  Well, and then you pursue, you file criminal charges, even knowing like that's probably not gonna go anywhere. And then the civil suit, which ultimately doesn't look like it's gonna go anywhere until a couple other dudes come out of the woodwork.

• 1:59:26Terry Crews?

  That's right.

• 1:59:26Rich Roll?

  And then it's a whole different thing.

• 1:59:28Terry Crews?

  Whole different story. And some females, guys and girls. It was crazy. And, uh, but if I hadn't gone public, it would have never, it would have never brought the real, the people out. And they wanted to join my case privately without, you know, saying their names. I don't think I respected that. But the thing was, is that they were willing to go to the mat for this guy. And it, it was so foul and so corrupt.

• 2:00:00Terry Crews?

  Because you gotta understand about Hollywood. I mean, like Harvey Weinstein would lead, you know, all these women in Hollywood parties at his house while he was raping them. You know, and this is the thing you're talking about. One reason I wrote the book was that I noticed that there was things where success is the warmest place to hide. You know, it's a great place because you don't, no one calls you on your shit. No one, because you're the man. You're Will Smith.

• 2:00:34Terry Crews?

  You're the head of the motion picture department.

• 2:00:38Terry Crews?

  And when what we need, because we talk about values, we can say values, but unless you actually act on those values, it means nothing.

• 2:00:49Rich Roll?

  Ultimately, money and power rule. And in the case of this Adam Vennett thing, it wasn't until money and power were threatened that you were actually able to move the needle. And what's interesting is that typically in these cases, then it then becomes about how can we discredit the person going after us. But because you had done all that inside work and kind of owned up publicly and privately to the stuff that they would have been able to hang over you. There was a freedom with that, right? Where you were like, come at me.

• 2:01:26Terry Crews?

  That was, again, when you're talking about gratitude. I'm beyond thankful for that D-Day. For that moment when I saw myself as I really was. Because if I hadn't, like you could ask me, like, where do you think you'd be? Oh, my God. You know, running, hiding.

• 2:01:51Terry Crews?

  Imagine, I would have had no strength to do anything, to even come up against something like that, had I had secrets like that, because they would have found stuff.

• 2:02:00Rich Roll?

  Well, and had you not unpacked those secrets, you would have cold cocked the guy.

• 2:02:04Terry Crews?

  Right, and.

• 2:02:05Rich Roll?

  But you might not have even been at that party to begin with.

• 2:02:08Terry Crews?

  Because you see, we can keep going. You know what I mean? It's kind of like, it could have been over before that. It could have been where, but where the question really is, is where would the fall have come?

• 2:02:19Terry Crews?

  That's really what we're talking about. Like, what would have taken me out? You know, because all of this, any of this deception that I was living was going to take me out some way, shape, or form.

• 2:02:31Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:02:32Terry Crews?

  And, um, let me tell you, man, I, I, that's where gratitude comes in for me right now. Because I'm just like, oh, if I hadn't have done that. And I just thank God so, I'm just thankful for my wife. I'm thankful for my family. I'm thankful for the people who did stick with me. Because it was a very lonely time during that period. There were camps and people were like, what is Terry talking about? And, and in my own community, I was looked at as a pariah for even technically joining Me Too, which they thought was a female thing until all these men. I mean, we had wrestlers and pro athletes that came out about, you know?

• 2:03:15Terry Crews?

  The fact is, there's an organization called One in Six that talks about how one in six men have been sexually molested at some time in their life. And wait, and don't even acknowledge it. They've been in military and whatever, and they, they just called it, well, the guy was goofing around. But you've been molested.

• 2:03:35Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:36Terry Crews?

  That line was crossed.

• 2:03:37Rich Roll?

  If you don't, if you don't unpack that and, and deal with that, you're going to act out in some way that is not in service to you or others.

• 2:03:46Terry Crews?

  The prison is full, full of people who were, at one time or another, used and abused in that way and acted out in some of, but would never, ever tell what happened to them.

• 2:04:00Rich Roll?

  I mean, that's why, you know, you doing what you've done is, is so powerful and palpable because you are the, you're, you're cut from this cloth of the ultimate, you know, you've got this incredible physique and this incredible career. And as such, for you to be able to come to the microphone and talk about these things, I think gives permission to all of these people who are harboring these stories with shame and in secrecy.

• 2:04:25Terry Crews?

  I'll tell you this, when, I will say my greatest accomplishment beyond film, beyond movies and TV and all this stuff was when I got to team up with Amanda Nguyen. And she is the founder of Rise, which was all about passing the Sexual Assault Survivors Bill of Rights. Because the thing is, is that whoever the perpetrator is, has tons of rights. And she found that the, anyone who was a victim of these things had no rights at all. And I joined up with her and we went to Congress. And what was wild is that she had always brought women there to talk. And it was never a big, it never got that much light.

• 2:05:10Terry Crews?

  And by having a man there, it was packed. That room was full. It was on CNN. It was the highlight. People were like, wait a minute. And I look at that and I could feel the millions and millions of people who never got to tell. Dude, it was, I don't even know how to describe it. Because it's something that, it, it, it comes with so much shame. You know, societal shame and, and, but I said, I have nothing to be ashamed of. And I remember, this was my, my log line during this whole time. I was like, I will not be shamed. I did nothing wrong. And I had to repeat that.

• 2:05:55Terry Crews?

  Because you feel like, ooh, people don't even want to touch it. They're like, oh, oh, oh, oh. And I said, I will not be shamed. I did nothing wrong. And this is what happens to people who are victim or victimized. I am no longer a victim. I feel like now, you know, there's a point where you, you grow past and you decide to grow and you decide to move. I was victimized, but not, but no longer. And, but to just be there and feel that from so many people, that energy was like, finally, finally, someone could come forward and say this. It was my calling and I said, this is the most important thing I'll ever do.

• 2:06:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:41Terry Crews?

  Ever.

• 2:06:41Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's really beautiful.

• 2:06:45Rich Roll?

  You've been very generous with your time and I want to let you go, but I can't let you go without one final thing that I want to talk with you about, which is this quote that I love,

• 2:06:57Rich Roll?

  that I've heard you say, which is, "In order to have, you must do."

• 2:07:01Terry Crews?

  Yes.

• 2:07:02Rich Roll?

  "And in order to do, you must be." There's so much in there, man. Like, this is, this is the keys to the kingdom, in my opinion.

• 2:07:11Terry Crews?

  It is.

• 2:07:11Rich Roll?

  So let's close it out with a few thoughts on what that means and how that idea has been transformative in your life.

• 2:07:18Terry Crews?

  You know, I'm, I am an idealist.

• 2:07:23Terry Crews?

  And I think it comes with being an artist or just seeing a vision and just seeing a better way and going, "Oh, I want to go, I want that," you know?

• 2:07:35Terry Crews?

  And the thing is, is that for me, what was wild is that I always thought things were impossible, or I thought it was magic, you know? But what I began to do is, in order to be the person I wanted to be, I had to say, like, "I have it already." Like, in order to be, to have the money and be, let's say, consider yourself a rich person, you have to look at the riches you have and say, "I have this." You know, and to order to have, you must do. And then, once you say, "I have this," you do the things a rich person would do.

• 2:08:19Terry Crews?

  And all of a sudden, you are.

• 2:08:23Terry Crews?

  But, but remember that when, in my mom's religion, the do part was gone.

• 2:08:29Terry Crews?

  It was gone. And I realized that in the action, first of all, the visualization, and then the action, and then there it is, it comes. And it's almost, it's almost like, like I say, you're, you're in, you don't know you're in Los Angeles, but you are, you know, you're, you're, so nobody, somebody just closed your eyes, blindfolded, you plopped you right there in it. You all of a sudden would have to know, like, you know, you, you would have markers and different things, all, all this stuff, but the realization is that you are there.

• 2:09:07Terry Crews?

  And you have to be there now.

• 2:09:08Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:09:09Terry Crews?

  And then you behave like you're there now.

• 2:09:11Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:09:12Terry Crews?

  Dude, it's a deep thought.

• 2:09:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you own that truth. It just hasn't happened yet. Like, my friend Jesse Isler has a, he has a quote that he used to, a mantra that he would repeat to himself when he was a young person, like, I'm a millionaire, they just haven't paid me yet. But like, you know, that idea applying to everything, like, I, you know, you just, you, you intuit or you inhabit the idea of what that, who that person is, who has the thing that you want, or is living the life that you want, and you then conduct yourself accordingly.

• 2:09:44Terry Crews?

  Let me tell you, and a perfect example is, the first time I tried to quit porn, you're like, this is the hardest thing ever, like, what am I gonna do? I mean, mind you, I had three different jobs. I started working like crazy, because I was like, what am I gonna do with my time? You know? And, but I was, it was hard, because I was like, this was what I used to do. And when I didn't do it anymore, the habit for doing something had, you, you don't, you don't get rid of things, you just replace them. And I started to replace it with good things, and all of a sudden, I didn't have any desire for it anymore. But I can't mark the moment, I can't mark the time, it was 12 years, but then all of

• 2:10:29Terry Crews?

  a sudden, you go, I don't need that, that's not me anymore, I'm a whole nother person. And it's so incredible, it's almost like going back through those Franklin planners, and realizing, wait, you saw yourself there, you're even past that, you know what I mean?

• 2:10:45Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but it's also the difference between white knuckling it, like, I'm gonna apply my self-will to this problem, and, and just, like, I am not gonna do this thing, versus, like, I'm letting go, I'm transcending this, because I am becoming this other person who wouldn't do that.

• 2:11:01Terry Crews?

  Let me tell you, and that, that is a great thing, because, I have to tell you this, because willpower doesn't work.

• 2:11:08Terry Crews?

  Doesn't work. Believe me, I tried the first time I was getting out of it. You're like, ah, you're like, no, it's ridiculous. But what I realized is that it's not a willpower issue. It's a lack of information issue. The more you start to realize and know, it changes you. I like, when you know what it's doing, when you know what it's costing. You know, I did things like making logs of how much I spent on all that every day. And you think, if you didn't write it down, you go, I spent 20 bucks. It, when I actually wrote it down, it was $300. And you go, what in the world?

• 2:11:52Terry Crews?

  But you, we don't, you can't rely on our intuition that way. You have to start to really write it down, see it, and the whole thing. And the willpower does not work. It's gotta be the info, the info. What is it I don't know? And once you start going like that, you know what, you're trying to lose what? You know what to eat, you know what causes you to do these things, you know? You know what exercises to do, you know what to be. And it's so, and it all of a sudden, it changes you. You wake up and you're just different because you know more and you're responsible for more. The more you know, the more you're responsible for. And so it makes it an amazing, I like to call it, it moves from a toilet into a tornado.

• 2:12:36Terry Crews?

  The spin just starts to go up and up and up and up. You know, the toilet is the other way, you know? But the tornado, it gets better and better and better.

• 2:12:47Rich Roll?

  I love it, man, I love it. Any final thoughts on somebody who might be listening to this or watching this? Who is caught in some form of compulsion or addictive behavior? And is having trouble knowing they need to put it in the rearview mirror, but can't seem to get out of their own way?

• 2:13:05Terry Crews?

  Let me tell you, my best advice, period, is find someone you love and trust and really, really believe in and tell them. Most addictions thrive in secrecy.

• 2:13:24Terry Crews?

  That's it. I'm telling you, it's the secret is the killer. Once, you know, I went public on Facebook Live.

• 2:13:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:36Rich Roll?

  That's done like hundreds of millions of views now at this point.

• 2:13:39Terry Crews?

  Oh, my God. Worldwide. When I did that, the world shook. But I did that to be, to, to kill it, to kill it for good.

• 2:13:50Rich Roll?

  Shame can't survive the light.

• 2:13:52Terry Crews?

  It can't. It's like exposing the germs to sunlight. And dude, fine, but see, I wouldn't say, and I would never, never, never suggest that you do this publicly. Do it with people you don't trust.

• 2:14:07Rich Roll?

  Usually it doesn't work out.

• 2:14:08Terry Crews?

  It doesn't. No, I, I was built for that. I was in that mold. But actually, I'd already been through past that point. And I went public just even to, to help other people. But I went, when I got public with my family, I got public when I started to voice that I had an addiction. I started to voice what the pornography thing was and I started to talk. It, it loses its power slowly but surely. The fact that you can talk about your alcoholism, it, it takes the power away from it. And so anyone who's going through this, the more you find someone you trust that you can share these things with,

• 2:14:52Terry Crews?

  it slowly starts to real, it's just, I like to say it shrinks and it gets cleaned out. But the secrecy, man, oh, everything grows in secret, dude.

• 2:15:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:15:05Terry Crews?

  Everything. You, you, you lose total control. The more secrets you keep, that's one reason why I'm so vulnerable. Cause I don't want, I don't want any secrets. I just don't, I, I don't want anymore. I tell the whole story and man, I'm in control. I feel totally.

• 2:15:21Rich Roll?

  The ultimate weight loss.

• 2:15:23Terry Crews?

  Yes, it is. Yes, it is.

• 2:15:25Rich Roll?

  You want to feel lighter in your skin.

• 2:15:27Terry Crews?

  It feels so good, man. I like to call it being one person. Remember it was the image, Terry? And then it was backwards. There's no, nothing feels better than being one person. Like, I mean what I say, I say what I mean. It's so refreshing and I have no, there's no guilt, there's no, it's like, like being debt free.

• 2:15:48Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:15:49Terry Crews?

  You know what I mean? It just feels like, no, I don't owe anybody.

• 2:15:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:15:53Terry Crews?

  Feels good.

• 2:15:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Amazing, man. Thank you.

• 2:15:57Terry Crews?

  Oh, thank you.

• 2:15:58Rich Roll?

  Appreciate you, Terry Crews. That was unbelievable. What a gift.

• 2:16:02Terry Crews?

  I enjoy this, man.

• 2:16:04Rich Roll?

  Thank you, man. It was great.

• 2:16:05Terry Crews?

  Thank you for having me.

• 2:16:06Rich Roll?

  Of course, everybody pick up Terry's new book, Tough, available wherever you buy books. And Terry's pretty easy to find on the internet, tracked down. If you haven't heard of him, I'm sure you already have. And also, America's Got Talent is coming back this summer.

• 2:16:21Terry Crews?

  That's right, this summer, May 31st.

• 2:16:23Rich Roll?

  May 31st, alright, so he'll be in your household worldwide.

• 2:16:27Terry Crews?

  That's it.

• 2:16:27Rich Roll?

  And I'm gonna get shit because like, you were here for over two hours and we didn't even talk about the fitness stuff, or intermittent fasting, or anything like that, so I might have to get you to come back here.

• 2:16:38Terry Crews?

  Yeah, yeah. Do your best. You know, do a five-minute workout. That's what you gotta do.

• 2:16:43Rich Roll?

  There you go. Thanks, man. Good times. Appreciate you.

• 2:16:46Terry Crews?

  Thank you.

• 2:16:46Rich Roll?

  Much love.

• 2:16:47Terry Crews?

  Thank you, my man.

• 2:16:48Rich Roll?

  Peace.

• 2:16:51Rich Roll?

  That's it for today. Thank you for listening. I truly hope you enjoyed the conversation. To learn more about today's guests, including links and resources related to everything discussed today, visit the episode page at richroll.com, where you can find the entire podcast archive, as well as podcast merch, my books, Finding Ultra, Voicing Change, and The Plant Power Way, as well as the Plant Power Meal Planner at meals.richroll.com.

• 2:17:22Rich Roll?

  If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, and on YouTube, and leave a review and/or comment. Supporting the sponsors who support the show is also important and appreciated. And sharing the show or your favorite episode with friends or on social media is, of course, awesome and very helpful. And finally, for podcast updates, special offers on books, the meal planner, and other subjects, please subscribe to our newsletter, which you can find on the footer of any page at richroll.com. Today's show was produced and engineered by Jason Camiolo, with additional audio engineering

• 2:18:04Rich Roll?

  by Cale Curtis. The video edition of the podcast was created by Blake Curtis, with assistance by our creative director, Dan Drake. Portraits by Davy Greenberg and Grayson Wilder. Graphic and social media assets courtesy of Jessica Miranda, Daniel Solis, Dan Drake, and A.J. Akpodiate. Thank you, Georgia Whaley, for copywriting and website management. And of course, our theme music was created by Tyler Pyatt, Trapper Pyatt, and Harry Mathis. Appreciate the love, love the support. See you back here soon. Peace. Plants.