724 Do What You Love with Mike Holston: The Real Tarzann

DO THE UNEXPECTED. Do you go the easy route? The expected route? Or do you find your own path that compliments your unique passions? Finding your own way takes inner strength. You won’t be able to do it without believing in yourself. It takes a special person to defy expectations and break into a new field. People will doubt you when you do something unexpected. That’s a given. It’s how you respond when people try to dissuade you will determine if you’re successful or not. On today’s episode of The School of Greatness, I talk with an unlikely zookeeper who is known online as The Real Tarzann: Mike Holston. Mike Holsten is a 24 year-old zookeeper at Mario Tabrue’s Zoological Wildlife Foundation. He recently did a collaboration with Will Smith and has over four million followers on Instagram. Mike says that working hard, believing in yourself, and prayer will help you be successful against any odds. So get ready to learn how The Real Tarzann came to be on Episode 724. Some Questions I Ask: How many animals do you have right now? (16:00) How many times have you been bitten or stung? (22:30) Why is important to see someone who looks like you doing what you do? (28:30) What was the first job you had that paid you to work with animals? (33:00) What’s the most endangered animal? (38:00) What has being around animals taught you about humans? (39:00) What has changed since Will Smith posted about you? (51:00) What has kept you motivated to pursue this dream? (53:00) Do you eat meat? (1:03:00) In This Episode You Will Learn: The biggest thing Cesar Millan taught Mike (14:00) Why some species get along with each other (19:00) The best pet Mike has (20:00) About the time Mike swam with sharks (24:00) If Mike thinks that wild animals should be left in the wild (35:30) The story of how Will Smith found Mike (47:00) What Mike did to get out of his depression (49:00) Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

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

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 724 with the real Tarzan, Mike Holston. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:32Lewis Howes?

  Harriet Tubman said, "Every great dream begins with a dreamer." Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. And today we've got a young man who is reaching for the stars and changing the world, literally, through the use of all of his education and his massive social media following. The King of the Jungle and the Real Tarzan, those are the names that this exotic animal specialist teacher and zookeeper, Mike Holston from Miami, calls himself. He's got over 4 million followers on Instagram and a massive following on YouTube.

• 1:14Lewis Howes?

  And he's used his huge social media following to teach others about exotic animals and wildlife, and our part in conserving this wildlife and maintaining this wildlife. He's inspired by Steve Irwin, who he calls his idol and the best man to stroll this earth. The real Tarzan uses visibility that he gets for the good causes that he's a part of. He loves to educate people about animals, and he often visits schools to teach kids. And now he uses his platform to teach people all over the world. And I've become obsessed with watching him on Instagram. He's literally grown, I think, 3 million followers on Instagram in the last 6 to 8 weeks alone.

• 1:57Lewis Howes?

  It's amazing what this guy is doing and educating us. And I realized how uneducated I am about animals until... I watched some of his videos and this is really inspiring stuff and I think sometimes we lose perspective of wildlife and animals in our own backyard or around the world what's actually happening and we talk about this today on some of these things. We also talk about his background, growing up in a rough neighborhood and how his family made it out of that background. He talks about how the love of animals saved him from depression, the power of what one Will Smith shared did for him on social media and reaching out to

• 2:38Lewis Howes?

  work with him and how that impacted people seeing his social media videos and actually being a part of this moving forward. We discussed the differences between animals in captivity and in the wild and how Mike would like to help save animals everywhere. We also talk about how following any dream, even if everyone says it's the craziest thing to do, Mike has built this incredible life for himself by talking about wildlife animals and by showcasing animals, playing with animals, connecting with animals. He has built a life for himself, a business for himself, a brand around something that most people said to him this would never work. And so if you ever have had a dream, maybe you've got something

• 3:23Lewis Howes?

  crazy in mind right now where everyone is telling you it's not possible, don't do this, you're wasting your time, go get a steady job. Here is a great case study and example and he's going to talk about how he's been building this and how it keeps growing. The more he dives into the dream, he attracts even bigger people to support him manifest it. So this is a fun one, guys, a powerful one. Again, LewisHowes.com/724. Post that link out to your friends, text your friends who have crazy dreams to listen to this, share this on your Instagram story and follow at TheRealTarzanMikeHolston. This is a powerful one, guys. So without further ado, let me introduce to you to the one, the only, Mike Holston.

• 4:14Lewis Howes?

  All right, welcome back in one of the School of Greatness podcast. We've got the real Tarzan in the house. Mike Holston, good to see you.

• 4:21Speaker 02

  Yes, sir, brother. Thank you for having me.

• 4:23Lewis Howes?

  Appreciate you being here, man.

• 4:23Speaker 02

  So much fun.

• 4:24Lewis Howes?

  You've been, you've been taken off of the last month. I found out about you from Will Smith and then it seems like everyone's been talking about you.

• 4:31Speaker 02

  Thank you, Will.

• 4:31Lewis Howes?

  There you go. Yeah. You are just like taking over the world with educating us about animals, all types of animals.

• 4:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, man.

• 4:39Lewis Howes?

  From domestic animals to the wildest exotic animals to reptiles, to snakes, spiders, elephants, anything in between. You, if it's an animal and breathing and walking and moving, you love it.

• 4:51Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 4:53Lewis Howes?

  When did you get into this like passion for just all types of animals?

• 4:56Speaker 02

  Honestly, I was born with animals, you know, like not born with things, but there was already two dogs in my family, born in my family. So I grew up with two dogs, you know, had no siblings, so those are like my best friends.

• 5:08Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 5:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:08Lewis Howes?

  Only child?

• 5:09Speaker 02

  I was at the time.

• 5:10Lewis Howes?

  You were at the time.

• 5:11Speaker 02

  You know, but I'm the oldest of 10.

• 5:13Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 5:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:14Lewis Howes?

  10?

• 5:14Speaker 02

  Big family.

• 5:15Lewis Howes?

  Brothers and sisters?

• 5:15Speaker 02

  Brothers and sisters.

• 5:16Lewis Howes?

  I was gonna say like nine animals or something.

• 5:18Speaker 02

  No, animals is way deeper than that.

• 5:20Lewis Howes?

  You're the oldest of 10?

• 5:21Speaker 02

  Oldest of 10.

• 5:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow. What is that like?

• 5:24Speaker 02

  It's just the best feeling, man. Me and my siblings were real close growing up. So it's just like, I always had that brotherhood, that sisterhood, and I had a bunch of cousins, but there's nothing like having your brothers and sisters, you know?

• 5:36Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 5:36Speaker 02

  I loved them tremendously.

• 5:38Lewis Howes?

  And you grew up in Rhode Island?

• 5:39Speaker 02

  Yep. Well, I bounced back from Rhode Island and Atlanta for most of my life. My dad lived in Rhode Island, my mom lived in Atlanta. So holidays, my birthday, or I was over there, then I would go, you know, I would be in school in Atlanta, I live in my life, my mom, my two brothers, and the rest of my family was up north.

• 5:56Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 5:56Speaker 02

  So every holiday, any break we had, we was, we was home.

• 5:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  Four, five, six times a year, you know?

• 6:02Lewis Howes?

  And you had a couple of dogs growing up. Did you, when did you really start to explore out and?

• 6:06Speaker 02

  I got my first snake at four. Four turned to five.

• 6:09Lewis Howes?

  What kind of snake?

• 6:10Speaker 02

  I had a burrowing stridger.

• 6:11Lewis Howes?

  Oh, really?

• 6:11Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I've caught snakes, you know, like garter snakes and, you know, decay snakes and. Rough green snakes, you know, growing up, but I never actually had one as a pet.

• 6:22Lewis Howes?

  So you would catch them?

• 6:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I'll I'll bring him home, mom's like, what the you doing? My mom's like, dude, you can't have any, you know, and it was in my frickin' house. So I just kept begging and begging and begging.

• 6:33Lewis Howes?

  You got a four, got a boa constrictor?

• 6:34Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 6:35Lewis Howes?

  Was it like a yellow one, like?

• 6:36Speaker 02

  It was a regular Colombian redtail, had like a tannish, you know, brownish body with a red tail, you know, with with dark brown stratus on top of him, but he was evil, bro.

• 6:46Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 6:46Speaker 02

  He was mean.

• 6:47Lewis Howes?

  Bite you a lot of what?

• 6:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, he bit me a lot.

• 6:49Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 6:49Speaker 02

  I didn't know a lot, you know, all I saw was TV stuff, you know, I had.

• 6:54Lewis Howes?

  You saw Steve Irwin?

• 6:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know.

• 6:56Lewis Howes?

  When did you first see him or see?

• 6:57Speaker 02

  Well, I actually first saw the old school Tarzan movies first. My my grandma was an older lady, she passed away a couple of years ago, but you know, seventy year old lady was sitting in her big huge chair every day and watched this black and white TV, and I loved my grandma to death, every time I came, we lived in the same house, so my dad was on the first floor, and then my grandma lived in the second, my great grandma lived on the second floor, and then my grandma lived on the third floor. You know, so I was always up and down, hanging out with my family every day. So when I go see my my grandma, she would watch these stupid old movies with black and white, and I'm like, dude, this is so boring. You know, like, I don't want to watch this, and then one day, she had a old school, like nineteen fifties Tarzan movie on, black and white, horrible.

• 7:42Speaker 02

  I look at it now, I'm like, dude, this is so bad, but back in the day, as a kid, I was like, yo, this is amazing.

• 7:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 7:47Speaker 02

  You know, and.

• 7:48Lewis Howes?

  Swinging a little rope, yeah.

• 7:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, fighting cheetahs and lions in the jungle with a, you know, tilt on, it's like, dude, this guy's amazing. And then I got a lot of stuffed animals after that, and then I found, but I knew it was off, you know, I knew Tarzan was a fake movie, and my stuffed animals weren't real, so when I finally got my snake, you know, I thought it was gonna be a walk in the park, and it wasn't. You know, because he was he was mean, but that's when I started watching Steve Irwin, and then I went from looking at something that was fake to looking at a real person.

• 8:18Lewis Howes?

  Who was really.

• 8:19Speaker 02

  Was really doing the stuff, exactly, you know, it wasn't a cartoon. Um, I had to be, I mean, anywhere from five, six, seven years old.

• 8:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 8:27Speaker 02

  You know, probably, probably younger or older, I can't remember. From watching PBS Kids and Zabuma Fool and National Geographic Channel and David Attenborough and Animal Planet, you know, you name it, dude, I was engulfed in animals every day of my life. You know, from a kid up until this day, you know, and it's just, it stuck with me.

• 8:47Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 8:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, like, once I love something or like something.

• 8:49Lewis Howes?

  You're all in on it.

• 8:50Speaker 02

  I'm all in, like, I eat the same food over and over.

• 8:52Lewis Howes?

  Me too, man, I eat the same restaurant like every three days.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  Dude, it's like, it's, how can you get bored of something you love?

• 8:58Lewis Howes?

  I know.

• 8:58Speaker 02

  It's like clockwork, you know?

• 8:59Lewis Howes?

  See, you had the snake at four, four or five, how long did you have this mean snake for? And did you ever get a place where you were like able to tame it or?

• 9:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, I think he bit me, my brother, my aunt, my mom and my uncle. And they would get, they were, they were like literally days away from getting rid of him. I kept going there, you know, I was nervous as a little kid, you know?

• 9:18Lewis Howes?

  I don't even have a curse.

• 9:19Speaker 02

  But I was like, it's my snake, I had to conquer this fear, you know, and every time we go to hang up, like handle this snake, everybody's walking away with tears or blood and I'm just like, dude, this is just horrible. And one day I picked him up and he didn't bite me. I was like, we're best friends.

• 9:35Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 9:36Speaker 02

  And then.

• 9:36Lewis Howes?

  But isn't it scary to like have something that's biting you to like put it up next to your face?

• 9:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, it takes, it takes time to do that, you know?

• 9:42Lewis Howes?

  Right in your eyeballs and like.

• 9:44Speaker 02

  It takes time, man, you know, like.

• 9:47Lewis Howes?

  You don't want to just pick it up and like, oh, hey snake.

• 9:48Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, no, not, not at the, at the beginning, uh huh, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta basically make him trust, you know, trust him. You have to trust him.

• 9:56Lewis Howes?

  You have to trust the snake.

• 9:57Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 9:59Lewis Howes?

  How you trust a snake when it's biting you?

• 10:00Speaker 02

  Exactly, once when you're nervous, you're scared, you can't trust them. They have like a, a defense, the same way with you, if you were walking down the street and some guy came to and he's like, hey, what's up buddy, you're gonna be like, yo, bro, I'm either gonna knock you out, I'm gonna run away or call the cops. But if someone walks, approaches you, says, hey, how you doing, shakes your hand and keeps it moving, it's a, it's a harmless.

• 10:19Lewis Howes?

  More calm.

• 10:19Speaker 02

  It's more calm, so when you walk up, you know, with a snake, you're like, oh man, am I gonna grab it? He's like, yo, bro, are you trying to eat me, are you trying to fight me?

• 10:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 10:26Speaker 02

  Like, I'm gonna bite you, just get away from me, cause they're more scared of us than, you know, we are them. But if you walk up to a snake and you're like, hey buddy, what's up, how's it going? He's like, oh, alright, cool, just chilling. Versus, you know, you go in here and you're like, oh, you know, you're trying to grab him, the snake's looking at you, you're looking at him, you know, it's just. But versus if you, if you literally do this. That's it.

• 10:48Lewis Howes?

  Calm.

• 10:49Speaker 02

  Calm. You become a tree branch versus something trying to eat you. You know, you're just a harmless figure.

• 10:55Lewis Howes?

  Wouldn't Steve Irwin be like that, like on the TV?

• 10:57Speaker 02

  Of course, there's different snakes. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You know, you gotta bring the viewers in.

• 11:02Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 11:02Speaker 02

  You know what I'm saying? But like, it's just, everything's like, it's like ballet. You ballet with this snake, and then if you had a breakdance, then you gotta breakdance, of course, you know, but it's all just simple, slow motions of trust, and if he's moving, you move with him, and he moves this way, you move that way.

• 11:19Lewis Howes?

  Same thing with like a dog, you know, I feel like, I feel like I do really well around dogs. Like, a lot of people who are dog owners are like, eh, they don't really like big guys, right? They get like skittish around big guys. But I'll just like kneel, and like, and I just put my hand out calm.

• 11:33Speaker 02

  Get down to your level.

• 11:34Lewis Howes?

  And let them come to me, and then they like start sniffing me, and like, start like putting their head on me, and then it's just like, alright, start petting.

• 11:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, best friends, just like that.

• 11:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and these people are always like, they never do that with strangers or whatever. I'm like, well, I'm just trying to be calm and relaxed.

• 11:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, everybody's so nervous and scared of people's dogs, that's why they freak out when they get to their houses.

• 11:51Lewis Howes?

  See, if it was a thirty foot boa constrictor, I might be, I might not be like, hey, little snake, like, or maybe like, touch the tail first.

• 11:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure.

• 12:00Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy, man. Okay, so you conquered the fear of your first snake that bit you.

• 12:04Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:04Lewis Howes?

  Did the snake bite you again after this?

• 12:07Speaker 02

  I'm pretty sure he did. I was so happy, you know, that I finally got to, you know, even interact with this animal. I didn't even care after that, you know, I just kept duplicating the same thing and doing more research.

• 12:18Lewis Howes?

  Probably, whatever. Really? You started researching about snakes in general, or about all snakes?

• 12:22Speaker 02

  Both constrictors, you know, at first I started doing, I just wanted a snake, you know, because I was just so young and naive, but, but I finally realized there's thousands and thousands of different species of snakes that get bigger and smaller and different colors and different places they live, in trees, live on the ground, live underwater. It's just like, when I figured that out, that there was so many more than just, you know, pythons and boas, I was literally like, oh my- Freaked out. Freaked out, bro. Imagine having your favorite food, right? And you eat it your whole life. And then one day you found out that food had millions of options that tasted just like that, but better. You know, you're like, dude. Sounds amazing. It's like, it's like an endless buffet of greatness. Oh, my gosh. So when I, when I finally figured out at a young age that there was like

• 13:07Speaker 02

  thousand different species of snakes, even the same species, you know, like a boa constrictor has seven or eight or nine or 10 different species inside just a boa constrictor of that country. And then you go to another country that got different ones, then another country got different ones, but they're still boas. They look different, they have different patterns, some get bigger, have different head shapes. It's literally so interesting. You know, some are more aggressive than others, some are calmer than others. And that's what really, you know, intrigues me and I'm like, dude, if I could learn this about snakes, how many other animals? And it's like that with every single species. That's why I'm addicted to all animals, because I love to learn. And you can, you can never stop. I mean, there's so many things you can learn. Yeah, bro, like literally. You probably know like 20% of. Bro, 20, no, I don't even know like 4%. Not even, I don't even know if I know 1%.

• 13:51Speaker 02

  That's just my opinion to the, to the outside world. I'm a genius. You know, a little bit about a lot of things. But to me, I'm a student to the game, always. I love to learn, I'm an open book. So when I get around different people, like, you know, I was at Caesar Milan a few days ago. He's been on the show, yeah. He's an awesome guy, you know, I looked up to Caesar Milan for a long, like a long time, you know? You went to his dog psychology center? Yeah, I went to dog psychology center and I, again, I told you, I was raised with dogs, you know? So I trained dogs and worked with dogs my whole life. But the moment I got with Caesar, I have no fucking clue what I'm doing. Teach me, that's how I am. I'm like, give me all you got. What was the greatest thing he taught you the other day? How to sit, how to make a dog sit.

• 14:33Speaker 02

  I've been doing the wrongest, I've been doing a great job to my, for myself, you know, but like he, he explained stuff to me and I'm like, holy shit, dude, that's real. Like, how do you do it? So what do you do, what do you, what do you tell a dog to sit, what do you do? Sit? Yeah. But it's more about the energy, right? Not even, bro, he explained this to me, it's so freaking cool. It makes total sense because it's applied in other animals too. When a dog is born, man, who knows? Their eyes and their hearing. So they're born blind, they're born deaf, but they can smell. So the first thing they can do is they can smell first. That's your first natural instinct is the smell. And then like a few weeks later, they open their eyes, they can see.

• 15:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, start hearing.

• 15:13Speaker 02

  And then they can start hearing. So when you go to teach them, you don't teach them through here, you teach them through here. And then here and then there. Because once this goes, everything else goes. Because this is instinct number one.

• 15:25Lewis Howes?

  How do you teach them through the nose?

• 15:27Speaker 02

  Treats, smell, attention, stuff like that. I'm still learning because I just learned a few days ago. So I'm going over the process of watching all this new stuff and like, okay, this is how it does it. So when I go home, I can train my dogs totally different now. Because now, again, I'm a new book. Everything I did know about, that I thought I knew, it's now an old book and I have a new book. So one day, when I get around another dog guru from another country, from somewhere else, I can completely erase, put that book on the shelf and they'll go learn something new again.

• 15:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 16:00Speaker 02

  So one day, when I can give out information, I say, oh, here's three books. I learned this and I learned that, I learned that. So here's your methods of, you know, that's how I like to reiterate things. Become, I basically become a sponge.

• 16:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, of course. How many animals do you have right now, personally?

• 16:16Speaker 02

  Forty-one.

• 16:17Lewis Howes?

  What are they?

• 16:18Speaker 02

  I have three dogs.

• 16:21Lewis Howes?

  This is in Miami or is this?

• 16:22Speaker 02

  It's in Miami, yeah.

• 16:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, okay, three dogs.

• 16:24Speaker 02

  I have a fox.

• 16:25Lewis Howes?

  A fox?

• 16:26Speaker 02

  American red fox.

• 16:27Lewis Howes?

  Like, like a wild fox or like?

• 16:29Speaker 02

  Like a fox.

• 16:30Lewis Howes?

  Like it's tame now, it's like?

• 16:31Speaker 02

  A lot of animals I have, like ninety-five percent of animals I have are like rescues. You know, besides my dogs, the dogs gave to me for free from people from Instagram. It's like, I worked at a reptile store back in the day. And then they sold animals, of course, to the public. And I'm in, I'm into the animal education and conservation space. You know, I really don't care so much for selling animals. I don't have a problem with people having animals as pets, as long as they have the, you know, the proper education and stuff and captivity to duplicate their enrichment in natural environments.

• 17:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 17:03Speaker 02

  But um, my fox was a rescue and I raised him with my pit bull.

• 17:07Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 17:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:08Lewis Howes?

  Was like a baby fox?

• 17:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, they're both the same age, seven, I think the fox was like eight weeks old. And my dog was like seven and a half weeks old.

• 17:15Lewis Howes?

  You raised it together?

• 17:16Speaker 02

  So I have a hundred pound pit bull that looks vicious, he's sweet as.

• 17:20Lewis Howes?

  Sweet, like they call him.

• 17:21Speaker 02

  And I have this fox and they're best friends.

• 17:23Lewis Howes?

  Shut up. So if a fox like bites you know or is it like?

• 17:28Speaker 02

  No, the fox is completely like.

• 17:30Lewis Howes?

  tame.

• 17:31Speaker 02

  Like never bit me ever, never bit anybody.

• 17:34Lewis Howes?

  What? Even though it's like in his DNA is like the more aggressive?

• 17:38Speaker 02

  Not even more aggressive, you gotta think, you know, in the wild, they're like at the bottom, not the bottom of the food chain, but they're like, they get killed by cars.

• 17:46Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 17:46Speaker 02

  Hawks, you know, if they're small enough snakes that eat them in different places, cougars, jag, you know, I mean not jaguars, but uh coyotes, bobcats, they battle with all these animals' territory, you know, so in the wild, people are like, oh, fox is aggressive, like no, he's just defending himself, you know, he has a lot of problems out here, you know what I'm saying? So, but the cool thing is, he was such a, he was so young, and my dog was so young, they, they bonded together, so my dog loves me, the fox is like, okay, I can trust this guy, I love him too.

• 18:15Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 18:15Speaker 02

  So my dog was, that's why I love pit bulls so much, people just, they're so underrated. You know, people think they're so vicious, but they actually are the best dog, you know what I'm saying? Like they live to please you.

• 18:26Lewis Howes?

  Gosh, I love it.

• 18:27Speaker 02

  You know, and whatever you do, and whatever you tell them to do, whatever you teach them, they're gonna do it.

• 18:31Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 18:31Speaker 02

  You know what I'm saying? So I just teach love, kindness, happiness, patience with this giant dog. He has love, kindness, and patience with everything and everybody, even a fox and a lizard and a baby monkey, you know, that he could easily eat in one bite, he's just, he loves it.

• 18:46Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 18:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, I got, you know, he's a hundred, he's, I brought him to the vet, he was like eighty-eight, like ninety pounds. He's only like eight months old.

• 18:53Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh.

• 18:54Speaker 02

  So, I got puppies, like fifteen pound puppy pit bulls, you know, I got this, I'm like, dude, this is gonna be, I gotta watch him, you know?

• 19:03Lewis Howes?

  Is he calm?

• 19:04Speaker 02

  Dude, he's just the best big brother ever.

• 19:07Lewis Howes?

  Wow, see, see how monkeys, the monkey play with the dog and the fox?

• 19:10Speaker 02

  Where's the dog?

• 19:11Lewis Howes?

  Fox doesn't eat the monkey?

• 19:12Speaker 02

  No, or the fox doesn't go next to the monkey. There's just certain.

• 19:15Lewis Howes?

  Certain things.

• 19:16Speaker 02

  Certain things you can put together, and if I groom up from babies, of course, but I can't.

• 19:22Lewis Howes?

  Otherwise, that would kill probably.

• 19:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, and then you don't wanna stress the animals out by trying to, they're not supposed to be together anyway. Sometimes it happens just naturally, I know, I have a friend that has, um, the dog just passed away like a couple of months ago, but for ten years, this guy raised a Saint Bernard with an adult male lion.

• 19:40Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 19:41Speaker 02

  I got video and picture.

• 19:42Lewis Howes?

  Was it, it started as a baby lion?

• 19:43Speaker 02

  They both started together.

• 19:46Lewis Howes?

  And then they would just like lay with each other and hang out?

• 19:48Speaker 02

  Best of friends, this six hundred pound

• 19:50Lewis Howes?

  A lion.

• 19:51Speaker 02

  Lion has a little sixty pound Saint Bernard, that's a best friend. And actually, the Saint Bernard was older, like by a few weeks, so he was more dominant than the lion.

• 19:58Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 19:59Speaker 02

  Swear. They were getting fights and then the Saint Bernard would win every time.

• 20:03Lewis Howes?

  What?

• 20:04Speaker 02

  He would back down, you know, it's his brother.

• 20:06Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh. Even though he was bigger? That's crazy, man.

• 20:11Speaker 02

  Yep, and I remember my friend was telling me, because they were so close for ten years together. You know, that's like literally every single day of his life, he's he had this this dog.

• 20:20Lewis Howes?

  Sad.

• 20:20Speaker 02

  You know, so.

• 20:21Lewis Howes?

  How long does a lion live for?

• 20:23Speaker 02

  Lion can live like twenty, thirty years, you know, so, I mean, in a wild, they don't last long, but it's been lies in captivity that lasted about twenty years, and of course, more.

• 20:32Lewis Howes?

  So what other animals do you have? You got foxes?

• 20:34Speaker 02

  I got a goat.

• 20:35Lewis Howes?

  Goat.

• 20:36Speaker 02

  I got Arabian dwarf mountain goat that just rescued from like a little cattle farm where they was gonna eat him. So I got him, and he's like actually the best pet I have. He's the best.

• 20:46Lewis Howes?

  Why?

• 20:47Speaker 02

  He's recently, he's new to the family, he's just so, you never think a goat would be just so loving, and you'd think dogs are affectionate. This goat wasn't leaving my side, bro.

• 20:55Lewis Howes?

  No way, dude.

• 20:56Speaker 02

  Dude, he's the cutest, he's like this big.

• 20:58Lewis Howes?

  What?

• 20:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:58Lewis Howes?

  Baby goat?

• 20:59Speaker 02

  Baby goat. You know, he drinks whole milk. I'm feeding him, giving him some milk because he's still a baby, he's only four weeks old.

• 21:05Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 21:06Speaker 02

  You know, and he has just the best personality ever, dude. He has like these little horns that's growing in because he's a baby, you know, he he just head bust you a little bit. He's just the cutest thing.

• 21:16Lewis Howes?

  He's gonna grow big, though, huh?

• 21:17Speaker 02

  No, he'll be small. He'll be like fifteen inches high.

• 21:20Lewis Howes?

  Okay, so you got goat, what else you got?

• 21:22Speaker 02

  I got a slew of snakes and lizards and I just got a bunch of spiders in recently and scorpions. Yeah.

• 21:29Lewis Howes?

  I saw a video of you with holding a bunch of scorpions and letting them pinch you or something, it's like, aren't they venomous or what?

• 21:34Speaker 02

  People don't know, man, you know, this.

• 21:36Lewis Howes?

  A little. I feel like I would hold those snakes.

• 21:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, they're harmless.

• 21:42Lewis Howes?

  Why?

• 21:42Speaker 02

  Not all scorpions, but that species. And I sort of go back to with the snake stuff, you know, when I finally figured out that there were so many different species of snakes. Some had different characteristics and personalities, some were super aggressive, some were super chill. Same with scorpions, you know, you think of scorpion like, oh, man, this thing's gonna pinch me and kill me with venom. But there's like thousands of scorpions and everyone is different.

• 22:05Lewis Howes?

  Different. So the ones you have aren't venomous or what?

• 22:07Speaker 02

  They have small venom, but it's like, it's like a bee sting to you, to a human. It's put into like a cricket or, you know. It still hurt for sure, yeah, but first it's something that can sting you and

• 22:19Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:19Speaker 02

  kill you, be dead in an hour or something. It's like, oh, that just hurt a little bit, you know? So that's the, that's the gradual scale.

• 22:27Lewis Howes?

  How many times have you been like bitten or stung or?

• 22:31Speaker 02

  I'll show you. My scars have scars and scars.

• 22:34Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh, man.

• 22:35Speaker 02

  This is, this is one of my favorite things to do. People always ask me, so I, I take my scars with pride. So you see those scars there?

• 22:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:43Speaker 02

  There.

• 22:43Lewis Howes?

  What are those from?

• 22:44Speaker 02

  Just random bites and scratches. I scratched there. All up on my wrist up here.

• 22:50Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 22:51Speaker 02

  There, here.

• 22:53Lewis Howes?

  Probably your fingers.

• 22:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was gonna do my fingers. A little anything that's like discoloration.

• 22:57Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 22:57Speaker 02

  It's just like old scars.

• 22:59Lewis Howes?

  Scratch there, yeah.

• 23:00Speaker 02

  Up there.

• 23:00Lewis Howes?

  So what are the types of animals that have bit you or scratched you or?

• 23:04Speaker 02

  Everything.

• 23:05Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 23:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, but it's like, I don't talk about it on a show because it's not like, it's everyday life.

• 23:10Lewis Howes?

  It happens.

• 23:11Speaker 02

  You know, it's like 95% of the times it's not an accident.

• 23:14Lewis Howes?

  Have you ever been like scared for your life, like, oh, I'm in a bad situation. This is not.

• 23:18Speaker 02

  Plenty of times.

• 23:20Lewis Howes?

  Give me, give me a couple moments, like when?

• 23:22Speaker 02

  I don't like sharing those moments with people. I guess animals are bad.

• 23:25Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, sure.

• 23:26Speaker 02

  There's enough.

• 23:27Lewis Howes?

  You're also doing way more than most people would do.

• 23:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:29Lewis Howes?

  And putting yourself out there and like.

• 23:30Speaker 02

  I think one day I have a lot of stuff documented. I'm, I'll go through and share some cool near-death experiences or accidents or.

• 23:38Lewis Howes?

  Can you share one? What was like one incident that you're like, oh, this was, maybe nothing happened bad, but it was like, oh, this could have been a bad situation?

• 23:47Speaker 02

  I went to the Bahamas, I saw my sharks for the first time. Oh my gosh. And uh, I'm the type of guy, I'm like, literally, I'm either all in or I Not at all. I should have been there in the first place, you know? And if I'm there, it's, it's, it's happening. So I went on this boat in the Bahamas, it's about a year ago. And I never saw my sharks before, for the first time. So, you know, of course, you see the shark week on TV, you see jaws, and you see all this crazy stuff, but I know like, I'm an animal guy, so I have to accept. You gotta do it. Everything, you know what I'm saying? Even if I'm not educated on it, I have to educate myself on it. Wow. You know, and, and learn and, and embrace it, even if I don't like it or wanna do it, I have to do it because it's my, it's my job.

• 24:30Speaker 02

  I can swim like a fish, I love marine, I have sharks and turtles tattooed on my leg. Wow. But um, dude, I got underwater and I never had a scuba tank before. So the dude was like, you can't come, you can only free dive. I'm like, dude, I wanna go deep and, and I wanna see these sharks, bro, like, stop playing with me. So, he went underwater with the tank and he, uh, he had this bigger nurse shark and he went under there. And then um, I think some black tipped reef sharks were swimming by, which are a little more aggressive shark. The nurse sharks are like, kinda like puppies, pussies, you know? So, I wasn't worried at all, you know, when he said, there's reef sharks coming, I'm like, yeah, it's gonna be gangster.

• 25:12Speaker 02

  So um, I wasn't worried about the sharks, it was more so the breathing apparatus you have to, you know, I'm on a scuba tank. Uh huh. So you go fifteen, twenty feet underwater and I'm walking on the ocean floor. And there's sharks swimming, there's stingrays, and there's fish. And I'm having a lucid experience, you know, walking on the ocean floor. You have to take a class and get certified to do stuff like this. I never did it. So I was breathing, but I got kinda a little excited. Yeah, yeah. I breathe in water, you know, and I'm underwater with a scuba tank that I have no clue about what to do. You know, do I swim to the top and catch my breath, do I? So I swallowed the water and started trying to breathe in the water. No. It's the freakiest thing, bro, like. Salt water.

• 25:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, and the sharks swimming around, so I can't like panic and like, you know, I don't wanna freak out. So it's literally like, I could feel my eyes tightening up and just weird experience, bro. So not from an animal, you got all this near death, it was from just like? But you gotta think, a situation like that is where accidents happen with the animals, you know?

• 26:15Lewis Howes?

  Cause they can feel the fear more than anything.

• 26:16Speaker 02

  They can feel the fear. I start freaking out. The sharks are like, okay, is this something hurt? Is he, is it time to eat? You know what I'm saying? So I start freaking out, someone's at the top, I'm bringing attention to myself, rather than being something that's just natural. Moments like those, you gotta compose yourself, or who could fucking compose themselves underwater? You know, when you're swallowing water fifteen, twenty feet on ocean floor with someone holding on to you, with the tube in your mouth that you have nothing, no clue about, just telling you to breathe. You know, these guys are licensed divers and I'm Joe Schmo that made him bring me down there, you know? So you have a split second, you're like, dude, this is a bad idea. And then you're like, alright, fuck it, I'm here. Alright.

• 26:52Lewis Howes?

  You talk about fear. You say that fear is a generational habit that can be broken. How'd you decide that?

• 26:58Speaker 02

  It's more so of like, uh, I seen it with animals. People were, oh my god, snakes are horrible. My grandma says, not my grandma, but people say, you see a snake, a good snake's a dead snake. You know, so you have all these people that are, for years, years and years, just passed down fear. Passed down fear.

• 27:18Lewis Howes?

  Spiders, snakes, whatever.

• 27:19Speaker 02

  Spiders, snakes. My grandma the same way. She doesn't like to drive on the highway. And I'm just like, dude, you drive on the street, you're just going ten miles an hour faster.

• 27:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 27:27Speaker 02

  You know, what are you scared of? It's a psychological thing, but her mother didn't drive that much. You know, and then her sister didn't drive that much, so they passed down the fear of driving on the highway. And it's like, dude, you're not giving me that shit. I don't want no fear that you guys got over there.

• 27:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 27:40Speaker 02

  But it's like, once you get past a fear, it's so, such a great feeling. You know, it's like the best thing you've, you've never had.

• 27:49Lewis Howes?

  Freedom.

• 27:49Speaker 02

  Freedom. You know, and that's what I applied to everything. A podcast, you were scared to talk in front of the camera, never did it before, but fuck it, we're here.

• 27:59Lewis Howes?

  Making magic, baby.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  Making magic.

• 28:01Lewis Howes?

  Why do you think it's important for people to see someone who looks like you doing something that's unexpected? Because most of the, you know, Steve Irwins of the world, the zookeepers of the world are all white.

• 28:12Speaker 02

  All white people, yeah.

• 28:13Lewis Howes?

  You never see a black person, like wrangling animals and hanging out with snakes.

• 28:16Speaker 02

  I got more so the confidence from my family, my white side of my family. I have a Cape Verdean background, so Portuguese and black, and then my grandma's like Russian, Polish and some other crazy stuff. So you see this, this black family, and then my great grandmother, this like blond hair, blue eyes.

• 28:32Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 28:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, like the soul of my family. You know what I'm saying? So. When I saw those, growing up, I'd never seen like black and white. Of course, I knew the difference between people, but my family, just as much as my mom and dad, because I grew up with them, they were the same bloodline as me. So when I saw that animal space, and I noticed it when I was like fourteen or fifteen, there was not a single black person that ever did anything that I wanted to do. I'm like, dude, I can use that as my advantage.

• 29:00Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 29:01Speaker 02

  You know, and it's also an inspiration because I inspire everybody. I don't care if you're black, white, Spanish, Asian. I got literally love for everybody, every religion. You know, I don't care what you believe in, I still love you. You know, we're just, I just spread nothing but love and positivity and peace to everybody, you know? And I feel like that's, that's a win. You know, I feel like people are like, oh, I can't hang out with this person because they're Jewish or they're Muslim. Dude, I don't care, bro. I wanna, I wanna learn. Teach me your language, you know, teach me your culture. I wanna, let's be friends. I, I hate barriers with anything, you know? I just love to be free, like animals.

• 29:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 29:34Speaker 02

  You know? Just be free.

• 29:37Lewis Howes?

  Did you play sports growing up too?

• 29:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:39Lewis Howes?

  Was like an athlete?

• 29:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:41Lewis Howes?

  Play football or basketball?

• 29:42Speaker 02

  I actually hated sports my entire life, but my whole family's full of athletes. And I was the only weird one because I liked animals, you know? So you got my brothers and cousins. That's my dad was a McDonald's All-American in high school.

• 29:54Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 29:55Speaker 02

  And my older stepbrother went to the league, NBA, played for the Mavericks.

• 29:59Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 29:59Speaker 02

  I got a slew of like athletes, and then you just got old animal boy over here.

• 30:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 30:04Speaker 02

  You know, so they're like, dude, why you not playing this? Why you not playing that? Why you not doing this? I'm like, bro, leave me alone. So after years of saying no, I finally said, yeah, I started playing football, started wrestling, until I'm playing basketball.

• 30:17Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 30:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I got pretty good at it. You know, because I got addicted to the, to the progress and the process.

• 30:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Played high school, did you play, you live, go to college too?

• 30:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, I played one year of college.

• 30:27Lewis Howes?

  Where'd you go?

• 30:28Speaker 02

  Played slot receiver at Georgia Military College and Atlanta Sports Academy.

• 30:31Lewis Howes?

  All right.

• 30:31Speaker 02

  Pretty cool.

• 30:32Lewis Howes?

  Nice, man, I played wide receiver too.

• 30:33Speaker 02

  Nice.

• 30:34Lewis Howes?

  Played in the arena league for about a year and a half.

• 30:35Speaker 02

  I wasn't.

• 30:36Lewis Howes?

  It's tough, man.

• 30:37Speaker 02

  It's different, man.

• 30:39Lewis Howes?

  It's indoors, you know, you got walls.

• 30:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:42Lewis Howes?

  So I broke my wrist diving into a wall trying to catch a football. It's just like the roughest sport. I mean, it's the guys who are pissed that they didn't make the NFL. Or they dropped from the NFL, they're trying to get back up. And it's just like, I'm gonna kill you.

• 30:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:57Lewis Howes?

  And I'm gonna work my way back up there.

• 30:59Speaker 02

  It's crazy, it's crazy to think like that, you know?

• 31:00Lewis Howes?

  It's so tough, man. It's like wild.

• 31:03Speaker 02

  I love competition, though.

• 31:04Lewis Howes?

  I love it, man.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  On an athletic level.

• 31:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 31:06Speaker 02

  It's like something that I crave, like.

• 31:08Lewis Howes?

  I crave it, man.

• 31:09Speaker 02

  Dude, I can't, I can't lose. You know, like, I can't.

• 31:13Lewis Howes?

  I hate losing too.

• 31:14Speaker 02

  Dude, I hate losing more than I love winning.

• 31:17Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. I was the worst loser for many years. I would like get so upset for hours, days that I lost. Even like the simplest little competition, ping pong, basketball, didn't matter what it was.

• 31:28Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:29Lewis Howes?

  But now I've learned like that anger, if I hold on to it, or frustration, doesn't serve humanity.

• 31:36Speaker 02

  Nope.

• 31:36Lewis Howes?

  It doesn't lift people up. It doesn't support me or the people around me. So I've learned how to take a loss as a learning experience quickly and just reapply the education from that loss. Into, okay, how can I be better?

• 31:48Speaker 02

  Exactly. And people should think like that, man, you know? It's, you win and you learn, you don't win and lose.

• 31:53Lewis Howes?

  That's it.

• 31:53Speaker 02

  You learn how to win.

• 31:54Lewis Howes?

  That's it.

• 31:55Speaker 02

  You know, you figure out what you messed up.

• 31:56Lewis Howes?

  And how to get better, yeah.

• 31:57Speaker 02

  Tweak down my stick and you go ahead again. You keep going at it till you win. That's, that's the way of life. That's what people need to understand.

• 32:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 32:04Speaker 02

  You don't lose. And when you, people lose and they say, okay, I lost. I'm done. And then you go, you're losing something else and you're done with that. And then you lose something else. You, you create a cycle of yourself of just fucking quitting, you know? And when you, when you finally figure out why you wanna win and where you're winning at, you can apply that. And your spiritual life, your mental life, your finance life, you know, your relationship, everything. Just straight winning.

• 32:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. So did you, did you start working? When was the first job that you had where you got paid working with animals?

• 32:31Speaker 02

  First job.

• 32:32Lewis Howes?

  How old were you?

• 32:33Speaker 02

  I was seventeen years old.

• 32:35Lewis Howes?

  At the store, is that where you were working at there?

• 32:36Speaker 02

  Not, not this one, but in Atlanta, I got a job at this place called Pet Land. It's a regular mom and pop shop that sold dog food and dogs and cats and birds. Little mice, snakes and goldfish.

• 32:49Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 32:50Speaker 02

  You know, like three or four snakes and, you know, just a regular pet store. Dude, I got in there and I felt like a million bucks.

• 32:56Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 32:56Speaker 02

  They actually didn't hire me at first.

• 32:57Lewis Howes?

  You're just working for free, like?

• 32:59Speaker 02

  They're like, why is this kid here every day? You know, I'm like, I want a job. But, you know, at the time I had long dreadlocks, had tattoos, fresh out of college, well, going into college and stuff. So, you know, what does this black guy would? Tattoos and dreadlocks, no, by animals. And I'm like.

• 33:13Lewis Howes?

  You probably taught them a lot, didn't you?

• 33:14Speaker 02

  Dude, I learned a lot.

• 33:16Lewis Howes?

  You did, huh?

• 33:17Speaker 02

  I thought, you know, that's when I becoming a real open book. You know, I started helping customers and, you know, just seeing the joy in people's faces. And I'm like, man, I want to be able to give them so much more.

• 33:28Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 33:29Speaker 02

  But I can't give anything more if I don't know more. You know, so I would start, every time we would have animals come in, I would pick certain animals I never had before and I would study the fuck out of them. And I would order stuff for their stuff in captivity, like their habitats and stuff. And then when someone came in and they were interested in that animal, I'm like, you want this? Okay.

• 33:50Lewis Howes?

  You know everything about it now?

• 33:51Speaker 02

  Here's what you do, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, and you're like, wow. But you can't get that service at Petco or PetSmart. They're like, go out of three. Or, yo, Billy, go back to fish form. If you four drops of fish food, change water once a week, boom.

• 34:04Lewis Howes?

  Right, right. Unless they had someone who was there that was like you or?

• 34:07Speaker 02

  I'm here giving you when they breed, how they breed, what they eat, why they eat, why you gotta turn the light off, how many times you gotta spray them.

• 34:15Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 34:15Speaker 02

  You know, like climate, hibernation, like everything. And they're just like, wow, that's so awesome. And then a person goes home with this animal. They come back for a check, they come, they come back, they get crickets, they buy another light bulbs. You ask them, how's your animal doing? He's doing great. And then seven months later, oh, I got another one. You know, and then you talk to him, you don't talk to him for three years. And then you find out on Facebook that they have the biggest reptile collection in Wisconsin or some shit. You're like, holy shit, dude. You know, it's like, it's awesome to be able to give something that I love to someone else and they love it too. It's just a beautiful thing.

• 34:50Lewis Howes?

  It's amazing. What about the people who say, well, we shouldn't be buying animals or having animals in our home or in our backyard? We should let them be wild. They're wild animals. Why do we have them in captive? What do you say to people like that?

• 35:03Speaker 02

  I agree to a certain extent. Animals, of course, should be in the wild, but you gotta think sometimes in the wild. They don't have homes because of us.

• 35:12Lewis Howes?

  Oh, interesting.

• 35:13Speaker 02

  And a lot of people forget that concept. And then another thing is if people don't have animals here, you lose touch with them.

• 35:23Lewis Howes?

  You lose touch with nature.

• 35:24Speaker 02

  You become oblivious to the problems that's happening in the wild. You kind of don't care, you know, versus if dogs are being slaughtered in China.

• 35:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 35:33Speaker 02

  You know what I'm saying? If you've never had a dog in your life, if the whole United States never had a dog, you're like, who cares?

• 35:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 35:39Speaker 02

  You know?

• 35:39Lewis Howes?

  You're not connected to it.

• 35:40Speaker 02

  Exactly, but being a dog lover, you know, like, you're like, oh, man, that hurts.

• 35:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 35:44Speaker 02

  It's home, what can I do to help? You you you just think about it, you know, even if you're not doing something actively or physically, it puts that thought in your mind. So if I can put that thought in that mind of everybody, I'm not saying I encourage people to have animals in captivity, but in all reality, the reality of it is people will always have animals in captivity. You know, it's not a what if or why can't they? It's just they are. Humans are gonna have animals in captivity. So if they are gonna have them, it's the reality of it, it's the realness of it. We need to be able to educate these people on why they have these animals and what can we do to better their lives in captivity. Because some people have animals in captivity that they breed them, they help them, and then they release them into the wild to help populations go. And then they're screwed because.

• 36:28Lewis Howes?

  It's not set up the right way, or they weren't educated.

• 36:30Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 36:31Lewis Howes?

  Wow. What's the most endangered species right now in the world? Do you know?

• 36:36Speaker 02

  Um, the most endangered species? I know the most tragic animals in Pangolin. Rhinos are critically endangered. Elephants are hitting, you know, a rapid decrease. Um, a lot of, a lot of animals, especially in the, in the African areas is, is getting hit hard.

• 36:54Lewis Howes?

  A lot of people are hunting, right?

• 36:55Speaker 02

  Hunting, you know, they banned hunting, so illegal poaching went up and, you know, it's just, it's horrible. And that goes back to having that, that, that heart for these animals.

• 37:06Lewis Howes?

  Connecting to it, yeah.

• 37:07Speaker 02

  So if some people see these things, like, it's been happening for like six years. Hey. Wake up, guys. These animals are rapidly dying by the thousands. Like, you guys don't care? You guys, you're not seeing it? What can I do to say, "Hey, yo, look at this. This is not right. This is happening. We gotta fix it." So I like being that voice for the voiceless.

• 37:28Lewis Howes?

  That's good.

• 37:28Speaker 02

  You know, because these animals can't tell you, "Hey, man..."

• 37:31Lewis Howes?

  I need help.

• 37:32Speaker 02

  Need help. You know what I'm saying? Their numbers just keep decreasing and decreasing and decreasing. And by time, it hits the global news when they wanna pick it up, when there's ten rhinos left. It's too fucking late, you know? It's like, where were you guys at four or five years ago when we had ten, ten thousand left? From a hundred thousand, that's even dressing difference. But don't make, don't make fucking headlines when there's ten left. It's too late.

• 37:52Lewis Howes?

  Sad.

• 37:52Speaker 02

  You don't wanna, you don't wanna wait till that brink of extinction.

• 37:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 37:55Speaker 02

  To make a change, make a change.

• 37:57Lewis Howes?

  What has working with animals taught you about connecting with humans?

• 38:01Speaker 02

  Humans are crazy.

• 38:04Speaker 02

  I look at humans and like, "Man, you guys are dangerous." Me being around animals so much and seeing how they live and adapt, you know, and, uh, survive and eat and breed and just everything about animals, I'm so obsessed with it. Then I look at the human species and I'm like, "We are fucking dangerous." We are animals, bro. Whether people wanna believe it or not, we are animals.

• 38:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 38:29Speaker 02

  There's a lot of good people out there, a lot of good people. But, you know, you look at the globe, and I remember, I think I was in fourth or fifth grade, I remember looking at the world population, like, three billion or something like that. You know, now I'm twenty, twenty-five, it's like seven billion. It's like, man, we're growing, like.

• 38:48Lewis Howes?

  Fast.

• 38:49Speaker 02

  Fast, like a lot. Imagine, you know, another twenty-five years from now, there's fourteen billion people.

• 38:56Speaker 02

  Where we gonna go?

• 38:57Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 38:57Speaker 02

  We go, and it's animals, man. You know, we, you know, go up, you know, frick. So, I just...

• 39:04Speaker 02

  I don't like humans, not like humans, but you know, like.

• 39:07Lewis Howes?

  In general.

• 39:08Speaker 02

  I'm an animal guy, so I spent my whole life with animals. I've been kinda antisocial my whole life. You know, so social media has brought out the social side of me, you know.

• 39:18Lewis Howes?

  To connect with people.

• 39:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. And it's cool. It's a definitely like.

• 39:22Lewis Howes?

  Starting to like humans more a little bit?

• 39:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, a little bit.

• 39:24Lewis Howes?

  Starting humans.

• 39:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, I started off with children first. I worked in the school districts for about six years in Miami and Broward. So I got to educate the children on animals and real issue with the kids and the animals. It was such a dope feeling and experience, you know, so.

• 39:39Lewis Howes?

  Where were you working at the time?

• 39:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:41Lewis Howes?

  Where was that you were working?

• 39:42Speaker 02

  Uh, South Florida. So I had a job at a reptile store called Underground Reptiles. I worked at a zoo called Zoological Wildlife Foundation.

• 39:50Lewis Howes?

  In Miami?

• 39:51Speaker 02

  Yep, in Miami.

• 39:52Lewis Howes?

  So you worked at the zoo for how long?

• 39:53Speaker 02

  Uh, about a year, about a year and a half.

• 39:55Lewis Howes?

  You were working with the kids at the zoo or?

• 39:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, I was working with the kids on like every aspect. I had my own small iguana business. I was rescuing iguanas. Yeah, I did educational shows and events. I did my regular management work at the reptile store, building cages, helping customers, picking up shipments, the whole shebang. I worked seven days a week for like three years straight, not a day off. Of course, when I like went on vacation or something, but dude, I'm so like involved in my niche of work from children to rescuing iguanas to working with monkeys at a zoo and learning as a young zookeeper, working at my old job, answering the phone, going out, feeding seven hundred lizards outside in the hot blazing sun and coming aside and pulling eggs and checking incubator

• 40:41Speaker 02

  incubator temperatures and down down data, just, just all stuff that I love to do. So when I can generate a hundred hours a week, seven days a week, working for somebody else. And when I finally birthed my whole Tarzan project, I was able to put all those hours for somebody else into my own craft. And it's just been an amazing thing.

• 41:01Lewis Howes?

  So the, so the Tarzan project, is that what you're working on now?

• 41:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 41:04Lewis Howes?

  Is that the, the brand, the business?

• 41:06Speaker 02

  We started.

• 41:07Lewis Howes?

  When did you start that?

• 41:07Speaker 02

  We started Tarzan.

• 41:09Lewis Howes?

  The real Tarzan?

• 41:10Speaker 02

  Ten months ago.

• 41:11Lewis Howes?

  And so you just started it. This is your brand, your company. What, what is it? What's the mission?

• 41:15Speaker 02

  So Tarzan.

• 41:17Lewis Howes?

  Besides all the crazy videos that I see?

• 41:19Speaker 02

  It's more so of me being a mirror. I'm a walking mirror. That's, that's, this is my motto to the world. This is, people wanna ask me what I do, why I do what I do. My business, whether it's Tarzan or King of the Jungle, or just might cause the name doesn't matter. I want people to see me and my brand or whatever I do as themselves. I want them to look at me and look directly back at themselves. Cause I come from nothing. I'm just a regular street hood kid from the smallest state in the United States. If I can do it, you can do it. That's my motto. So people see Tarzan and I want people to see themselves in their arts and crafts. Or they want to open up a wine business or they want to be a chiropractor.

• 42:02Speaker 02

  I want you guys to put that same effort that you see me do into your stuff. Because I believe in you, because I come from nothing and I want to see you make it. So that's what my Tarzan project is. Of course, educating people with animals, et cetera, et cetera. But the whole project's way bigger than just myself. It's about the people, you know, and inspired, encouraging people to be bold. It was first, I am Tarzan. And then, because I was wanting to be Tarzan as a kid, so I never stopped thinking about being Tarzan. Now that I'm Tarzan, it's like, okay. Everybody's like, oh, Tarzan's so cool. It's like, no, you're cool. Go do your own shit, you know? That's just, I want to be able to inspire these people from a real level, you know? And I feel like I can touch people because I'm young, 24-year-old millennial kid that lived in South Beach,

• 42:46Speaker 02

  that's still parties, listens to rap music, does all this stuff. But I'm just so focused on my dreams and goals that can't shit break me. So I want to be able to reiterate that to the younger people, the younger generation, the people in middle school, people in high school now, in college now, people that are struggling now already have degrees. I want to be able to get them that motivation, like, look, bro, go out there and get that shit. Don't take no for an answer. Don't take no L's. You're just winning, you learn, you know? That's what Tarzan's about. That's Tarzan as a project is just basically being a giant mirror of yourself.

• 43:19Lewis Howes?

  I like that, man. And what's the business model for you? Is it events? Is it curating?

• 43:24Speaker 02

  I want to educate in highest platform. Of course, Instagram has gave me such, such an exposure and I'm very grateful for it, you know, but.

• 43:31Lewis Howes?

  Was Will Smith the one who kind of like launched it even to more heights? You was building it on your own and then?

• 43:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, I still to this day, I hustling hard on it. It feels good to be able to work and work and work and work. And then one day you get an email from Will Smith's company and I thought it was spam, honestly. It just said, hey, we're from Will Smith's team. We love what you do. Will's a big fan of your work and you want to do a collaboration, you know? And then I'm like. Yeah, right. Okay. So, of course, I replied to the email. I said, absolutely, I would love to work with you guys. But I had the thought, you know, that thought in the back of my head, like, it's never gonna happen. It's Will Smith, bro, you know, like, who has just... Will Smith emailed him. Yeah, exactly. It just doesn't make sense, you know, so I had that hope, but then again, I was like, this is not real. Yeah.

• 44:19Speaker 02

  A few weeks passed, and I actually, I didn't forget about it, but I kinda like, just kept moving, you know, and I end up coming out here with one of my friends, Austin. And I was, I got on a plane at like, one o'clock from Miami, East Coast time. I had 1.2 million followers when I got on the plane. Pretty big on your own in like, 10 months doing it on your own, right? It was insane, dude. So, I got on a plane, I had like, well, I just, I remember, I remember making a post on Instagram, saying, thank you all for supporting me, we just hit 1.2 million followers. I love you all, can't wait to continue to see what's next. So, I get on the plane, I take off, and I usually always buy a wifi when I'm on the plane so I can keep working,

• 45:04Speaker 02

  answer emails, reply to text messages and DMs. I'm like, you know what? I'm working hard, I'm just gonna rest on this flight. Few hours of chill, yeah. I'm gonna take a few hours of chill, go to sleep, and then I'll start fresh when I land, cause I was gonna, when I land, I'm back working again. Yeah. And dude, I landed, and I turn my phone on, I'm like, yo, why is my phone like? Blowing up. It's not even blowing up yet, it's like freezing. You know, so I open my phone, and it's just, uh, so, I pick my phone up, and like... You're at 1.2 million when you took off. I'm like, dude, why is my phone not working? You know, and then I put it in my pocket, I go get my luggage, I feel my phone go like,

• 45:41Speaker 02

  so I open my phone, bro, I have like, 200 text messages. Like, yo, Will Smith just posted, like, literally, everybody I ever had, like, in my contacts texting me. Oh, my gosh. If I haven't talked to you for years, I got a text message, you know what I'm saying, so... I was like, I was like, no way. So I go to my Instagram. I got 1.8 million followers. Oh, my gosh. Within like three, four, five, LA flight from the east coast to the west coast. I went from 1.2 to 1.8, just like that. One post. One post. And it kept going. And you never met him? You never met him yet? I didn't meet him yet, no. Never talked to him on the phone. You didn't know that he was gonna post you? No, I didn't see the video or anything. Cause he just reshared a video, right? No, no, no. He made his own like compilation, like highlight reel of me. Of you?

• 46:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, and then he was like, this is Mike Holston, the real Tarzan. He's incredibly, like Will Smith talking, like saying this stuff, like in my mind, I started crying when it happened. I told him when I before, it's the first time people hearing that, you know, but like. I cried too, I'd be like. Dude, I sat there and I like literally started crying, you know, like. How, how did it make you feel to know that he really like cared about your mission, your message, your? For so long, bro, you know, I've been working on my Tarz since a little kid, you know, had this vision of being Tarzan. And I got plenty of doubts from, you know, my family, from friends, just everybody like, yo, don't do that. No work animals, there's no money in it, there's, there's no this, there's no that, there's, I've, I've heard it all.

• 47:05Speaker 02

  It was cool to be able to have someone that I looked up to, like Will Smith, like, yo, I support you. I love what you're doing, you know, and that meant a lot to me because I put so much blood, sweat and tears into my little small craft. To have someone at such a high level. And not even from being Will Smith. I was at a dark place, not a dark place, but I was like depressed and lonely for a certain, like a long time of my life. And Eric Thomas and Will Smith, I watched their videos on YouTube. I cut all music out of my life for like two years. And I listened to straight motivational podcasts and speeches. And it basically like cleansed me and Will Smith, Eric Thomas, C.T. Fletcher, this guy named Bradley Martin. I went through this whole like fitness, you know, phase and working hard on my craft. That's when I developed, working 100 hours a week, that's when I birthed all that stuff.

• 47:49Speaker 02

  So to stay focused, I didn't, I didn't go out to the club, I didn't hang out with chicks. I didn't do nothing but work out, go to the gym, listen to those guys, Will Smith. So when it was, you know, that time hit, you know, it brought back. Everything, you know, as soon as I I heard his voice, like, this is Mike Holston, the real Tarzan. Dude, it's just like, came like a ton of bricks, you know, of happiness.

• 48:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 48:11Speaker 02

  And I'm like, holy shit, dude, like, this is really happening. Cause, you know, seeing these followers is cool, you know, they're just numbers, they're people that are interested in what you do. But it goes to a whole other stratosphere when you have people of that caliber, like, okay. This guy's dope, and they publicly go do that, you know, these guys are busy.

• 48:32Lewis Howes?

  They don't have to do that.

• 48:32Speaker 02

  They don't have to do that, they have millions of dollars, you know, they have so many projects to work, they have families. What are you worried about little Tarzan for? The same thing with P Diddy, you know, Diddy's a big part of my life, you know, and it's like, it's so cool.

• 48:46Lewis Howes?

  Did he find you after Will Smith, did he reach out and all these people start reaching out after that?

• 48:50Speaker 02

  I I I'm not sure the process of how he found out about me, but I remember seeing him and he's like, we gotta connect, cause I was hanging out with his children already.

• 48:58Lewis Howes?

  You were, before, before Will Smith was.

• 49:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, I would, I would see his kids every now and then when I went out to go network and stuff. And.

• 49:06Lewis Howes?

  And show them animals and snakes.

• 49:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, so I saw him here in L A at the same exact time that Will Smith posted me, I was, I was in L A. I went to a day party, had no clue Diddy was gonna be there, Diddy's there, you know, and he's like, hey, what's up, Tarzan? I'm like, how the fuck does P Diddy know who I am, you know? He's like, hey, we gotta talk some business, man, I love what you do, we'll chop it up one day.

• 49:27Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 49:27Speaker 02

  P Diddy, billionaire, Ciroc, bad boy, Sean John.

• 49:33Lewis Howes?

  And just hanging out with snakes.

• 49:34Speaker 02

  Just crazy.

• 49:34Lewis Howes?

  Chilling.

• 49:35Speaker 02

  You know, and that's just, it's all history from there.

• 49:37Lewis Howes?

  This is what, like, a couple of months ago or something?

• 49:39Speaker 02

  Dude, like, two months ago, three months ago.

• 49:41Lewis Howes?

  So what has happened in your life since then, like, what are the?

• 49:43Speaker 02

  Since the Will.

• 49:44Lewis Howes?

  Business opportunities?

• 49:45Speaker 02

  Post Will Smith.

• 49:45Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:46Speaker 02

  Everything like.

• 49:47Lewis Howes?

  Changed, huh?

• 49:48Speaker 02

  Changed.

• 49:49Lewis Howes?

  What's been happening?

• 49:49Speaker 02

  Nothing changed for me as far as like.

• 49:51Lewis Howes?

  You're still doing the same thing.

• 49:52Speaker 02

  Well, stuff behind the scenes that I'm working on, it's just.

• 49:55Lewis Howes?

  What can you, what can you share? What's changed? Who are the people that have reached out to you since then that you've connected?

• 50:00Speaker 02

  Tarzan got a TV show coming, twenty nineteen, that's all I'm gonna say.

• 50:03Lewis Howes?

  All right, my man, I like it.

• 50:04Speaker 02

  So I can't say where, I can't say when, just know, you're gonna see this beautiful, bright smile with a bunch of animals.

• 50:10Lewis Howes?

  I like it, man.

• 50:11Speaker 02

  Coming soon. And I guess going back to saying, you know, once you get here, you gotta keep going, you know, of course, I can say, oh, I got a TV show, I made it. Fuck everybody, I'm done, you know, but the real me is like. Dude, this is it. This is where you really go hard. This is where you really block everything out. And you really focus. You really start studying. You really learn different languages. You really start, you know, mastering your physical aspects of just everything. So this is scary for like.

• 50:39Lewis Howes?

  Scary, but also good.

• 50:40Speaker 02

  People think like, yo, this guy, you have no clue what I'm about to tap into. They thought Eric Thomas and Will Smith did something many years ago that made this wait till now. You know, like.

• 50:52Lewis Howes?

  I like it, man.

• 50:53Speaker 02

  It's, it's, it's fun, man.

• 50:54Lewis Howes?

  What has kept you motivated to pursue this dream even when the money hasn't been there? Or it's not this profitable like?

• 51:01Speaker 02

  I've been broke this whole year.

• 51:03Lewis Howes?

  Until now.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  A rich at heart.

• 51:06Lewis Howes?

  Rich at heart.

• 51:07Speaker 02

  Rich at heart. There's nothing. I've been homeless. I've struggled. I've lost everything. I've lost animals. I've lost people.

• 51:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 51:16Speaker 02

  You know, so when little stuff happens in my life, little problems, it doesn't, it doesn't bother me. Because I know I can overcome it. It's more so of a mental thing. And I lost my dad when I was 14. So that's, that's, that's probably my main focal point of why I drive hard every day. Cause me and my dad was real close. You know, so when I lost my dad, I lost, I lost love. I didn't love nobody, didn't love anything. That's when I told you I was in that dark place from 14 till about a few years ago. And dude, it's just, I had to transition that anger and that hurt and that pain into something positive. So once I made that, it took a while, it took, it's still hard for me to this day, you know?

• 51:57Speaker 02

  But I made that small turn and dude, it just like, I don't know where it comes from. It's like, you know, I pray a lot. I ask God for strength and guidance and motivation, you know, and open doors and closed doors, give me signs. So whatever happens in my life, I just flow with it, you know? And I'm always, always working.

• 52:14Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 52:15Speaker 02

  And I, I made a promise to myself and God. After I was homeless before, I said I would never go hungry again. I would never go homeless again. And I heard something inside of me, it's as long as you work hard, you'll never go without food and you'll never go without shelter. So I've stood that day.

• 52:30Lewis Howes?

  Wore it hard.

• 52:30Speaker 02

  Busting my fucking ass.

• 52:31Lewis Howes?

  It's good, man.

• 52:32Speaker 02

  Every day. And I've never been homeless. And I've been hungry sometimes, but it ain't to the point where like.

• 52:38Lewis Howes?

  Intermittent fasting.

• 52:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:40Lewis Howes?

  Just called that.

• 52:41Speaker 02

  So I take a day off, sorry.

• 52:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 52:42Speaker 02

  You know.

• 52:43Lewis Howes?

  What's the, what's the greatest lesson your dad taught you?

• 52:46Speaker 02

  If you're gonna do it, do it. And what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. That's, that's one thing he always told me growing up. You know, and I didn't know what it meant until I needed to know what it meant. And that was actually one of the first tattoos I got across my chest. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. So when he was killed, it broke me, but it made me unbreakable in the same sense. Because I loved him so much, you know, he was a hero. You have a dad, right? You know, so your dad's like, bro. It's like, dad, what kid, what does one's dad? Love your dad. So when that was taken away from me, everything was gone. My love for animals, my love for, I didn't love my own family.

• 53:28Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 53:29Speaker 02

  You know, so what brought me back to reality was the animals, which would save me because I was depressed. I was lonely. I didn't have anybody to come to, you know? So once I got back with these animals, I started praying a lot. Dude, like, I felt love again. I felt myself come back. And that's why I go so hard for the animals, because animals is what saved my life.

• 53:49Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 53:49Speaker 02

  Without even knowing. I knew they'd bring me happiness my whole life, but when I was in my darkest place in my life, that I didn't care or love myself or anybody, they loved me.

• 53:59Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 54:00Speaker 02

  They brought it out of me and I'm like, dude.

• 54:02Lewis Howes?

  And they needed you.

• 54:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, just as much as I needed them.

• 54:05Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 54:05Speaker 02

  You know, so like, it's cool to be able to, people don't know the real story of my life because nobody knows me. They just know Tarzan and cool videos, apes and lions and snakes and stuff. But this whole animal stuff is what, it keeps me going every day, it just keeps me happy. I don't know anything else to do. You know, I have small hobbies, but every day, every second of my day, every thought is around animals because that's what keeps Mike happy. That's what changed my life. So when I get to this point in life where these animals have brung me, it's like, I gotta do everything in my power for them.

• 54:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 54:42Speaker 02

  So that's why I go so hard on the education. It's not even from a. Of aspect of education is understanding. People just wanna be understood. So do animals, just wanna be understood. I don't care to be understood because I let the work speak for itself, you know? I don't like talking much, that's why I never done like any podcasts or interviews. It's just, I've always had dreams my whole life to do stuff. And every time I told people, it was like, ah dude, that doesn't sound good. You know, so I was like, okay, how about I can show you?

• 55:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 55:13Speaker 02

  And then you give me your answer afterwards, you know, so.

• 55:16Lewis Howes?

  That's good.

• 55:16Speaker 02

  It's cool to be able to just do it.

• 55:20Lewis Howes?

  I love it, man.

• 55:20Speaker 02

  I love it.

• 55:21Lewis Howes?

  What about the biggest lesson your mom taught you?

• 55:23Speaker 02

  Biggest lesson my mom taught me? My mom is a hell of a woman. Strong, strong as shit. And my mom taught me without, without knowing she taught me was it's okay to leave. And do your own thing. My mom comes from the same hood all my family comes from. But she was the first one to leave. When everything was bad in my neighborhood, my family. She was the first one to leave Rhode Island to Atlanta to give us a new life.

• 55:57Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 55:57Speaker 02

  And she had nothing. She just went with her gut feeling, you know? She knew an opportunity was gonna make something out of it. And she brought two of her kids and herself, but like a hundred bucks in her pocket. And we drove eighteen hours from Rhode Island, packed all our stuff up and went down to Atlanta. Never looked back, but it was the best thing she could have did for us.

• 56:18Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 56:18Speaker 02

  Because if we stayed home, we wouldn't have made it. I'd have been dead easily. All the kids I grew up with, all my friends, went to the Boys and Girls Club, played football with, went to elementary and middle school with, they're all dead. Every last one of them. That's why I take this stuff so serious because like, I ain't supposed to be here.

• 56:38Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:38Speaker 02

  You know, and it like, it kinda makes me emotional now.

• 56:41Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:41Speaker 02

  But it's a good thing, cause I like to inspire people to show them the realness of it. Like, I lost a lot, but I gained a lot. Cause I get to show them there's life outside of whatever you go through. You can always make it. So, I like to show people that strength you can have without knowing you have it. See, my mom, she had the strength to leave. But she didn't know she gave me strength to leave. So when I left L A and to go to Miami to live with my dreams.

• 57:13Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 57:13Speaker 02

  It made it. It gave me that strength to go. I was like, okay, mom can do it. I can do it.

• 57:18Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 57:18Speaker 02

  And the same thing with that fear. It's so generational. It just keeps going. But then you look at it, my grandmother, my mom's mom, back in the day, left from Rhode Island and moved to California. No friends, no family, no nothing. With all her kids, my aunts and my mom, so. My mom got that from her. Then I got that from my mom.

• 57:42Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 57:42Speaker 02

  It just, you look at that effect in life and it's like, holy shit. It's crazy. I take all this shit real deep and serious, you know, I get, I have a lot of fun on social media, but there's like, there's so much behind it that, there's so much in the, in the gas tank, in the engine that keeps this going. And it's lovely.

• 58:00Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, man. Thanks for sharing that.

• 58:02Speaker 02

  Definitely. Sorry for getting all choked up.

• 58:04Lewis Howes?

  It's all good, man. It's what we do here. We get real here. Real talk, Zan, real life, you know?

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:09Lewis Howes?

  What message would you have to young kids who, who grew up like you? Who maybe are afraid to adventure out and try new things, whether it's being with animals or just trying new things in, in general?

• 58:21Speaker 02

  Pray. Pray for strength, pray for guidance, and believe in yourself. Everybody doubted me. I never doubted myself.

• 58:29Lewis Howes?

  How did you believe in yourself when everyone doubted you? How do you believe when you, when you don't have that belief?

• 58:35Speaker 02

  It's hard to explain. It's more so of, that's where I feel like praying comes into play at. And again, this is going to, I don't care what religion you are. I love everybody. So I give this advice to people. If you believe in Buddha or you're a Christian, you're whatever you are. I don't care. I still love you. So what I'm going to say is to apply to your life is pure faith. You believe in a higher power, you should believe in yourself. If you can pray and see stuff and want to achieve stuff and you, you're going to work hard towards it, whoever you pray to is going to help you.

• 59:10Speaker 02

  You're gonna help yourself, you know, you're gonna have enough strength and motivation to keep going. So when the world tells you no, whatever you're reading in the Bible, or whatever you're doing in your life, God is gonna give you signs that you're gonna see, and only things you're gonna see is what you prayed about. So when I pray and ask God for signs, and he puts signs in my life, I'm like, okay.

• 59:31Lewis Howes?

  There we go.

• 59:32Speaker 02

  Here we go. I always ask him to open and close doors in my life. So when he closes doors, sometimes I'm like, fuck, I wanted that door to be open then. It's like, I prayed for, I prayed for it, you know.

• 59:44Lewis Howes?

  A year later.

• 59:45Speaker 02

  And a year later, I realize, I realize, I'm like, oh.

• 59:47Lewis Howes?

  That's why.

• 59:47Speaker 02

  That's why. Totally get it.

• 59:49Lewis Howes?

  It hurts sometimes to close doors.

• 59:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, bro, it does, but God always got a better door open for you, you know. So just have faith in yourself, you know, work hard, and I'm telling you, you can become a very scary individual.

• 1:00:04Lewis Howes?

  In a good way.

• 1:00:06Lewis Howes?

  I like that. You love animals so much. Do you, do you eat meat?

• 1:00:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:11Lewis Howes?

  What's your?

• 1:00:12Speaker 02

  This is a great conversation.

• 1:00:13Lewis Howes?

  What's your viewpoint?

• 1:00:13Speaker 02

  I'm dying to have this conversation. So my mom's a vegan.

• 1:00:16Lewis Howes?

  I have lots of vegan friends, you know, I eat meat, but I also believe in being more plant-based.

• 1:00:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:23Lewis Howes?

  If possible, the more like conscious minded I become, it's like thinking about where the meat comes from and everything like that. So why do you eat meat if you love animals that much?

• 1:00:31Speaker 02

  Well, I grew up on meat, and of course, now, like I say, I get educated in things. Of course, with all the great publicity I'm getting with animals, people are asking why do you eat meat still? But then again, I'm real about it. So of course you have, and again, I don't mean to offend anybody with what I'm gonna say, but I got these vegans, not all vegans, they kinda attack certain people. You know, like, you need to do this and this, you know, it's like, that's not how you approach situations, for one.

• 1:01:01Lewis Howes?

  So the main. I'm from a loving place.

• 1:01:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, the main reason I'm not a vegan is because of the people. I've been bullied a lot my whole life. I got kinda like PTSD when that shit, I don't know if it's the right terminology for it, but like, when I feel like people are attacking me, I get on a kind of a whole different person. It's just naturally how I am.

• 1:01:21Lewis Howes?

  Like a snake.

• 1:01:21Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:01:22Lewis Howes?

  It's like, it's gonna attack, it's gonna bite you.

• 1:01:23Speaker 02

  You wanna fuck, fight, let's fight, you know, so it's, it's wrong for me to do, I'm learning to have educational conversations without being on a defense, you know. I have this cool conversation with a lot of vegans. It's been working pretty cool.

• 1:01:38Lewis Howes?

  What is it?

• 1:01:39Speaker 02

  You know, and it's like, they ask me about, you know, the animals, why you eat meat. I'm like, you know, you can't really, I don't waste food. Every time I eat food, I have food in front of me, I eat it. That's how I was raised, you know, I don't waste anything. I'm gonna try to go vegan next year.

• 1:01:54Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:01:54Speaker 02

  I'm gonna still eat meat, but I'm gonna hunt for it myself.

• 1:01:56Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:01:57Speaker 02

  So I'm gonna work for my food.

• 1:01:58Lewis Howes?

  Which Zuckerberg did.

• 1:01:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think it's awesome. But um, for like, the vegan community, you have to be

• 1:02:07Speaker 02

  a little less harsh at your words and try to educate a little more on a maybe a different way. The same route I took with animal education. So much you can do for so long, so you gotta switch it up.

• 1:02:19Lewis Howes?

  You can't shove it down people's throats. You gotta entertain and educate and make it fun and do it a different way.

• 1:02:26Speaker 02

  Yes, of course, I don't agree with animals that's killed or slaughtered in humanly for, you know, food consumption. But we are all animals, we're on the food chain. We have canines and our teeth, that's not for eating plants, of course. You can eat meat.

• 1:02:40Lewis Howes?

  What do they say about like, well, gorilla eats vegetables, right? Just like?

• 1:02:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, a lion just eats meat, you know, it's the same thing. It goes hand in hand.

• 1:02:48Lewis Howes?

  Gorilla's got canines, right?

• 1:02:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, gorilla's got canines.

• 1:02:51Lewis Howes?

  But it doesn't eat meat, right?

• 1:02:53Speaker 02

  But they have, they have more so of uh, where they come from to, you know, their, their DNA, how they're wired. It's just different, some different animals, you know, of course, like I can't, you, you couldn't switch and eat for, for a gorilla to eat meat 24/7, he'd die.

• 1:03:10Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 1:03:11Speaker 02

  He can't get the proper nutrients, you know, his stomach can't hold it, he doesn't have certain acids to digest certain things. Versus a lion, I can't just feed lion kale and lettuce and plants all day.

• 1:03:21Lewis Howes?

  He'd die.

• 1:03:21Speaker 02

  He'd die.

• 1:03:22Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:03:22Speaker 02

  You know, he wouldn't get the proper nutrition.

• 1:03:23Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:03:24Speaker 02

  You know what I'm saying? Of course, you could probably like blend up proteins and stuff like that and syringe feed them, but, you know, naturally. He just can't do it, you know, so.

• 1:03:33Lewis Howes?

  But he can't.

• 1:03:34Speaker 02

  Huh?

• 1:03:35Lewis Howes?

  We can survive on just plants.

• 1:03:36Speaker 02

  We can, we can, we can, we can bounce back and forth. Going back to my original statement, they're like, oh, these animals, this and that. And I'm like, okay, you can't sit there and say that you're a hundred percent for these animals. Because where do you live? We live in a house.

• 1:03:52Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, what are you wearing?

• 1:03:53Speaker 02

  What are you wearing? You know, like.

• 1:03:54Lewis Howes?

  Makeup, the shoes.

• 1:03:56Speaker 02

  All that stuff plays in, you know, there's leather on your car, you know, like all that stuff plays until back, until you're vegan.

• 1:04:01Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:04:02Speaker 02

  Stuff, you know what I'm saying? So you can't sit there and say, hey you, hey you, hey you, when you have a bunch of hey you's behind you in your life. In order for us to be, one, be able to spread your message, because it's not just for me, a lot of people don't like the way they approach people. And I'm pretty sure there's tons of people that can have educational, fun conversations about their way of life, and it needs to be done in a better way, of course. But just for me, it's like, I'm gonna try it for my own benefits, you know, of hunting for my own food. I like challenges, you know?

• 1:04:32Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:33Speaker 02

  If I wanna buy food, I'm gonna buy only fruits and veggies. But I'm gonna go fishing. I like to fish, you know, so I'm gonna go fishing. I go hunt, if I wanna eat, I'm gonna go hunt it. All next year, that's my, that's my motto.

• 1:04:43Lewis Howes?

  Just a lot of time and energy.

• 1:04:45Speaker 02

  Hey, if I want it, I gotta do it.

• 1:04:46Lewis Howes?

  That's true.

• 1:04:47Speaker 02

  You know?

• 1:04:47Lewis Howes?

  If you wanna, at least a try for a year. Yeah, I always take the approach of like, no matter what stance you have, or what you're trying to like, come at someone with, whether it's veganism or whatever, just how you show up in general. If you are trying to attack other people on one topic, you better have your whole life figured out on every other topic. You better be in integrity all the time, a good person, you better be like, you know, in shape, all these other things, like, cause then they can just come and attack you on something else.

• 1:05:15Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:05:16Lewis Howes?

  Learn to educate and connect with people on something you're passionate about, but don't make them wrong.

• 1:05:20Speaker 02

  Yeah. So when they come at me, I just say, I love you.

• 1:05:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:23Speaker 02

  And I don't wanna argue. I love you. We're on the same team. Have a good day.

• 1:05:26Lewis Howes?

  That's a good response.

• 1:05:26Speaker 02

  Is it?

• 1:05:27Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, that's a good response.

• 1:05:27Speaker 02

  You know, people always wanna fight, but I would just fight your teammate. If you love animals and I love animals, I'm not educating and you're out here educating, leave me alone.

• 1:05:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:36Speaker 02

  But we can have educational conversations, but if it's negative, I love you. Have a good day.

• 1:05:41Lewis Howes?

  What's, a couple of questions left for you. I'm curious, what's the best animal to rescue or have that is not like the normal domestic animals, the cats, the dogs, the? I don't know.

• 1:05:52Speaker 02

  Best animal to rescue.

• 1:05:53Lewis Howes?

  Rabbits, I don't know. If there was like an exotic animal that you wanted to have, whether it's a fox or monkey or you know.

• 1:05:59Speaker 02

  Iguanas.

• 1:06:00Lewis Howes?

  Iguanas. Why is that the best to have?

• 1:06:02Speaker 02

  Iguanas are so, such dope creatures, dude. Oh, man, like so.

• 1:06:07Lewis Howes?

  You catch a lot of them too. I saw a video of you catching like thirty in a night or something. I was like, this guy's crazy.

• 1:06:11Speaker 02

  He catches like three hundred in a night.

• 1:06:12Lewis Howes?

  Crazy, man.

• 1:06:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's like nuts.

• 1:06:14Lewis Howes?

  They're all over Miami.

• 1:06:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's like, it's, they're a basic species in Miami. I've had, I have, I've had iguanas my whole life growing up. So I've already had a natural love for them, you know, so, but then moving to Florida when I was seventeen and seeing.

• 1:06:25Lewis Howes?

  Everywhere.

• 1:06:25Speaker 02

  More iguanas than there were people was like.

• 1:06:28Lewis Howes?

  They're all over the place, buildings, trees.

• 1:06:30Speaker 02

  Everywhere, bro. Trees, they're in the city, they're at the beach, they're at restaurants, they're on the highway, bro, they're everywhere.

• 1:06:37Lewis Howes?

  So why are they a good animal to have?

• 1:06:40Speaker 02

  I mean, I wouldn't say a good animal, I would just say a rescue animal.

• 1:06:42Lewis Howes?

  Gotcha.

• 1:06:42Speaker 02

  As exotic, but they're real personal.

• 1:06:45Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:06:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, they have such personalities, you know, and like, not saying a wild iguana, but like, once you have an iguana in captivity.

• 1:06:51Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:06:51Speaker 02

  They're just so smart and intelligent. They understand you. You pet them, they raise up their feet to pet them.

• 1:06:58Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:06:58Speaker 02

  You scratch them on the head, they're like, oh yeah, that's just, just like a dog. They're affectionate, you know, they go through their mood swings, you know? They're just, they're just awesome creatures. And when it's your friend, you know, you have a lizard that's in your living room, you sit on the couch and he walks across the whole house and crawls up your leg and falls asleep in your lap.

• 1:07:15Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 1:07:16Speaker 02

  Dude, how.

• 1:07:16Lewis Howes?

  A lizard does that?

• 1:07:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, bro.

• 1:07:19Lewis Howes?

  I gotta come see your animals.

• 1:07:20Speaker 02

  It's sick, bro. Literally sick.

• 1:07:22Lewis Howes?

  I gotta come see them.

• 1:07:23Speaker 02

  My lizards, I have two rhino iguanas, they're like almost thirty years old. I rescued them from this guy. When I say rescue, like sometimes people, they don't want their animals anymore. So I'm like, okay.

• 1:07:33Lewis Howes?

  Took them, yeah.

• 1:07:33Speaker 02

  I'll take them in and I build them like these giant huge enclosures and feed them tons of fruits and veggies of all different kinds and just, I have so much fun with it. I don't breed anything, I don't have anything like to resell. Animals I get are like, I think out of all my animals, I think. Maybe four of them are nice. Really? Yeah. Four, what are the four? Uh, my dogs.

• 1:07:57Speaker 02

  And your fox? Yeah, I got a chameleon, that's pretty cool. But everything else is like, just evil. They're not nice. Just rejects, people I didn't want. And I love the challenge of taking on the challenge. None of them are nice. None of them. Are they nice to you or no? Over time, certain animals take a few weeks, a few days, a few months. Um, I have an iguana at home, you know, and I've, I've caught over almost fifty thousand iguanas in the past couple of years, easily. In the wild? In the wild. Yeah. You know, so I have one in captivity that you would think that I've had so much experience with iguanas, I would know. I got one iguana, bro, he's just a dick. Won't let you pick him up, won't let you. Just recently, the weather's changing, you know, they're going into hibernation and cremation. So he's, he's starting to eat a lot more to fatten himself up. Slow down and so. So.

• 1:08:42Speaker 02

  I used to put food in his cage, he would run to the back and just look at me. And now I'm going to his cage and he's sitting there staring at it and he's not moving. And then he's walking closer and like licking the fruit as my hand's still in there, so I grab some banana, he's still smacking me and biting me. Really? But just that, that little bit of him not running away, the same way how I had my snicker as a kid. There's that one day I went and picked him up, he didn't bite me. So I kept duplicating that, building that trust. Same thing with this iguana. Even till today, he's still mean, but a couple of days ago, I got the, and I've had this thing for almost a year now. Oh my gosh, you got a lick. Uh, you know, I got, I built him this huge cage that cost me like, you know, and a lot of my animals have cages that cost way more than them. I have a, I have a monkey, a rescue monkey that's evil, I can't touch him or anything. Really?

• 1:09:26Speaker 02

  And the, the thing cost me three hundred bucks to rescue, just to give the family a feed to cover some expenses, but his cage costs like four thousand dollars. That's just the type of. You can't even touch it? Can't touch it. Right, how long have you had it? I had him for like, three months now. We're getting closer, you know, but animals go through psychological and tragic experiences from other homes, you know, and they don't like humans. And you gotta rebuild that trust again. You know, that could have been a good monkey for seven years and then it took one that instance. Oh, man. You know, you broke the monkey's trust and he's just freaked out by you. And you gotta start from day one. Oh, man. And so people were like, man, fuck that process. I'm not going back through that again. I wanna get big again. You know, I don't wanna, I don't wanna keep cleaning up his shit.

• 1:10:09Speaker 02

  I don't wanna keep buying fruit and, you know, I don't wanna... No affection back, no love back. Exactly, you know, so that's where I pride in my at-home collection, because I have animals that just don't like me. But I gave them the best life possible and ended up loving me. And I showed that on social media. If you scroll back, I got this giant six-foot lizard from New Hampshire. And when I got him in, his mouth's open, he's smacking his tail, and it's literally telling me to the hospital. Literally like the smallest bite possible. Took you to the hospital? I'm saying he can. Oh, wow, one bite. One bite, I'll go straight to the, I can rip ligaments in my hand. Really, it's a big... Oh, yeah, it's a six-foot water monitor from Asia, like a Komodo dragon. Oh, my gosh. But it's a, it's a, it's not a Komodo dragon, but it's a, a close relative of it. So I got this thing in, and he's just evil.

• 1:10:54Speaker 02

  And then feeding him, taking a couple smacks and huffing and puffing, and then you just start petting him and hanging. Now, I can go in there, I can pick him up. No. I can kiss him on the face, I can pull his tongue out. I can, I can, I can, I can be in front of him. I have videos, I go online all the time. And I chop up raw chicken, right, with my hands. And I take the chicken and I'm like, here you go, buddy. And he grabs it and doesn't touch my finger. No way. Swear. And then my hands are covered in juice and chicken guts. And I'm putting my hand in front of his face, he's just looking at it like... What, do you wanna pick a chicken up? He grabs it. So that's how intelligent these animals are, you know? He knows, even though he smells my hands full of chicken, he knows that I'm not, I'm not food. Wow. Mm-hmm.

• 1:11:39Speaker 02

  It's sick, dude. I got these giant lizards from Dominican Republic, five foot, they're called rhinocerous iguanas. They have rhino horns, like a, like a rhino, but on an iguana. You know, and they got these big, huge, big, huge face, these teeth that go back. Scary looking, right? If you grab a little blueberry, and you give this blueberry to this fucking lizard, his head's this big. He reaches out with his little tongue, grabs a blueberry, and chews it. It's literally insane, bro.

• 1:12:05Lewis Howes?

  Dude, I wanna watch some of this.

• 1:12:07Speaker 02

  It's insane, bro.

• 1:12:08Lewis Howes?

  If I come to Miami and you're there, can I come check it out?

• 1:12:09Speaker 02

  We're gonna have stuff here, I'm moving here.

• 1:12:11Lewis Howes?

  Okay, great.

• 1:12:12Speaker 02

  So I'm gonna go home, pack up, and I'm a road trip all the way over here.

• 1:12:15Lewis Howes?

  No way, with all the animals?

• 1:12:17Speaker 02

  Not all of them, I'm gonna, I got, I got a couple of friends.

• 1:12:19Lewis Howes?

  You got other stuff here too, yeah.

• 1:12:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm gonna say, hey, you know, here you go.

• 1:12:23Lewis Howes?

  Dude, I wanna come experience this.

• 1:12:24Speaker 02

  It's gonna be sick, right here in your backyard.

• 1:12:27Lewis Howes?

  This is amazing, man.

• 1:12:28Speaker 02

  Sick, bro, I can't wait. And like, see stuff like this, you know?

• 1:12:30Lewis Howes?

  It's exciting me.

• 1:12:31Speaker 02

  We can set your podcast up in a monkey cage. I have a podcast in there for one day, you know?

• 1:12:35Lewis Howes?

  It'd be crazy.

• 1:12:36Speaker 02

  For real, it'd be sick.

• 1:12:38Lewis Howes?

  Monkeys are amazing, I feel like. I haven't had much experience with them.

• 1:12:42Speaker 02

  Just, I raised, I helped raise a chimp, Chimpanzee. Probably one of the coolest things I've ever done in my life.

• 1:12:49Lewis Howes?

  Like a little baby?

• 1:12:50Speaker 02

  Like a baby chimp, like a baby, that little ape. Bro, it's insane.

• 1:12:55Lewis Howes?

  They're just hanging on you and playing on you?

• 1:12:56Speaker 02

  This is so intelligent, it's like a human. He's literally a human with extra hair. And he can't, and he can't talk, but everything that we do.

• 1:13:03Lewis Howes?

  Can he sign, can he like?

• 1:13:04Speaker 02

  Dude, he's just, you show him how to blow a candle out, in a couple of minutes, like, it's hot, don't touch it. He's like, oh yeah, it's hot. It's like.

• 1:13:14Speaker 02

  It's like you're brushing your teeth, you can turn the water on, and you turn it off.

• 1:13:17Lewis Howes?

  Then you can do it.

• 1:13:18Speaker 02

  He's like, turns the water on, he drinks it, and turns it off. You're like.

• 1:13:23Lewis Howes?

  This is crazy, man.

• 1:13:24Speaker 02

  It's insane, bro. You should put an iPad and you show him how to swipe and hit apps.

• 1:13:28Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 1:13:29Speaker 02

  Swear. It's literally mind blowing how smart these animals are.

• 1:13:34Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:13:34Speaker 02

  They share, I think they share like 98% of our shareable DNA, you know, so.

• 1:13:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow, man.

• 1:13:40Speaker 02

  It's just having a, knowing it's an ape, but it's like a human.

• 1:13:47Lewis Howes?

  If you could only have one animal that wasn't a dog, let's say for five years. You couldn't keep any other animals, hypothetically, right? It's like, you could only choose one, this was gonna be the one that you were gonna be with and train with and hang out with.

• 1:14:02Speaker 02

  Any type of pet, what would it be? Black Jaguar. Why is that? It's my spirit animal. Okay, do you have one now? No, I've raised some before. Wow. Help adopt some and gave some money towards their food and cage builds. But I've never personally owned one. You've been around them though? Yeah. What's it like? It's just, dude. Those things are powerful. I've been around Jaguars before, but I've always loved, you know, from the movie Black Panther. I've always had an obsession with Black Panthers, even though this thing isn't really a Black Panther. But Black Jaguars, it's just been my spirit animal since a kid. Actually, I'll show you a funny clip. This is where. Black Jaguar, okay. This is where it gets funny for me.

• 1:14:45Speaker 02

  This is how I know these are my spirit animals. I started working with this little Jaguar. He was confiscated from some smugglers and he was freaked out. It's a Jaguar, it's an apex predator in the jungles of Central and South America. These are big, man, right? Yeah, bro, they're just. Muscular, strong. Muscular, strong, just. I was down in, you know, working with this Jaguar and he was just not having a good day. And we just understand with the situation. And this is just photos, the first time me interacting with him. I got videos, I'll show you. He was just totally freaked out. How big was it? He's only probably about this big. Baby or now? Yeah, his baby. Like six months? No, I'd say like three months. Oh, young. Yeah. Man, he is not.

• 1:15:29Speaker 02

  Freaked out, humans, horrible people. Yeah. You know, but that's how he's supposed to act. You go in a cage and he's in the back of the cage showing his teeth, hissing and growling, which is, you know, it's what he's supposed to do. But you take him in the water? Took him in the water, calmed him down, fed him, gave him some space, did it again, fed him, give him space. So after he's swimming and swimming and swimming and he's about to have enough of me.

• 1:15:59Lewis Howes?

  Is he biting you or now clawing you?

• 1:16:00Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:16:00Lewis Howes?

  He is. But his baby doesn't hurt?

• 1:16:03Speaker 02

  That's him. After four days.

• 1:16:05Lewis Howes?

  Look at his claws.

• 1:16:07Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Like, they have full teeth, full claws and everything.

• 1:16:11Lewis Howes?

  Is he scratching you a lot or no?

• 1:16:14Lewis Howes?

  The first day?

• 1:16:15Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. They distracted you in accident. So that, yeah, just.

• 1:16:19Lewis Howes?

  Wasn't breaking the skin or?

• 1:16:20Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. So that was my first time. Working with a black jaguar was that one. I've worked with jaguars, four standard colored jaguars, but I just feel like my, my spirit animal was that.

• 1:16:30Lewis Howes?

  Do you think if you raised it as a baby, would it be tame around you as an adult?

• 1:16:34Speaker 02

  It's more self trusting. Of course, you can't.

• 1:16:36Lewis Howes?

  You can't be like playing, rolling around.

• 1:16:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, you never, you never encourage.

• 1:16:40Lewis Howes?

  Like a bear?

• 1:16:40Speaker 02

  Playing with any wild animal, you know, or.

• 1:16:42Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 1:16:43Speaker 02

  You know, a pet predator in captivity.

• 1:16:44Lewis Howes?

  What about those, that guy who's like always with the lions?

• 1:16:47Speaker 02

  Which one?

• 1:16:48Lewis Howes?

  There's a few of them, but there's a guy who did like a bunch of GoPro stuff that was like.

• 1:16:52Speaker 02

  Oh, Kevin Richardson.

• 1:16:53Lewis Howes?

  The guy in South Africa or Africa, yeah.

• 1:16:55Speaker 02

  He's a badass, dude.

• 1:16:55Lewis Howes?

  He's like just walking out with the lions like, and then playing with them and grown lions.

• 1:17:01Speaker 02

  He spends hours and hours and hours.

• 1:17:03Lewis Howes?

  Doesn't matter one.

• 1:17:04Speaker 02

  Every single day, yeah. One instance, you're gone. But that's the.

• 1:17:07Lewis Howes?

  But he probably raised him as a baby.

• 1:17:09Speaker 02

  Awareness he's raised. In our line of work, we have to make that sacrifice. You know what I'm saying?

• 1:17:14Lewis Howes?

  It's your life.

• 1:17:15Speaker 02

  It's your life, you know, but I'd do it any day.

• 1:17:18Lewis Howes?

  But you do it in a safe way. You're not like.

• 1:17:21Speaker 02

  In a safe way, it's to educate and inspire.

• 1:17:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the safest way possible.

• 1:17:24Speaker 02

  I look at it as if we can, if I can make a sacrifice for myself and I can work for 10 years to say, God forbid something happens to me, but I can inspire 100 million people to love animals and only 10 people are gonna fully chase that dream hard like I did. It's imagining what 10 Tarzans can do in 10 years from now, you know, so that's the sacrifice we make to inspire and courage and.

• 1:17:49Lewis Howes?

  Rise to consciousness, yeah.

• 1:17:50Speaker 02

  Sometimes you get caught in the fire and stuff, you know, but it's okay because that's what we do. It's like playing NFL, you're gonna get a concussion, you're gonna break a leg, you know, you're gonna, if you're a race car driver, you're gonna get in an accident. Shit happens. Of course, you don't want it to happen, you know, but that's just life. That's why the bites and scratches don't bother me because it's every day. It's like getting fouled in basketball.

• 1:18:15Lewis Howes?

  Right, it happens.

• 1:18:16Speaker 02

  You know?

• 1:18:16Lewis Howes?

  It's a hard hit, a bruise.

• 1:18:17Speaker 02

  It's a bruise.

• 1:18:19Lewis Howes?

  This is your contact sport.

• 1:18:20Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:18:20Lewis Howes?

  It's getting a little nip by like a guano or something. Okay, final couple of questions for you. This one is called. The three truths, I ask this to everyone at the end. So imagine it's your last day on earth. You choose the day as many years out as you want it to be. You've done everything you want to do. You've accomplished all your dreams, it's all happened. But for whatever reason, you've got to take all the information with you. All the videos and content and work you've done, TV shows, it goes with you when you pass. So no one has access to your information anymore. But you could write down the three things you know to be true about your life, your experiences, the lessons. And there's only three things you can share with the world. What would you say are your three truths?

• 1:19:00Speaker 02

  Hmm, that's cool. I like that question. The three things that would be the truth, if I could take everything away. Love always wins. That's the, that's the truth of my life. I could easily hate a lot of people for a lot of things, you know, but if I love you, what happens after that? You got nothing. If I go negative about it, we can go on for years of negativity, fighting back and forth. You know, all types of crazy stuff, but at the end of the day in my life, what's been making everything happen? It's love, you know?

• 1:19:39Lewis Howes?

  That's great.

• 1:19:39Speaker 02

  So, love always wins. God is good all the time. Second truth. Third truth. The truth I would love to leave is we need animals more than they need us. Cause if they go, we go. That's the reality of it. That's the truth. So if I were able to leave this earth and not have anything I've ever done be shown, but leave three truths behind. Love always wins. God is good all the time, no matter who you believe in. And animals.

• 1:20:19Speaker 02

  If there's no animals, there's no us.

• 1:20:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:20:23Speaker 02

  It's the truth.

• 1:20:24Lewis Howes?

  Wow, those are powerful, man. Well, what can we do to support you? What's a project that you want us to follow? Where can we follow you online? At TheRealTarzan on Instagram? You guys gotta check this stuff out. If you guys aren't following, make sure you follow and just see the videos. They're inspiring. So what else is going on for you?

• 1:20:43Speaker 02

  A lot of charitable work. We're gonna be giving a lot of money and a lot of... We're gonna do stuff different. A lot, I feel like a lot of companies, organizations have billions of dollars from charity and give back, but they only pinch out a couple hundred thousand dollars. Maybe a couple thousand dollars. I wanna be known as the dude when I die, like, yo, that motherfucker Tarzan was giving away big checks and doing big work and just doing real humanitarian, loving work. Like going to Africa, really rebuilding shit, you know, documenting it, showing people where their money's going, where my money's going, my time's going. I feel like we missed, we're missing that aspect of reality.

• 1:21:24Speaker 02

  You know, I feel like as Americans, we're so comfortable and cool here, you know, but there's a whole nother world out there that needs, that needs us. And at the end of the day, we can be Americans, we can be Africans, we can be Europeans or Australians. By the end of the day, we're all brothers and sisters and we're all people. And that's where the love comes at. Where can we go out and help these people?

• 1:21:44Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:21:44Speaker 02

  You know? And that's where like, I feel like the love is gonna be just so real that we're gonna be able to show it, you know, help build on it. I'm starting my own nonprofit in 2019. So, you know, I've been using a lot of my own money to go out and do this work, you know, and bringing people along with me, whoever wants to tag along. That's why I feel like I've been building these relationships. Will Smith, Diddy giving all these eyes, these people. Once we start hitting these real projects and showing a real progress, it's gonna be a beautiful thing and start a trend of just helping and showing love.

• 1:22:18Lewis Howes?

  That's great, man.

• 1:22:18Speaker 02

  So just... I can't tell you what to do now.

• 1:22:22Lewis Howes?

  Just follow you on social media right now.

• 1:22:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:22:25Lewis Howes?

  Stay tuned.

• 1:22:25Speaker 02

  Stay tuned, man. You know, there's a whole lot of stuff coming. Whole lot of gangster shit coming your way, in a fun way.

• 1:22:32Lewis Howes?

  I like it, man. Yeah. That's cool. Well, I gotta acknowledge you for a moment, Mike, for being authentically you because you grew up in a place that wasn't supportive of your dream, but you did it anyways. You did something that most kids that look like you don't do.

• 1:22:50Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:22:51Lewis Howes?

  And you're doing it anyways with a lot of passion and love and generosity. You give back constantly, which is really inspiring. So I acknowledge you for your efforts, your work, your care for animals that don't have care. And you constantly show up in a big way, man, and your heart is infectious. So I acknowledge all that you do.

• 1:23:11Speaker 02

  Thank you, brother. I really appreciate that, man.

• 1:23:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, man. Of course, man. My final question is, what is your definition of greatness?

• 1:23:19Speaker 02

  Definition of greatness? Definition of greatness? I love this. So this is how, best way I can explain it. I look at Mike Tyson, look at Michael Jordan, Michael Phelps, Michael Jackson, Michelangelo. And you get these people that share a name, Michael. This is just me. This could be anybody. Greatness is when you look at these people's lives and you parallel them, and they never cross paths in their actual line of work. And they all have one thing in common: relentless hard work. Looking at Michael Phelps, what he's do every, every day?

• 1:24:04Speaker 02

  He swims. He masters his craft. He doesn't worry about anybody else. He worries about himself. He masters his fucking craft. And that's why he's the best Olympic gold medalist swimmer for whatever swim thing he does. I don't know exactly what he swims with, but I know. He puts the work in, you know what I'm saying? Look at Michael Jordan, sickening work ethic. He's great. So true greatness lies in hard work. No matter how talented you are, if you work your ass off every day, nonstop, you become great. But you just gotta believe that shit. If you don't believe me, look into these great people's lives, the real greats, the real goats. And you see what they, look at the documentaries, look at their work, look at their, their passion, how they move.

• 1:24:49Speaker 02

  They have relentless hard work. I was working hard all year, what I thought I was. I met Will Smith, and I think I met him a month and a half ago. After the video came out, then you met. So I've been traveling the world and doing my Tarzan stuff. And I talked to Will Smith, and he's like, yeah, Will Smith hasn't been home since Christmas. Working. Working. Just out there getting it. Another country, another day, another project. And it's just like, music video, TV show, YouTube, drumming, helicopter, you get boys doing it. And it's like, it's the hard work. What do you think Tom Brady does in his off time? Studies, trains, game film.

• 1:25:31Speaker 02

  What do you think, Michael Jackson, his music, just? Master's craft. Master's craft, you know what I'm saying? Just these people, greatness lies in hard work. You're talented all day. Tell my little brother, my little brother is a talented young man. His name is Randy, my favorite little brother. And he's so talented, man, just naturally talented. But it could be a blessing and a curse. Because you may not work as hard when you're talented. So I tell him, I'm like, look kid, you're very talented, but that doesn't mean shit. I say, you're already ahead of everybody just by talent wise. I said, eventually they're gonna catch you just by talent wise.

• 1:26:16Speaker 02

  I said, imagine when you put relentless hard work on top of your already God given talent. No one would ever be able to catch you. You'd be far ahead of everybody for a long time, for forever. And I tell him that at six, six years old. And we win five state championships in football. And then he leaves basketball, leaves football, and then goes wins another four state championships in basketball, and won the state championship in baseball. And it's just like.

• 1:26:46Speaker 02

  That's my boy.

• 1:26:46Lewis Howes?

  What's he doing now?

• 1:26:47Speaker 02

  He's playing basketball. He's 13 years old. Just turned 13 on October 12th. He's 6'1" with a size 13 shoe. He's a monster. So if you think I'm talking-

• 1:26:57Lewis Howes?

  Talking already?

• 1:26:57Speaker 02

  He damn near. I haven't seen him in like a couple of months, but-

• 1:27:01Lewis Howes?

  Close.

• 1:27:01Speaker 02

  Every time I come home to see him, he's like-

• 1:27:02Lewis Howes?

  He might be taller, yeah.

• 1:27:04Speaker 02

  So.

• 1:27:04Lewis Howes?

  It's amazing, man. I love it. Good stuff. Make sure you guys follow this guy, The Real Tarzan. Appreciate you, Mike.

• 1:27:09Speaker 02

  Thank you for having me, brother.

• 1:27:10Lewis Howes?

  It's great, man.

• 1:27:17Lewis Howes?

  There you have it, my friends. I hope you enjoyed this one. LewisHowes.com/724. Mike Holston in the house. Super pumped about this because he's doing incredible work. Again, make sure to check him out. Tag him on your Instagram stories, @MikeHolston, TheRealTarzan. Powerful stuff, and his videos have been crazy the last couple of weeks. So check out his videos, his photos. They're gonna inspire you to want to be more a part of this conversation and engaging in wildlife as well yourself. So check it out. Tag him as well and share this with your friends. LewisHowes.com/724. And again, if you have a dream, if you have a passion burning inside of you, this is another example that you can pursue that thing

• 1:28:00Lewis Howes?

  and make a full-time living doing what you love. That's what this life is about. It's not about doing something you hate for your whole life. Listen, I get it. For years, I had to do things I didn't love in order to gain the experience, the skillset, earn the money, to have the freedom to then pursue things that I did love. But don't ever let someone hold you back from saying your idea is too crazy. Because there are examples every single day of people doing things they love. They're making big impact in the world, like Mike Holston, and making a full-time income doing it. So again, use this as an example. Share this with your friends. Let me know what you thought of this over on Instagram. LewisHowes.com/724 for the full video interview. Check out Mike Holston @TheRealTarzan.

• 1:28:43Lewis Howes?

  And Karyat Tubman said, "Every great dream begins with a dreamer."

• 1:28:48Lewis Howes?

  Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars, to change the world. I love you so very much, and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.