287 Russell Simmons on Living Vegan, Finding Calm, and Changing the World

"Anything you want, you have to give." - Russell Simmons If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes and more at http://lewishowes.com/287 Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This is episode number 287 with Russell Simmons.

• 0:07Speaker 00

  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.

• 0:33Speaker 00

  Welcome everyone to this podcast. Very excited about this one. It's with the American business magnet, Russell Simmons. He's the chairman and CEO of Rush Communications and co-founded the hip hop music label Def Jam and created the clothing fashion lines Fat Farm and Tantrix. Simmons most recently launched All Def Digital, an original content channel on YouTube with over a million subscribers. He's also been described as the third richest figure in hip hop. We had an incredible conversation in his studio in Los Angeles. And some of the things we cover today are about the lessons he learned about life and business from selling drugs.

• 1:14Speaker 00

  What entrepreneurs inspired him early on, about the vegan philosophy and about why humans ate meat and who ate meat hundreds of years ago, how to handle negative emotions throughout your life and something that Russell says he does every single morning before he does anything else. This is a must do for him, the political side of animal rights and so much more. I'm very excited about this one. Make sure to share with your friends, lewishowes.com/287. And without further ado, let's go ahead and dive in with this interview with the one, the only Russell Simmons.

• 1:56Speaker 00

  Welcome everyone to the School of Greatness Podcast. I'm here with the man himself, Russell Simmons. Good to see you.

• 2:00Speaker 01

  Nice to see you.

• 2:01Speaker 00

  New York Times bestselling author. New book called The Happy Vegan: A Guide to Living a Long, Healthy, and Successful Life. Make sure you guys go pick this up out right now. We'll be talking about this throughout this interview, but I'm really excited. We met actually years ago through a dare. Probably don't remember. It was about five years ago. We met also at Summit Series at Sea, the first time they did Summit at Sea. And it's been fun to see your journey ever since. And obviously, you've had an incredible career and built an amazing business, many businesses for years. But since I really became more aware of you, it's been fun to follow and dive more into the vegan lifestyle and learn about it. I've been introduced to it much more since hearing about it from you and your other books. And I want to dive in and get started. And first, ask you a question about

• 2:45Speaker 00

  who was the most influential person in your life growing up and the biggest lesson they taught you?

• 2:50Speaker 01

  There's a lot of people that were involved. My father was very good. My mother was very good and big influences on me. You know, a lot of, a lot of street cats, you know, gave me some direction in terms of just how to move around the streets, not get too twisted. And a lot of, a lot of different influences from different walks of life, right? Especially as I was bussed to school. I met all kinds of people from different, you know, ethnic backgrounds and stuff. And a lot of people inspired me. You know, depending on the minute you ask, what's my favorite record? I'll give you a different record. I mean, maybe the one on the radio that I don't want to change.

• 3:26Speaker 00

  Right.

• 3:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, but if you could press any button at any time, then any record you're playing is your favorite because you could play something else. So I don't like to, you know, I can't say one person more than the other. I couldn't say that Minister Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam, inspired me because they showed me potential. You know, they were like, we're in the street, we're selling drugs. They'd come over like, brother, why are you doing that? We had a mosque, a stake and take, and a dry cleaners on the corner. We also had Larry Lucas on the corner, which was, you know, Frank Lucas, the drug dealer, had Lucas cleaners, a couple of his cousins had, and we had one on our corner. That was the heroin capital of Queens. So that was a good place to sell weed and to, you know, it was a big drug block.

• 4:07Speaker 00

  Right.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  But it was also a block where the Nation of Islam was very present. And they were very, very influential in that they were very street, very hood. But they were very clean cut and upright and that was inspiring to see that. And I think a lot of people my age have that experience, so.

• 4:24Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  Those some of the influences, I mean, again, it changes depending on the day you ask me.

• 4:28Speaker 00

  Right, right. What were you, what would you say you're most passionate about in your teen years going into college? What was the thing that you're most excited about? Were you into music the most then or did that come later?

• 4:38Speaker 01

  No, going into college, I really didn't know what I wanted to do too much, you know. I went into college, you know, all I wanted to do is get high and get girls, you know what I mean? Like cocaine and pussy was my two driving forces. I used to joke and say that, but I probably meant it. I got a little older, I, in school, in City College, and I found hip hop. I was selling drugs, I was selling like bad drugs, good drugs, whatever, but a lot of incense, people shooting in their arms and I was, I thought it was safe. I mean, I didn't really have a lot of direction.

• 5:11Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 5:11Speaker 01

  And, and until I found hip hop and wanted to promote the parties of the artists. Because I was inspired by them is another way, it also had lots of different, you know, benefits. I mean, you could not only get in the club, but you could make money from the club and you could promote the artists who I loved, the hip hop artists like Eddie Chiba, DJ Hollywood, Love Books, Darcy. These guys were the founders and godfathers of hip hop and I was one of the promoters who got to promote them. Early on, like in the late seventies and, you know, and it was an inspiring moment for me, seventy seven to seventy nine. When we made our record Christmas Rapping and still those guys, you know, recently I just saw them at a funeral, a lot of them.

• 5:49Speaker 01

  Those guys inspired me to shift my attention away from, you know, frivolous street activities that could have destroyed my life like it did so many of my friends. Into something that turned out to be, you know, a, a dharma that was inspiring and, and uplifting and healthy.

• 6:09Speaker 01

  Eventually healthy. I mean, I was still high the whole time, but I was promoting parties and I was doing something that was not as dangerous.

• 6:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 6:15Speaker 01

  But that was cool.

• 6:16Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 6:17Speaker 01

  And that's kind of a little journey thing there, but.

• 6:19Speaker 00

  Sure. Did I hear you sold fake cocaine as well? Is that where?

• 6:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, we used to have this house where we sell heroin addicts incense. They could shoot it with the heroin because it had caffeine in it.

• 6:28Speaker 00

  Okay. Can I have a similar effect or?

• 6:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, you put it in your mouth and freeze your face off. You thought it was cocaine back then when nobody knew cocaine. But dope fiends used to like to shoot cocaine with their heroin.

• 6:39Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 6:40Speaker 01

  Because it would be, um, you know, the speedball effect. And in our, uh, uh, incense, we had like a caffeine kind of thing. So it was speedy.

• 6:48Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  So I went with the heroin well.

• 6:49Speaker 00

  Gotcha. What did you learn from like the, that whole phase of selling drugs and how to translate it into?

• 6:55Speaker 01

  You never know.

• 6:56Speaker 00

  Selling music?

• 6:57Speaker 01

  I understand your question, but you never know how bad your life is or what risk you're taking when you're surrounded by people who seem to be taking greater risks.

• 7:06Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  Say, I'm not killing anybody. They're killing people. I mean, you always feel safer than the neighbor, you know, who's doing something maybe a little bit more risky. But what I learned was, you know, you take something for a dollar, you sell it for two.

• 7:18Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 7:18Speaker 01

  Especially as I, as I used to have pounds of weed. I sell, you know, you make, you make so many nickel bags out of a, a pound of weed. It's ridiculous. And you could make, you know, some money. And that was something that in, in the black community, at a low middle class place like Hollis, Queens, like your only job was maybe if you can get out of school and be a teacher or something. Like that was it. Education. It was not a culture that, that, that promoted entrepreneurialism.

• 7:41Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 7:42Speaker 01

  So you notice some of the great entrepreneurs from the black community, especially ones at least my age, they were inspired by their street experiences.

• 7:49Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  Because that's what they had to learn to fend for themselves and create one dollar that turned into two.

• 7:55Speaker 00

  Right.

• 7:55Speaker 01

  As opposed to working for someone else.

• 7:57Speaker 00

  Right.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  So that's the only cultural thing that really reminded you, like the guys who owned the stores, like, you know, uh, Johnny was a number man and he owned a store, but he was his own man, you know? And whoever owned the store, it seemed like they used to be drug dealers or something, but now they own the deli or now they own the, you know? So that's a kind of, um, interesting experience.

• 8:19Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 8:21Speaker 01

  A lot of what came out of our community, you know, where people moved in, integration destroyed the fabric of the community, economic fabric, because you don't have the black doctor, the black pharmacist, the black whatever. You just got now, or not at that moment, but you have Rite Aid, for instance. You know, you have whatever it is that moved in, you know, so then. So that integration thing, you know, kind of was always troublesome to a lot of people because it destroyed the fabric of the community, economic fabric, and took the money out the community.

• 8:50Speaker 00

  Right, okay.

• 8:50Speaker 01

  So, but anyway, as an entrepreneur, I learned from having some experiences selling drugs.

• 8:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 8:57Speaker 01

  It's true. But music was a totally different thing. I was selling parties, I was promoting parties where great artists performed. And, and we booked the ballroom for a thousand dollars and we had a bargain guarantee, we get the money back because they drink a thousand dollars and we keep the door. It was a very lucrative business for me as a, you know, a sophomore in City College. You know, so it was a way to really fall in love with rap, but there were no rap records.

• 9:23Speaker 00

  Right.

• 9:24Speaker 01

  In 1979, I made a record and that record was Christmas Rapping. And it became a big hit and it plays every Christmas. And since then, I've been on, you know, I've been really inspired to give artists opportunities. I mean, that's what I've done my whole life. Even now here at All Deaf Digital, we have all these young writers, directors, producers, who I get to say, yes, go shoot it every day, at least, you know, once a day. I say, go make it.

• 9:50Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 9:50Speaker 01

  And I couldn't do that. That, I mean, that is a very, very great thing to let people express themselves and be part of that process. So, that's, that's.

• 10:01Speaker 00

  Sure, sure. Who would you say is the most, that you looked up to in terms of entrepreneurs that you were inspired by in your early twenties when you started doing the music stuff? Were there a lot of people that taught you a lot of?

• 10:13Speaker 01

  A lot of people really meant a lot to me. Quincy Jones, David Geffen, you know, Dick, Dick, Griffey who ran. Barry Gordy, obviously, was always an inspiration. You know, I noticed that Barry Gordy's gone vegan. He looks like he's 12, he's 80 something years old, 85 years old. Or older than that, right? Barry Gordy might be 90, he hadn't looked 12. Literally, he looks 12, he's a vegan. He's got vegan power. Yeah, so I noticed that about him and a lot of people. Like, a lot of people make choices that, you know, they're still, you know, like I said, my friends are dying. A lot of them, or have cancer. I heard somebody had triple bypass. Yeah, my man just had triple bypass.

• 10:54Speaker 01

  A lot of my friends, you know, right now, AJ Hip Hop Summit, one of the great hip hop DJs, laid up in a box the other day, ass cancer. I mean, colon cancer, and then Joey Robinson, who is the son of Joey Robinson, started Sugar Hill Records, who ran the company for years, he died same week, ass cancer, same thing. The number of people dying, along with the destruction of planet, along with the comic disaster of 100 billion animals being made to suffer short lives. 100 billion? Yeah, 10 billion in America alone. Wow. Made to be born through rape and every other factory practice, and stuffed with shit to make them grow fast,

• 11:37Speaker 01

  in the most difficult environment possible, the most suffering possible. And then they, all they, their real good is that they poisoned the planet and its inhabitants. And so, to me, that's why, a subject, I brought you back to the subject. It's like, there's something that I did, I care about, right? Like, I like looking back and saying, I changed the drug laws in New York State. I helped people do it, and thousands of people came home from jail. That, to me, is better than my goal records. I could talk about that sometime, because we still have so much more to do in that area. And I like to talk about this work, and this book in particular, right now, because there's a transition that has to happen on a planet that will be uninhabitable, and you, your children, won't have nothing. You know what I mean? They won't be able to inhabit the planet.

• 12:20Speaker 01

  I mean, your children, they'll be older probably. They'll probably be in their 40s, and shit gets real hectic. But we don't know how quickly the global warming is growing, because we never expected what's happening now. So. I even noticed, I have even heard, I heard that dumb black guy on Fox, but really I have not heard any Republican say in the last six months that global warming is not manmade.

• 12:43Speaker 00

  Really?

• 12:44Speaker 01

  They stopped saying it. That's amazing.

• 12:46Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 12:46Speaker 01

  They're like, they don't want to say that shit. Maybe Trump might say, he'd say any dumb thing, but I mean, everybody else is like, we don't want to say anymore.

• 12:51Speaker 00

  Right.

• 12:52Speaker 01

  Because it will haunt us.

• 12:53Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:54Speaker 01

  The fact is that this planet will be uninhabitable soon.

• 12:57Speaker 00

  Really?

• 12:57Speaker 01

  If we continue down this path.

• 12:59Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 13:00Speaker 01

  So this company is like Beyond Meat and Hampton Creek and these companies that are studying the forty thousand plants and trying to figure a way around poisoning the planet and the people.

• 13:10Speaker 00

  Right.

• 13:10Speaker 01

  You know, with plant-based diets that people will accept because they're used to eating poison. They've been trained, they've been, um, and tricked, bamboozled, uh, uh, into being addicted to some of the stuff that they put in the food.

• 13:25Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 13:25Speaker 01

  So they keep going back to it. And that, you know, we got, you can get off it and you can get some healthier stuff and we want to give like the methadone off the heroin. That's what some of the, that's what some of the stuff is. Like some of the soy-based products, not great for you, but it's way better than the heroin. It's the methadone, right?

• 13:41Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 13:41Speaker 01

  And then Beyond Meat makes healthy, organic stuff and before you know it, you'll have these taste buds that taste.

• 13:49Speaker 00

  Evolve and change.

• 13:50Speaker 01

  That like, they evolve. They change very quickly, yeah.

• 13:52Speaker 00

  I'm, I'm inspired this week. Um, I'm, I'm going meat-free this whole week because I knew I was going to be interviewed. So I was going to see how my body was reacting and evolving. And I've been, Rich Roll, who came here the other day, he's been for years telling me about it and he's been saying, I used to play professional football and he said, and there's a lot of NFL guys who are now going vegan and track athletes and people in the Olympics.

• 14:13Speaker 01

  A lot of that.

• 14:14Speaker 00

  People are starting to move towards that and they're seeing, you know, the positive effects.

• 14:17Speaker 01

  That was the name of the podcast I was doing on the phone when you came in.

• 14:20Speaker 00

  Which one was that?

• 14:21Speaker 01

  Athletes, vegan athlete, something. I think it's like a, a fun name.

• 14:26Speaker 00

  Interesting.

• 14:27Speaker 01

  You know, like, you know, kind of dispels the rumor, like, you know, that you can't like be an athlete or whatever and be vegan. I think it's the name of the podcast, athletes of vegan, for veganism or something. I'm gonna tell you the minute. That's why I just got off the phone with this guy.

• 14:41Speaker 00

  Sure, sure. How many, uh, when did you, so you used to eat meat, right?

• 14:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I ate pig feet, chitlins.

• 14:47Speaker 00

  You, what's it called? No meat athletes.

• 14:49Speaker 01

  No meat athletes, that's a podcast.

• 14:51Speaker 00

  That's interesting. So you used to eat meat a lot? And then what, what inspired you? What was the first moment?

• 14:56Speaker 01

  The yogis helped, Simone who's sitting here helped. Glenn Friedman, my other friend helped. A lot of friends were beating up on me. And I saw Die for a New America. That was it.

• 15:04Speaker 00

  Die for a New America?

• 15:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, I saw that video.

• 15:06Speaker 00

  Is this a documentary or is this a?

• 15:07Speaker 01

  Documentary. It's a book. That was a best seller.

• 15:10Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 15:10Speaker 01

  For a long time, but it really, um, Die for a New America was, um, the, the video that made me, like the, the movie documentary that made me really say, like on January 1st, I'm not eating no more meat. And I didn't.

• 15:23Speaker 00

  January 1st, what, what year?

• 15:25Speaker 01

  Probably about 19, 18 years ago.

• 15:27Speaker 00

  Wow, okay. And have you had meat since? Ever, like just every now and then?

• 15:32Speaker 01

  Not meat. I mean, I've cheated, had fish at people's place.

• 15:35Speaker 00

  Sure, sure.

• 15:36Speaker 01

  Uh, I'd eat noodles with eggs in them and then.

• 15:38Speaker 00

  Right.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  You know, I don't, I don't.

• 15:40Speaker 00

  You try not to eat the, the red meats and all that stuff?

• 15:42Speaker 01

  No, red meat, no, I haven't had red meat. I don't know when.

• 15:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, okay. Wow. Um, and what, how's your body evolved since then?

• 15:49Speaker 01

  I'm a hundred and eight years old, nigga. How old are you?

• 15:52Speaker 00

  I'm 32.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  Right, I'm a hundred and eight. I feel good. I could out yoga you.

• 15:55Speaker 00

  I'm sure you could.

• 15:57Speaker 01

  I don't know if I could outrun you, maybe.

• 15:58Speaker 00

  You're pretty fast though. Yeah, yeah.

• 16:00Speaker 01

  Or maybe not. But I'm in good shape though. I'm alright, yeah.

• 16:02Speaker 00

  You look young. And I, I think I read somewhere, maybe it was on your Instagram, um, that you don't do anything before you meditate. Is that right?

• 16:09Speaker 01

  I don't do nothing before I meditate. Yeah, every morning.

• 16:12Speaker 00

  Why is that?

• 16:12Speaker 01

  Cause I, you let your brain settle. Reboot your brain. It's really good for your memory, for your brain capacity. To connect the left and the right side of the brain. To regrow those cells that start to block and stop and make you get aged. They can un, they can go the other way.

• 16:30Speaker 00

  Really?

• 16:30Speaker 01

  You know, if the brain settles, the body heals itself. In sleep, the brain doesn't get to settle the same way.

• 16:38Speaker 00

  Why is that?

• 16:38Speaker 01

  Because it just doesn't. It's just moving all the time. It's racing. So when you let the mind settle.

• 16:44Speaker 01

  Then the brain can reboot and then the brain can do amazing things.

• 16:48Speaker 00

  Right.

• 16:49Speaker 01

  Healing the body and also getting greater brain capacity, greater immune system.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  You know, there's just so many benefits for meditation. That's science today. People have been doing it for thousands of years because they know it. Be still and know. In the scripture, you know, every scripture speaks of quiet, still mind. Everyone, when a noisy mind causes suffering, the quiet mind is bliss. That's true.

• 17:18Speaker 00

  Yeah. When did you get to start getting into that practice?

• 17:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit after meditating, I mean, after going to yoga.

• 17:23Speaker 00

  Really?

• 17:23Speaker 01

  A lot of yogis were meditators.

• 17:25Speaker 00

  Seventeen, eighteen years ago.

• 17:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little less, probably fifteen years ago.

• 17:28Speaker 00

  And did you feel like your life was a lot more stressful or hectic before you started this, you know, met, you know, still mind?

• 17:34Speaker 01

  Your life is not stressful, stressful or hectic. It's your mind that's stressful or hectic. So watching the world move in front of you, it's a movie. You're in moving meditation, so the world is doing what it's doing. You don't have to be attached to it or feel pain from it or suffer from what the world is doing. Your suffering is self-made. If you meditate and if you watch the world without too much attachment, then the world gets easier to deal with. Things come and they go.

• 18:02Speaker 00

  Right.

• 18:02Speaker 01

  Thoughts come and they go. You learn that in meditation.

• 18:06Speaker 00

  Did you notice your inner world changing then as you started to practice and?

• 18:09Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. My first yoga class, I was addicted. Because, you know, you smile and breathe in difficult poses, right?

• 18:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's hard. I don't like it. It's challenging.

• 18:17Speaker 01

  You smile and breathe in difficult poses. It's very good for you, you know, and it's a practice. You get out in the world. Somebody cursed at you, said, bitch, I just did a twisting triangle. Like, what are you, how are you gonna steal my joy with your nasty mouth?

• 18:29Speaker 00

  Right.

• 18:29Speaker 01

  You can't really get a guy who's just been through the most difficult physical practice with your dirty mouth. You know what I mean? Not probably. If he's smiling in hard poses and you say the wrong thing, he just can look at you like, like, you know, you ain't a twisting triangle. You don't hurt.

• 18:46Speaker 00

  Right.

• 18:47Speaker 01

  You know, I mean, I don't know. I feel like that the physical asana practice, which is what we're talking about now of yoga, is to teach you to be comfortable in difficult poses. On and off the mat, obviously. And it's really good. It's part of the overall science for happiness that comes through the yoga sutras and the scripture. And it's something that it goes along with, you know. A compassionate diet.

• 19:11Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 19:11Speaker 01

  Along with a healthy diet and along with protecting the planet by not causing so much harm through your diet. So they all go back to the diet, right? The diet is, you know, a centerpiece. The thousands of animals you kill in your short lifetime, many, many thousands that you kill as an animal eater.

• 19:33Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 19:34Speaker 01

  That when you put that on your hand, the blood on your hands should feel something, but people are taught not to feel nothing. You know what I mean? They're unconscious.

• 19:42Speaker 00

  Well, there's a middleman, you know, there's someone else doing the dirty work.

• 19:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's always a middleman. Middleman don't put the animals they kill. Like the people who make the chicken, they don't. Who manufacture those lives, they don't eat that.

• 19:52Speaker 00

  Right.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  They can't, like three out of four of them can't. Some can still, but don't often. Most don't ever eat chicken after that shit. After working in a chicken factory, you don't eat chicken.

• 20:03Speaker 00

  So do you, do you feel like it's, um, you know, what about people hundreds of years ago when meat wasn't looked, I guess, down upon or looked as it was harming the environment or creating, causing?

• 20:14Speaker 01

  They ate less meat.

• 20:15Speaker 00

  They ate less meat.

• 20:15Speaker 01

  Period, anyway. You know, that whole shit about culture is bullshit.

• 20:19Speaker 00

  Right.

• 20:20Speaker 01

  Like the words Irish corned beef and cabbage, they wrote back to Ireland like, they giving us some corned beef. Like they didn't have corned beef and cabbage, you kidding me?

• 20:28Speaker 00

  Right.

• 20:28Speaker 01

  Slaves and their pig feet and their chitlins, they came over, they wouldn't eat no flesh, they would die, they were dying. Depending on where you're from, you eat okra and, and green beans, ok, ok, um. Whatever, depending on the plants that they ate and the places where they were stolen from, they had to go back and get that shit for them. Cause they would not eat flesh.

• 20:48Speaker 00

  Right. So in an ideal world, what would, uh, what would it look like for you in an ideal world?

• 20:53Speaker 01

  Well, one, we would stop poisoning the plant and killing the people. Uh, with, with the destruction of animals when we have so many replacements for them. That we would find ways to feed the planet, which they're working on. Again, Beyond Meat is one example, another one is, uh, Hampton Creek where they studied the forty thousand plants and trying to figure out what alternatives there are.

• 21:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:14Speaker 01

  To the crap that we eat.

• 21:16Speaker 00

  Right.

• 21:16Speaker 01

  And there's lots of alternatives now, but they want more.

• 21:19Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:19Speaker 01

  So it's like. If you got horses pulling carriages, then the one day is a car. Horses, carriages are bullshit. Like, you don't need them anymore. You got cars.

• 21:29Speaker 00

  Right.

• 21:30Speaker 01

  So therefore, that's the way we should do the animal industry. Like, we just replace them with something that is useful and not hurtful to the planet.

• 21:38Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:39Speaker 01

  And healthier and tastier.

• 21:41Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:42Speaker 01

  That's the mix. Making it taste better, healthier, cheaper. Healthier, cheaper, taste better.

• 21:48Speaker 00

  And better for you.

• 21:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:50Speaker 00

  That'd be the, that'd be the jam. Just gotta get people off that addiction.

• 21:54Speaker 01

  We can do it. They have to do it.

• 21:56Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  You know.

• 21:57Speaker 00

  Eventually, it's gonna have to evolve and change.

• 21:59Speaker 01

  Exactly. It already is, but I'm saying it has to do it quicker.

• 22:01Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:01Speaker 01

  Quicker than we think.

• 22:02Speaker 00

  Okay. Um, now, I heard that, well, I, I, Derek told me that you're really passionate about a number of giving back causes, and you give back a lot. And, um, I'm curious, what are the top one or two things that you're most passionate about in giving back? And why do you choose to give back so much?

• 22:22Speaker 01

  Because you can't take this shit with you, and as long as you can make it to the finish line. And my kids are so rich anyway. I mean, you know, I mean, why would I not try to do good things for good people? I mean, I'm involved in four or five philanthropic social, um, organizations and, and other political movements that help underserved communities because we are all connected, ultimately. And what we do for other people is what we do for ourselves.

• 22:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:47Speaker 01

  So we should lift other people as part of our process. Uh, what we give to the world, the world gives us. It's true. Good givers also are great getters. You know, Jesus taught two sermons, one to the masses. Give and you'll get. And then when you get, you can pay the Romans their taxes. People went out, masses, and they did that. They told his disciples, give without expectation. Be focused on the giving itself. And the more focused and present you are in your gift, then the more, um... The more effective you are in your giving.

• 23:18Speaker 00

  Right.

• 23:19Speaker 01

  You're a great, great giver and they keep giving and you're more like Lakshmi, the Indian goddess. So you just give and they, and everybody's got a pile of shit up at your feet because they want you to keep giving.

• 23:29Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 23:30Speaker 01

  So that's what the good givers do. The great givers give without expectation.

• 23:33Speaker 00

  Right.

• 23:33Speaker 01

  So that's.

• 23:34Speaker 00

  Did you, were you always a big giver or is this like something that you learned over time or?

• 23:38Speaker 01

  Over the last 20 years or so, it's been more prevalent in my life, but I, you know, if you want money, you gotta give money. You gotta make money for somebody else to get money.

• 23:46Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  You know, and to really be a moneymaker, you gotta make money for someone.

• 23:50Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:51Speaker 01

  To really be a good or do something, you know, of equal, to make real happiness, you have to promote happiness for someone else.

• 23:58Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:59Speaker 01

  Anything you want, you have to give.

• 24:00Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:01Speaker 01

  You have to give what you want to receive. So, you know, I, I learned that. I believe in that. I believe in the cycle of giving and getting.

• 24:08Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  That is continuous and that you should participate in it without fear.

• 24:15Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:15Speaker 01

  And that if you do that, then you will be a, a much more prosperous person even.

• 24:21Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:21Speaker 01

  In terms of junk in the world and stuff and return on your investments. But you will be more prosperous if you are focused entirely on the gift and the honest service. Uh, because if the man in front of you don't pay, the man next to him will. So you guys gotta do it. Just do your job and forget Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, you have control over the work alone, but never its fruit. And he says, go out and give.

• 24:48Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:48Speaker 01

  Yep, so.

• 24:49Speaker 00

  Speaking, speaking of fears, do you have any fears right now?

• 24:53Speaker 01

  If something may happen to a daughter or something, sometimes I worry, are you sick? Are you not well?

• 24:59Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 25:00Speaker 01

  I said, other than that, I'm not scared of much.

• 25:02Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 25:03Speaker 01

  I mean, I wouldn't want Sugar Knight to come in here shooting at me, but I'm not.

• 25:06Speaker 00

  You're not afraid of it.

• 25:07Speaker 01

  I made that example. I don't know. I'm not afraid of much.

• 25:09Speaker 00

  Yeah. What, um, it sounds like you don't have many breakdowns because you're constantly in a, in a state of meditation. You're in a state of clear mind, of taking care of yourself.

• 25:17Speaker 01

  Breakdown like what?

• 25:19Speaker 00

  Do you, do you experience breakdowns throughout the day or do you just say, or do you just smile and laugh at, uh, you know, a situation that comes to you?

• 25:25Speaker 01

  You know, I have problems sometimes, but I don't break down like start crying, oh, life is so tough. You know, I haven't had that, you know, I don't know when, ever. I don't do that. But I, you know, I got moments where I'm not as happy.

• 25:38Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 25:38Speaker 01

  Um.

• 25:39Speaker 00

  And how do you handle in those moments? Are you just, do you allow yourself to express and be unhappy for the moments? Or do you acknowledge and say, okay, I'm aware of what's happening and, and move through it in a specific way?

• 25:48Speaker 01

  I, I think I'm okay with moving through it. I'm probably pretty insensitive.

• 25:52Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 25:52Speaker 01

  I never know when I'm not happy, for sure.

• 25:55Speaker 00

  I thought you were the happy vegan.

• 25:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, I never know when I'm not happy.

• 25:58Speaker 00

  Come on.

• 25:58Speaker 01

  I'm never aware of it. You don't seem so good today. I don't know.

• 26:02Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 26:03Speaker 01

  You know, and there are moments, I guess, I don't know.

• 26:05Speaker 00

  Sure, sure. What are you most excited about over the next five years? You've created so much in your business. You've got, you know, so many companies.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Watching these kids build this company, all that digital, I've done on a regular.

• 26:15Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 26:15Speaker 01

  I have another kid who's downstairs, he's got 15 movies set up and, um, in, um, the, um, film Death Pictures.

• 26:22Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:23Speaker 01

  I have another guy who's been in television his whole life and he was behind NBC's drama, but now he's developing tons of TV. I want to see that thing really take off.

• 26:34Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:35Speaker 01

  I want Simone to own the biggest farm factory in the world.

• 26:38Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 26:39Speaker 01

  Um, whatever the fuck, I mean, not farm factory, you know, like farm sanctuary type.

• 26:45Speaker 00

  There you go, farm factory.

• 26:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know what I mean? Like some shit that where she can save some animals. I don't get the saving one animal. Like that animal, that blind dog she has, I could give about. I think that it's about saving a hundred billion animals.

• 26:57Speaker 00

  He's smiling, though.

• 26:58Speaker 01

  She spends her whole life saving one.

• 26:59Speaker 00

  He's smiling. He's happy right now.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  I know it's good to do that. I know God favors those whose intentions are that pure.

• 27:04Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 27:05Speaker 01

  That they see one suffering animal and they take their time, but I'd rather just with a sweeping hand, change a lot of people's minds and say, like, I like to teach Oprah to meditate so she can teach the masses.

• 27:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  Rather than teach Simone to meditate so she can tell her best friend only. And then, really.

• 27:21Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 27:22Speaker 01

  I love Simone, but I'd rather not teach her.

• 27:24Speaker 00

  Right.

• 27:24Speaker 01

  Rather teach Ellen DeGeneres. I did those too. They got big mouth. They taught a lot more people.

• 27:28Speaker 00

  Right, right. What's a good meda-, I mean, for someone who's never done meditation, we, I've talked about a lot of my podcasts. I bring on people that go through guided meditations. Do you ever, do you go through guided meditation yourself or do you have a?

• 27:38Speaker 01

  No, I do mantra-based meditation. My book was based on a lot of the principles in TM, but a lot of the principles in, uh, Tiyogi's taught me.

• 27:46Speaker 00

  What's your mantra? Are you allowed to share or?

• 27:48Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, well, I gave away a mass mantra, which was rum, rum.

• 27:55Speaker 01

  So I would think that mantra, but my own mantra that I paid $2,500 for from the David Lynch Foundation, I can't share that.

• 28:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, it's personally, yeah.

• 28:04Speaker 01

  Personally paid for it.

• 28:05Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 28:06Speaker 01

  The money goes to the kids in the programs that we build, I'm on the board. And I use the mantra I got from Bob Roth, who taught so many people to meditate, like he was close to Maharishi, but I was okay with giving everybody the same mantra in my book.

• 28:20Speaker 00

  Sure, sure, got you, yeah.

• 28:22Speaker 01

  And it's a vibration and it was one that, if he had given me that mantra, I would have freaked out because I always liked it. But anyway, the point is, but it was like, I use the mantra that I use.

• 28:32Speaker 00

  You're constantly giving back, so many people are aware of what you're doing with politics and, you know, I think there's a foundation with prisoners, right, that you're supporting or...

• 28:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, but the Foundation for Ethical Understanding is one of my big...

• 28:45Speaker 00

  Gotcha, gotcha.

• 28:46Speaker 01

  Things, we get imams that speak in synagogues and rabbis that speak in mosques. And I think that that's, you know, we need that. And it's just an example, it's a microcosm of what we need. It's interesting to see the chief rabbi of Israel and the grand mufti of the Palestinian people in Israel, or in Palestine, whatever you call it, to have them be open and willing to promote this program where imams speak in synagogues and rabbis speak in mosques. That to me, and Simone Perez said it wasn't going to happen, then I come back to, yeah, our programs are starting to run. He was kind of surprised because he lives there and he didn't think it was possible.

• 29:30Speaker 01

  So dialogue is king, you know?

• 29:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  And dialogue is very important.

• 29:35Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 29:36Speaker 01

  In every, because when you don't talk, you get separate, you forget that you have the same wishes for yourself that the other person wishes for theirselves. You forget that you have the same desires and hopes and fears and questions.

• 29:53Speaker 01

  That they have.

• 29:53Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 29:54Speaker 01

  And when you find that common thread, you realize you have so much more in common and almost nothing that's not in common.

• 30:01Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:01Speaker 01

  And I think that's what dialogue does, like the Imams and the rabbis, they did the same anyway, the same religion.

• 30:07Speaker 00

  Right.

• 30:07Speaker 01

  Well, I could tell. Um, so that's interesting to see all the Judeo-Christian faiths, they're all the same, but the, the fact that they think there's such great differences, you know, and that one's right over the others is also disturbing, but that's what it is, whatever. I, I just think that, you know, th- those things are, are really important. People need to be able to communicate and to touch each other and to find the sameness in each other.

• 30:32Speaker 00

  Yeah. How do you balance all this? I mean, you've got, you know, your family.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  I sleep usually six hours. I meditate, I go to yoga, and I, sometimes now I go to cryotherapy. But today I'm gonna try to erase the cryo, go to yoga, go to my book side, and go to my comedy show. But I, you know, I meditate and I do these things. If I have those things in my life, I can do everything. And this whole idea of being stressed, you know, I kinda let that go a lot. I don't carry a lot of weight.

• 30:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:58Speaker 01

  And I don't think it's necessary to carry weight to, for what?

• 31:01Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 31:02Speaker 01

  You can't change shit you worry about. You can change stuff you focus on, but not that you worry about.

• 31:08Speaker 00

  What do you think your life would be like right now if you didn't meditate, do yoga, and you ate meat?

• 31:12Speaker 01

  There's a picture of me from thirty-three years ago on my, um, on my, um, Instagram. I look like I'm about to die.

• 31:20Speaker 00

  Really?

• 31:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:22Speaker 00

  Did you post this recently?

• 31:23Speaker 01

  I posted a while ago. It's, but I posted again, I mean, so often. Yeah, it's not, it's a few days back, I posted again.

• 31:29Speaker 00

  Thirty-three years ago, huh?

• 31:31Speaker 01

  Yep. Yeah, like I was gonna get and die, literally.

• 31:34Speaker 00

  Okay, so that's what you'd be like right now, about to die?

• 31:38Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, probably. Look at, look at me then.

• 31:40Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 31:40Speaker 01

  You see that shit?

• 31:41Speaker 00

  Can't see it. You have it on there?

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Look how old.

• 31:43Speaker 00

  Wow, that's you?

• 31:44Speaker 01

  Thirty-three years ago.

• 31:45Speaker 00

  You look like, that's sixty right there. You look like you're about sixty, right there.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I'm twenty something.

• 31:51Speaker 00

  Yeah, okay. All right. I'm curious, with all the stuff that people know about you, all the great things you've done, what's something you've done that you're really proud of that most people don't know about?

• 32:04Speaker 01

  I like the idea that I was helpful in creating the movement that changed the Rockefeller drug laws. I like the idea that I wrote the letter that went to the president and to the attorney general that got signed by all of Hollywood and all of these people and then eventually was tweeted by Justin Bieber. And the attorney general called me immediately and the president changed the way he charges first time offenders. I like, there's a little shit I did that I'm, you know, that I like that I did. I mean, some artists became more conscious and did more things philanthropic, social and political. Because I dragged them down one block one day and they realized how powerful they were and they changed and they

• 32:47Speaker 01

  they used their celebrity to make things change. When we had the Muslim inquiries and Kim Kardashian tweet out, "She's Muslim for a day", they shut them down. Congress was so embarrassed, the shit went all over the world. That there was this protest, people, rabbis especially, were saying they're Muslim for a day and that was wrong, was un-American. These inquiries that the Congress was holding. So little things like that matter, like really, like no one will write about that much. No one will care about that much. But they'll care about, you know, the records you sold. Other stuff. I'm surprised, frankly, I'm really surprised I see the change. My publisher didn't even want a chapter on being vegan in my last book.

• 33:32Speaker 00

  Really?

• 33:33Speaker 01

  And now they asked for a book about vegan. Right, so the world changes. They asked me for that. So my reason for going vegan, well compassion, I'm not one to contribute to the abuse of so many animals. Not even the environment, which obviously is just really, you know what? As a yogi, all those reasons matter, right? The first shock was should always be of a concern. But my reason was really compassion.

• 33:57Speaker 00

  Compassion.

• 33:58Speaker 01

  I couldn't write that in a book, could nobody give a, don't nobody care about the animal. I really don't. Simone would disagree, she gets angry, she's taking care of a blind dog, but most people put that animal to sleep.

• 34:11Speaker 01

  Most people would put that at a blind dog, like you gotta take your whole day and watch the dog. They put in the sleep. Right, right. So that's how people feel about individual animals and certainly about a hundred billion of them that they don't know. Right. You see when, you see women. And they're not killing either. Yeah, and they walk around in their fur coat, walking their dog. You know what I mean? You see it all the time. You see this with their brand new fur coat. You know, eight thousand chinchillas into one little coat and then they walk in their dog like the dog is precious. Right. The dog, I'd rather have the dog be the coat than eight thousand chinchillas. Right, right. If I could choose, but I mean, I want none of them to die, but so to me, it's a big picture thing. You know, when they wanna save horses, I help save horses. When they save dolphins, I help save dolphins. But every cow counts. Yeah. Every chicken counts.

• 34:56Speaker 01

  Pig, yeah. Pigs, smarter than the people, let's kill them. They count. And dolphins too, probably, but you know, I mean, smart, not that it matters, suffering is suffering, but Yeah. animals that feel so much pain, go through so much shit. So we can get sick and cancer and diabetes and heart disease, it's kinda nutty to me. Yeah. Such a thing, you know, is a process and it's all money. Yeah. Greed. And it's all the downfall of this fake democracy, which is controlled by money. And it bothers me that our American government can't get on its feet.

• 35:35Speaker 01

  The only two people who could talk about, say what they wanna say, are free to kinda really make a campaign to run for president. Uh, Donald Trump, who said, "Look at, look at these people on the stage." He said, "You know what?" He paused, he said, "Good people. Money corrupts good people. What do you think?" And the whole crowd looked, they didn't get it, and he said, you know, about Citizens United. I, I got it right away. I thought it was a funny, cause I watch him, he's entertaining. I've known him forever, so I'm watching, and he's very entertaining. But what he said about people being corrupted by money, they all look like, like little girls in miniskirts at the wrong party. Like, they should go home, cause they're like horse. And it was wrong, and it was wrong. He said it, and it was true. And it was like, that's the Republican Party. And then you have Bernie Sanders.

• 36:21Speaker 01

  Who talks about the one tenth of one percent getting all the money. And he's saying stuff, he's dragging Hillary there because Hillary doesn't want to lose. But, you know, she's doing it with the, with the awareness that she's got their money in her pocket. Yeah. And that she owes, he is free from the control of corporate interests at this moment. And he's, he's bound by his past, you know, the gun thing, he lived in a gun state, he had to bend, politicians mostly do, they learned, he learned some lessons about bending. You know, the gun thing, he has lived, or little things that he did to survive in the state in which he was. So, the idea of people free from corporate control, I didn't like Mayor Bloomberg, I campaigned against him.

• 37:06Speaker 01

  Hmm. Uh, and I campaigned for some Democrat, I mean, I might have did it again this time. Uh, but this guy won, de Blasio, because he hadn't had any balls, because he's, he needs money just to breathe. Hmm. You know, and, um, he needs money to win again, and he's controlled. Right, right, right. Hasn't been able to do anything. I, he announced his deal, I was so happy, I just heard his headline, he made a deal for animal rights people that put him in office. Hmm. Then I found out the deal sucked, it's hor, it's horrible, it's not helpful. To me, I think it was because he saved seventy of the two hundred and ten horses. It sounds insensitive, but seventy horses were not the question. The reason I thought we were taking horses off the street is not for the two hundred horses.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  It was because I didn't want my kids to see the abuse. I wanted just one more statement, one more step towards the, the, the lack, the, getting away from the belief that animals are here to work for us. Yeah. That animals are here at our, you know, play things. Yeah. So, letting, getting rid of their horses mattered to me because it's part of a bigger picture. There are people who really wanted the horses off the street and don't care about the other animals, and there are people who, I'm not one of them, I'm, I'm, every step counts, you know, every chicken, every bird of every kind and every species and the suffering of each of them is equal to me. Hmm.

• 38:33Speaker 01

  So, getting seventy horses off the ground, yeah, I, I totally get saving one animal at a time. But I, but I think my time is better spent on the mass.

• 38:42Speaker 00

  But this save a lot more if one person chooses to go vegan.

• 38:46Speaker 01

  One person chooses to go vegan, change the whole world.

• 38:48Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 38:49Speaker 01

  I mean, it changes the, uh, the dynamic, yeah.

• 38:51Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 38:52Speaker 01

  So that's a, that's true too, get back to that. One person can make a tremendous difference.

• 38:56Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 38:57Speaker 01

  You know, thousands of animals, he won't participate in eating.

• 39:00Speaker 00

  Right.

• 39:01Speaker 01

  Or eat. And, um, also maybe he rubs off on another one.

• 39:05Speaker 00

  Right, by someone else, yeah.

• 39:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:07Speaker 00

  Uh, couple of questions left for you, cause I know you got a lot going on. Uh, what are you most grateful for in your life recently?

• 39:14Speaker 01

  Grateful, just, you know, the family.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  You know, basic stuff, you know, I'm grateful to get out of bed every morning, every morning.

• 39:25Speaker 01

  For my service, you know, that goes well and days I get rest today, you know, it's hard. I just say, wow, I go through the whole day. I do all these podcasts and interviews and stuff. This is about the animal rights thing now and also grateful we got funded. All Def Digital is now, you know, really doing very well and a lot of movies are in development and a lot of TVs are developed. The world is moving along.

• 39:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:48Speaker 01

  My personal peace is, is, is more accessible. I'm generally more happy today than I was before. Um, I think that that idea, moving toward the calmer space and recognizing how little the world has to offer me regarding my happiness. The more I recognize that, the more free I get from stuff.

• 40:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 40:14Speaker 01

  You know, I'm surprised these things didn't come get me for the shit I'm saying. I, did I tell you that the American government gives thirty-eight billion dollars to the meat industry?

• 40:22Speaker 00

  Really?

• 40:23Speaker 01

  Meat and dairy and seventeen million to vegetables. That they are poisoning, subsidizing the poisoning of this planet and the poisoning of its people. And it's just lobbyists and stuff, you know, so I'm surprised the stuff that I say.

• 40:38Speaker 00

  They're not coming after you.

• 40:39Speaker 01

  I don't know what they can get me for. I mean, it's all documented. That was PETA's. So get PETA. But it's all documented in the book, you know, so it's none of it's my, I didn't do the research.

• 40:49Speaker 00

  Right, right. Sharing it with the world.

• 40:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm sharing the research. And I guess most of it's pretty correct. So they haven't come after me to try to destroy me, like they did Oprah years ago. I don't have Oprah money. I really can't afford to fight them in that way forever. It probably cost a 20, 30 million dollars to talk to them. I don't want to do that.

• 41:11Speaker 00

  Right.

• 41:12Speaker 01

  But I'm not going to agree that eating animals is okay.

• 41:15Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 41:15Speaker 01

  I ain't gonna bow down. I ain't a punk. So I say what I think needs to be said. I think that's important.

• 41:21Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 41:21Speaker 01

  I'm proud of that. I'm proud of the fact that I have spent a great part of my life saying things that people don't like to hear. Saying things that I believe are necessary, that should be shared, that people overlook. There's a lack of consciousness on the part of humankind to recognize a lot of its flaws. I have most of them, but the ones that I recognize, I speak out about.

• 41:43Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 41:43Speaker 01

  So that's what it is.

• 41:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, okay. Two final questions. I want to make sure everyone goes and gets this book, The Happy Vegan, and they can get it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, anywhere books are sold. Is there also a specific website you want to send people to for you, or the book, or anything they should be following? Where do you, where do you hang out most on social media?

• 42:01Speaker 01

  I hang out most on my Instagram.

• 42:03Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 42:03Speaker 01

  Uncle Rush.

• 42:04Speaker 00

  So go follow you there.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, Uncle Rush is my Twitter and my Instagram.

• 42:07Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 42:08Speaker 01

  I play on Instagram. Like, I swear to God, probably you unfollow me.

• 42:10Speaker 00

  I see you posting like 10 times a day.

• 42:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, probably unfollow me, right. But I send out prayer, and I feel like I'm curating a magazine.

• 42:17Speaker 00

  Lots of yoga stuff on there.

• 42:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, I like, yeah, I put shit on it, and I like, so it's.

• 42:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, I like it. I like it. Okay, so we'll go follow you there. Last two questions. If this was, you know, your last day, and you have all your friends and family there to support you, and all the books you've written have been erased, and all the stuff you put out there has been gone for some reason, and you've got a piece of paper and a pen to write down three truths, the three things you know to be true about your experience from life that you want to share with your friends and family as your message back, three simple things, what would those be? Putting you on the spot, obviously.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  Do everything you can to be comfortable in your seat, but use scripture as your guide, because those are the honest and quickest routes to that kind of happiness I want people to look for. Give what you want to receive.

• 43:07Speaker 01

  And the world has nothing to offer you. You have everything to offer it. So therefore, don't trade with the world. Give to the world. And all those things, those ideas alone will help someone to be successful in their goal, and the goal is happiness.

• 43:24Speaker 00

  I love it. That was a great truce. That was a great truce, thank you. Final question before I, before I ask, I want to acknowledge you. I acknowledge every one of my guests at the end for speaking out and using your voice and saying what you want to say and not holding back. I think it's really important with someone who has a platform like you to be able to share, whether people agree or not agree. I believe it's important that you're sharing your message and a positive message with, with this meditation, your, your political messages, things like that. So I want to acknowledge you for speaking up and not being afraid to share your voice, no matter what people say about you or, or do behind your back. It's, I think it's really a great way to, to stand up for yourself and, and inspire others to do the same.

• 44:04Speaker 01

  Thank you. I, I, I like doing it, so it's, it's easy. Healthy sleep at night.

• 44:10Speaker 00

  That's good.

• 44:10Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 44:11Speaker 00

  And a final last question really quick.

• 44:12Speaker 01

  You said last question like 12 times.

• 44:14Speaker 00

  I apologize.

• 44:15Speaker 01

  It's all good though. Well, you just, I just want you to know how many times you said last question.

• 44:19Speaker 00

  What's your definition of greatness?

• 44:21Speaker 01

  Greatness. I like this, what you said about giving your heart to the world and being honest to the world despite being criticized by the world. There are a lot of leaders who uncompromising, who believe in their messaging and believe that they're serving God, or, you know, if they're religious, or the community or the people, you know, people go out every day and just try to make the world a better place. You know, I would, you know, count a few people who from the outside in looked almost enlightened. And, and those people are, you know, they're around me sometime. I, I would think Minister Farrakhan, when you're around him, you're like, wow, he really believes everything out his mouth.

• 45:03Speaker 01

  He really wants to help his people and he saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of black people. He's a very special man in that regard. I believe that there's a few other people who really go to work every day, try to make the world a better place and really are selfless in their nature. Simone here really believes that going out and pouring paint on Kim Kardashian's coat makes the world a better place. She goes out, you know, and does what she does and she means it. She spends all her time trying to save animals, except for the time to make her read scripts. People are dedicated to making the world better is great, you know, and the size of your impact is, I said about Farrakhan and him saving hundreds of thousands of black lives is one thing.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  And I said about Simone who really sparks, sparks a lot of energy that creates a vibration to save a lot of lives as well. But people who just have the honest intention to do well for the world, who are selfless are the ones that, that are favored. Not the guy who gave the billion dollars, the guy who actually administered the drugs in the most difficult climate, they went, they tried to save the person. If to the God outside of us, he favors that person over the person who gave the money.

• 46:16Speaker 00

  Russell, thanks so much.

• 46:18Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 46:19Speaker 00

  Appreciate it. There you have it, guys. I hope you enjoyed this episode with Russell. Again, a very powerful individual who's created so much good in his life and his message resonates with so many people. Make sure to share this with your friends, lewishouse.com/287. Let me know what you thought on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and tag Russell as well over on Instagram and Twitter with this episode. Let him know what you thought. We've got the full video interview back at the show notes as well, lewishouse.com/287. Make sure to check that out and subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or SoundCloud, wherever you prefer to listen. And also make sure to subscribe to the YouTube channel.

• 47:02Speaker 00

  That's youtube.com/lewishouse because we're doing multiple videos a week moving forward now. I'm very excited about the video that we're creating moving forward. So make sure to subscribe and check that out. As well, I love you guys, I appreciate you so much. Thank you for being here and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.

• 47:54Speaker 00

  You