How to Build Unshakeable Certainty When Life Falls Apart | Tony Robbins

Tony Robbins shares a truth that will stop you in your tracks: every limiting belief you have comes down to one core fear, and once you understand it, everything changes. The conversation moves from his childhood in LA where four different fathers shaped his identity, to the night he ran 17 miles home doing incantations that built the unstoppable force he is today. You'll learn why most people approach breakthroughs in reverse order, starting with strategy when they should start with state, and how that single mistake keeps them locked in place. Tony breaks down the hero's journey we're all on, whether we realize it or not, and why the challenges destroying you right now are actually calls to adventure that will make you stronger than you ever imagined. The Greatness Playbook: The Breakthrough EditionJoin Tony at the Time To Rise Summit and step into your next level of growth, clarity, and connection. Explore this breathtaking Bel Air estate at Carolwood Estates. Tony’s books:Awaken the Giant WithinNotes from a FriendUnlimited PowerMoney: Master the GameUnshakeable: Your Financial Freedom PlaybookThe Path: Accelerating Your Journey to Financial FreedomLife ForceThe Holy Grail of InvestingIn this episode you will:Break through the limiting belief that you're not enough by recognizing it's really a fear that you won't be lovedMaster the art of building internal certainty so you never have to rent it from external circumstances like jobs, money, or other people's approvalDiscover why your mental and emotional state controls your story, and your story controls what strategies you'll even attempt in lifeTransform your relationship with stress by understanding the difference between managing circumstances and creating your lifeUnlock championship biochemistry in your own body by understanding how testosterone and cortisol create the state of peak performanceFor more information go to https://lewishowes.com/1875For more Greatness text PODCAST to +1 (614) 350-3960More SOG episodes we think you’ll love:Lewis Howes [SOLO]Dr. Caroline LeafJim Curtis Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  So many people have made major impacts on my life. But when I think back to the days before it all began, before the business, before the podcast, before the big audience, I needed the motivation to become someone greater than my fears and my limitations. And one of my first inspirations was Tony Robbins.

• 0:19Tony Robbins?

  This straight-laced kind of teacher, I'd see him after class and he said, "You know why I'm here to talk to you? You have a gift." And I'm looking at him like he's crazy. "I have a speech here that I'd like you to read. And if it appeals to you," he said, "I think this is your life." The title was "The Will to Win." I could cry just thinking about it. It was so intense. I mean, I'm reading it and crying, just going, "I'm only here still, all that I've been through because of my pure will that I will not give up."

• 0:46Lewis Howes?

  I still remember the first time I walked into a Tony Robbins event. I was 16 years old. I was searching for direction, for belief, for something to grab onto. And I had no idea how deeply that experience would stay with me.

• 1:01Tony Robbins?

  Designing a life is a different way of living. And it requires courage. You can have courage if you can trust in a higher understanding that everything has a higher purpose. And this isn't unfolding for me. But I've found if you live enough life with that faith and with the drive to find it, you'll find those answers.

• 1:17Lewis Howes?

  Tony Robbins is one of the most influential personal development teachers of our time. He is a number one Your Times bestselling author, a global entrepreneur, and an advisor to world leaders, CEOs, and elite performers. He's impacted millions of people around the world. And over the years, Tony has joined me on the show multiple times. But what's mattered more are the conversations we've had in between those interviews. The lessons I've learned, the standards that have been set, and the challenges to grow when growth wasn't comfortable. This isn't a conversation about how to win more or do more. It's about the journey behind the impact of what Tony Robbins has done.

• 2:00Lewis Howes?

  What it costs to build a life that ripples outward around the world. And what remains when the noise fades. So we are... Here in this incredible home, and over a decade ago, we did an amazing interview on a private jet. I don't know if you remember this.

• 2:17Tony Robbins?

  Yes, I do remember.

• 2:18Lewis Howes?

  That kinda went viral. This private jet interview. Yes, it was in Burbank Airport or over there. And now, over a decade later, we're doing another epic interview in this $150 million home here in Bel Air. And you gotta tell me, what is, what is this place and why are we here?

• 2:34Tony Robbins?

  Well, this is Artie Trandegarian built this home, and he is a dear, dear friend of mine. He actually, when I was doing the Delmar Castle, I wanted to, I came here to LA and I was such a big accomplishment. I had this castle overlooking the ocean in San Diego. And, um, and then I came to see Chris Hemminger here, who built, uh, if you've ever been to the Big Island of Hawaii, uh huh, there's a Hilton there now, and it's, you go to your room by boat, or you go to your room by monorail. He built that place to scratch.

• 3:00Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 3:01Tony Robbins?

  So I went to his house and he had this underground, like, um, you know, place that was full of, you know, all those wines and cigars. But it was such an intriguing place. And when I left, I was like, I live in the Delmar tenement. And so Artie had started like me from nothing. And he wanted an address in Beverly Hills, so he went underground and got this little area, he's gonna have an address there as an architect. And he started designing and he's grown, he went to date with Destiny, they became good friends. So he did my castle. And then gradually over the years, he's grown to be, you know, one of the number one designers in the world for the wealthiest people on earth. And so every time he builds one of these homes, he goes, you gotta, you made such a difference in my life, you gotta come live in it for a week or two.

• 3:40Tony Robbins?

  And I resisted for many years, but my, I came here with my wife and, and my daughter, and we spent, I don't know, two weeks living here. It's pretty, pretty amazing home. So it's 35,000 square feet, four stories high, downstairs, you'll be able to film it later, there's the most amazing areas, you know, for, for spa areas and, I mean, everything about it, all these doors open up, so it's just, he's a genius. He's got this spiral staircase that goes up all four stories. And you're in the middle of Bel Air, I mean, you've got an amazing just lifestyle.

• 4:09Lewis Howes?

  The view of the whole city, it's unbelievable.

• 4:11Tony Robbins?

  And like all these things come up, you know, it looks like a garden bed and it's a giant television that comes up.

• 4:16Lewis Howes?

  It's unbelievable.

• 4:17Tony Robbins?

  And you're looking right over the Bel Air Country Club and Century City, and so it's just cool, so.

• 4:22Lewis Howes?

  Living the dream.

• 4:23Tony Robbins?

  My BBJ is being, doing the whole new internal piece, that's, I know you wanted to do the plane, but I figured, okay, here's another nice place for you. It's not bad.

• 4:30Lewis Howes?

  So cool, I'm excited to do it.

• 4:31Tony Robbins?

  So you wanna go upstairs?

• 4:32Lewis Howes?

  Let's do it, let's do it.

• 4:34Tony Robbins?

  Okay, here we go.

• 4:34Lewis Howes?

  Go ahead. You're gonna be on the left over there, I think.

• 4:37Tony Robbins?

  Okay, you got it.

• 4:40Lewis Howes?

  Well, I'm here with the inspiring, incredible Tony Robbins. Thank you so much for inviting me in this incredible home that you were just talking about. We're here at this expansive hundred-plus-million-dollar home in Bel Air. And we're talking about how being in an environment like this allows you to expand your own mind at this season of your life, at this stage of your life, and how you just keep expanding your thinking by being around the right people, being in the right environments, and allowing you to imagine a world that you don't have yet. Talking about your property in Tennessee and imagining creating the thing you want to create. I'm curious, we were talking as we were coming up here about my Olympic handball journey.

• 5:21Lewis Howes?

  We're talking about the people that you have mentored and coached, Olympians, billionaires, presidents. You've coached the best of the best, overcome their limiting beliefs to help them achieve their own level of greatness. I'm curious, from those who are at the top of their game to those who are struggling day by day, what is the number-one limiting belief that most people have that keeps them from accomplishing what they want?

• 5:47Tony Robbins?

  Well, it's different depending upon what level of life you get to, but people usually bump up against, "I'm not enough." You know, the whole idea that today, they talk about it in a trite way. It's like, I remember talking to Anthony Hopkins, Tony Hopkins, the actor, he's a good friend of mine. And I was surprised because this guy is so obsessed that he not only knows his own lines, I've made a few movies, and I was shocked that people didn't know their lines. But you know, you shoot things 10,000 times. So he knows his own lines and every other person's lines. And so he's that committed and he's that great an actor. And he says to me, "Tony, I feel like, you know, I'm a facade, I'm a phony, I'm gonna get found out." And so I think not everybody has that exact belief, but the idea that maybe I'm not enough for this level, but I'm going to,

• 6:31Tony Robbins?

  or the level I want to go to in my life. Whether it's, they might be great in business, but they're not doing great in their relationship. Or they're great in a relationship, but they're not good with their kids. Or they're good with their kids, but their body's not where they want to be. They got all the money without the body, right? And so I think most people bump up against that fear that something in me is not enough. And the deeper fear is that, "I'm not enough, I won't be loved." And so it's an unconscious fear. So most people push it aside by focusing on what they're good at. And not taking care of those other things till they bite them, the relationship, the body, whatever it is, the kids. Or they come up with a story about, well, I don't need to be good at that, or it's just not my nature. And so I'm often called in to help somebody, you know, sharpen their skills. But you're right, usually there's a limiting belief of some sort.

• 7:14Tony Robbins?

  So I couldn't say there's one, but if I was saying the most dominant one, it's like, I've never done this before, so how the hell am I gonna do it? Right? There's uncertainty. If you look at a great athlete, what makes a great athlete? There's that sense of, not only you practice and you got it in your nervous system, your incredible, your strategy in the sport, but there's the state you bring to the table. So I'm sure you've seen an athlete, basketball player in the NBA about to shoot a free throw, a kicker in the NFL, and they go jogging out there and you look at them, you go, they're gonna miss it. And sure enough, they do. Everyone's had that experience. How did they know? They saw the lack of certainty in their body, right? And so when you try to get yourself to do something you've never done before, it produces that kind of uncertainty. So I always tell people, if you want a breakthrough,

• 7:57Tony Robbins?

  I think of it as three things at the most simple level to create a breakthrough. A breakthrough being, maybe there's an area that you've not gotten to where you want to be, and you've promised yourself you're gonna do it, and then you don't follow through, or you fall back, and you're frustrated with yourself. Most people have had something like that, but one day they did breakthrough. They did finally say, enough of this. And that day, that moment, they changed their relationship, they quit what they're doing, they started something new. And what I found is there's three parts to that breakthrough. And if you want to break through in any area, these are the things you gotta do. But I want to give you in reverse order real fast, okay? So reverse order is, most people, they want to get, make something happen, they focus on the strategy. Now, I'm a strategist. I get paid to be able to show someone how to save a decade, because the right strategy in business can save you ten years, right?

• 8:41Tony Robbins?

  Can accelerate your earnings, can decrease your costs. There's so many tools. The right strategy in a relationship is priceless. But as much as I love strategy, it's not what I start with with people. The reason is because the natural question is, I want to achieve this, but how do I do it? There's nothing wrong with answering the question how, it's just the sequence of these that are critical. It's like if I told you this is someone's phone number and you have the right numbers and you dial the wrong order, you're not gonna reach him.

• 9:07Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 9:08Tony Robbins?

  If you knew the vault numbers, but you put them wrong order, the vault doesn't open. When it comes to a breakthrough, most people are focused on the strategy, the how to, and the problem is when you go to how to do something you've never done before, it brings uncertainty.

• 9:20Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 9:21Tony Robbins?

  And uncertainty creates hesitancy and hesitancy kills momentum, hesitancy kills performance, hesitancy kills, you know, most things that really matter in your life. So what I tell people is, if you took it something like losing weight and said, you know, most of America is overweight, why is that? Is it because the strategy for being fit and strong is so complex? No. Is it only for the 1%? No. Is it super expensive? No. You have to basically ignore everything that's around you, right? So it's not a strategy problem. People think it's a strategy problem, it's not. The real problem is they have a story. So I think it's these three S's. The story is locking them in place. The story is, you said, a belief, but when you stack a set of beliefs together, you build a story.

• 10:04Tony Robbins?

  And you tell it to yourself over and over again until you believe it. So the story is, I've tried everything.

• 10:09Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 10:09Tony Robbins?

  And I'll say to them, really? Everything? How many things you tried? I've tried thousands of things. Then I go, okay, name them. And they'll go, uh.

• 10:17Lewis Howes?

  I've tried two things.

• 10:18Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, yeah, exactly. These two things that don't work, I did over and over again, right? You know? But as long as you believe that, a belief is a feeling of certainty about what can be done or can't be done, right? Who you are, who you're not. So when you go first for how, you have uncertainty. I call it the tyranny of how. You don't want to get to the how first. You gotta deal with the story before that, right? So the story might be all the good ones are gone, right? Or they're all gay and I'm not, or I'm gay and they're not. You know, some story that makes it impossible to succeed. If you change the story, you can get a strategy that works, but the order people work on is strategy. You rarely pay attention to the story, but the one before that is where we need to start. It's your state. Your mental, emotional state. As an athlete, you know this, right?

• 11:00Tony Robbins?

  So that state of certainty, that state of passion, that state of conviction, that stage of absolute determination, right? That state that every great athlete has, that state, any great leader has, any great business person has. If you have that state, it will change your story and it'll change what you're able to do strategy wise. So like, for example, Have you ever gotten pissed off at somebody and then realized, remembered everything you've ever been pissed at them about? You know, it's like you get in that mode, you remember everything, right?

• 11:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 11:29Tony Robbins?

  Or when somebody's in love, what's wrong with life when they're in love?

• 11:32Lewis Howes?

  Nothing.

• 11:33Tony Robbins?

  Nothing.

• 11:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, it's amazing.

• 11:34Tony Robbins?

  So your story changes with your state, right? Your story about your life, it's, it could be one day it's horrible, the next day, life's a gift. So the most important thing to do is change your state first. That's why most people fail to achieve what they want. They have not become masters in their own mental, emotional state. And you know, in our events, that's my number one piece, because without that, you won't get lasting change. You'll get temporary change.

• 11:55Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 11:55Tony Robbins?

  Once I get enough state, I can change the story, that's easy. Once I change the story, if I don't give you the strategy, you'll find a strategy. You'll make it happen. You'll find a way, you'll make the way. You've lived this as an athlete and as a businessman. So I look at this and say, the problem is, most people do it in reverse order. When they go in reverse order, they stop the process. They don't know how, they freak out about the uncertainty. Their story doesn't support them, and now they're in a lousy state. And so they try something, try something for a little while and never follow through.

• 12:26Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 12:26Tony Robbins?

  So that's the breakthrough I do it. So it's, it is a belief system, and I want you to see it's a little more complex than that. It's the state, because in you, were you taught, look before you leap?

• 12:36Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 12:37Tony Robbins?

  Were you taught, he who hesitates is lost?

• 12:39Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 12:40Tony Robbins?

  So which one do you pick?

• 12:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, right, exactly.

• 12:43Tony Robbins?

  The answer is, what am I supposed to do? Your state will determine it.

• 12:47Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 12:47Tony Robbins?

  So if you're fearful, he who hesitates is lost, you're gonna justify. If you're more aggressive and there's something you really want, you're gonna, you know, it's like, I gotta make this thing happen, right? It's a different piece. So you pick your beliefs based on your state unconsciously. So state is the controlling factor in everything, in a relationship. Congratulations, you've got your two daughters and your wife. We talked for many years about relationship together.

• 13:10Lewis Howes?

  Struggled for many years.

• 13:11Tony Robbins?

  No, but you did it right.

• 13:13Lewis Howes?

  I needed to learn a new story. I needed to learn a new story, and I needed to kind of heal that story.

• 13:18Tony Robbins?

  That's right.

• 13:19Lewis Howes?

  And create a do, a different one for myself, so I could attract the wife that I have now. That amazing relationship.

• 13:24Tony Robbins?

  But even before you got the story, you had to get the state.

• 13:26Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 13:26Tony Robbins?

  When the state was there, it became easier to get the story.

• 13:28Lewis Howes?

  I was living in fear a lot in intimacy.

• 13:30Tony Robbins?

  I know.

• 13:31Lewis Howes?

  You know, I was able to live in the thrill of excitement.

• 13:34Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 13:34Lewis Howes?

  Without really going deeper and making sure the values align.

• 13:38Tony Robbins?

  That's right.

• 13:39Lewis Howes?

  And then later you learn about the values and you're like, oh, but now I'm I'm stuck in this and I can't get out. I'm afraid to be alone now. So I was living in fear or excitement, but it wasn't like grounded certainty. And I think when you get in a relationship, when you get, when you start dating someone, you're never certain it's gonna work out. But it was more of like, I was finally was like, I'm certain I'm gonna be okay no matter what happens. You know what I mean? It was like, I'm certain.

• 14:02Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 14:03Lewis Howes?

  If we don't align, then I want the best for her and I want the best for me.

• 14:06Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 14:07Lewis Howes?

  And I was certain that I was okay.

• 14:08Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 14:09Lewis Howes?

  No matter what.

• 14:10Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 14:10Lewis Howes?

  And before I never had that certainty or because the story didn't match that.

• 14:15Tony Robbins?

  And think about it, fear almost always makes you make the wrong choice.

• 14:20Lewis Howes?

  Every time, every time, every time.

• 14:22Tony Robbins?

  And so there's so much fear and uncertainty in that. And so by the way, your next one is gonna probably be about your two daughters.

• 14:28Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 14:29Tony Robbins?

  Well, it's like this first time parent, right?

• 14:31Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man, yeah.

• 14:32Tony Robbins?

  And you got two of them simultaneously.

• 14:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, at the same time.

• 14:34Tony Robbins?

  So that'll bring up those pieces and those pieces, by the way, can filter into the rest of your other areas of your life without you noticing it. Being aware of it when I say noticing it. So you gotta be cautious about that, meaning not cautious, just do the same thing you do with anything else. You wanna jump into parenting and learn everything you can about it. So when things happen, you know the pattern in advance.

• 14:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:52Tony Robbins?

  You, you have a great state, you have a great story and you have a great strategy, but you've done some study, you go like, you know, certain things, they're predictable, right? When you have your first child, for example, most people, the first child, the child gets really sick and they freak out, they run to the doctor. If they have four kids, by the time they get the fourth kid.

• 15:08Lewis Howes?

  They don't care about the last one.

• 15:09Tony Robbins?

  You get a earache, they can, you care just as much, but you go, it's part of this stage. It's a problem, but you don't freak out about the problem.

• 15:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 15:15Tony Robbins?

  Same thing in a business. In a business, when you understand the patterns, in the beginning of a business, it's gonna be a cash flow challenge, right? They're gonna cash flow challenge when it's mature. That's a, that's a real problem.

• 15:25Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 15:25Tony Robbins?

  But each stage has predictable challenges and opportunities. And the more you can know the pattern in advance, the more you can anticipate. Anticipation is power. Reaction puts you in fear.

• 15:38Tony Robbins?

  And so you found the right state, the right story, and then you found the right lady, right?

• 15:42Lewis Howes?

  Exactly. And I feel like we, we did the work together while we started dating. We went to a kind of couples therapy in the beginning to make sure we were in alignment and kind of communicating, hey, when something happens in the future,

• 15:53Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 15:53Lewis Howes?

  how do we want to handle it?

• 15:54Tony Robbins?

  Exactly.

• 15:54Lewis Howes?

  It doesn't mean it's going to be perfect.

• 15:55Tony Robbins?

  That's the anticipation part.

• 15:56Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 15:57Tony Robbins?

  Right? Instead of waiting until it happens, then you're in it.

• 15:59Lewis Howes?

  Exactly. And my, my twin girls were born two and a half months ago. And I felt like I was so prepared. Like I, I didn't know what was going to happen because I never experienced it. But I felt emotionally ready.

• 16:11Tony Robbins?

  That's great.

• 16:12Lewis Howes?

  And my wife, you know, she did an amazing job, but she had to go to the ER twice after we got home from preclampsia and had complications and the twins and all these different things were happening. Family was around. It was just a lot of chaos for about six weeks.

• 16:26Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 16:26Lewis Howes?

  But I felt more calm because I felt like I'd been preparing for years.

• 16:31Tony Robbins?

  That's great.

• 16:31Lewis Howes?

  For the uncertain. I was like, I was certain it was going to be uncertain.

• 16:34Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 16:35Lewis Howes?

  And I would be okay.

• 16:36Tony Robbins?

  And that extrapolate that to life and it changes anybody's life.

• 16:41Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 16:41Tony Robbins?

  Like, you know, I train people how to build certainty about it because people say now to me, they'll say things like, oh, the AI coming and all these changes occurring, like when there's no certainty, when people lose their jobs, when there's no certainty outside world, how are people going to have certainty? And I go, let me give you a clue. There was never any external certainty.

• 16:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 16:58Tony Robbins?

  You've had rented certainty. You've convinced yourself hypnotically that you're certain because you had a job and you had this. None of this. You walk across the street and get hit by a bus, right? There's so much that can happen. So we hate uncertainty so much and we want it so strongly. But if we link it to our job or to an income or to a person responding the way we want to, then you're going to live a very fearful life. If you train yourself to feel that internal certainty, which is what you're dead, and anticipate as much as possible and you know, no matter what, I'll find the way. That is a different identity.

• 17:30Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 17:30Tony Robbins?

  You've gone to a level of not just how to deal with things, but the identity is, I'm the guy that will find the way for my kids and for my family, right? And that is freedom.

• 17:40Lewis Howes?

  You said something to me seven, maybe seven or eight years ago. It was in Fiji. We were at a mastermind with you and Dean Graziosi. There's about 20 of us there. You said many things to me over the years, but this, I remember the line you said. You said, "Winter is coming." You said it while you were barefoot on the beach in Fiji with the sun on our faces and the ocean breeze and this beautiful resort that you have. And you said, "Winter is coming." And it was maybe a year before COVID, right? Or a year or two before COVID, a year and a half, something like that. And you said, "Winter's coming. It may be a year, maybe eight years, but it's coming."

• 18:14Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 18:14Lewis Howes?

  And I remember taking that very seriously.

• 18:17Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 18:17Lewis Howes?

  You know, as seriously as you can take a time on the beach with Tony Robbins hanging out in the sun. But I remember saying, "I need to continue to prepare."

• 18:25Tony Robbins?

  That's right.

• 18:25Lewis Howes?

  For winter.

• 18:26Tony Robbins?

  That's why I was telling everybody that.

• 18:27Lewis Howes?

  Yes. And I felt ready when COVID came.

• 18:32Tony Robbins?

  That's awesome.

• 18:32Lewis Howes?

  I felt ready because for years before that, I'd also been doing the work and I was like, "Let's go."

• 18:38Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 18:38Lewis Howes?

  I was telling my team this earlier this week. I was like, "When you stay ready, you don't have to get ready."

• 18:43Tony Robbins?

  That's right.

• 18:44Lewis Howes?

  And this is a lot of athletes say this as well. And I think it's being ready for the uncertainty or the winter, whatever is coming, it's coming.

• 18:51Tony Robbins?

  And it happens for everybody. Listen, call it extreme stress for a moment. You just call it that. Extreme stress. Who's going to experience it in their lifetime?

• 18:59Lewis Howes?

  All of us.

• 18:59Tony Robbins?

  Everyone.

• 19:00Lewis Howes?

  All of us.

• 19:00Tony Robbins?

  I don't care if you're the most God-fearing, loving human being. I don't care if you're religious. I don't care if you're smart as a whip. I don't care if you're the richest person. No one escapes massive, massive stress. And what does that look like? It looks like your house burns down, like you're in LA right a year ago, right?

• 19:15Lewis Howes?

  Lots of my friends' houses burned down.

• 19:16Tony Robbins?

  I know. I was here when it happened as well. So I actually, I put in $6 million. I'm not patting myself on the back, but I just couldn't see people just not have a home. They had a 14-day pass. So I worked a bunch of organizations, but I might have burned down 20 years before in California here.

• 19:31Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 19:32Tony Robbins?

  And it was when there was no, you know, AI, no place to put all your stuff, pictures in the cloud. I lost everything, but my family, which is the most important thing, right? But there's a journey that it takes you on. If you deal with extreme stress. Like what else? Your house get burned down. You get robbed. Somebody steals from you in your business. Covid happens and the government shuts down your business against your own will. Um, you're in a place where you lose your job. I mean, there's somebody dies in your family. Someone tells you you have a tumor. All of us are going to experience something like that or for someone in our family. So when that happens, what do you do? You either use stress or stress uses you. Yes. And the way you stress is, you know, the whole, the whole phrase they'd say, you know, when you go through hell, keep going. Yeah. If you keep going, three things happen. Number one, you discover how strong you really are.

• 20:18Tony Robbins?

  You, it's the only way you're gonna find it is to push through it. And then each time you do it, by the way, you get stronger and stronger. Second, you figure out who your real friends are, not your Facebook friends. Cause when all hell's breaking loose, no one sticks around except real friends. And then the third thing, most important thing is it gives you like almost a little immunity to future stress because it's like a vaccination of it almost. I, I remember I dealt with this friend of mine, Captain Coffee was his name, and he was a pilot and, you know, young and, you know, you know, looks like, you know, Top Gun kinda guy. And in Vietnam, he got shot down. And he got locked up for seven years in a Vietnamese prison. Literally in isolation on a floor, cuffed to the ground and upside down so that when he peed, the acid would run down his back. They beat him, they interrogate him, everything they do.

• 21:03Tony Robbins?

  And I remember this is decades later, I said to him, he was dealing with the IRS and they were, it took him three years to get his money back. Some guy was, when the IRS was just, got a, some problem about him. But it was brutal what he went through. And I was like, how do you deal with this? He goes, Tony, after being with the North Vietnamese in prison, so do you think the IRS can hit me? So there's great value in that process. Now, if you make it through those steps, now that internal certainty inside you just builds and builds and builds. And then what happens is life has got a different experience because it's like some part of you goes, God's guiding me, or I've always found a way in the past, I'm gonna find a way again. And so you don't go through all those fear stages that make you make the wrong choices in relationships, in business, or anything else.

• 21:46Tony Robbins?

  And that's part of the value of decades.

• 21:49Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 21:49Tony Robbins?

  You know, it's like

• 21:50Lewis Howes?

  That's wisdom. Forty-two.

• 21:52Tony Robbins?

  Forty-two. You're not the same man as you were at thirty-two.

• 21:54Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 21:55Tony Robbins?

  And we all think we're men when we're twenty, right? But you become a man basically in your forties and fifties, in my experience, most people, because you've lived enough life and you find, if you're growing, you see the patterns you've not seen before.

• 22:08Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 22:08Tony Robbins?

  And it frees you.

• 22:09Lewis Howes?

  Speaking of life, we're here in this amazing home again. A friend of yours who's built one of the biggest builders in the world. We're here in Bel Air, but you grew up a few miles from here in North Hollywood, or at least I think you were born there, in North Hollywood area.

• 22:21Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, more the San Gabriel Valley. Yeah. La Dora Zouzou, where the small is.

• 22:24Lewis Howes?

  But a few miles from here, you were raised or you were, you know, close by in California. And, you know, a lot of people have heard your story. You've said it many times, that your mom was abusive in certain ways, although she loved you a lot, but she was abusive and you had, you know.

• 22:38Tony Robbins?

  She used alcohol and prescription drugs.

• 22:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:40Tony Robbins?

  When that happened, she was a different human being.

• 22:42Lewis Howes?

  Exactly.

• 22:42Tony Robbins?

  Unfortunately, but she made me a practical psychologist.

• 22:45Lewis Howes?

  Exactly.

• 22:45Tony Robbins?

  I had to learn to manage her emotions.

• 22:47Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 22:47Tony Robbins?

  So I got a younger brother, five years younger, younger sister, seven years younger, so. She was the most important influence in my life and loved me to death and had quirks, but we all have quirks.

• 22:57Lewis Howes?

  Exactly.

• 22:57Tony Robbins?

  And it gave me a gift.

• 22:58Lewis Howes?

  Hundred percent. And you also had, you know, a father that left your mom and that

• 23:02Tony Robbins?

  Four fathers, yeah.

• 23:03Lewis Howes?

  Four different fathers left your mom, but you spoke about the word identity a moment ago. And when you're, you had a father that adopted you, I think at twelve. Is that correct?

• 23:14Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 23:14Lewis Howes?

  So you originally had a different last name. You essentially had a different identity until twelve, when you took on a new identity with a last name.

• 23:22Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 23:23Lewis Howes?

  I don't think I've ever heard you talk about this moment

• 23:26Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, no one's really asked me about it.

• 23:27Lewis Howes?

  in terms of taking on the identity of a new person's name. How did that shape you from, for twelve years of your life, you're a different man's name? Then you take on Robbins.

• 23:38Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 23:38Lewis Howes?

  What did that identity shift do internally for you? Did it give you a different certainty or confidence in life? Because this father figure was more empowering for you than the previous ones? Did something shift and say, I'm gonna go create something in myself now that I take on this name? I've never heard you talk about this. I'm curious about it.

• 23:56Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, um, it's interesting. Yeah, you're right. It was 12. I was in the seventh grade. It was my fourth father, Jim Robbins, name I carry. He adopted me. I loved him to death because he was an athlete, you know, semi-pro baseball player. And I'd done that. And so, you know, when I was a kid, I really wanted to play sports, but we had no money. So, I, you know, couldn't go play Little League or Warner Football, things of that nature. I just couldn't afford it. And so he convinced my mom that, and my mom didn't want me to get hurt. I was always the smallest guy, believe it or not. I mean, you know, I was five one in high school, you know, it's like my sophomore year and then boom, six, seven. But the, the process he brought was, I think, more, I connected him through moxie. Like, I think I always had in me.

• 24:41Tony Robbins?

  He had the moxie. He had moxie and I had moxie, but like through sports is how our relationship created. Like he started playing fast pitch softball and I would get up there and pitch to him. As hard as I could throw the ball for three hours till my arm was literally falling off me. And it was just like, or he hit me baseballs for two hours and I was in the beginning and I hadn't played, right? So it smacked me in the face and I'd be bleeding and he goes, keep on going, Tony, and I keep on going, right? And I was like, so part of it was my nature, but my nature got nurtured. Yes. Right? I got rewarded and rewarded was the form of love I had from him. So I think it wasn't, it wasn't the name as much as the relationship, but the name was, um, uh, my name was Maharavik. Your last name was Maharavik?

• 25:26Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, M A H A R A O V. I, I used to hate when I go into school because they'd say, no one could pronounce my name. So now I'm Robbins. It was easier. There's some value in that, but I think some bigger piece was, it was more than that. It was more like, okay, this is my father. My natural father is a really good man. Looking at my life now, 66, looking back, I can see what a good man he was. But he worked underground parking lots here before we had automatic parking. So that's all he did all day long for 40 years. And he was an alcoholic, but not a mean one, is a nice one. Uh, but my mom framed me on who he was. Yes, she told a story. And I believe the story. And so that's, yeah, interesting. And the story is, he's weak, he's worthless, he's all these things. I don't want to be those things. Right.

• 26:10Tony Robbins?

  Because, and then the second husband she had, she left him for the same reason. And then the third, and somehow the fourth, and he's not weak. So they fought like you can't even imagine. Interesting. Um, but, so the answer to your question, I think, is, um, I developed this identity that was based on I'm gonna be an athlete and I developed a plan. I'm a plan guy, right?

• 26:31Lewis Howes?

  Strategy, you had a strategy.

• 26:33Tony Robbins?

  That's right. I mean, I remember we had no money. I'd like save up all my money, work as a janitor so I could go to Dodger Stadium and bleed Dodger blue in the right field, bleachers way at the top, you know? But twice in a year would be a big deal. I own them. You own a piece of them.

• 26:46Lewis Howes?

  That's a, that's a dream come true. That's amazing.

• 26:49Tony Robbins?

  Pretty cool. Small amount, I own them, but still own them, right?

• 26:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 26:51Tony Robbins?

  And so, anyway, just at the World Series with Peter Guber is the primary owner, my dear friend. And we were there for the seventh game. I witnessed that. It was just such a, such a journey. But, but my, my plan was simple. It's like, here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm a shortstop and a pitcher. I'm gonna crush it, you know, in junior high school here. I'm gonna go to my high school. I'm gonna crush it there. I'm gonna get a scholarship to USC. Then we'll play in the minor leagues and then eventually the Dodger organization, I'm gonna bleed Dodger blue. I wanna be a Dodger baseball player, right? That was my whole plan. So here's what really changed my identity.

• 27:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 27:23Tony Robbins?

  I'm Robbins. That didn't help. I've got, I've got a good mind. So I was like the best science student. So the science teacher was the coach of the baseball team. And I was a little bit of his favorite student.

• 27:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 27:34Tony Robbins?

  Cause I could absorb it. I always wanted to make things work and figure it out. And so he loved about me. So I make the first cut, I make the second cut. And then I know at that time I had hair down, well, my, it was a style back there.

• 27:45Lewis Howes?

  California guy, you know.

• 27:46Tony Robbins?

  California guy, your hair was down here. And he was a straight laced guy and you didn't have it. So my mom cut all my hair off.

• 27:52Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man.

• 27:53Tony Robbins?

  And I show up and I got cut from the junior high school team on the last day. And I'm like, my brain was like, what? If I don't make the junior high school team, how the hell am I gonna make the high school team? How am I gonna do at USC? I mean, the whole thing just exploded in front of me. So something inside of me has always been, there's a way, right? You know? And so I was like, what do I want? What am I gonna do with my life? You know, cause there was no safety net in my family, right? There was no economic safety net. No one's gonna send me to school. And I was like, okay, what do I want? What do I love about? Baseball, whatever, sports, I love the energy, I love the passion. Same thing is making you wanna go to the Olympics, right? I wanna, I wanna go in there, in the game, but I want the, the energy that we generate, how it lifts people, how the crowd becomes one. So, okay, well, how can I do that?

• 28:36Tony Robbins?

  Well, I'll be, I'm smart, I'll become a sportscaster, I'll be a sportswriter. So I took, in the seventh grade, I took up typing and I was the only kid, only boy in a shorthand class, so I could take notes really rapidly. And, and then I was in a program, it was called mentally gifted minders, like, test my IQ is pretty high. So they gave you a free, you know, hour in the day, that you could do whatever you want. You could design whatever it was, and then they'd score you based on what they thought you did with your time. And so, I started reading every book about every different athlete, and I'm learning to type, so I thought, I'm gonna interview, I'm gonna interview the Dodgers. So, in those days, we had mimeograph, I don't know if you even know what that is, this stuff. And I typed this stuff on mimeograph, and I had these questions, and I sent them to

• 29:18Tony Robbins?

  Dodgers, and they didn't respond, I sent them again, and I called in, and I just kept pushing. And one day, I got this envelope with answers from Ron Say, who was with third baseman, right? And then Steve Garvey is still around, and some other players. And then the next thing I know, I decided, I gotta get live interviews. And I wanna work for a newspaper. I'm fourteen.

• 29:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 29:40Tony Robbins?

  So.

• 29:40Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 29:41Tony Robbins?

  One day, I'm in my little open class, and I'm in, I'm reading the newspaper at sports parks, see what's going on, and I see an ad that says Howard Cosell, who was the biggest sportscaster in the world at that time. Like, he was the guy that did the Super Bowl, he and Muhammad Ali had this taunting relationship. He, he was a huge personality. He'd written a book, and it was by Simon and Schuster, who later published my books, and he was gonna be over here in West Hall, or, excuse me, in the west side, here of LA, uh, at, uh, Robinson's.

• 30:09Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 30:10Tony Robbins?

  And he's gonna sign books for people that bought them. So I called my mom, who never left the house, was always there, and I said, "Mom, I never ask you for anything, but I've got a private interview with Howard Cosell."

• 30:20Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 30:21Tony Robbins?

  And I did not have a private interview.

• 30:22Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, but you told her you did, yeah, yeah.

• 30:23Tony Robbins?

  I said, "I need you to come get me out of school, drive down there, and get me down there." And I, I was so, I don't know what it was, somehow I got through to her, and she did it. They had tape recorders, then there were cassette players, but they were this size with a separate microphone. So, and I printed out these business cards that said, Tony Robbins, future sports caster. Currently limited brief taped interviews sponsored by the MGM program. So I had a little business card. That's cool. I'm fourteen. Yeah, fourteen. Wow. And so she drives me down. It's about a two hour drive to get here. And she's like, this interview better go well. It'll go well. And I go up and I'm watching. He's on this little dais and these people are standing in line and, you know, getting a book signed.

• 31:03Tony Robbins?

  And this older woman walks up to him and had not bought a book with a napkin and said, did you please sign? He goes, I only sign books, ma'am. And then I'm like, oh my God, I'm having an interview with this guy. And then all of a sudden, he's starting to finish up and the guys, these publicists are, you know, ushering him out of the room. And we're starting, all of a sudden, he's getting surrounded by, there were like cameras everywhere and all these, you know, these sports people. And sports writers, they're like, tell me about this. And what about the World Series? And what about this? And my mom, the league and the Super Bowl. He's answering and so I finally pushed through the crowd. I'm this little guy. I got this little green Levi jacket on and jeans. And I got my microphone and I had on my card and I say, sir, sir, I'd like to interview you. I'm interested in becoming a sports caster. I want to know what makes the difference there and everything else.

• 31:45Tony Robbins?

  He said, you want to what? So he looks at my card and he looks around the audience and he saw the moment and he used it and he said, young man, I'll give you an interview. He goes, you people wait. So we're standing by the towels and like that. And he puts his leg up and he goes, tell me your questions. So I take it, my hands shaking like that. And I'm going, and my mom, I'm thinking, thank God I got this interview. And so I asked him, what does it take to be a sports guest? And he says, well, I'll tell you, Tony. He goes, it's not being an athlete. They know nothing about the English language. And he went through this tirade about athletes become sports writers, but people like you who are educated, going for it. So he does this whole thing. So I get about five questions in and the time was just guys like, I'm gonna get him out of the room. Yeah.

• 32:28Tony Robbins?

  And everybody's taking pictures. The LA Times is there, everything else. And he says, he goes, I think I gotta go, Tony. And I said, well, could I ask you one final question? He said, sure. At that time, there was a radio guy here in LA who used to, the day after Monday Night Football, he would take all the flubs of Cosell and play them. And he was a super popular, his name was Jim Healy. Most popular radio guy at the time, sports guy. I said, you ever wish the morning after Monday Night Football, that Jim Healy would wake up with laryngitis? And the crowd goes, oh. And the whole time he's been calling me Tony, right? He goes, I'm sorry, son, but I've never heard of Jim Healy.

• 33:05Lewis Howes?

  Oh, wow.

• 33:06Tony Robbins?

  Everybody clapped and cheered. So the next day, the LA Times wrote an article about this kid. Talked about how the woman couldn't get an autograph, but this kid got this interview, right? Well, my local newspaper, my local town saw this and said, would you write an article? So I wrote a 20-page, single-spaced sports article, which they trimmed down. And then I started interviews with Woody Hayes and Joe Namath and all these people at 14 years old. And so that was going to be my target. And then what changed it all was my mom felt like I got KCTV Channel 11 here, it's a Fox station, it wasn't then. They had tried everything to get ratings. They tried Fanny Fox, the stripper, to be the sportscaster. They tried all these things. And then they saw me do these interviews and get interviews that people no one else did.

• 33:50Tony Robbins?

  Like right before the Rose Bowl, I get Woody Hayes and Ohio State.

• 33:54Lewis Howes?

  Ohio State. I'm from Ohio. That's my guy.

• 33:56Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, and a roomful of reporters and I pulled it off and got it.

• 34:00Lewis Howes?

  Really? You interviewed Woody Hayes?

• 34:01Tony Robbins?

  Yes, yeah. And I wrote this article about the real Woody Hayes, because, you know, he was, he smacked a player.

• 34:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 34:06Tony Robbins?

  He had all this controversy about him. Anyway, we wrote these articles and they turned around and they said, he should be our sportscaster. So at almost 16, 15 and a half, I got offered the job to be the sportscaster at KTV. And my mom said, your ego's too big. And all this stops now. And she took away it all. I started working for a daily newspaper. She took it away. She said, you're going to come home every day and you're just going to work. You're going to clean the house. You're going to do the things. It was brutal.

• 34:36Lewis Howes?

  What did that do to you psychologically or mentally?

• 34:39Tony Robbins?

  At the time, I hated her. I thought it was the worst thing on earth. The gift it is, is like every day of my life, I have people tell me, you know, you're the greatest that ever exists. I love you. You changed my life. But I never lost perspective that's all, that I'm just a guy. It was probably God's way of making sure that I'd be prepared for the future or the universe's way, whatever you want to call it. Uh, my mom was a great vehicle for it. But what changed my life and why I'm here today is because, so now I'm in class. And I have, take up a speech class. I'm a sophomore in high school, I'm just turning sixteen. And I'm mouthy. I don't, like, I didn't care about, I never, I never used drugs and alcohol because it was abused in my family, right? So the cool kids, I told them, you know, read between the lines. Yeah.

• 35:21Tony Robbins?

  And so I don't give a damn, I don't know who you are, who you think you are, but I'm little, it's like, and I'm attracted to beautiful women. So I'm in my speech class and my journalism class and I'm already writing for the daily newspaper, so they bring me in even though I'm a sophomore. And the head nose guard is this girl named Nancy Coleman, she's the head song leader, and I can make her laugh and I'm getting her attention. And he gets mad and so he comes up to me and says, you know, I'm gonna destroy you. And so he pours chocolate milk all down my head and then he and five of the guys chase me. And I was not very fast, I got the beat out of me, but I get back up and go, screw you, you know, I was just willful. So one day, after a speech class, Mr. Cobb, this straight-laced, right-wing kind of teacher, says,

• 36:07Tony Robbins?

  "Robbins, I'll see you after class." And I go, oh, you know, because I was always, I was making fun and teasing things and stirring the class up. So I see him after class and he said, "You know why I'm here to talk to you?" And I said, "Yeah, I think I understand why. I'm sorry." And he goes, "What are you sorry about?" And I said, "Well, I know..." He goes, "No, I want to talk to you because I've never seen a student in my thirty years who can stand in front of all these other kids and mesmerize and hold their attention for thirty or forty-five minutes and influence them." He said, "You have a gift." And I'm looking at him like he's crazy. He goes, "You don't understand, you have a gift." He says, "There's something about how much you care and something about your intensity, something about your style."

• 36:49Tony Robbins?

  And he goes, "Mr. Robbins, I've done some homework on you because I'm fascinated by you and I know more about your home life than you think I do." Because I was in really bad shape, my fourth father had left, my mom kicked him out, you know, I'm going through a rough time. And he said, uh... I have a speech here that I'd like you to read. And if it appeals to you, he said, I think this is your life. And he said, I want you to memorize it and I want you to compete and persuade the oratory. You still have to be a junior to do that. I'm like, well, I'm not a junior. He goes, I don't care. I'll get you in.

• 37:19Lewis Howes?

  How long was the speech?

• 37:21Tony Robbins?

  Um, 20 minutes, 25 minutes.

• 37:23Lewis Howes?

  Oh, wow. Man.

• 37:24Tony Robbins?

  I read this story. The title was The Will to Win. And it was my life. It was like, I could cry just thinking about it. It was so intense. I mean, reading it and crying, just going, I'm only here still, all that I've been through because of my pure will that I will not give up. And I took that speech and I read it and owned it. And I got up and I went first place, first place, first place, four in a row. And then I've gotten to bait. And then that led me in a different direction. And then I ran for student president. I wasn't the most popular kid, but I went around and did actual speeches about what I do. And I go find out if it could really be done. And I shot people straight. And I beat the most popular girl in school and became the president. And that made me believe, this is the identity, long answer.

• 38:08Tony Robbins?

  That if you really are sincere and you're really real and you really give and you tell the truth, that it doesn't matter whether you're popular or not, you can write your own ticket. You can make this world the way you want it to be. That influenced me more than the name Robbins by far.

• 38:22Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 38:24Tony Robbins?

  It's part of the journey, though. It's having all your plans be messed up. You know, it's like, what can I say? If you want to make God laugh, go on with your plans, right? You know, so.

• 38:30Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 38:31Tony Robbins?

  It was a larger plan.

• 38:33Lewis Howes?

  Two things that are interesting to me is you had your natural father.

• 38:36Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 38:37Lewis Howes?

  And then you had your adopted father.

• 38:39Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 38:40Lewis Howes?

  And you had these different influences, teachers that saw something in you throughout the journey.

• 38:44Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 38:46Lewis Howes?

  I guess what was the, the story, if you can look back now? Since you have a different interpretation of the story now.

• 38:52Tony Robbins?

  Yep.

• 38:53Lewis Howes?

  What is the story of the lesson your natural father taught you versus your adopted father, who you took on, the Robbins name taught you?

• 39:01Tony Robbins?

  I think what I've learned today is I judged my natural father and didn't want to be him. I wanted to be anything but him because I wanted my mother's love. I was closer to my mother because my father was, my mom was alcoholic too, but she was more there. He was more of a quiet, by himself kind of guy. And I realized that as much as I love my mom. Her interpretations are allowed to become mine and I won't let that ever happen again in my life. Interesting. Um, cause it affected and I've, I've actually, you know, it sounds corny, but I've actually had prayers and so forth of, to my natural father saying, you know, I'm sorry, I love you, please forgive me for the judgment I had. At the same time, I'm proud that Jim Robbins, I think he and I, our natures were more aligned.

• 39:46Tony Robbins?

  Yes. And so he fanned the flames of my true nature and my grit and my capacity to push to anything, which has been a part of my entire life. Um, was, was expanded by that. And then it got tested because he got kicked out by my mom. My mom chased me out with a knife. I knew she wasn't gonna kill me, but I wasn't going back in that house. And I was working as a janitor in San Marino, California, where some of the fires were Pasadena area. And I, I, I realized if I, I could be paid not by the hour, but by the result. If I cleaned two banks, I could do it in the same amount of time in the middle of the night going to high school. So I had to take buses there because my mom kept my 1960 Volkswagen. I'd learned it 40 bucks a week. So I would take all the buses all the way there. It'd take me about 90 minutes because you had to switch buses and all that.

• 40:30Tony Robbins?

  And then I'd finish about two in the morning, clean two banks thoroughly. But I was the guy that left notes for people and left candy canes for Christmas as a janitor. I was just still a people person. Yeah. And I came out one day, it was two o'clock in the morning and that's the other day that changed my life. I'll never forget, I'm standing by the thing and I'm standing waiting for the bus, waiting for the bus. I mean, I gotta get home and get some sleep, two or three hours and I get it and go to school. And finally no bus like after 20 minutes and I'm like, that's really late. And I'm standing by the bus stop and this car comes cruising up. It's the middle of the night. The guy rolls his window and goes, hey buddy, didn't you see there's a bus strike? So. You'd be sitting there all night. I'm 16, 17 miles from home. I have no one I can call. I have no net, no money, I have nothing of that nature. There's no Ubers, right? I didn't have the money for an Uber anyway in those days. I'm like, what the hell am I gonna do?

• 41:15Tony Robbins?

  And then there was such anger in me about my mom kicking out and everything else. I started with anger and I'm like, F this, I'm gonna run the whole way. Now I never even run three miles in my life and it was 16 miles. I, I actually drove it one day. I think it was seven, almost 17 miles. But the last mile I walked is I've got shin splits. It was so bad. And, um, but so from two in the morning till like four, whatever it was, I ran, but the while I ran, I did incantations. Not affirmations, because I, I remember when I first got kicked out. I realized I need to feed my mind. And so I took a little bit of my money I had and got on the bus and I went up to this spiritual bookstore. It was like 20 minutes from my home by bus.

• 41:57Tony Robbins?

  And I, I was up, a book's gonna guide you. There's a book that's gonna be here. And I got uh, Magic of Believing by Claude M. Bristol. And in the book, he talked about your beliefs control everything. And the way to condition them is through not just affirmations, but uh, what I became called incantations. He still called them affirmations, but he taught, the difference was saying, I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy. And your brain goes, I'm not happy versus I am ripping this open where your body, your voice, your mind all engaged with enough repetition. And whatever you attach to words I am to, with enough consistency, enough emotion, you become, it will hypnotize you into it. So I started out with every day and every way I'm getting stronger and stronger.

• 42:39Tony Robbins?

  And then I go every day and every, I'm stronger, every day and every, I'm stronger and stronger. And then I got burnt out of that one. So then it's like healthy and healthier and more and more happy. I did that the whole way. To this day, that energy lives in me. It's like, it's an energy of like pure effing will that you tell me can't be, I'll run through the effing building. You will not stop me if what I'm doing is for a greater good, right? But I left from the anger part, in the middle of it, the anger disappeared. And I didn't need that because anger fuel will run out. And I got into the excitement of becoming more.

• 43:12Lewis Howes?

  Let's go.

• 43:13Tony Robbins?

  Right? And it's like, this is, this is my juice.

• 43:16Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 43:16Tony Robbins?

  Right? It's always, I tell people, there's like two types of motivation. There's willpower. There's what I call push. And I got a lot of that. I know you do too, my friend, right?

• 43:24Lewis Howes?

  That drive.

• 43:24Tony Robbins?

  Yeah, drive, that push. That push is invaluable, but there's a limit to willpower. You don't know how much you and I both have.

• 43:30Lewis Howes?

  Burnout. Yeah, yeah.

• 43:31Tony Robbins?

  But pull motivation is very different. Pull is there's something so magnificent, you want to serve more than yourself. You want to create, you want to make it happen, then it pulls you through those times. And pull is way more powerful than push and pull does not wear out. And so I discovered pull on that trip. And I also discovered this part of me. So I always tell people, it's like, this Tony Robbins guy, I created him. He's always me, but I shaped and created this MFO, right? I like, I decided who I'm here to be now, and I created it through incantations. Again, not affirmations, but saying it, feeling it, visioning it with such intensity for hours and hours. And I didn't stop after that. I got, I go on runs and I do this over and over again. I, I did it with abundance because I grew up with no money, no opportunity.

• 44:15Tony Robbins?

  There's no money in my family. There's no money for food. That's why I fed a billion people. Now it's 62 billion. I don't know if you know, I'm a hundred billion meal thing. I'm done 62 billion meals. So it's insane what I've been able to do. But it started with me being able to get inside that head of mine and just create absolute certainty and train it into myself until I built an identity. This is who I am. And your identity is the strongest force you have. The strongest force in any personality is to stay consistent with your identity. If you think, you know, you're a loser, you find a way to lose. If you're Lance Armstrong and you say your core belief, your identity, not just your belief is I am a guy that finds the way to victory. When he was told he had cancer in his brain, his lungs and his testicles, which is inconvenient when you ride a bike. Yeah.

• 45:01Tony Robbins?

  Right? Instead of saying it's over, he said, I will find the way and created Lip Strong and he survived. Unfortunately, it also was why he used drugs to win. He used every way. Yeah, every legal ways too. Yeah. The same way. I will do whatever it takes. Whatever it takes. So, identity is the force that controls you. And when you enhance your identity, you enhance your whole life. Otherwise, it's like a thermostat. You set it at 68 degrees. If the temperature drops to 65, you're okay. But there's a place, maybe 60 degrees, where all of a sudden the brain goes that, hey, you're supposed to be at 68 degrees. And the heaters kick on and you gotta make it better. You've been there. It's not good enough. But what people don't realize is if you're, think you're at 68 degrees, that's your, you know, comfort zone. That's what you've, it's not your goal, but it's what you're used to.

• 45:45Tony Robbins?

  And you get to 70, 78, 80, 88, 90 degrees, all of a sudden in the middle of the night, your brain goes, what the hell are you doing up here? You're not a 60, you're not a 90 degree or a 68 degree. And you lose your drive, right? The heaters stop. And if that's enough, the air conditioners come down and bring you back to where you are. So all of my work is change identity. If I came to you and said, you don't smoke cigarettes, correct?

• 46:06Lewis Howes?

  Never been.

• 46:06Tony Robbins?

  If I said to you, you know, um, would you like a cigarette?

• 46:10Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 46:10Tony Robbins?

  You wouldn't say, what brand is it?

• 46:12Lewis Howes?

  No, no, no, no.

• 46:13Tony Robbins?

  Because you go, I'm not one of those. I'm not a smoker. That's different. That's an identity belief. Identity beliefs are the controlling force of your life.

• 46:21Lewis Howes?

  Yes. But if you've never tasted abundance, again, you didn't taste abundance. You were living in scarcity emotionally. You know, probably maybe spiritually, financially, all these different things. You didn't have the resources. If you don't have a taste of abundance, you weren't living in this hundred sixty five million dollar home. You weren't even coming here and visiting it. But if you can't taste it, how do you make your identity shift to become that abundance?

• 46:46Tony Robbins?

  Proximity is power.

• 46:47Lewis Howes?

  Yes, it is.

• 46:47Tony Robbins?

  You have to get yourself in the environment. When I was in the banks, I would, one of the things I would do every night is I'd go to the CEO's office, which I had to clean up and everything else, but I read all those documents, which is totally inappropriate. But I want to know how he thought, what he was doing was going on. And when I was there, he had pictures on the wall. And you know, he had this boat and he had different things. There was like, wow, that's, that's an interesting life. That's an interesting way of being. And then gradually I got the chance to be around people where I got to coach some people that were just unbelievably successful in terms of movies, business, life. And they're much older than me, twenty five, thirty years older than me. And they're like, man, you helped me with this thing. I don't know what you're doing. You're just a kid, but I wasn't stupid enough to thought like you go, I'm helping him.

• 47:29Tony Robbins?

  It was like, let me suck out of their brain, everything I can. But I got in proximity. That's the first piece. And I saw.

• 47:35Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 47:35Tony Robbins?

  But that's not enough. You can get in proximity and go, I'll never have this.

• 47:39Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 47:39Tony Robbins?

  Right?

• 47:40Lewis Howes?

  And be defeated.

• 47:41Tony Robbins?

  And be defeated. Yeah. The, the thing that saved me was when I worked for Jim Rohn and I'm just seventeen, eighteen years old and I'm learning basic philosophy. For things to change, you gotta change. Things get better, you gotta get better. But it's all still foundational. I went to one day, cause I got a chance. I'd done so well for him that I got a chance to have a lunch with him and some other people. So I had access to him. And I said, you know, Mr. Rohn, I said, I'd love if you could help me with something. I said, I have had forefathers. They were all good men and.

• 48:11Tony Robbins?

  All of them, at times, we had no money. We had no money for food at times. And I said, um, I don't understand how that can be when someone's a good person. Hmm. They lost their jobs. And I don't understand how a school teacher back then, it was like thirty five thousand dollars a year, making thirty five grand a year. And this hedge fund guy over here is making a billion dollars in one year. I said, that is so unjust. And can you tell me why? And he was so awesome. And the advice he gave changed my whole life. He looked at me and he said, Tony, you are right. We are all equal as souls on this planet. But we're not equal in the marketplace. Interesting. I said, what does that mean? He said, let me ask you a question. Is it possible for someone to make twice as much money in the same amount of time as someone else?

• 48:54Tony Robbins?

  I said, yeah. Five times, ten times, a hundred times? Yeah. I said, how? He said, that person who goes to McDonald's and they make that minimum wage and they he said, that is not supposed to be a career. It's an opening job and the reason is you're not adding much value. Anyone can learn to do a job in an hour. Today, they they use machines, right? There's more and more robots are coming for it now. He goes, that school teacher, he said, that school teacher was not willing to bet on themselves. They wanted security. Hmm. And how many of them were great? I said, a lot of great teachers. He goes, name them. So I thought of Mr. Cobb. I thought of like three of my teachers. He goes, how many teachers have you had? Yeah. And he goes, and how many people did they help?

• 49:39Tony Robbins?

  They work with how many people? He said, so they had a limited added value. And some of them didn't get better. Right? Some of them just went there for their pension. At the minimum, they wanted security. He goes, that guy who made a billion dollars? He had a thirty eight percent return last year. The money he has comes from people's futures. It's for their retirements, it's retirement funds. It's funds for people's college educations. It's for the, he goes, he made forty eight billion dollars last year for his clients. He's worth a billion. Wow. He goes, so Tony, here's what I want you to remember the rest of your life. You need to become more valuable. Not valuable, what you think is valuable, what serves those out there?

• 50:20Tony Robbins?

  And you gotta give what people need. He says, you need to find a way to add more value to people than anybody else in the marketplace. If you become more valuable, we're gonna add more value, not the value you wanna give, the value they need. He said, you will never have to worry about money for the rest of your life. And I've never forgotten it, and you know, I've got one hundred and twenty-one companies now. We just got over twelve billion dollars in business, and I've got in all these different industries, it's radically different industries. And what's the common denominator having them? Every single one, I get great leaders and I create a culture where everybody understands we're here to do more than the customer could possibly imagine. And that creates raving fans, because satisfied customers go away, raving fans stay.

• 51:01Tony Robbins?

  And so people come to my seminar, they're raving fans, they're not, you don't come to seminar and go, that was good, or you don't like that. People go, I changed my whole life, right?

• 51:08Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 51:08Tony Robbins?

  That's, and I've been doing that for, you know, for my forty-ninth year.

• 51:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I, I think Stanford actually did a study about Date with Destiny, I believe, a few years ago, that they studied all, a lot of people that came in who had depressive thoughts, a depressive mood and depressive energy. And I think it was within ninety days, or sixty or ninety days afterwards, they didn't have the depressive thinking anymore.

• 51:29Tony Robbins?

  It was actually during the, the, the COVID situation, during the shutdowns. They came to me because two of their professors came to my Date with Destiny, the six-day seminar. And what's interesting is they both were clinically depressed, and they came back and got rid of their medication and had no symptoms. And they said, this is impossible. They said, do you have data on this? I said, well, yeah, I got millions of graduates. I said, no, no, like scientific data. I said, no, it's not my focus.

• 51:54Lewis Howes?

  Come do the data for me.

• 51:55Tony Robbins?

  But that's what I said. I said, you wanna do a study? And they said, yeah, about what? They said, depression, because during that time, depression went through the roof. And as a result, suicides went through the roof, overdoses went through the roof. And I said, okay, if we're gonna do this study, help me understand, what did the meta-studies say right now on various treatments? What's, what's out there? And they said, and this blew my mind, sixty percent of the people that are depressed who seek improvement through psychiatric or psychological tools, so drugs or therapy or both, sixty percent make zero improvement.

• 52:25Tony Robbins?

  Forty percent improved and the average improvement across all the meta-studies is fifty percent. So it means they're half as depressed as they were. Some, some people got well, but very few, most of them stay on drugs forever, right?

• 52:35Lewis Howes?

  It was probably because of lifestyle changes or relationships or other things.

• 52:38Tony Robbins?

  That's right. And so now they don't grow, they're just numb, right?

• 52:41Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 52:41Tony Robbins?

  So I said, okay, that, I said, you should be able to get that result with a placebo.

• 52:46Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 52:47Tony Robbins?

  And, and he kind of got nervous, gave us a nervous laugh. He goes, yeah, maybe. I said, we, we will destroy that number. I said, but tell me another thing. I said, what is the best result you've ever seen? What's the best study, single study? And it was done almost now nine years ago at Johns Hopkins and they gave people psilocybin, magic mushroom for thirty days and cognitive therapy. So I said, you did that much to their biochemistry.

• 53:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:13Tony Robbins?

  You had to make some major changes and they did. It was the most successful study in the history of psychiatry up until that point. At the end of six weeks after the treatment, they had fifty-seven percent of people had no symptoms. Unheard of, right? Unheard of. So I said, we'll beat that. And I said, I know that sounds like ego or hyperbole or exaggeration.

• 53:33Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 53:34Tony Robbins?

  But I said, I'm telling you this not because I'm so smart, but because we're going to change, your emotions come from the meaning. Is this the end of the beginning? Is this person, you know, disrespecting me? Is this person challenging me? Is this person loving me? Is this person coaching me? Whatever answer you give, it changes your emotion. And emotion is where depression comes from. So I said, we're going to change the meaning maker. I don't tell them what to do. They rewire that. I said, you will see radical changes and I guarantee it'll beat this, but let's see what's right.

• 54:02Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 54:02Tony Robbins?

  So they set up the study exactly like the study done at Johns Hopkins with the comparison group. And then they put this group of people in Date with Destiny and six weeks afterwards, ninety-three percent of the people who went to Date with Destiny had no symptoms whatsoever. Seven percent improved, but not to the point where there were no symptoms. They had some. But the best number was seventeen percent came in with suicidal ideation, constantly thinking about suicide, someone attempted it. And when they left, not a single person. And the best statistic of all is one year later, with no communication from me whatsoever in the whole year, the average person reduced their negative emotions over seventy-one percent and increased their positive emotions fifty-two percent and now they're still depressed.

• 54:43Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 54:44Tony Robbins?

  So now I just did one on engagement. Because in business, engagement equals EBITDA. And since COVID, engagement has dropped through the floor. You know, they measure engagement, disengagement, which is like quiet quitting where people try to do the minimum. And then active disengagement means they're doing the least they can and they're trying to hurt the company too. Right? The largest change in 50 years since COVID is huge drop in engagement. Huge jump in active disengagement, trying to hurt the company. Right? And so we just finished a study, 12 months. Um, I believe 1,500 people. So most studies are 35 people, right? Yeah. One year, not two, three months. And the numbers will be coming out in two months. So it'll be a medical. Wow.

• 55:25Tony Robbins?

  And you'll see it blows your mind is we made up for all the disengagement in six days. We got them back to where they were before COVID. But the best part is every month after that, an increase that I never spoke to them again. Because their meaning maker changed. Yes. Right? And then we did all this by changing their biochemistry, not through drugs. You know, you've been to an event. What they found is when, when people like, um, they've done this test on Tom Brady. They've done it on, um, the Tampa Bay, uh, Lightning who've won multiple times the NHL Hockey Championships. And what they found is they put a monitor on me. 70,000, $65,000 device. And at every break, they came and took my saliva to find, cause they can feel your, take your hormones out of that.

• 56:08Tony Robbins?

  And they took my blood and they're monitoring minute by minute, 12 hours a day on stage. And it's for three years. At the end of it, there was a pattern that's just so clear and they call it championship biochemistry. You'd be interested in this and what you're doing. What happens when Tom Brady is down in the fourth quarter by 10 points with four minutes, whatever to play. If you remember that game. Oh. And he comes back to win. How does he do it? Here's what he does. This happens in my body every time I get on stage. Testosterone surges. Now testosterone produces focus, power, intensity, and it enhances your memory massively. If I said to you where you were on nine 11. Yeah, I remember. Most people know where they were sitting, where they were. If I say, were you on eight 11?

• 56:50Tony Robbins?

  Because information without emotion is barely retained. But when you have testosterone, it drives. That's why a year later, they still had it. But normally with testosterone, you get the stress hormone cortisol. In Tom's case, my case, the Tampa Bay guys case, this championship biochemistry, the cortisol drops off the cliff. So all you have is power and focus. So you go, Tony, aren't you lucky? You have this. The best part is then they measured my audience. Then during COVID, they measured people in different parts of the world who in their homes, experiencing it digitally.

• 57:21Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 57:21Tony Robbins?

  And it looks like, you know, mirror neurons are right. You look at somebody, maybe they're paddling and if you're really connected, you kind of feel that unconsciously in your body. Well, it looks like mirror neurons. We look, it looks like music. What they all surge with me and their cortisol drops off the cliff. I go to the fire walk. They're in front of a fire of 2,000 degrees and they might feel some feeling, but the testosterone is so strong, the cortisol is so slow, so low, they storm across it. But more importantly, they retain it. So it's the biochemical changes that make it last. It's not just the insulin.

• 57:54Lewis Howes?

  I have two minutes, two, three minutes left, so I want to get through the final two questions quickly. If that's cool. I could hear you tell stories for as long as it takes, but I want to be, I want to be respectful because I know you got another interview here afterwards. Before I get to the final two questions, you've got a summit coming up very soon. This is going to be coming out here in a couple of days, but you have time to rise summit.com. January 29th through 31st. It's a free event. It's virtual and you're going to be giving them some incredible insights and strategies to help them rise in 2026 and beyond. Just what you're talking about with your six day in-person events or your UPW walking on the fire. This is going to be a taste of that virtually.

• 58:33Tony Robbins?

  Well, you know what I created? I created during COVID because during COVID, all the stadiums in the world, I was used to doing 15,000 people. They go, you can put 100 people in there. It's like,

• 58:42Lewis Howes?

  With masks 20 feet away. Yeah.

• 58:43Tony Robbins?

  So then I tried to move to Vegas. They shut down Vegas, moved to Texas. I tried to do movie theaters since they're like, you have 10 people in movie. They shut down the movie theaters. I built this studio, 50 foot high ceilings, 20 foot high LED screens, point six seven highest resolution in the world, 50 feet around me. And then I called the founder of Zoom, Eric Yan, who's a friend of mine. And I said, I can't just have a thousand people. I need 25,000. Anyway, we did the first one with like 400,000 people.

• 59:08Lewis Howes?

  It's amazing.

• 59:09Tony Robbins?

  And now I've done it for five straight years. We've had, last year we had 1.3 million people from every country in the world that attended. And I didn't just do two hours. I did, let's do three hours a day for three days in a row. And let's give them the best tools, figure out what they really want, change their energy, find what's stopping them, give them the strategies, show them what they're doing in their relationships in a compressed period. Like, imagine like going to a movie, but the movie's your life and you're actively creating instead of possibly, but it's that enjoyable. And so we've done it every year and we're gonna do it again this year. So there's, as you said, there's no charge for it whatsoever. It's not partially, it's totally free. If they go to timetorisesummit.com.

• 59:45Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 59:45Tony Robbins?

  Get yourself registered and you can do it from your home or you can do it in your office. Think about, there's some people you want to do it with because it's really fun. And by the end of those three days, instead of having a new year's resolution, which people have already violated.

• 59:57Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 59:58Tony Robbins?

  You'll actually have a plan and a strategy and have momentum and there's no charge for it.

• 1:00:01Lewis Howes?

  That's powerful. And I've been to many of your events. I've, I think this is the sixth time I've interviewed you in 13 years of this podcast.

• 1:00:08Tony Robbins?

  Really?

• 1:00:08Lewis Howes?

  Six times. And it'll be a 13 year anniversary that week of timetorisesummit.com, of me starting the podcast.

• 1:00:15Tony Robbins?

  Wow.

• 1:00:15Lewis Howes?

  And so every, thank you. Every time, it's every week for 13 years. I haven't missed a week.

• 1:00:20Tony Robbins?

  Wow, that's awesome.

• 1:00:21Lewis Howes?

  Not the smartest, but I'm consistent. You know, it's like I got, I got the will to win like you.

• 1:00:26Tony Robbins?

  Repetition is the mother of skill, baby.

• 1:00:28Lewis Howes?

  It's it.

• 1:00:28Tony Robbins?

  Right? As an athlete, you know that.

• 1:00:29Lewis Howes?

  That's it.

• 1:00:30Tony Robbins?

  People think they do something once is enough. It's the repetition to get you to master something.

• 1:00:33Lewis Howes?

  Exactly, exactly. So I have been around you, I've had you on the show six times now. I've been to many of your events. I've been in masterminds with you. I've been around you for uh, over, you know, a decade of this work that I've been into. But I met you originally, you don't remember, but I met you when I was 16 and I've told you this many times, but I met you the first time, I was 16 years old. I went to one of your big events that you used to do in an arena.

• 1:00:56Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:56Lewis Howes?

  Donald Trump was actually speaking there, Larry King Live, Pat's Summit, all these like all-stars were there. And um, you came up out of these stands into the audience and stood right next to me. You don't remember this moment, but I remembered it as one of those memorable moments in my life.

• 1:01:12Tony Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:12Lewis Howes?

  Where my state changed, just like Mr. Cobb for you.

• 1:01:16Tony Robbins?

  Yes.

• 1:01:17Lewis Howes?

  You didn't look at me, but I saw you looking around me and looking at everyone and the energy you brought in that moment is still with me 25 plus years later.

• 1:01:27Tony Robbins?

  That's beautiful.

• 1:01:27Lewis Howes?

  And if anyone watching or listening right now feels like they need a new step change in their life, a new breakthrough, they're stuck, they're feeling anxious, they're feeling overwhelmed, whatever it might be, I'm telling you.

• 1:01:40Tony Robbins?

  You're succeeding, you want to go to another level.

• 1:01:41Lewis Howes?

  And you want to go to another level, you have to go to this event, TonduriseSummit.com. I'm telling you, it is a game changer. And I know we got to.

• 1:01:47Tony Robbins?

  Thank you for those kind words.

• 1:01:48Lewis Howes?

  Of course, and I tell you every time, it was a massive moment for me as an inspiration and a mentor that, I didn't even know you were mentoring me, but you were mentoring me back then, and I hope everyone gets that experience with you through this event or one of your events in the future in person. My final question, because they're telling me to wrap it up now. I asked you before your definition of greatness many times. I'm going to read one of them for you, and then I'm going to have you adjust it. You said this the first time I had you on 12 years ago.

• 1:02:19Tony Robbins?

  Wow.

• 1:02:20Lewis Howes?

  2014.

• 1:02:21Tony Robbins?

  I can't believe I've done this many times.

• 1:02:22Lewis Howes?

  This many times. You said back then, you said greatness is somebody who just will not settle and finds a way to do, be, share, and create in life what they want as opposed to fitting in. I'm curious if your definition of greatness has changed now almost over a decade later, or if there was one message that you wish you could yell, scream, or say loud enough that people would truly hear, that if this was the only message that you could share and you're just like, God, I don't want to regret not saying this enough. What is that message you want everyone to know?

• 1:02:56Tony Robbins?

  There's so many, but I think at its core, people don't understand that life is a journey and it's a story and it has predictable elements. And that the greatest story, if you study mythology and religion around the world, the greatest story of all is always the hero's journey. And it's that step I mentioned earlier that we're being called. To an adventure. It doesn't feel like a call. It feels like your life's ending. It feels like your house burned down. It feels like you're something you value is gone. Your house, you lost your finance, you lost your job. But if you try to refuse the call, it's still gonna take. It's like Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz. The tornado is gonna take you anyway. So why not go proactively into it?

• 1:03:36Tony Robbins?

  And what you'll end up doing is you'll enter a different world and you'll meet different friends and you'll have new mentors and then you'll go through ordeals and do battles. But eventually, if you keep going, you'll slay the dragon. And you will become something more than you ever were before. And then you get to come home as the hero in your own heart and your own soul, not an ego hero, hero who knows they've conquered things. And you have something to give. And so I think maybe the subset, the simple thought of that is, is that everything happens for a reason. There's a higher purpose in everything, but it's your job and my job to find it. It's like I believe in my soul that life is always happening for us, not to us, even though it looks like it's happening to us. Like COVID, for example. COVID looked like I can't do my work anymore.

• 1:04:19Tony Robbins?

  And then my seminars went from ten or fifteen thousand people to a million people. It was like all over the earth and, you know, one hundred and ninety-three countries simultaneously, right? It's like, but I had to find that. It was my job to find that. So and if you trust in that, if you can have that core belief that, it's like almost anybody's listening. And I ask you too, have you had some time in your life where something happened that was so painful, difficult, frustrating, whatever? It it felt like it wiped you out and you'd never want to go through it again. But then you get five years later, ten years later, you look back and go, I see the universe of God's perfection. That that made me so much stronger. That made me have more courage. That made me care more, right? In my life, I've never not found one of those. Now, it's sometimes hard in the moment to find it.

• 1:05:03Tony Robbins?

  But I think that's the most important thing. I say, the second thing I'd say is most people live a life where they talk about being stressed all the time. There's only one reason you're stressed. You're managing your circumstances instead of creating your life. Like, we were not made to manage circumstances. We were created by something called a God, called the universe, whatever your preference is, but no question, something created us. And we're given the ability to create. This house is a creation. Your life is a creation. Your two daughters are an amazing creation between you and your wife and the universe are God. I just think the more we're in a creation mode, there's zero fear in creation. There's fear when you're trying to manage or hang on to something, when you're trying to maintain, when you're just trying to make a living. It's like designing a life is a different way of living and it requires courage. Yes.

• 1:05:47Tony Robbins?

  It requires faith. But you know what? I tell people, not religious faith, just faith. You were born with faith. If you're gonna drive down a highway here and there's nothing but a little yellow line dividing you from people coming 65 miles an hour at you. And you know, every day in every city on earth, somebody falls asleep or is reading a text or is drunk and they come across and kill somebody in every city, every day, all over the earth. So how the hell do you drive down the street without fear? Because you use your faith. Cause without it, you'd have to do what they did in COVID, live in your house and not move and have no life. Yes. Right? And so courage does not mean you're not afraid. It means you're afraid, but you do it anyway. You can have courage if you can trust in a higher understanding that everything has higher purpose. And this isn't unfolding for me. Yes.

• 1:06:32Tony Robbins?

  And it's gonna lead to something greater and that takes faith. But I found if you live enough life over and over again with that faith and with the drive to find it, you'll find those answers. Hmm, Tony, thank you so much, man. Appreciate it. Great to see you. Amazing. Congratulations once again on your wife, on your two daughters. Thank you. And I'm gonna look to see you in 2028. You're gonna be at the Olympics. I'm coming. You remind me, I'll be there. Okay. You've got it. Thanks, man. Appreciate it, man.

• 1:06:53Lewis Howes?

  I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review. You on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that

• 1:07:33Lewis Howes?

  you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.