#AskGaryVee Episode 223: Eric Thomas, Motivation, Success & Public Speaking

– Hey Gary, hey ET,
it’s Byron Lazine. I appreciate you guys
taking the question. I’m about going into the gym
here, it’s 5:45 trying to get my hustle on.
– 5:45PM? – I sent my question to Gary
last week and I hope whoever is editing this will throw in
my YouTube channel here just obviously hustle a
little bit of exposure. You guys have been such
a big inspiration to me. ET, I found you a number of
years ago at the talk you did to that classroom. Inspired the crap out of me. I’ve watched it
over a hundred times. Gary, first time I saw you
was a keynote to RE/MAX. You ripped their faces off. And I’m going to be giving a
keynote actually or rather 18 minute talk at the
Tom Ferry Summit next week. This is the Super Bowl of all
real estate conferences. I’ve done two, three,
400 person talks but this is in front of 5000 people. What advice you have for me
stepping up into the big leagues and guys I’d also like to know
when your speaking career really launched, were you out pushing
that or did you let all those paid speaking
opportunities come to you? How do you grow and
paid speaking business? Thanks guys, be well. – Eric, let’s
answer it, go ahead. You go first. – Yeah, so first of all I want
to say this because you talked about that first speech. Again, Gary, I wasn’t
doing that for the world. It’s an accident
that video came out. I had no idea. – [Gary] Somebody was recording
it and put it on YouTube? – Actually a guy
recorded for his thesis. – [Gary] Yep.
– Never used it for his thesis. – [Gary] Okay. – The only reason he mic’d
me up was because of that. – [Gary] When was this? – This was 10 years ago. Actually, the anniversary to the
Guru story is this school year. So that’s when I did it. – And that was your break out?
– That was the break out. When we say break out
we mean to the world. I have two careers. The first one was
I had been doing this,– – 100%. – I had been doing this
for 10 years before that. – People are like,
“Oh, you broke out.” I was like, “Yeah, I
worked every day of my life. “I finally broke out.”
– Right, right. So I ended up breaking out
after 18 years, yeah broke out. – If you call breaking out like
punting anything that was happy and fun and easy and just
grinding my face off, yeah I broke out.
– Yeah. So for me that speech was to
about 40 or 50 kids from the inner city who were about to get
kicked out of Michigan State and I was going off. I was just going off because
they don’t have three chances like their parents, you know,
just got laid off from Ford, GM and Chrysler. We’re talking about when the
country hit the recession. These kids parents
had lost their jobs, GM, Ford, Chrysler
all crashing. This is their chance
to get a degree– – And they’re bullshittin’.
– So I’m going off. – Of course.
– Somebody happens to record it. – Especially ’cause, you know,
I’m going to use that as my answer which is when you tell
your truth it’s not scary to talk to one, it’s not
scary to talk to 50,000. You ask me right now to read
your email, right now, if you gave me a long email and said
read it, I’d be scared shitless. You know why? I’m bad at reading.
I don’t like reading. – Yeah. – It’s not what
comes natural to me. – It’s not jut me it’s Gary.
(group laughter) – I could go speak in front
of this whole city, this whole thing. Give me 80 million
people, I’m ready. Give me the mic, I’m going. I’m ready right now. You ask me to read in front of
this inner circle I’m like, uh, let’s get a drink guys.
– Yeah, yeah, yeah. – Nah, that’s stupid
let’s do business. It’s unbelievable. So to Brian, Byron?
– [Andy] Byron. – Byron, just go
speak your truth. The biggest mistake people make
and your by accident similar to me, I was a businessman just
going to a conference, I don’t know, the number one
reason people fail is ’cause they have to think.
– Yep. Yep. – And when you think because you
don’t know, ’cause you’re trying to fake it, you know what’s
easy for us and your’s is more extreme than mine but I have my
version of it, when you’re not at any plateau, when you’ve been
there nothing’s super scary. – Yep, yep. – What you’re
going to laugh at me? When kids made me drink pee
’cause I couldn’t speak English? Things aren’t scary.
– Right. – What is somebody
going to do to you? When you’re eating shit
out of the fucking corner? Who’s going to do what? Somebody’s gonna laugh
at you at a conference? They didn’t like
the way you cursed? That’s the silliest. I think the biggest thing
is to talk your truth Byron. Don’t try to act
bigger than you are. Everybody does that.
– Yeah. – Oh, now that I’m a big stage
let me make pretend or embellish that I built, sold a lot of
apartments or people embellish or fake it and
then you’re scared. You’re scared somebody’s
gonna call you out on it. You’re scared
somebody’s gonna come, you know what I’m pissed about? I had Tyler right now
I’m getting my report card right now sent to me. My report cards from high school
because somebody in the comment section of Facebook said, “Gary,
you aren’t that bad of a student “from high school.” Only ’cause I they like me and
they didn’t want to believe I was such a bad student.
– Right, right, right. – I’m like, “Oh, you think
so, let me go get them.” I just thinks it’s truth. – And I would say to him as
well, give them something, man. Too many people spend so
much time talking about their accomplishments and what they’ve
done, give them something, give them a tool or two that
they can literally take. I’m talking about as soon. Don’t, I listen to some of these
guys, no disrespect but it takes about 18 messages before you
actually say something to them. Right? So I’m saying, do me a favor
just give them one or two things that as soon as the conference
is over they can really take with them and actually use. – I’m super mad you said that
because you’re more right than what I was saying. It’s more important than
your truth even though this doesn’t sound like it. I believe that 90% of talks in
public today are press releases for that person and they’re
doing propaganda for themselves and they just leave.
– Absolutely, Gary, absolutely. – I’m trying to guilt
mother fuckers to love me. – Yep. Yep. – That I gave them so
much that they’re like damn. Honestly, you know what I
like about Kendrick Lamar? – What do you like
about Kendrick Lamar? – I like, oh, we got a nice
little cadence going here. (group laughter) I like that when I feel like if
I was good enough to be a rapper I would have the same mindset. What I think he does, and
I don’t know if this has been talked about, again I don’t read
anything so I don’t even know if this is out there, I assume it
is ’cause it’s so obvious, he goes and goes on
other people albums and he’s trying to steal those fans. When I listen to how he
does it, I’m like I get that. I literally, Eric I swear to
God, I go to every conference and I’m trying to make anybody
that came there for somebody else question that person.
– Yeah, yeah. – I want them to be like damn.
– No, no, no, explain. ‘Cause they’re laughing.
Explain that though. – [Gary] Okay, I go to every
conference and I go look this is a conference and there’s
this fancy person, there’s Warren Buffet,
there’s Tony Robbins, there’s Eric Thomas,
I’m sure they a lot of people, I’m not the only person but
I’m going to go on stage and I’m going to make every single
person leave saying I don’t like Warren Buffet anymore.
I like GaryVee. – Yep. – And by the way, that’s
not having by having bravado. – Yeah. – That’s not having, that’s not
cursing that’s I’m gonna provide so much stream of value so hard,
so long that they’re going to be tired when I’m done.
Bring value. – And that’s why you
know who GaryVee is. For real.
You guys got to hear that. Because a lot of people that
study, studying GaryVee this is why I laugh, Gary. There’re people who look up to
you who don’t do what you do. – You mean everybody? You mean everybody? Do you know how many
people tweet hustle and work six hours a day? I know.
– I’m serious. – I know. – I’m serious. Someone I’m very
close to today asks me about my schedule and I told him
the schedule and then they asked me well why are you up so early?
(laughter) – Yeah. Let’s move to the next
question before I get angry. By the way, real
quick I got angry.

– [Voiceover] I.K.E. asks,
“As a rapper, what’s the best “marketing tips to implement?” “Should I treat music like an
entrepreneur would his product?” – I would just say exactly
what Gary said before, just add value. Think about a specific
group of people ’cause you can’t reach everybody. I’m just being real. I don’t care how good
you are at what you do. You pick your poison, you pick
a group and you just pour into that group so that every time they listen to you
like Gary said. I’m just going to be honest. I’m like Gary I don’t listen to
anything, I don’t read anything. But I got hooked on this Beyoncé
song and I been listening to that song this morning,
I listened to it, it’s like I can’t put it down. And it’s not
because it’s Beyoncé. No disrespect but it’s not
because of what you think but when I hear the song
I hear I was here. So I’m waking up this morning
like you get to GaryVee show you got to be present. Not just there, you
got to be present ’cause you may only get to
do this one more time so I’m listening to her song, and
I felt like she wrote it for ET. – We should find out, we should
activate everybody let’s find out if B wrote it for you.
(group laughter) You think she did? – I believe she wrote it for me. I really do. – Listen, I think way too many
people, I’ll give you my advice. I think you need to make
pretend, not make pretend let me rephrase, you haven’t made it. I don’t think this was J Cole
asking the question, right? You haven’t made it. So stop being fancy. I am stunned by the fanciness in
the market of speakers, authors, entrepreneurs, athletes and
definitely rappers ’cause I got a ton of them. You’re trying to be big time, you think acting
like that is that. You know how
you promote music? Make one person every
day like your music. – Right.
– You know how you do that? By liking them first. By literally going to Twitter, I’ll give you something
real tangible. (tapping from ceiling) – Somebody loves us.
– I love it. Twitter.com/search. Twitter.com/search
go search people. You’ve got your opinion of
who you are as a rapper. Go search people
talking about Future. You think that’s your style. Jump in and say yeah
I like that track, too. Yes, I love that hook. When ET tweets that Beyoncé
spoke to me, jump in and be like yeah that part. Become part of the community. Everybody wants
everybody to love them. Love the community first
then they’ll love you back. Guilt them into loving you. – Oh that’s so ah, ah! Look guys that first video, for
real, you’d be shocked at the millions of people, that one
video has 38 million views. – Fuck! – You’ll be shocked that
I did not do that on purpose. You’d be shocked that I just,
what GaryVee just said, I poured in to that community
for about 18 years and then, boom, all of a sudden one day that seed blossomed
into the tree. 18 years. – Doing the right thing
is always the right thing. – 18 years.
– I love it. – So I also said to whoever
you are, don’t do what Gary is saying and think that six months you’re going to see the
results, or a year. Just because he told you that and you did what
he told you to do. At six months later,– – [Gary] How do
think about patience? – I mean it’s life.
It’s everything. – I’m a big, big,
big pusher patience. – Yeah, I’m just saying, because
you don’t know the result. You can only work the process. You don’t know when
the prize– – You know what I’m most
fascinated about? Everybody there right now,
how many there gave up a month before it was going to happen. – Yep, yep, yep, yep.
Weeks. – I’m worried that what happens
when you die and you go talk to God, God’s like yo, listen,
I got to show you something. You gave up on March 19, 1994,
it was gonna happen on April 7, 1994 and
you’re like what? I’m fascinated by
lack of patience. – Yeah. Yep.
– All right, let’s move on. – [Voiceover] Jacob Brown asks,
“As a PhD, what percentage of

“would you contribute of where
you are today your degree?” – Absolutely zero. Zero. I didn’t get the
PhD for success. I got a PhD for the patience. I got the PhD for the process. – When did you get a PhD?
– Last year, May. – Did you think you,
you know what this is a real good opportunity. On a real serious kick, I think
what makes this show good is I’m super not scared.
Talk me through the PhD. Did you feel like that that
was a smart strategic thing to create a little more air cover
so that you had more room to do your thing. For real, for real? – For me Gary, I was trying to
and when I first walked in you talked about business.
– Yep. – And I told you
I build people– – Yes. – but building people
doesn’t always pay well. – I understand. – So I had to put myself
in a different market,– – I understand. – then what I originally wanted
to be when I started, right? – Yeah, yeah. – But what happens when you’re
from Detroit, like I am, one of the most segregated cities
United States of America, I did not have the code, the language
or the rules to get in the game that I wanted to play in.
– That’s right. – So for me Michigan State gave
me that opportunity to go to class and hear that language. To get in an environment
for six years and be a part of the rules. So, you can’t play the game
if you don’t know the game. So, the degree to me was about, it doesn’t make
Detroit bad. It doesn’t make my community
bad, but there’s some things I need to operate on this level. – It’s interesting
you even went there. I’m so fascinated
that you said that. I’m fascinated that in your
mind, it processed that this thing could be a counter move
to making that thing look bad. It’s actually a massive insight that people
grossly underestimate. It’s a thing that I grew up with
in a different way, you know, I came to this country because Jews were persecuted
the Soviet Union. My parents and grandparents grew
up in an environment where they were blamed for the world war. My grandparents, both
my grandfathers went to jail for being Jewish. And I think that people don’t
understand that being a minority somewhere, Jewish in Europe,
African-American in America, there’s a psyche that people
don’t understand which is you hear, you hear us white guys
here hear selling out, you know, Uncle Tom getting away from, it’s so much deeper
than you think. – So much deeper. – Let me tell you where I’m
going with it, I’m actually going a very left turn on this, most of you are so molded by your parents you can’t even
wrap your head around it. And there’re certain things your
parents put in you, that you were scared to break against
because you don’t want to let them down even though you might hate your parent or
what have you. It’s unbelievable to
me that you went there. That the success of PhD had to be hedged in
your mind through your word that that’s
not bad on Detroit. – Nuh-uh. – That to me is such an
insight that we need to have a conversation in general about
people understanding that having something good happen,
doesn’t trigger a negative event somewhere else and that is
something we’re all dealing with in our own versions. – And so for me it was like, E,
if you can’t, if there’s certain arenas you can’t operate
on if you don’t know it. Can’t play football if you
don’t, here’s the thing I hate; okay, so what I do for a living
I hate Gary that a guy thinks he’s gonna do what I’ve done for
20-something years, he’s gonna watch my videos, he’s just
gonna do it for five months, five years and boom
he’s the next ET. – Wait a minute, ET, you mean
you can’t register Seven Figure Mastermind Instagram
account and become that? Yeah. – I mean it’s real.
– The realist. – I realized that, ET, you have
what you think is success but you get that PhD
you’re gonna understand it. It’s like another language, Gary, it’s like
another language. Like another world. – You like being a student?
– I love, I love it. Not reading but
I love being a student. – Yeah, it’s interesting,
I don’t like reading. – I don’t want people thinking
we’re contradicting ourselves. – Yeah, yeah, no. It’s interesting,
it’s interesting. Huh. I like that, okay.
What was a question? – [Andy] As a PhD
what percentage– – Got it.
– Oh, ok, zero. – Zero, okay good. Zero. – [Andy] Video question. It’s your boy Zain coming from
Sydney, Australia and

It’s your boy Zain coming from
Sydney, Australia and welcome to the show, ET. I believe this is a huge issue
for a lot of people in life and my question is where does where does motivation stop
and execution begin? I want to take this opportunity
to thank you both for being huge influences in my life and I can
proudly say that I wouldn’t be the man I am today if
it wasn’t for you two. – That’s very nice.
– I appreciate that, man. – Z-squared I’ll tell you that,
the amount of people that come in and write notes all day,
little notebooks of motivation, spend ungodly amount of hours, the amount of hours that we’ve spent watching
each other’s stuff, I don’t want to speak for you but my gut is zero.
Zero full hours. – He said it. – You know, I don’t know,
I don’t know but here’s what I can tell you some
people need to be motivated. For me, I didn’t. I got a chip on my shoulder and
that thing will drive me until the day I’m in the ground. I’m so motivated it’s
coming out of my face. So I don’t need that. So I can’t speak for everybody, everybody’s got
different versions. But here’s what I can tell you
there’s a sign in here that is driving everybody crazy. It’s been brought up like
four times in the last week. It says, “Ideas are shit.” It hangs in our office and it’s
driving crazy and the reason I don’t finish my statement in that sign is I want people to think. ‘Cause the sign actually reads
if it was in full entirety, “Ideas are shit
until you execute them.” Where does
motivation stop and start? Everybody’s got a different
answer but here’s what I can tell you; It’s really easy to be
motivated either you’ve got it or you can watch it. It’s really hard to execute. It is the variable
that separates people. People are always gonna tell me
every day, every day I roll up on people they’re like yo,
I’m gonna buy the Seahawks and you’re gonna buy the
Jets and I’m like great. Can’t wait to see you. People are always telling me
that going to do this, this and this and that and you know what
I do, I don’t know if you do this I ask a lots of them to
email me in 60 days, in 90 days in a year and you
know how many do? Goose egg. (clicks tongue)
People talk shit. And I don’t know where it stops
or starts but I know that most of you, 99% of you aren’t going to do anything about it
and that sucks. – I’m with Gary, inhale, exhale
it’s like asking me which one is which, I don’t know
which one is which. When you inhale, you exhale. I don’t know which ones first
which one is second but you’re not executing
you’re not motivational. I don’t know what the other
stuff is you’re doing but real motivation I don’t know which
one comes first but it makes you do something. If you’re not doing anything
you’re not really motivated. – Do you think it’s a
little bit Star Wars like? I just went somewhere weird. I’m sitting here I’m like you
know, the truth is don’t you think motivation comes
a little bit from a little bit of darkness? This is my point, this is fun
to do this in his room and I’ve been talking to a bunch of
female entrepreneurs the other day and some
leaders in my company. There’s a lot of
mixed genders in here. And again, I’m so scared to go
here because I understand where I’m going I don’t know, I think having,
being a minority, being an underdog
is an advantage. I can’t not believe that. I genuinely believe
I’m making this for my son, Xander, I think you’re soft. I think you’re watching this
right now, six years now I think you’re gonna text me in
a few minutes and be like “Yo, I’m going to kill you,”
which I hope because I hope you have that in you but the truth is, I just believe
that Andy’s in a disadvantage. I just genuinely believe that. I don’t know how else to say it? Now, by the way,
that’s me stereotyping. If Andy’s lucky to be motivated,
something bad happened, I don’t know his dynamic with
his brother but I think being a younger brother’s a
great one, right? Show me a kid who walks in here and says, I’m like
what’s your story? Well, I grew up super rich
and white and it’s awesome. I’m like keep going, they’re
like well my older brother was a star football
player and I wasn’t. I’m like okay now right
I’m like show me something. – Absolutely. – I think, I think a lot of you
are not motivated because you’re lucky and what I mean by that is
you’re lucky in different ways. You haven’t dealt with adversity
that much and by the way it’s not a black-and-white
thing, girl-boy thing– – Absolutely, absolutely.
– you just had great parents. You had a good upbringing. Life just didn’t give you that
much adversity and so, I don’t know,
I want to slice throats. – Yeah. – Like I don’t know.
My stuff is super evil. I’m being really honest
with you guys today. I go to the conference
everybody’s in the green room friends, friends. I’m like I’m gonna
slice your throat. – No question. – You’re gonna go up there
and people are gonna clap. I’m gonna up there and
people are gonna hate you after. They’ll be like why did I even
clap for the guy before me. That’s what’s
going through my mind. – No question.
– It’s just not a nice thing. – Yeah, no question. – Do you know why people
hate when I have guests on? It just happened right now.
I interrupt. – You’re supposed to, Gary.
– I can’t help it. – You’re ready to go. I was an was gonna say for
me, everybody’s like you’re so engaged with your son,
you’re so engaged your daughter. That’s because my
father wasn’t there. I’m not a good father. I just didn’t have my father so every day I wake
up that drives me. I’m not gonna be him. Every time I get on the mic it’s
like my people didn’t take all of us talk
nobody’s taking action. So I’m with you
it’s the dark side. It’s the I didn’t have,
I ate out of trash cans. I told the kids yesterday with
the NBA I said look everybody can get but can you keep. So, for me, I say I’m not into
money I just don’t want to go back to being homeless. I don’t want to each
out of trash cans again. I don’t want to sleep
in abandoned buildings. It’s the darkness that
gets me up and drives me. – I genuinely believe the
worst thing in life is to be somewhere, grow and
then go backwards. Now, I’m weird because I’m
also weirdly romantic to it. That Rocky where he
loses everything, he’s back. There’s a part of me was always
like, ooh, if I lose everything but then I’ll rise back and then I’ll realize who my
real friends were. Andy will not want to
be my friend any more. Good, when I rise back,
I’ll be like fuck you. – Andy will be there.
– You think so? – I think so. – Let’s go to the next one.
– Andy, you owe him. – [Voiceover] Aaron Perez asks,
“En route to self-awareness,

“do you believe we find
ourselves or create ourselves?” – That’s a deep question. How self-aware do you think
you are if I asked you that? – Very.
– Me too. – Very. – Who do you think is
more self-aware, me or you? – Me.
(group laughter) – [Gary] You know what I feel.
You know what I feel. – I think you think it’s you.
– [Gary] Of course. I genuinely think I’m the
most self-aware person on Earth. – Right, right,
I don’t know, Gary. I’m waking up at
3 o’clock in the morning. – I’m texting you at 2:53
tomorrow morning and I haven’t even gone
to sleep yet. (group laughter) – Well, I did go to sleep. – That’s a really nice
question, what you think? – I believe, I believe that
in our book we just came out “Average Skill,
Phenomenal Will”– – [Gary] Is that
your first book? – Third book. – [Gary] How are
you in book world? You good at it?
– Yeah, we’re good at it. – [CJ] Very good.
– Very good. – How good?
– [CJ] Underground. – What do you mean underground? – Garage.
– Really? Self published from
the garage? Like, what? Open up the trunk and
selling it from the back? – Absolutely.
– Love it. – [CJ] And online. – I know. I’m kidding. Have you ever considered
going main publishing? – [CJ] We have but we
didn’t like the numbers. I’ll be honest, when we started
out we had such a big following that a ton of supporters right
off the bat said we’ll buy this as soon as it
comes out at $25.99– – Yeah. You’re like why go
share it with other people? – [CJ] You’re right.
They’re like $4 a book. We’re like, yeah
we’ll go over here. – [Gary] Yeah,
totally understand. – So for us, in our third book,
“Average Skill, Phenomenal Will” underdog we believe that you
don’t have to have phenomenal skill but if you have a
phenomenal will you’re not going to quit, you’re not going to
stop, you’ll be successful the very first chapter, this is why
I think I’m more serious about it, the very first
chapter is self-awareness. The very first chapter. – Really? Because you know
what’s funny about my book, talk about who’s more serious. I put self-awareness in
my mother fucking title. I put it in my title. You got chapters, I got titles. You got chapters, I got titles. – Yeah, you got on the cover.
He’s got it on the cover. – I think it’s a really
interesting question. I think that’s one that we’ll
never really fully figure out. I’m always wondering
was this my destiny or did I mentally create it? I think it’s a very fine line. I definitely think
there’s elements of both. – Absolutely. – And I’m a big
believer in momentum. I’m sure as you
started feeling it– – Oh yeah. – momentum is real. I do think a lot of things like
I think a lot about sports and you see that athlete who matured
a little bit late, right, had a big second year and
then all of a sudden it’s like wait a minute. You know what’s funny,
I started a sports agency called VaynerSports.
We just started. We’re recruiting kids. I’m talking to these kids when did you think you
could be a pro? Right, they’re like juniors
right now seniors about to come out. And a lot of them were like after this one game my
sophomore year. – Wow. – Like multiple people said it.
– After one game? – One big game, right, or when
my homie went to the league and I was dogging him in practice. I’m like, wait a minute,
Jerome’s going to the league? – That underdog.
– Yeah. But what’s interesting what I’m
trying to make the connection is when they said that, when
they made the decision that they could go in to the league,
everything changed. They worked out more,
they played better, they ate better, they went down to one
girlfriend instead of seven. My one man I was
dying when he said that. But it’s funny, it was the
mental decision that created their actions.
– Absolutely. – I got my health together two
years ago, it was a mental game, then I got there, now I’m there. – Yep.
– It’s very mental. – It is. – I don’t think we talk about
the brain enough in our society and I think that’s going to be a
big subject that we’ll discover and I think people will look
back at some of the things we talk about and others 100 years
from now and be like wow, they were early on to understanding
how much the brain could do versus all the
other intangibles. – Absolutely. Yep. – Alright, ET, you get to
ask the question of the day.