Remember when people used to talk about saving money I Literally you and I grew up in an era where that was a conversation that people were like. that was a word that people said. There's not a under 25 years old that even wraps their head around the idea of like I'm gonna work and I'm not gonna go into credit card debt I'm gonna live within my means and save 10 or 10 20 of my take home. We are now in a place of zero savings.

Full debt, full debt and we don't own it all to buy all to buy. That doesn't mean the inner Nation What is good? A pretty exciting podcast today. Uh, we continue to try to bring some of the brightest and most exciting Minds in the world. Uh, this uh gentleman is one of the few people that has been on the podcast more than once.

He's putting on all sorts of helmets. If you're listening at home, there's a spark element now. We got a army hat. If you're watching the videos, you'll see it.

Damon John Uh, world renowned entrepreneur investor? Um, but all around good dude and so uh I uh it's really nice to have you on the show brother I Hope you've been having a great summer. The last time I physically saw you were sitting apart from each other at a Knicks Heat playoff game and I was texting you I don't think so I don't I think I think I was at V con after that was I oh you're right, that was after was it? You're right. Thank you sir. You're right.

I Just want to bring up the Nyx heat thing because I'm still a little salty because I felt like you were clapping for the heat in Miami and I was like wait a minute Tell me, educate me you know I I got some closure at B con because I know at Vcon you sit up there and you say yo cats don't get to me You gotta understand in high school I you know I've been a Jets fan you said something like you was like so nothing can get to me so um you know we'll we'll get back to this helmet later. um but you know I realized that the Knicks have lost for 40 years now Gary I Want to make sure that you understand a lot I Know that you somewhat think you understand business and I'm pretty good at it. but they have a job their job is to win. For 40 years they have lost.

Yes, I'm not sure if any of our employees if you would say hey, by the way, it's 50 by the way, 1973 it's actually 50 now 50. Okay so yeah, you know you know the chef you know or the person who does the catering. If after two weeks you you're starving and you're like I didn't eat I think you would fire the person? Well good news. The mix have gone through a lot of players in the last 50 years anyway.

Look I know we don't have a lot of time and I'm excited to have you on. I just want to go right into this I think one of the reasons I was excited to have you on is I've been thinking about just having people that I think are doing things I admire I think can bring value to the audience in a podcast. And literally the only question and then I just want to Spring off of it is what are you up to? what's on your mind? What are you most passionate about? What's interesting? What are some of your observations? What are some of your conclusions? what's brewing, or what's what do you have closure on? That's a full belief. Those are the things running through my mind.

Yeah, things running through my mind. That is a big question, but you know. Uh I I think all of us really go through that every single day. unless we're blindsided by the fact that we're having a temporary form of success in one way or another and we're thinking that for some reason it's not going to go away.

but usually no. uh, normally we have a healthy paranoia. So if I have to think about the entire scope of everything I'm doing right now is number one of course. I have a dedication to entrepreneurs from Shark Tank because it's not a game, right? They're they're they're livelihoods are you know are there.

And even if I quit today I still have five to ten years of being uh, somebody of value to the ones I invested in I'm thinking about what do I do as this world has changed I have uh in I have remote employees uh I have other employees that work next to me every single day I knowing taking my inventory I do not want to have I don't want to be a Gary where I have a thousand two thousand people. it's a lot of uh responsibility. Uh when I when I topped out, it was 500 400 employees. So what do I do where I get to really be? Uh, the point where I have a small amount of people that I know all their names right I know everything they want to do in life because when I had when I had 500 employees you know every time there was we had to stop doing birthday cakes because birthday cards were coming in every day and I was like well yeah, exactly right.

So um so how do I keep it small? but yet how do I make a Major Impact globally using all these new devices and Ai and all the things that are changing and then of course you know sometimes you can draw on an opportunity People Like Us I'm over billion dollar funds every single day. Hey Damon let's do a fun no luxury funding this and that and it sounds good. but at 55 years old uh to it's not that easy. You know when you were raising capital from people and if I do if I go around to whatever 20 30 people and raise These funds, well the teachers union or pension, they're not giving you 50 million about you showing up in Geneva or some other place every other day.

Now you times that by 20 people and then you have some billion dollar fund. You have a lot of people reporting to you. You have to report to a lot of people and then my quality of life goes away because I'm giving it all away and not to my children. So I don't need 20 houses So what the hell do I need a billion dollars for? So I have to think about purpose Yes at the end of the day and how does that equate to my health, my family, uh, my experience and my time.

And yeah, your joy. Yeah my joy. Yeah I hear it right through your mouth like it's a very it's I love the last minute or two because what I'm hearing and it's so right. which is.

it's a three-dimensional game of you know, entrepreneurship in life, right? Of course you know of course, especially for you and I and for many people listening. um when you the money part, especially when you don't have any of it early on, it's just so black and white it's like that's a thing. Yeah, yeah. I need to feed my family.

It's pretty simple. you don't have anything, Yes. But then as you like go through the processes that we've gone through whether our own accumulation of more paper or more Interestingly for me and I have a feeling you're gonna jump in on this. You start looking at the people that are generation or two ahead of you now that we're 47 and 55.

We have a lot of contemporaries ourselves who are in places of achieving certain things and you just kind of get to this place with where you're like man I know Unlimited sad, anxious, depressed, miserable, wealthy people and like what the is that about that's not. There's nothing interesting about that and then you get into a place of like oh, if I'm gonna play this, you know I hope you're thinking the same way I am. My great hope for you is with modern medicine and the way we all roll. Now you know 110 is not impossible for us, you know.

And so if you've got 55 more God willing you know you'd like to kind of enjoy it to the best of your ability. And that definitely isn't going to be money at all costs that comes in Impact Purpose Joy You know it matters I mean U.S Final: We are at the greatest time and you agree with me, we're the greatest moment in our lives. Where listen, you Know what? uh put it like this: if if you're that everyday person right now who is growing, uh I'll give an example. You know because we are so tempted and it is our ego too.

That is a little bit of a I can do this but you go to a place and I love I invested in a restaurant I Remember about 10 years ago because I love the chicken wings. They were amazing I said you know what? great I Go there I have a good time. The feel of everything think chicken wings I'm Gonna Make You know what? I'm gonna then start doing these chicken wings Frozen I'm gonna make them all over the place. whatever.

when I started having to deal with the labor and the the inventory and all that I never went back to that goddamn place again because I just wanted to enjoy the damn chicken wings and I should have just left it at that. Yeah right. Um and but today, like you're saying, you know I heard listen Kim Kardashian had a has gotten a lot of different uh uh uh uh uh hate mail because she went to a place called Pronubo that I went to about a month ago I wouldn't get this full body scan, no radiation. They find an aneurysm or a Baker cyst in my leg in the back of my leg now my friend who just sewn The Who unfortunately passed away J.R Redinger who first vacation he took in 30 years on his 85 million dollar yacht.

um he had a pain in his leg. he went down downstairs and unfortunately he's no longer here because of an aneurysm. So immediate I was petrified. but because I got that 25 or 3 000 and I understand I don't want to be telling that I got that that that that that uh that renewable thing I went I was able to check it and realize it was just a baker's cyst.

but I have a freedom of uh of you know thought to know that I'm okay, that's what technology is today. but why am I saying that? Because technology is to the point where uh, you know I'm having things on the Ebu machine and I'm draining my blood to see and what I'm doing is uh uh um uh, ozone in my blood to see how much inflammation on my body. technology is. A great point, but we can live forever now.

I'm gonna pay it I'm going to touch on that Kim Kardashian thing for a second everybody slander Kim 2500 Three thousand dollars. but you know what? Unfortunately, maybe then some of those people standing outside of those luxury uh stores that I see online all day long that ain't got it. Maybe they won't be able to afford a bag for another six months, but they'll be able to live for the next 20 years of their life or before. Take the point of where we are today and forget if you can't afford a 25 or 3 000 uh you know, uh thing like that if you work at McDonald's and you know you get every year one physical, go get your blood checked to see if your white blood cells are in line or whatever it is right? Gary My point is that technology today is there.

My favorite thing Oprah did ever is she's done so many iconic things was she had a huge audience. Really go to the doctor on their birthday. The big agenda she pushed on her show and I watched women across this whole country during that you know era where she was that person in society create new behaviors in a positive way and to your point in a world we live in Now this is my number one point of social media to a lot of friends. You I tell my friends you posting a picture of you on a private plane break down for me how that's valuable for the person that's receiving on the other end and then and you know what they'll do Like they'll try to be like you know it's aspirational Gary I'll motivate them.

it ain't aspirational you I'm like I want to see that? Yeah, I'm like that's gonna make people upset. On the flip side, you coming on this podcast right now and saying hey I'm empathetic I've been On both sides of the financial equation, but even if you're making minimum wage, you do have most of us. God Bless. No matter what the financial situation, your ability to check your white blood cells on a blood test in around the world is high.

Of course there's third world countries. Of course there's North Korea I Get it, there's edge cases. But starting that, these conversations where there's value like I'm with you a hundred percent Gary You know we're not. We're not.

We're not. We're not crucifying anybody who's talking about how many planes and trains they're on and or drinking uh, you know x amount of champagne and carbs or crucifying her. but you know what the point of the matter is Gary you and I we both come from immigrant parents. We come from a day and age where we didn't have social media to say what is the right thing to do.

You know what? maybe I can't afford that but I know how to put a bunch of ice in a damn tub and then and and and reduce my inflammation. You and I come from parents and people who didn't have this information or they said listen, we never go to the doctor because we can't afford the doctor or they're wrong or whatever the same way that I get motivated from following. whether Garyvee or somebody or or somebody about medicine, everything else, well then you know what. If you're going to have all these feeds on places to go and things to buy and music, no problem, put some feeds on there of AI Financial Intelligence how to help your health and you know what? Slowly in the morning when you look through these feeds, maybe you started to realize maybe I should do something else BJ I'm so proud of you brother I'm loving everything coming.

this is going so well I literally just was in Australia and you know we both speak a lot. We've been able to cross paths I still always finally smile when I think I love the gangsterness of how long that goddamn truck trip took because everybody like you said, they see the stages and they don't realize your ass was. oh I don't know how long it's no joke. but go ahead, let's go.

that's that's what I want people to see but let's go you and I you know I I've always liked your speaking style as well because I think you you know you don't have the same deck and so in this talk I did three cities real quick and I I did in the first place so I brought it back in both spots. improv kind of I was like hey by the way, talk about these feeds when I open my Instagram when I open my Tick Tock I'm seeing people save a kitten off a tree I'm seeing a three-year-old hug another two-year-old I'm seeing Jets videos I'm seeing sports like you. You find what you're looking for, the fact that you just went there as well. which is like you can say that like that, we're getting all this bad stuff.

why don't you and engage and spend time on good stuff, you are more than welcome. like Damon just said to go to Instagram and Tick Tock right now which are the predominant Feats For a lot of people, go to the search type in financial literacy enter things will show up. You can then follow nine of them. You don't buy anything I Of course, don't buy it.

Get educated. back out type in: eat cleaner and healthier. enter follow 912 people enter back out how to fix back pain enter find a bunch of content, follow that tomorrow and I have a funny feeling both of us are going to get some tweets on this. Everyone listening can change their feed tomorrow by searching 20 positive or informational or thoughtful things, following 20 to 50 accounts through your little discovery of that and watch what changes become what you think about most of the time.

Oprah said and we can do these in simple forms. You know, you know what I've learned. You know. Listen, they say that I don't know.

Whatever it is, all the Phds will correct me. there's a hundred and whatever right? 105 000 words in the English language. We use about six or seven thousand of those words And if you want to make immediate changes too. My little girl is seven years old, she's taught a new word every single week.

And the word that we use B are the people we are if we use words in our five thousand to seven thousand words. If we use words like drama, hate broke, um, fight ignorant you know what I mean then we're going to start moving there. So the words that I teach my daughter every week is something like uh, interests. If you know about interest, you'll earn it.

If you don't know about it, you'll pay it or love or Compassion or empathy or save. You know these type of words. It's the same as the feeds we're watching, right? It's all of these things that we use that slowly can change us. We always think too literal.

we gotta go to school and learn Financial intelligence. Right now we gotta do this. It's the small habits that get us because when you when you stick to those small habits, you know we stick to bad habits no problem. Or how I say the devil thinks your life I'll give you an example how I think about I told somebody the other day they said well I can't get nowhere in life right? So when you go on vacation when you say I'm gonna get that pina colada with a double 151 shot as soon as I land I promise you as soon as you land, you got that goddamn pina colada with a double thing and then you go into more.

Came out with a 150 150 miles you know I worked at Red Lobster you had that 151 in there double shot when I was a kid in the liquor store. The people that bought the 151 I was like oof, they're playing. let me to drink Mad Dog 2020. so that that shows he was doing some other right I mean I thought it was only Grady on Sanford and Son who drank that and and ripple right or others.

You're not gonna let yourself down when you say I'm gonna do that. but you know what? when you say I'm gonna go home and read the chapter every night. You get the other things. I I You know it's the ones who.

It's the ones who break those habits and are just as disciplined about the positive things. whether they're scrolling through those things or getting their one in the back half of this podcast. let's go Mike Bro we went very macro about perspective mindset. I Think everything we've just touched on is going to bring a ton of value, especially because we went a little deeper on.

like change our algorithms. Talk to me about, um, in the micro, Any, any sectors, any startups, anything that has got you going, Anything what's going on with, actually, how about five minutes about what's going on with you? Like what do you like? what's going on with you with content or podcasts or or you know it's a good question. So I I I I think the obviously the biggest uh to utilize what I have in my my disposal. I've come from a business where I had to make a shirt Warehouse I love content but I love content and education.

My my my three Pete If I'm gonna call it or the rest of my life is going to be spent uh, on drilling down on education and giving access. Now there's a couple of forms of access to give right? There's what we do every day. you and I have written many books on this. I'm on Shark Tank I do that.

but I've become a little more of a garyvee Kevin O'leary kind of guy where I'm like, all right I wrote five books on it. If you guys don't get it, then that's your goddamn problem. But the people that I want to get it is the kids. So my my thing is that uh hopefully I've made an impact with football.

Hopefully I made an impact with Shark tank but my my my my my really goal now is Financial Intelligence and Education for children six to ten years old to start them off thinking this and break the school system that does not teach them this because what happens if you don't teach them this and then it's at at 18 years old they can go get 500 000 worth of student debt for uh, for a career they're not even sure they want to have. Then you set our country up for failure because then they don't have enough money. And when you don't have enough money like we talked about earlier, the cheapest things to consume for food are made out of salt, sugar, and butter. And also we have a bigger issue that's my, that's my, that's my three.

Pete I Want people to say Damon changed the system and he got a whole bunch of other amazing people to either compete with him or see the value. and and that's why I had that book little Dana learns to earn that did really well hit Amazon Number One for 24 hours, that's where I'm going. Good for you I love that you know it's funny I love that and you know what's crazy is I I said something ironically on this point. Uh, this last week last week.

I also improved into the stand-up keynote style that I talk I'm like, remember when people used to talk about saving money I Literally you and I grew up in an era where that was a conversation that people were like. That was a word that people said there's not a under 25 years old that even wraps their head around the idea of like I'm gonna work and I'm not going to go into credit card debt I'm going to live within my means and save 10 or 10 20 of my take home. We are now in a place of zero savings. Full debt, full debt and we don't own all to buy all and we don't own because now we rent an Airbnb or we taking or we don't own any equity And and that's critical.

But you know, Listen. Even even as I talk about investing like this, you know, listen, you are. You are obviously somebody who broke into the market and really have educated us on Nfts. You know I I just did a post I said you know when it's not sexy anymore and you really love it That's when it's time to invest Because if you know that you know you know you know e and you know you need Bitcoin But you need E to power all these Nfts and nobody's talking about it no more.

Bitcoin just went up from from I don't know 15 or 18 dollars to to whatever. It doubled in six months right? So you already know that this stuff is not going away. but if you get financial intelligence from us, you can. Oh, you could have think about when would your money have doubled in six months Ever.

Yeah, but if you're not thinking like what you're talking about ownership saving investing in early like Barbara says buy houses Now why interest rates are too much, you know why. Because nobody else is buying and the interest rate is going to reset in another six months or a year. So this is the time to buy. Love I love and listen I think the six to ten thing is massive and I think you're so on it because I think look, be friends.

All this crazy, right? The Nft part. obviously that's a very volatile asset similar to internet stocks in the 90s. We talked about that at Nausea. Yep, on the flip side, the mission like what I'm doing with the cards and the comic books and the toys and the animations.

Teaching kids at Six to Ten which is my targets five to ten in a lot of ways. With what I'm doing now, later it will be more like yeah, same thing. five to Ten something yeah later I'm gonna convert them into the stuff like Marvel movies 18 to 25. All that.

but Teach an accountant when people ask me what's your favorite befriend I don't it's like children I love them all I created them. but when I tell you a countable ant if I can get a countable Aunt to be cool as and a real thing to five to ten-year-olds and humans at 18 to 30 like think it's a good thing to be accountable. It will literally reverse. Forget about Covid.

The great pandemic of the last decade is a complete lack of accountability. Literally everyone on Earth is walking around pointing fingers. It's the government's fault. It's that person's fault.

It's Technology's fault. It's the it. Everyone's fault for themselves. Exactly.

Is that crazy? The accountability? It. It is critical. I Mean you know those are the type of books I'm trying to put out, right? Uh, little? Damon learns the barter. Little Damon learns responsibility.

Little Damon learned all those types of things you know you know. And it's also. we have a job and that's the problem, right? You know, As we know our children are growing up and they all want to be singers and dancers. and Tick Tock people and China's changed in the whole game and they're showing them.

But we want our children to understand these processes early. like I say you know you don't teach I Mean maybe that this is exactly what they probably did to all the players on the Jets and the Knicks. You don't teach people to be a professional athlete when they're 18 years old. You teach them when they're five.

Now, most of the Jets and the Knicks were probably taught at 18 years old. But you don't teach people to play an instrument at at 20 and put them in an orchestra. You teach them at five and six. and I always break down the very simple way that any person should activate three dollars.

when three dollars, Three million, or three billion come in the first style. And so if you teach kids this in the right way, they'll start thinking like this: The first dollar goes to feel what exactly they need to buy because they need to live. The second is an investment. An investment can be in there, in in their in their uh, public company, in their uh, education, whatever the case is.

and the third dollar goes for what you would like to have but don't have to have. If you don't buy it, then put it into number two number two. Sooner or later grows because their Investments and to bucket number one and number three. But the way that we live today.

like you said, with no ownership and no accountability, we work really hard. Yeah, I Get that we go and buy number three first because we want to treat ourselves. That means we have no money for number two and then we're paying eighteen to twenty four percent. Credit card interests are number one and we never ever get out of the cycle.

Teach kids that at five to six to seven years old they will start off with the fundamentals on what to use with financial ability. Well you battle on that which is going to be massive. I'm gonna be battling on redefining success. Some of these kids of like hey, if you're happy like real talk if you're 24 and you wake up if you're 33 and you wake up it and you live within your means of making 79 000 a year.

Yeah telling y'all' you're winning I know what? you with all the glitz and glamor I Know the Hollywoodification Listen I'm a capitalist and an entrepreneur but the capitalist entrepreneur Hollywood American Thing Do not get tricked. You need to fight for happiness and being content. That doesn't mean being passive. Being content and happy is Unstoppable like I'm ambitious as but there's a level of contentness that doesn't lead to the anxiety.

I'm going to tell you I'm going to share with you a story that you know I've never shared with anybody and I just thought about it. You know So football was obviously doing really well but I knew and I did my my math I was like listen, you know what when I came into the market Levi's doing 18 billion is doing three now I don't even know where United color of benettons are I don't know where these are So naturally I'm not going to put myself first as an ego sooner or later FUBU will have its up finish down I realized I lived across the street at the time from my office and I had a Maybach because I wanted to pull up of course all the time at the parties in the club. get the Maybach when I think about it I'm paying for a Maybach I'm paying for all this stuff I'm flying private by the way, you know I gotta fly private that time because I'm rich right when I really thought about it, The five people that saw me in in first class uh, going to La and the five people that saw me coming back I got them maybe two hours later. but you know what? it was a difference of sixty thousand dollars.

Why do I give a about those 10 people that saw me or not? Why did I need the Maybach to go across the street to my office right? What I did was I went and bought a little property. didn't cost much but it was in the middle of the Woods Way Upstate New York and I said if everything goes to I got this little place and I'm not gonna have to be and I can live I had enough money to live I can now live and not have to worry about being scrutinizing. Hey weren't you. The food would do.

No food will suck yo you're broke I I did that I put that away and thank God I did. But today now you can live anywhere you want in the world and you don't have to walk down the block. You can have a ass little farm that you're super happy with, you can live in a little last apartment no matter what, and you can really be financially secure with what you're going to do and put that money into what you really need and not have to. Who gives a about what other people are going to think about you because you know who's important, what your kids and your family and your wife and your husband and your parents to be okay.

And today we're in the world where you don't have to live in the city, you don't have to have a big car. You don't have to have that because this is the only place they really need to see you. So who are you trying to impress at the end of the day And that's the important part of what what success is to you. success needs to be.

Are you happy with the ones that you love? I Couldn't agree more. Man: I'm listen I'm sitting here and having an out of body view of our combo and I'm like man, there's a there's there's a chance if guys like us who are in the public sphere right now for business yeah are having a 30-minute conversation that we just had. Yeah, we have a real shot because the bottom line is this was none of the conversation by mature business men and women in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s. And I think this is huge because I think a lot of people are very confused about how to get to a good place and I think that there's a level of compassion and empathy and sympathy and good that is emerging and I do believe in the power of Merit The reason I love sports and business is they're grounded in a level of Merit that school and politics and corporate are not and I just really hope that you and I are the preview and there's others out there right now doing the same thing.

if we're the preview of the well-rounded business combo. I Think we're gonna have more successful financially and definitely more emotionally successful people and I'm excited to be on that. Journey I am tilling I don't even need your answer because I know just like I just said whether is when I gave up everything I started working Red Lobster I found this thing called FUBU and when I gave up everything and I moved that little house I found this thing called Shark Tank because I was able to clear my head and do what the hell I liked and I loved and that's when my greatest successes came. I Love you brother! thank you for being on any last parting shot that you want the Vayner Nation to know about or go check out or anything.

just check out! check out my podcast it's called that moment with Damon John because I I learned from Gary as well. This is what I love about it when people give answers to a lot of questions. A lot of us are like parents and we talk because we know that's the go-to I dig really deep in the conversation. say, hold on, don't rush over that.

What happened that moment? What happened that moment I Dig really deep. Check out the podcast it's on every week. uh I think Monday and Tuesday Black Effect podcast Network I Heart and all that good I Love you man! Thank you so much! You've done so much for my family! I'm not gonna mention it. You never mention it.

You never asked for any favors I Love you man I Love you Man! That's why you're so great! Thank you.