The New Fight: Why MMA Champion Daniel Puder is Taking on Bullying Across America
"Success is what happens to you. Significance is what happens through you.” It’s the mantra of Daniel Puder, as well as the concept behind his wildly successful podcast, “Significance Breeds Success.” He’s a former Mixed Martial Arts fighter and pro-wrestler turned social entrepreneur who is fighting a new battle - against bullying. In this interview, Daniel shares his message of motivation, and how we can all find our own inner strength through adversity. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
So what's it like to stand up in a classroom and realize that you are having a difficult time saying some of the words and having teachers and kids around you look at you strangely?
Horrible.
Like it hurts.
I can still feel what I felt back then.
And it's difficult, and when kids snicker and tease you and laugh at you and put you down, after a while, you start believing it because you don't know any difference.
So I had a foundation of loving family, but at the end of the day, I was at the school eight hours a day.
I was with my parents a couple hours a day, but the eight hours versus a couple hours is a big difference on that negative peer pressure that can really impact and hurt somebody's life.
Hi, I'm Dr. Oz, and this is the Dr. Oz Podcast.
Success is what happens to you.
Significance is what happens through you.
It's the mantra of my next guest, as well as the concept behind his wildly successful podcast, Significance Breeds Success.
Daniel Puder, former mixed martial arts fighter and pro wrestler turned social entrepreneur.
I actually met him in Washington, D.C., where both those art forms can be valuable, is fighting a new battle against bullying.
He's here today with his message of motivation and how we can find our own inner strength through adversity.
So I didn't know Lisa had not met you before, but everywhere I go with kids, Daniel's always there.
He's inspiring and nudging and pushing.
But as a pro wrestler, you can actually get them in a headlock, a full Nelson, on one of the other illegal moves, and make headway.
So let's start there because it's the most unlikely of places to have a pro wrestler pushing for anti-bullying.
And listening to some of your podcasts and some of the work you have on, we have a TEDx video that I watched as well in preparation for discussion.
It's pretty powerful to hear that story.
So let's start before pro wrestling.
Let's start before you were famous in that world and understand what a 6, 7, 8-year-old Daniel Poodle was like.
What were the challenges you were facing?
So I was born in Cupertino, California, home of Apple computers.
So I was the special ed white kid with a bunch of really smart Asians and Indians in my neighborhood.
So it was super challenging to be taught how the school system taught us back then.
And they told me I just wasn't good at something versus doing a love language assessment or learning style assessment or really showing me what I was good at and how to learn properly.
And they never taught me how to learn how to learn.
Right.
So it wasn't the resourcefulness.
It was just like, read this and do this.
And so when we built our first school this last year, we're showing kids how to do this.
We're not telling them they're special ed.
So that was my biggest challenge growing up.
My blessing was I had the most amazing, loving parents.
So I was that super loving kid that was big boned, as they say, in special ed classes and just...
Just amazing kid.
So what's it like to stand up in a classroom and have a fear of public speaking, which is the single most powerful fear that most people still have, and realize that you are having a difficult time saying some of the words, and having teachers and kids around you look at you strangely?
Horrible.
Like, it hurts.
I can still feel what I felt back then.
And...
When somebody doesn't understand you, because we're not taught to understand ourselves even, the emotional intelligence side, so how do we understand somebody else?
And when we push a kid, like my teachers did at some points, when I was pushed to be able to read in front of class but I couldn't read, now it makes me embarrassed because I don't even know myself.
So...
It's difficult, and when kids snicker and tease you and laugh at you and put you down, after a while, you start believing it because you don't know any difference.
So I had a foundation of loving family, but at the end of the day, I was at the school eight hours a day.
I was with my parents a couple hours a day, but the eight hours versus a couple hours is a big difference on that negative peer pressure that can really impact and hurt somebody's life.
How old were you when you found martial arts?
So I started amateur wrestling.
I always wrestled with my dad.
He's super fun-loving.
But I started actually on my sixth grade summer, after sixth grade.
So my parents knew they had to get me into something to build me.
I was the last picked on the soccer team as a kid, stuff like that.
So I wasn't very good in sports when I was younger.
But then I had Coach Lee from my middle school.
Um, they said I had to leave halfway through my eighth grade year, uh, to be, or they would fail me at this middle school that I went to.
So I left, went back to the public school, failed a math class with this teacher that I won't mention.
I always remember her name, but I started wrestling and then martial arts.
I started a couple months after I went to juvenile hall, um, got, got beat up a kid when I was 16 years old, uh, because of just what are you saying?
And I was tired of it.
And then my athletic director, um, basically told me to go F myself.
for like 20 minutes, like super rude guy that didn't care about kids whatsoever.
And so I went and beat up this kid, went to juvenile hall for a weekend, learned my lesson.
Don't want to go in a box.
And my coaches literally saved me at American Kickbox Academy.
Javier Mendez literally saved my life 'cause I could have gone down the wrong path if it wasn't for him and Frank Shamrock and some other guys. - I love that you know their names And just for the coaches out there, because I know Steve Hyde, John Pearson, Harry Bacher, my coaches as well, played a similarly powerful role in my life.
A lot of times, it's not that clear the role that coaches play from the outside, but from the inside is very evident.
And I'm part of this Council for Sports Nutrition and Fitness, sports, nutrition.
It's founded by Eisenhower.
It's a presidential council.
And the biggest challenge we have in America is we don't have enough coaches.
Literally, kids in underprivileged neighborhoods don't have enough people volunteering to be coaches.
People can't afford to volunteer to be coaches.
And then the kids have to pay to play sports.
It's the exact opposite of what you ought to be doing.
So if anyone was listening out there, we'd literally need more coaches in America.
So think about it.
So let's go back to follow up on Lisa's question.
So you start wrestling.
It's not a peaceful sport.
You seem like a peaceful person to me right now.
What was that like for you?
What happens the first time you walk into the ring and some guy tries to take your head off, or you have to take their head off?
So the summer camp I went to in sixth grade, right after sixth grade, I had actually, I was, the older kids actually just beat me up and picked on me.
So I went there with my brother and it just wasn't that much fun.
So my parents got me into my seventh grade wrestling team, which was great because it was a brand new team at this school.
When I went to ninth grade, my youth pastor from my church brought in like five coaches.
So it was a brand new team for four years.
So I had a team for two years and a team for four years and it was awesome.
It was something where I could go after and I could use my frustration because I didn't understand how to shift my way of being.
So we do a lot of I am statements now and how do we foundationally set up our lives?
A lot of people think who they are is what they do every day versus who they show up as.
Give me some I am statements.
So I am loving, authentic, and committed.
It's not going to help you in a wrestling match.
So I'm committed to whooping somebody, right?
Let me just pin you up.
And every fight I had, every pro fight you can see me, I hugged the guy after, except for one.
And there was a little bit of drama, a little bit of fun, PR stuff.
But every fight I would go up and hug him, or I'd hang out with a couple of them, or I'd spend time.
But it wasn't about the fight, it was about the competition.
I think a lot of people take it from the anger aspect.
If you get angry, then that's not the context that's going to help you in a fight, because you burn out faster.
Is that right?
Well, you see the guys that come in like all hyped up and like, I'm going to get, you know, it's just using so much energy.
Like I'm like, bro, your mind is about to blow up.
So I went in there and I was almost asleep by the time I'd actually walk into the cage and then when the music, then I'd start waking up when I was in there jumping around and I'd turn it on.
So I got to the point where I could visualize it.
My brother's a psychiatrist now at Loma Linda Hospital in Southern California, and he was working with me with a couple visualization coaches, and I got to the point where I could see my opponent coming at me, even when I was driving, which isn't a good idea, or sleeping or just sitting there, and I could see them, and I could see what I would do to them, and I would visualize every single move that they could possibly do and what I could do to win, but it wasn't about an angry—it was about anger in the beginning.
I was very angry when I was 16 years old, subconsciously.
Consciously, I was a nice kid, but I could pull that anger out.
And so I used that anger to be able to get out aggression.
And then after I started figuring out, I'm like, I'm not angry anymore.
A lot of these other fighters, they're just doing this because they're angry.
That's not who I want to be.
But I still wasn't taught the emotional intelligence side about anger.
I wasn't taught on how to revisit my story or how to understand my story that I'm creating in my life.
There's lots more when we come back.
It is ironic that you'd have a professional wrestler talking about bullying.
And I understand that you went through it yourself, which is why you get it.
But what was it like in the very beginning when you approach a school and say, hey, I got this program to help with bullying.
And you walk in looking the way you look with the history of being an MMA battler.
So most schools I went into, they said, we want you to come speak.
And I go, well, I don't want to just speak.
I want to launch a program to help people understand what's going on with the bullies.
Because an angry person that's taking their anger, frustration, hurt, pain out on somebody.
So I have the most amazing people in my life.
And from psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, school resource officers, teachers, principals.
And so I just started picking their brain.
I'm like, how do we get people to understand themselves and grow And so a lot of the principals said, no, no, no.
And there's one principal in Southern California that said, no, we just want you to come speak.
So I spoke for him because I was working with the Los Angeles Schools Police Department.
And we went in and I did this thing called The Biggest Challenge.
And I had about 2,000 kids in the auditorium and about 300 to 500 of them wrote on a piece of paper their biggest challenge.
Like one of them at that school said, my dad hit me because I got a B. So if a dad keeps doing that, the kid is going to make up an interpretation and a story and all this stuff, and then eventually he's going to take that anger pain out on somebody else.
And the principal said, no, we don't have a problem at our school.
We don't have a bullying problem.
And I'm like, here's 300 problems that they're going to hit.
Six months later, a kid jumps off the top story and commits suicide on that campus.
Oh my goodness.
So I've seen this around the country.
But the challenge is, is the education system doesn't set people up to know their own emotional intelligence.
When we launched at Nova Southeastern University three years ago, our EQ course, we have less than 3% of freshmen that drop out compared to the norm, which is 25%, because they really understand what they're there for.
And they cut down on all the BS in their life because they're very focused and purpose-driven.
And that's in the education department.
And they don't understand that even at the university level on how to help teachers understand problems.
And so the teacher goes into the work world, becomes a principal eventually, just because they're good at management.
And they don't even understand how to solve these problems from the root.
And I think policy is a big challenge too in schools.
So what is the purpose of a freshman kid's life in school?
It's a big transition.
So I think freshmen at the university level, it's about partying and getting out of the house.
And I think a lot of the time, that's why these dropout rates are ridiculous, and then they have a huge debt.
So same thing with high school.
Every single school is trying to find yourself, but school doesn't teach you how to find yourself.
And kids don't, I mean, I've had three kids, I've probably had about 40% of the kids that go to our course, it's a three credit course, 40% that have told me or voiced something like, I didn't want to be here after the first day, but I'm going to push through it, because the first day is not easy.
Like, I help them look at themselves in a deeper way than they've ever looked at themselves, and it's only eight weeks.
Give us a taste of it.
What is that first day like?
So have you, for instance, have you ever gotten angry?
A lot.
Okay.
So there's four answers.
So I ask people, did the person make you angry or did you let yourself get angry?
And what I find is most people give me one main answer, which is they made me angry.
So that's more of like a blame game.
Other people say I let myself get angry, which is accountability.
So if we have accountability like with a partnership, then – and I can take accountability for everything I do and say in deals I put together and everything because it's my choice – The other third answer is a little bit of both.
And the last answer is my most interesting one.
I don't get it much, but people just look at me.
And they don't give me an answer.
So what we do is we play little games and give concepts and ideas on how to be introspective of your own life so that you can be accountable.
And if you're accountable, think of, like a lot of people in relationships say, this is my other half.
Have you ever heard of that?
Yes, a lot.
Instead of saying, this is my other whole.
Hmm.
So if you need somebody in your life, from my perspective, to fill you up.
Then you're incomplete.
Correct.
Yeah.
Why would you want to be incomplete versus being complete and then having somebody add so much more value to their life because they're complete and you can just be supervision, purpose-driven together long-term?
Yes, that's good.
I'm sure jaw's dropping and folks start to get it, but I would think that would be enjoyable from day one because you start to have new insights into the challenges that you're already facing.
And it makes people start looking at their decisions.
So one of our ground rules, for instance, is don't believe a word I tell you.
That's like the don't part, but we say, and the opposite is believe or think about what you believe.
So most people, like, do you believe everything you hear?
No, definitely not.
Definitely not.
Do you believe everything you think?
Definitely not also.
First of all, I think the word thinking is the wrong word.
For most people, thinking is just self-beratement.
It's just beating yourself up when you ask someone what they're doing, and I'm just thinking.
But I also think that, I know that most of us use words in our minds that we would never say to others.
We're much harder on ourselves.
Which is why when we talk about some of the basic rules of life, like do unto your neighbors, you have them do unto you, the word kind is not in there.
But the word fair is.
So it doesn't mean we have to beat ourselves up or someone else up or be overly ingratiating, but we have to be fair to everybody.
And that's something that I think we missed the boat on.
Yeah.
Do you believe everything you see?
That's interesting.
There's like a lot of augmented reality, right?
Oh, yes.
Digitally.
Digitally, right?
No, no.
Almost nothing.
Right?
Yeah.
So it's interesting, like, for instance, as men in America, I believe that we're told to suck it up, be tough, and don't cry.
Mm-hmm.
And then we're so disconnected as men from women because we're not being vulnerable.
So I learned the tough side, but I didn't learn how to be super open and vulnerable.
And you can be both or I can be both.
I am both.
In your TEDx talk, you say that failure is a mindset, success is a mindset, but significance is a lifestyle.
And that's the first quote I said, you know, success is what happens to you and significance is what happens through you, which I love.
Because a lot of us are, it's hard to define what success is.
I mean, I have a perspective on it, but I can get it.
But significance is That's a universal reality that we all see.
But there's also an implication there because through you means it's not self-generated.
There's something else that is...
There's an implication of something higher, either higher value or higher energy.
There's an implication that if it's coming through you, not by you, that you're not the end-all and be-all.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, I think...
You ever shown up to a restaurant and they just take your order and they're not very nice?
They just don't care?
Yeah, sure.
Never.
They're always nice to him.
And then you show up to like a Chick-fil-A or an In-N-Out burger or something and they're so sweet and nice and happy and excited to see you.
So, I think that's the significance.
Like, you can do the same exact job with whatever you do.
Like, what you're doing with TV and podcasts or impacting lives with council or fitness or whatever it is.
And you can be...
An ass.
Or you can be loving and caring and kind and do the same exact job.
And I think that people follow people that they want to be like and that they want to be connected to.
And it's interesting which CEOs, for instance, like Gary Vee, I don't know if you know who that is.
Mater Shark?
Yeah.
Oh, very well.
We play basketball together.
Nice, okay.
I've known him since he's back making wine recommendations.
So guys like that that I've been watching that are growing their companies, but there was somebody on one of his logs that walked out of an elevator and said, I just saw a couple people give each other hugs.
And he goes, that's a culture we have at our company.
So I'm looking at how do I position companies and with what we're doing with corporate stuff too and everything else, how do we build corporate culture to be super kind and loving and supportive instead of the opposite?
But go back to this issue of significance, to address this issue.
I know that it's cultural and it happens through you, which you picked that word on purpose because you're very thoughtful of the words you use.
How do you know what you should be significant in?
Or is it more just an attitude towards everything you do?
For me, it's an attitude and a lifestyle.
It's something, it's how I show up and the ways I show up.
So with my I'm loving, authentic, committed, that's a significance because when I show up that way to a kid like Jesse out here who, you know, he's telling Jessica, you know, six years ago he was lost and he called me up and he's like, I want all this stuff.
And I'm like, do you need it or do you want it?
And what's your purpose?
And so we started defining how he was going to show up for himself and how he's going to show up for others.
You ever heard the saying, you can't love somebody unless you love yourself?
Yes.
So true.
Right?
And I don't believe you can love yourself unless you understand yourself.
So fully love yourself.
I mean, loving yourself from one guy could be doing drugs.
Another guy could be helping the homeless on the weekend.
I don't know.
I mean, doing drugs is not a real act of self-love because if when you love someone, like, do you have kids?
Not yet.
Not yet.
Well, your parents or your brother, right?
When you love them deeply, you want what's best for them.
When you want what's best for yourself, it's not doing drugs.
That's avoiding, that's actually, it's not loving your best self.
It's not loving that core of who you are.
It's just wanting to, it's almost the opposite of self-love, I think.
So I agree with you.
And I think that people in that position that are using drugs, for instance, they don't understand that from our perspective.
They're looking at just from, I need to feel or I need to not feel.
So one of my kids is in juvenile hall right now.
They said he was going to die.
He's in foster care.
He's been in foster care.
They said he's going to die in a month if you don't help him.
And I'm like, okay, what do you need?
So I show up to the juvenile hall.
He got arrested.
Show up to Citrus.
He got on a 72-hour hold.
And so I walked in, and he had a broken arm.
And the lawyer and people were telling him what he needed to do.
I go, let me tell you something.
You can go to jail for the rest of your life if you want.
You can stay out of jail for the rest of your life if you want.
It's your choice.
And, you know, he had a broken arm.
I go, instead of, like, hitting the guy in the face next time, elbow him, would you?
Like, he's not going to break the elbow.
I get a little crack out of him, right?
So I catch him right there.
I'm like, I got you.
He has a tattoo of a bullseye, a big bullseye, about six inches wide on his neck.
He's got face tattoos and he's 15 years old.
Oh, no.
So most people would say, you need to get rid of your tattoos.
You need to do this.
You need to do this.
So I'm talking to him for two hours.
He locks his eyes on me and does not take his eyes off me for two hours.
Eye to eye.
Like, this kid is a rock star.
And the two things I wanted to understand was, who do you love most?
He said his mother.
And the second one is, why do you do drugs?
He said, because I don't want to feel.
And I said, because you want to feel or not feel.
So I want to understand where he's at mentally.
So I show up one month later.
I show up one month later.
After that, three times.
After the third time, one hour each, his mother.
And I helped him.
I said, you want to go to jail for the rest of your life and leave your mother on the street?
You can go do that.
And she's probably going to be run through by a bunch of guys.
Because you weren't the man of the house, and she doesn't have a good man in her life.
And so it's a repetitive cycle.
And so I gave him the real truth about what's probably going to happen.
So three times later, his mother calls me after three months, and she goes, my son used to tell me to go F myself every day.
And today, for the last few weeks, he's been telling me he loves me every day.
So I think that a lot of people tell people what to do.
Like in the word culture, there's a word called cult.
So we cult everybody to believe what we believe.
ISIS does the same thing to their kids and they do, you know, we think it's crazy and they think we're crazy for doing what we do.
And so I think that if I can love somebody unconditionally based upon understanding them and what they're doing, even when they go through rough times and we just continue to commit and love them, they'll start seeing what's possible.
And with him, he is now getting his GD. He'll be out of a juvenile hall program in about a year.
And I told him, come work for me, I'll hire you, because you're on track and you're doing great in life.
So it's interesting, his mentality shifted, and it was so simple.
We've got some more questions after the break.
Lisa and I have this foundation called HealthCore, which you've thankfully helped us on.
I appreciate it.
And, you know, we're around the country not taking care of kids who are in juvenile detention, but just average kids in high schools who probably aren't the star of the sports team, aren't the leader in the theater.
You don't get the advantages of the coaches and the other mentors that you get if you're really talented.
They're just trying to get through life.
How do you help them?
How do you take it one step down from the juvenile detention?
Or is it not?
Is it the same tactic no matter who you're talking to?
I believe the same topic, no matter if it's a foster care kid or DJJ kid, is creating value for what you want.
So people do things for value.
So for instance, you have a TV show, whether it's because you want to become a face so that you can impact more people's lives, you can make a living, like everybody does something for a reason.
And usually, um...
When they don't understand their value internally, we help them define it.
Like the book, GPS for Life, right in front of you.
We created a series of questions over 20 units.
Because most people, they write books to give content and information and recommendation suggestions versus asking people what they want to create for their own life.
A lot of time, kids don't know.
So what we do is then we do group discussion.
So we'll play games where we'll say, what are a quality of mentors you want?
Or what's your vision for life?
And some people have no clue.
Like they have one vision.
I want to be out of the hood.
I want to make a million dollars.
I want to be a pro athlete.
I want to, whatever that is.
And so we put it on a big wall and then other people work with each other to that experience of having 20, 30 kids in a room or 50 or 100 adults.
The adults are just as lost and more in a box based upon they've been told what to do and what to believe.
And from zero to two, we tell them to stand up and talk.
From two to 22, we tell them to sit down, be quiet, and look at the back of somebody's head in a classroom.
And then at 22, we tell them to stand back up and be productive, loving citizens and go change the world.
Well, we have an agrarian 1830s model for education, which we could do better on.
So, you know, if you don't mind, you mentioned this young man, Jesse, earlier that my producer caught you in the coffee shop downstairs with.
I'm only bringing this up because you actually were literally just meeting with the kid, trying to be a mentor, which shows the dimension that you are.
But I'd like to meet him.
Is that okay?
Sure.
Jesse, come on in here.
Oh, wow.
They're going to open multiple doors to the studio.
This place is like a...
You can actually store gold in here.
It's like Fort Knox of people.
Is this mic on?
Yes, have a seat there.
How are you?
I'm good.
Have a seat there.
I'm speaking to this mic right here.
I want to know a little bit about this Daniel Puder.
How did you meet him?
How did he play a role in your life?
Daniel Puder played a huge role in my life.
I met him through a very interesting friend who became my brother.
His name is Kylan Moore.
Right now, he's a rogue scholar.
Came from the hard streets of Compton.
I'm from Polo Grounds Projects in Harlem.
I thought that I lived a hard life until I met Kylan.
You know what I mean?
Kylan was taking bucket baths while pulling A's and, you know...
In some of the toughest schools in LA. He's a Rhodes Scholar now.
Yeah, yeah, it's amazing.
And a bucket bath, just explain to everybody.
A bucket bath is when you boil hot water, whether in your microwave or let it sit out in the sun for a while, and you take a washcloth, I think in his case it was a sock, and he would just wash his body.
While getting A's.
While getting A's, and he became a quarterback at Marist College at the time, private school.
And, you know, Colin introduced me to Daniel.
He was like, man, this is this guy who came to his neighborhood in Compton and was challenging people to arm wrestling match.
And at first, it didn't register because it doesn't make any sense because he showed me a picture of Daniel.
And I'm like, man, Blonde hair, blue eyes, you know?
Dashing.
He looks like a superhero.
Yeah, literally.
And I didn't believe it.
I'm like, man, let me look into this guy.
Either he's insane or he's really trying to do something real good.
One of the two, you know?
And I was convinced, like, hey, I gotta meet this guy.
I reached out to him in email.
You know, student loans was hitting.
It was hard.
And, you know, at that point in time, you're looking for as many allies as you can before you're outside the door of the college, you know?
And I reached out to him, and he reached back.
And we were exchanging these motivational videos back and forth, and...
I was like, man, I gotta meet this dude.
So, you know, I flew down to Florida.
I also had a European basketball invitational and he was in Florida.
So I'm like, you know, I gotta meet this guy when I'm down there.
And I was just like...
For me, it was the first time...
I mean, I've been around...
Being from Harlem, you see basketball players all the time, but they never really interact with you, email, while it's almost like looking at the stars in the sky.
You know, they're there, but you can't touch them.
And here's a guy willing to reach out to me and touch me.
I don't care what he looks like.
You know, he's willing to talk to me.
So I did that in, like, I think for a week...
I just studied.
We spoke, but I'm more of a prove-it kind of guy.
And I watched him sit at his laptop and just sit there and just discover how he can change kids and kids' lives.
And I saw all the books on his shelves.
He mastered Master some of the greatest speakers that I've seen.
And I even went as far as to take pictures of the books that he was reading because I want to do that.
Of course.
You know?
And it was one really pivotal moment in my life where, you know, I'm out of college, you know, got cut from the team, not because I wasn't good, but because, you know, politics.
Yeah.
And...
That contact was still on my phone.
My phone bill was off.
I was using my neighbor's Wi-Fi for WhatsApp.
And I'm like, I just connected.
And I'm like, yo, who can I call?
I have parents and stuff.
At the time, they was divorced.
And I moved upstate, so I was in a room, literally in a box.
By myself, with a TV, an old TV, and a laptop that I was hooking up to to watch videos over and over again, motivational videos.
I gotta keep myself sane.
So I had one contact, and I'm like, I'm gonna call Daniel Pewter.
I'm going to text him.
I said, Daniel, like we talked about earlier, my needs for my wants.
At the time, you know, society says you need, you know, it sounds generic, everyone says this, but you need Jordans, you need a Mac computer in order to be successful.
And coming from a private school, like I said, where I was at, I was convinced that I needed that stuff to succeed because I saw all the kids around me with it.
You know, and I reached out to him like, hey, I need a Mac computer.
You know, I need some Jotens.
You know, I got to get the latest fade haircut.
You know, he was just like, do you need that stuff or do you want that stuff?
And, you know, through the videos that he sent me and through the program of My Life, My Power, I realized that, like, I didn't need that stuff.
I wanted it.
And that I didn't need anyone to be great.
I needed myself.
I didn't need that stuff, you know?
So you know what I did?
I flipped over in my bed and that moment started doing push-ups every night.
Told myself, like, even though I'm not there, I'm going to get there somehow.
And it's so ironic because this past summer, I now run Lifetime Sky at a gym.
Where the pros go.
Yeah, and I just got in the game.
I run the gym now.
I guess you get into the games now.
Yeah, I actually got a chance to play against Kevin Durant.
Oh my goodness.
A blessing.
I beat him three times.
My team beat him three times.
My team beat him three times.
Well, he's a superstar because he connects.
What do you have to say to this guy here?
My power of my life, Daniel's done a lot of things for a lot of people, but you're a walking testimonial to his effect on people.
So what do you have to say to the guy?
Thank you.
Thank you so much for reaching out to me.
Thank you so much for being a star that you are.
Even that handshake alone just now, I'm able to still touch him even now.
Even at the peak of my success, that's huge.
Well, that handshake would have broken my hand.
As a surgeon, I'll stay clear.
Daniel, GPS for Life, well thought through.
My life, my power, the program in general, but most importantly, the legacy you're leaving behind.
Congratulations on all that.
God bless you for all you do, and you've made me an MMA fan, by the way.
