Maurice Clarett, Cory Gregory, and John Fosco | This Past Weekend #140
Sitting down one on one with Maurice Clarett, and eventually joined by his podcast cohosts John Fosco and Cory Gregory. Check out their podcast Business and Biceps https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/business-biceps/id1072159330?mt=2 Support Our Sponsors Squarespace http://squarespace.com/theovon 10% off your first purchase or domain Skillshare https://www.skillshare.com/theo 2 months unlimited access for $0.99 with this link Grey Block Pizza 1811 Pico Blvd. Santa Monica, CA http://bit.ly/GreyBlock Music “Shine” - Bishop Gunn http://bit.ly/Shine_BishopGunn Submit a video question on LiveRaise’s Fan Line: http://bit.ly/Theo_FanLineSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Today's episode is brought to you by Gray Block Pizza, and that's a great place to get a pizza pie.
He's a college football superhero and an embodiment of perseverance.
He's one-third of the Business and Biceps podcast squad, and they will be joining us later.
It is Maurice Claret.
How long have you been out here?
I've been out here about 14 years, I guess.
So 14 years would it be back in 04?
Yeah, actually, I guess maybe about 02 or 03. And when were you here?
You lived in Los Angeles.
Yeah, January 04. Yeah.
January, February, 04, yeah.
Yeah.
And was that fun?
Like, was that a fun time in your life, or what was that like being out here?
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
So just for my listeners, so if we could, could you kind of, if you could, I know this might be absolutely impossible.
Maurice Clarette, could you sum up like kind of like football and some of the Ohio State stuff maybe in like, you know, about two or three minutes or whatever you think you can?
Yeah, for people who may not be familiar, well, you know, I came out just as a highly touted recruit from Runa Nation.
Went to Ohio State and in the first time in history started as a running back for Ohio State.
Went out and went and won a national championship within my first year.
A huge amount of success from a personal level and from a, you know, obviously a career level.
And in the process of doing that, I always put it in context.
I got to remember that LeBron is about a year younger than me.
Oh, wow.
So around that time.
Yeah.
And so LeBron grew up maybe 40 minutes away from me.
And this is at the height of LeBron basically going to become LeBron.
You know, in high school when he's selling out college stadiums.
And at this time, you have, you know, 50 cents a new rapper.
Jay-Z's fairly new.
He had like the blueprint two out.
And I can just remember after having so much success in watching LeBron have his success, I can remember just me sort of losing focus as a college kid.
Oh, I see.
So you kind of said you kind of followed that, like his path, even though it wasn't your path, maybe.
Yes.
You know, and I'm speaking of hindsight is 2020, right?
Yeah.
So I can remember after being done with the season and, you know, as an 18-year-old kid, you won everything in high school.
Fast forward 13 months later, you won everything in college.
All of the adults around, I don't blame this on them because everybody's enjoying the moment.
When you're famous or popular or notarized, nobody tells you no.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
You get it all.
Everybody's just telling you yes.
And I can just remember, I can remember when 50 Cent had to end the club song came to audio.
Still one of the best.
Still one of the best albums.
Still one of the best albums.
Period, yes.
And I can just remember, you know, LeBron asking, oh, let's go up to Cleveland State and let's enjoy this.
And I remember Nike, Reebok, Cadidas, all these guys were chasing him.
And I could just remember just enjoying that a bit too much.
And then the reality of it is that I ended up getting suspended from having too many illegal benefits.
It wasn't LeBron's fault.
You know what I'm saying?
Just doing too much.
And what ended up happening was, and I always say it, that was probably the most impactful time from an individual standpoint because that was the first time I actually felt like depression.
Never really went through anything from a mental standpoint.
Never felt anything adverse from a personal level outside of sports.
In sports, if you have a hard time, you can watch film, you can lift weights, you can get in better conditioning, you can, as a comedian, you can learn how to tell better jokes.
But from a personal standpoint, I just didn't know how to process that.
That was a tougher thing.
Yeah, and that's an age when the voice inside of your head starts to become like a real voice, I feel like, at that point.
You can hear it more.
And so, you know, obviously I didn't realize that prior to that, from having so much success, there was so much sex, drinking, drugging.
But it was done in a celebratory standpoint, from a celebratory standpoint.
Like, you know, I'm celebrating a game or hanging out with the fellas.
It switched from having celebrations to me masking what I really felt.
Yeah.
Because I can't go play sports.
I can't go play the game.
I have no fucking clue as to what's going on in my life.
And so that's kind of like where life kind of really met me at.
And that's like a gray space.
Nobody can kind of navigate out of this.
And nobody knows what's going on.
You know what's going on.
You don't want to reveal your feelings.
And that's kind of like what really had happened with me.
And you probably can.
I mean, at that point, like you couldn't trust the media very much.
It was like, I'm sure you were probably not scared, but just directionless, maybe.
I don't know.
Yes.
So just to put context to it, after I got kicked out of school, there was a two-year waiting period before I was allowed to go to the NFL.
And at that time, I really thought that the NFL would let me enter the draft because, you know, I was big enough, strong enough, and everything else.
But when they didn't allow me to enter the draft, I was just kind of like sitting two years away from football.
So I ended up going to Vegas to watch.
It was a Roy Jones and Antonio Tarver fight.
I go out there and when I watch it, I'm in the House of Blues and Jim Brown was out there.
Jim Brown hits me up.
He says, yo, you know, I remember I helped you out with your case at Ohio State.
Can you please like, you know, get away from that environment?
You just don't look like the same individual that I seen, you know, a few months.
Prior to that.
And so that was the original reason for me coming out to L.A. So when I came out to L.A. So you took that to heart when Jim Brown said that?
Yeah, because, you know, he had seen me as the 19-year-old kid who still was wanting to play football and everything like that.
And when he seen me at the Antonio Tarber fight, that was probably seven months later, eight months later.
Different you.
Different me.
You know, I had partied all night.
You know, we up to four or five in the morning.
You know, you know, you know that look.
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah, you know that look.
I saw one time I used to go by makeup, dude.
I'd be so, I've never worn makeup in my life, dude.
I'd be in a 24-hour CVS at like 5 a.m.
Trying to get yourself together.
Asking people about bronzer and blush.
I'm just trying to look okay for a meeting in the morning.
So yeah, I feel you 100%.
So he saw you and he said he kind of just, you know, commented and then you moved to Los Angeles.
Yeah, I commented and I moved out here with the whole motivation to come out here and to gather myself.
And when I got out here, what I didn't realize is that, you know, he was in North Carolina or South Carolina, wherever he was at.
And there was a period of time when I was out here by myself waiting for him to come back out.
Who, Jim Brown?
Jim Brown.
And so when I got out here, I was like, all right, you know, I'm cool.
I kind of got away from Ohio too.
You know, like during the process of me getting away you know i got back into the streets i'm selling dope i'm selling weed i'm hustling you know what i'm saying so i was full-fledged into the streets and i'm full-fledged away from everything sports related i'm just all the way deep in the hood right i separate myself i come out here uh because throughout that process also uh and i was talking to john this morning i got almost robbed three times and the last time that almost get robbed my mother was in the house you know some guys on our bushes oh wow uh ended up uh coming outside you know we was in the suburbs
at the time so these guys ran off you know by that time i was like man i got to get the out of here you know too close to home too close to home and do you think you were in those streets like do you think you went back into drugs and into like or into selling that type of environment because there's still a level of you probably got a a lot of street cred did you like was it just for the hustle was it just for money or do you think there was because there's a you know there's a level you can always have acclaim at in the streets i feel like that you that's different than you know in
the in the world like in society like in the streets if your clout is a certain level it's kind of always there it's in that space well when i look back on it um there was a few things that put me into streets one my brother had needed money because he had just got arrested right he had needed money for an attorney the second thing that put me back into the streets is just familiar familiarity yeah if i can say it right right just the feel familiarity of how do i take care of myself and i think there's some sort of glorification that when you come from the hood um
the machoism of selling drugs and the coolness right is attractive right so it's something still almost as cool as athletics in a way in a way and you still you're still allowed to be a somebody right and my access to me being able to get drugs from people uh the drugs that i was selling they they these people it was easy to get to these people so so so i'm speaking from that perspective and i gotta say and also just from being just being a bit more real uh i i was just a dumb fuck when it came to school right you know what i'm saying so there was nothing like you
know let me go ahead and get an education and you know football's not working out let me go ahead and live my life in some academic format so it just wasn't there you just couldn't even pay attention in school it just wasn't your thing it just wasn't interesting like when you look back on it uh when you grew up in an environment you know like um when you grew up in an environment the only thing that you see as being successful what you deem successful is guys either selling dope or the cool guys or the athletes that's the only thing that you want to gravitate to as a kid especially like probably growing up black in america at your age i mean i remember the
only successful black men i even knew growing up were the guys on coming to america no joke or the dallas cowboys when i really think about it as a child like even or the guy on uh in the heat of the night the you know virgil tidbit yeah but see when i think back like that's who i it's like there was only a really yeah like i remember and i've talked about this before yeah if i even remember watching commercials for like disneyland or something like that it was always white people like there was probably yeah so i can only imagine what the vision probably looked like being a young black child you know yeah
so see you just you just put that into context and so you gotta you gotta put everything in context you're more more about being cool is important to you rather than doing the right thing and building your life at 18 19 years old oh cool is it cool as it and so the selling of the drugs makes me cool to the women right the selling of the drugs gets me money in my pocket to do foolish to buy champagne to buy liquor but you don't realize the habits that you're forming from this are detrimental to you yeah so at that point uh i
can remember i'm out in at that time in vegas and jim brown's like yo slow down like yo like just slow down i can remember even i remember at that time too james prince was out there i remember james prince was like yo you tripping you know man because he had seen me as a regular football player and then to see me in that condition i can remember him saying like yo you're tripping you know what i'm saying slow your ass down so i came out here and in the process of jim brown not being around i went down to sunset yeah and i go down to sunset when i'm going into hollywood when i'm partying all
day oh yeah uh you know partied on a monday never heard of party on a monday party on a tuesday party on a wednesday you know party on a thursday hey come get this brunch you know but it's hollywood's crazy man you can always find it you can find it this group of people that it just never ends so so just take like this so put this in the context i'm from ohio yeah from youngstown and columbus ohio i don't care how progressive you think ohio is if you're from ohio it's still slow in comparison to these larger cities and how they do stuff so
in ohio if you're uh fucking drunk out of your mind and high out of your mind at fucking two in the afternoon somebody would say you're crazy in la they walk past you like there's no big deal yeah you know because this is a social function and so i got caught into that crowd and it was just a good time but also in ohio you can be very popular you can come to la you can hide right nobody knows you so they don't know that uh your accountability for being a professional uh there's no accountability right they don't know that yeah there's no accountability you can fake it it's all yes there's no you can't see any
of the behind the scenes of anyone here really no like in in a smaller city you can see you might run into maurice's cousin or maurice's aunt or a friend of maurice's who's like he's not doing well or here everybody will lie to prop everybody up yes and nobody even knows what anybody's really doing anyway and nobody really knows and so from there you know obviously i partied and jim brown reached out to me a couple times and i went to his house up in the hills and just from the the discipline he tried to implement on me i was resistant for him i was like yo how much how much of
africa is in jim brown's house i bet i could see him having masks i could see him having like traditional mombasa warriors like that he gets really real in there does he no he is serious dude uh serious and just he has he has a great spirit and a great soul but uh if if if if i if i remember correctly just a bait like this very basic house wow but one thing he talks about is his view like if you go up there you can just see the whole city like it's a phenomenal view yeah and uh he always hosts like uh he probably still does it to some degree he used to host like
meetings at his house every monday and tuesday nice and bring different dudes from different gangs all over la to his house and you know bring in uh just people who would speak and it was just about basically basic fellowship on life so he's big on that yeah so he had the american program and this was helping guys transition from prison giving them job skills giving them uh different support once they were released back into society so he had felt that since he's dealing with people who are gangsters that they would take me in like a little brother and provide some structure for me to basically get better.
Great idea, but I just wasn't ready for it.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, you know, you can, in my mind, I was a celebrity.
In my mind, I'm like, fuck, I'm somebody from Ohio.
I'm not about to come out here and listen to guys and have structure and discipline and go to bed.
It's hard to hear.
It's hard to hear when you're a celebrity, isn't it?
Yes.
When you think you're a celebrity, right?
Right.
When you think you're a celebrity, when your ego really starts to puff up, it's hard to, you can listen to people, you can look at people, but it's hard to really hear them.
There's something that's different.
I would call it there's no discernment, right?
So because this is what happens, you get to a space with how you've always wanted to live your life, right?
So, you know, I grew up in the MTV Cribs era.
I always say that, right?
Oh, yeah.
And so to a kid, that is impressionable.
You know, if I made it, you know, like, who doesn't?
Like, let's like, you know, I have a woman.
We've been together 14 years, right?
But in that space, I want to have sex with the most beautiful women.
I want money everywhere.
I want a fucking Bentley outside.
I want a Rolls-Royce outside.
I just want to live life.
Oh, yeah.
So anything that you get.
Tigers.
Everybody gets tigers.
So, you know what I'm saying?
You get to a, you're living some sort of pseudo moment in your head.
You don't want this to end.
And so now you're coming to me as an advisor with a great advice.
And I'm like, fuck, like, it makes sense, but this isn't helping me to do all this shit that I want to do.
Right.
Like, this isn't helping me, you know, fuck all these girls.
This isn't helping me be cool in the club.
And fame is like fame or notoriety is fucking intoxicating.
It's intoxicating, especially when you don't have a lot of feelings already inside of yourself that kind of that you can notice that sort of thing.
Like you don't have like a real framework or a groundwork that builds you up from the inside any, you know, anyway.
And I'm not saying that you don't, you know, I'm just saying you're from my own life.
It's like, I know that there's things that's like, man, when things come in, it seems appealing.
But you got to ask yourself, when did you figure out the discovery process of knowing yourself?
You know, nobody's thinking 18, 19 years old.
Maybe.
Come on.
Listen to me.
I'm still at what do I value?
How do I love myself?
You know, what is really important to me?
I was sitting down today with John having coffee.
I said, man, like I'm having fun sitting on a table outside having coffee at Starbucks.
I can appreciate just cars going by.
You know what I'm saying?
Different appreciation.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, it's, yeah, I mean, I got it.
You know, I'm a sober guy now.
So I got in a program about two and a half years ago.
And that's the first time that I started learning.
That's the first time I could almost really even hear anybody.
Like before that, life was just this.
It was great and there were great moments.
And I was involved and invested, but I just couldn't, I don't know.
The things hadn't lined up enough.
It was still too much of a Rubik's Cube, you know, for me.
But not to take your story away.
So you end up back out here.
Jim Brown has you up in the hills.
He's trying to help out.
Yes.
And so at that time, I disconnected from him and all things responsible.
Ended up coming and met another gentleman, still a good friend to me today.
And his name was High.
He was obviously in the 30 for 30. Oh, yeah.
So I'm in the 30 for 30. So I met High.
And at that time, High was under a federal case, a federal racketeering case, and that's highly noted and all over the internet.
And so what happened was we ended up going to a party at his house, and he lived out in the marina.
And as we went to the party at the house, I ended up bumping into him to make a long story short, you know, we was just talking shit to each other, just, you know, like, who are you?
Where are you from?
Like, how did you get out here?
We ended up partying some more that night.
And then he was just like, yo, like, you're kind of from Ohio.
You've landed in LA.
You don't know anybody out here.
Like, you know, hook up with me.
Like, let me help you get your shit together.
And I don't really understand like even how it happened, even when I look back now, but it was like one of the best.
It was one of the best and worst things that happened to me.
The best because I got a friend and a brother for life.
Like that was, that was guaranteed.
There was also like a cool deal of just me getting exposed to other people who are successful outside of athletics.
Okay, right.
You got in the end crowd.
Yeah.
So I never knew somebody.
So they own a shit ton of real estate, you know, probably a couple billion dollars worth of real estate.
And I could just remember thinking to myself, I'm like, how the fuck are these people so rich?
You know, as naive as it sounds at 20, 19, 20 years old, I never seen somebody who had had money outside of athletes.
I couldn't even conceive of people being like that massively successful.
And so what ended up happening was that he was under a racketeering case, you know, at that time.
And he was getting ready to go to trial, like maybe that next summer.
And so every day he would get up at eight in the morning and he would have his curfew at 11, but he thought he was going to prison for a long time.
So it was all about living life to the fullest, right?
Okay.
And you were on that wave.
And I was just, I happened to be a part of the boat.
So I'm out here trying to semi-train for football, nothing really serious.
And I'm also around him every day because this is the only person I know.
Right.
So we're talking about a guy who has three or four fucking Bentleys, a fucking house in Beverly Hills, a house in fucking by the beach.
And just seeing that as a young man, it can't really, I could imagine probably in your scenario, I don't even, I don't know if it could help that much.
Seeing all that.
But it makes it worse.
And I got to say this.
One of the worst things that can happen is that you get into a vehicle or you get around people who are super successful and you lose sight that this is their success.
You're just living in it.
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying?
Oh, yeah.
And so the hunger for me to want to become something had faded because I thought I made it.
And 19, 20 years old, you're not processing like this is their shit.
You know what I'm saying?
But you have a sex with beautiful women.
You know, because there's a lot of beautiful, insecure women out here.
It's the sex belt out here, man.
It's the sex belt.
Think about this.
You have a Mercedes.
I got a 2004, 5 Mercedes 6004 in my garage.
It's 2004.
You have a 745 out here.
It's brand new cars.
You're living in the marina.
You know, you got money in your pocket.
You're partying up.
You got goldfish made out of real gold.
You know what I'm saying?
I remember they couldn't even swim.
Like, damn, those fish are heavy, man.
Like, that's a 14-carat flounder right there.
You know, they got all kinds of stuff.
So you have the bad scenario.
You get caught up.
You have influences, but their life isn't your life.
And you're starting to believe that it is.
Of course, at that age, who wouldn't?
I'm starting to, but it's easier to live the lie.
And you end up, and I remember you ended up back in the NFL combine.
Yes.
Went back to the NFL, went to the combine, failed horribly.
Ended up coming back to L.A. And as I come back to L.A., I'm thinking like, I'm not going to get drafted anymore.
And after I ended up getting drafted in the third round, I went to Denver.
And really, it was just a shit show in a nutshell.
I couldn't stop partying.
I was literally going to the clubs, and we'll stay out till maybe three or four in the morning.
And we have to be to practice at seven.
So I'm coming to practice in the morning like shit.
You know what I'm saying?
Not just a professional athlete.
And I always talk about Denver because I can't really shit on Denver.
They tried to help me, right?
So throughout the process, they tried to sit me down with a sports psychologist and they said, hey, you know, can you please slow down?
You know, get with the sports psychologist and allow her to assist you because they kept on saying you've experienced a lot of trauma before you've come to here, right?
Instability.
So at my mind, I'm like, okay, I'm not about to sit here and talk to this lady.
One, because she is a lady.
And two, I think that I'm a gangster.
And this is like an old white lady trying to talk to me about ignorance.
You know, not that she has some information, but just pure ignorance.
So you fast forward that story.
We're getting ready to play the Indianapolis Colts.
This is the third game of the preseason.
They come to me again and they say, hey, can you sit down and work with the sports psychologist, but also get on a practice squad?
Like just sit yourself down, like allow us to develop it.
In my mind, I process that as I'm not good enough and you want to sit me out.
Couldn't see the forest from the trees, right?
So the next thing you know, I push her away.
They call me that next day.
They cut me that morning.
I ended up getting on the plane, coming back to LA.
And when I got here, you know, the depression went from like, you know, a two to a negative 40, right?
And it's building behind the scenes.
You don't even know it.
Absolutely.
It's such a monster the way that depression and that kind of stuff and all of the, it can be building in your base and you don't even realize it.
100%.
100%.
And when I get here, this one I knew I was real fucked up.
Like sometimes like, you know, you have moments of clarity where you can identify how you really feel.
I went to a party off of sunset and I can remember like it was yesterday, I'm standing in the party and as I'm standing there, the whole party's going on and I literally had smoked before I came.
I had drunk before I came and I literally felt nothing.
Damn.
Didn't feel high.
Didn't feel drunk.
Didn't feel connected to the moment.
Didn't feel the party.
Didn't feel the music.
Like just was like in this like stale space.
So anybody ever been fucked up off of drugs know what I'm talking about.
Right.
So the next thing you know, I get in the party.
I'm fucking around.
And I was like, man, I got to get the fuck out of here.
I just knew I had to exit LA.
So I get back to the house.
I went to, at that time, I was banking with fucking whoever that next day, withdrew my money because they didn't have the same bank in Ohio, caught a one-way ticket to Ohio.
And went home.
Left all my shit, right?
So I connected with my coach when I came back home.
And when I connected with him, the whole thing was like, hey, you know, I need to get my shit together.
I feel lost.
Like, I'm just like totally disconnected from fucking reality.
So I ended up coming back to Ohio.
When I got back here, the coach had gave me a bunch of instructions, like, you know, a bunch of shit to do to help me get it.
Direction, direction.
Did you follow it?
No.
But he always talks about Coach Tressel always talks about takeaways after we're done talking.
And he said, you know, I need you to go back to school, but then I also need you to get in better shape.
The first thing was like fucking shit ton hard because I couldn't get back to school because I didn't know how to do the fucking work, right?
So I was rejecting that in the back of my head.
The second one, I said, okay, I'll start to get in shape.
So as I started to get in shape and wake up and go to the gym that he referred me to, like I started to feel better, look better the whole nine.
But what happened was I had a ton of free time on my hands, right?
So I'm 21 at this time, ton of free time on my hands, no money, can't pay for rent, really didn't have like the humility to go get a job.
Right.
Back to the streets.
Yeah, back to the streets.
So you're still a king.
You're always a king there.
In my mind.
In my mind.
So I get back in the streets.
And as I'm getting back into the streets, the drugs are not as accessible as they were before because the guy who I was messing with, he ends up going to the federal penitentiary.
So now I'm messing with all type of new guys.
Inconsistent.
I still got back, but I got LA habits.
So LA habits are spend money like it's fucking going out of style.
You were just with a guy who spends thousands every day.
So I'm still caught into that mind frame.
Oh, yeah.
You'll tip a rich guy in LA.
There'll be a fucking rich dude.
You give him 20. He'll be like, what the?
I don't even want this.
But you lose your fucking mind.
Agreed.
You lose your mind, right?
And so I come here.
I mean, so I get out there.
The next thing you know, money's starting to slow up.
So now I'm like, fuck it.
I got to start robbing people now.
So now I'm robbing people.
That's great.
And not to laugh, man, it's just so wild, bro.
Fucking delusional, though.
You know, I could have came back to LA, humbled myself, really talked to my guy and said, hey man, I got to get my shit together more.
My pride wouldn't allow me just to be where I was at, right?
So next thing you know, I end up catching a robbery case in Columbus.
And so I'm kicked out of college, kicked out of the NFL.
Did you do it?
Were you the robber?
Yeah, 100%.
100%.
Yeah, I got caught.
You know what I'm saying?
He gave up his shoulder pads.
He ran a 4-2.
It was definitely.
I feel bad.
Like, what is this?
This is 2018 now.
I feel fucking bad for doing it.
Were you a good robber or not?
I was good into that point.
No, but the irony of this, this is probably our first time saying this shit.
This is the wrong people.
So the people who are supposed to go and rob, they weren't there.
Are you an inaccurate robber?
You're supposed to hit the A gap and you hit the B gap.
That's what happened.
So if the people listen, I'm sorry, you know, this is Theo laughing, not me.
No, and I'm just laughing.
I'm laughing because I can laugh now at the pain.
I can see, you know, it replaces it when you can laugh at it later.
You got that right.
I don't know.
Yeah, you were a different.
I was out of my fucking mind.
Out of your mind.
Out of my mind.
And so I ended up getting caught for that, and I was out on bond, but January 2006 to August when I got arrested, I was just out of my fucking mind.
And, you know, I'm committing more crimes because I have no money.
My lady's pregnant at this time.
Our daughter's getting ready to be born.
And I'm like, you know, you're going to the penitentiary.
It's like the perfect storm.
You ever seen that movie, The Perfect Storm, with the Andrea Gale?
No.
And it's like the ship and everything.
The ship, it's like it starts off it as a great plan.
And then next thing you know, it's just trying to catch shrimp.
And it's in the middle of like nine tidal waves and a typhoon.
You could probably call it that.
Yeah, it just seemed like, I can't even imagine that at 21. At 21, so just 21, imagine having everything at the height of your life.
You lose everything.
Put this in context, right?
After you lose everything, every decision that you make is fucking retarded.
Yeah.
Or you fucking think about it.
Excuse my language, but it's stupid.
Yeah.
And you fast forward.
Everyone's ignorant at 21. Yes.
Especially people that, you know, if you don't have certain guidance or you're not really connected to whatever guidance you have, you know?
I think that's good.
You're not connected to the guidance you have.
I think that that would accurately describe me.
And from there, nine months later, I end up going to get caught.
I came down to Columbus.
This is a real story.
I tried to tell it to ESPN, but they didn't include it.
And as I come down to Columbus, I get off on the wrong exit.
This is about three in the morning.
As I get off on the exit, I come to the stoplight and I make a U-turn in the middle of the road.
So when I make the U-turn, there was a Home Depot parking lot.
There's a police officer sitting in there.
Make the U-turn.
I have an AK-47 on the passenger side, right?
I'm out on bond.
And as he comes up to me, I start thinking about this episode from cops, right?
I have no fucking clue why.
Bad boy.
Yeah.
So I'm thinking to myself, when he walks up, I'm going to pull off.
And from there, you know, I get away.
So he walks up on the car.
And literally, I can see when he looked on the passenger side, he see the fucking rifle.
So he's like nervous as shit.
I fucking speed off.
He's running back to his car and I'm coming over this on this bridge on this thing called Bryce Road.
I get on the orange ramp.
He's right behind me.
Here's a real deal.
I'm trying to get away in the Hyundai, Santa Fe.
You know what I'm saying?
Take the Get White car.
You know what I'm saying?
That's hectic, boy.
Yeah.
And so now the next thing you know, we're running down the freeway and we get about four or five miles down the road.
And as I get further down the road, you know, I'm not from Louisiana.
I'm from Youngstown, right?
We have fucking like buildings and shit.
I start to see the woods, right?
And so I'm thinking to myself, like, you know, brothers don't do no woods, right?
A lot of brothers end in the woods.
Even on cops.
Even on cops, that's where cops end every time he's, it's in the woods.
Absolutely.
So let me turn my ass around.
So I turn my ass around.
The next thing you know, they have the fucking spike strips they throw out.
They bust the top.
Get a cop out, bro.
If I'm a cop, a real cop, dude, get up there and shoot somebody.
Lay the strips down.
You know what I'm saying, bro?
That's easy.
That's like when they hire a dog to do the cop's job.
Get out there and get your neck wet.
Well, they got me, they cop me.
Hit the strips?
Yeah, I hit the strips.
So it's like when they throw them, hopefully never be in the situation you're going to run.
Those fucking strips are like probably 40 yards long, man.
Oh, wow.
You throw them out there.
Probably 20. I would say legitimate 20 yards.
They throw them out there and you can't even swerve to get around them.
And they busted the tires.
And the next thing you know, I ended up getting pulled over, you know, and easily getting pulled over.
Easily getting pulled over at that point.
And they took me out.
They roughed me up, threw me in the back of the car, shit, and basically took me downtown.
And the next thing you know, I call this like one of the, I call it like my divine intervention moment.
You know what I'm saying?
Because I believe personally, had that not happened, I really believe, and I know people talk about it a lot, I can just see myself either going to prison for life or being dead.
Yeah, because what's next after that?
When you think about the scale of anything, what's next after running from police and having guns?
It's like there's not much else after that.
Bro, you keep on pushing the proverbial bar until you just fucking believe that shit doesn't stink anymore.
And the next thing you know, you put yourself in a horrible situation.
Were you grateful, you think, when that happened a little bit?
That's what I see.
I guarantee if you're going to talk to people on treatment, talk to people who got locked up, even though you don't want to admit it because it sounds crazy, you're glad that you're in a circumstance that you can't get in your way anymore.
And that was my exact feeling.
I can't get in my way anymore because if I do it, I'm going to fuck it up.
I just don't have the discipline right now.
And another thing that happened to me, I went to court that next week, because I was Wednesday.
I went to court like that next Monday or some shit.
The judge had mandated that I get a mental health assessment.
So I've been pushing away all this mental health assistance in college and the pros and all this other shit.
She mandated I got it.
And I was suffering from anxiety and depression.
Yeah.
Right.
Finally get on mental health medication.
My first seven months of my incarceration, literally in a room probably about the third of this size, a nine by four cell you lock down 23 hours out the day.
You know what I'm saying?
Three pairs of drawers, three socks, three t-shirts, same toilet that you're pissing shit in.
It's the same shit that you drink water out of.
You know what I'm saying?
Literally just basic.
Basic shit.
And that process, I call that like, you know, like probably the most introspective awakening process of my life.
It was almost like a childhood or like an adolescence in a weird way because you're very limited.
There's not much you can do.
You can't really, you're safe in a way.
You can't really harm yourself.
Great way to look at it.
You know?
Great way to look at it.
It's a good chance for your brain to just be patient for a minute.
You know what you do?
You empty yourself because when you get caught, and this is a real experience, and I've heard more people admit to it, you start to think about everything you've done wrong.
Yeah.
And you start to like cleanse your mind of thoughts of things to put you in here.
Right.
Because there's nothing to distract you.
You can't do anything to distract yourself.
And what ended up happening was like the greatest fucking thing, all of that isolation, a guy, I will promote this book to the day I die.
A guy dropped off a book, a small 70-page read called As a Man Thinketh by James Allen.
The most impactful book I've ever read in my life.
Bar none, comparison to none.
Very simple.
And I was asking myself, like, how did you get Aries?
And after reading the book fucking 70 times in that situation, the book kept on showing me that thoughts are things until thought is linked with purpose, nothing intelligent should ever happen.
Until thought is linked with purpose, nothing intelligent should ever happen.
I kept on thinking to myself, like, what the fuck does that mean at first, right?
What a man thinks about, plants in his brain, plants in his mind, he shall manifest.
Whatever you conceive, believe, and achieve, and speak up over, it shall come.
So true, isn't it?
Bro, so fucking true.
So simple, though.
Yeah.
But when we grow up, we think like life is just a series of events, like random shit happens and you have no control over it.
This game's supreme control over me creating my life.
Wow.
And so I said, oh, I thought I was a gangster.
So I responded as a gangster.
I talked as a gangster, but gangster shit has Consequences within the American system.
You ended up as a gangster.
You're running from the police.
You got AKs on the seat.
That's you get everything that you want.
You know what I'm saying?
So then I'm transitioned to prison.
At this time, I get seven and a half years.
Now, when I take this medication, I'm stable.
I'm calm.
I'm cool.
Like, there's no anxiety.
There's no like, I got to get somewhere and go.
Something that makes you go.
Yeah, absolutely.
Like a dirty motor.
A dirty fucking motor.
100% you can label it that.
I get to prison.
There's a gentleman by the name of Mr. Kellekante, the warden of the prison.
Beautiful guy.
He talked a bunch, but he said, Maurice, my father was a chief of Sierra Leone for 15 years.
Wow.
He said in Africa, he said, when guys would do something wrong, we would bring them closer to the village, figure out what's going wrong, help them out, fix them back up, and then send them back out.
He said, in America, you all throw people away.
He said, this is not over.
I don't want to throw you away.
So I'm like, all right, this is like, all right, cool.
I've been in my fucking way this much, right?
Next thing you know, he said, I'm about to put you in a bunch of psychological, social, and emotional supportive courses.
Right.
At this point, I never heard of this shit, but for those who don't know, it's therapy.
All he told me is like, you're going to therapy.
But guys in prison don't want to call it therapy.
It's just you're going to class.
And so through the process of that, I start going to these fucking classes every day from like eight in the morning till 12 in the afternoon.
And could you, how educated were you at this point?
And not judging your education or anything, but like at this point, how were you like, could you read a book?
No, I was going to get into that.
No.
So I could read the words, but I probably couldn't comprehend.
Right.
Right.
So my talent allowed them to, or I allowed myself to basically be pushed through school.
So it was about 10th grade.
Like me and Corey were laughing.
I had a 13 on my ACT and I cheated to get into college.
You know what I'm saying?
Right.
Like just.
Right.
It was all the barriers weren't there.
There was nothing to tell you, hey, look, there was no mirrors really for you.
It was just all just one-way signs.
As long as you can generate revenue on this football field, we'll find a way to get you to the football field.
And then you never think it's going to end.
Of course not.
You know what I'm saying?
So we literally got done with that.
But then another thing happened after I was doing that.
I didn't realize that that same motivation that I had to be a great football player was the same.
Like that was an energy that was inside of me just wanted to do something phenomenal.
Right.
So I said, okay.
Oh, that's a great.
I was going to ask you about this.
Yeah.
So I said, what do you do when you want to be good in football?
You go watch film from people you want to be like.
So I said, okay, I want to be a businessman because there were so many entrepreneurial things that drug dealing had gave me.
I always say crime in its inception is entrepreneurial.
I want to take control of my own destiny.
Oh, yeah, drug dealer.
People always look at a drug dealer like a bad guy.
I'm like, that man is a businessman.
Wrong product.
Right.
Yeah, bad product.
Bad product, but he's the businessman.
He sources product.
He sells.
He retains customers.
He gives consignment.
He work with logistics.
That's really true.
You can capital allocation.
We can go on and on and on.
Agreed.
But that's what he does.
And so I said, okay, let me formally teach myself about this.
So I start educating myself in reading and reading.
So I used to go to commissary.
And when people would send me money, $20, $30 here, I would start to get legal pads and I would start to do book reports and just read from people, read from people, read from people, read Entrepreneur, Incorporated, Fast Company, Wall Street Journal, New York Times.
And how are you feeling at this point?
Like, are you like, I mean, are you still thinking about football at this point?
No, so at that time I was 22 and I had seven and a half years would have put me out of prison.
I'd have been 30 years old.
So at that point, I'm like, you know, I'll never play football again.
And so I was just anxious to learn something else that I can take care of myself with.
And so through reading, I was just like, yo, there's a fucking big world out here.
You can be successful.
Anything you want.
Anything you want.
And if you ever hear me talk, I always talk about fucking reading changed my life.
Nothing else.
Reading changed my life.
It just opened my eyes up to what was possible, what you can do, how you can create your world, how you can take that same work ethic and place it elsewhere.
And what about your child at this point?
Is your baby born yet?
Yeah, so she's born and she's- You can't see her.
You can see her.
During visitations.
So what would happen is that, you know, every probably three months, and I stopped them from coming because it was easier to live the life prison as if they didn't exist.
Oh wow.
Or did you tell yourself that?
So it became hard.
So if you came to see me, it will remind me of what I was missing.
Oh, wow.
So if I see you, I got to see like, fuck, this is a whole child.
She's around me.
I mean, she's around me in the moment.
I'm visiting my emotions that I cut off in prison.
This shit is like for real.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, what the fuck am I doing?
You'll start to beat yourself up.
Is that a common practice for people that are inmates sometimes or people that are incarcerated?
Oh, you have two different extremes.
Some guys like a ton of visits because they like to live in the outside world.
Right.
So, you know, prison is like, prison, I always say, is the most intense environment you can ever be in.
You know what I'm saying?
So just think about this, right?
And there's no women in there.
It's all men?
The guard, women.
The guards are women sometimes.
Oh, that's got to be, that's got to even be worse.
Like, damn, I can't even get a woman.
This one's making me go to bed.
Yeah, man.
It's fucking nuts, man.
Just imagine like six o'clock in the morning.
So, first of all, the lights never go out.
Just imagine this.
I used to remain in college, I wouldn't turn the lights out, dude, and it fucking pissed me off, bro.
So you'll be pissed off in front of me.
Dude, Lester, yeah.
If fucking Lester's out there, they call him lit up Lester, bro.
This dude was fluorescent as fuck.
Bulbs all day, bro.
Bulb, bulb, bulb, bulbs.
The dude loved light bulbs on.
All day.
He'd walk in any room and he wouldn't even in the room and just turn on the fucking lights and roll out.
Like, fuck him.
Yeah, there was something rotting in his head.
If he had lights on, it made him feel comfortable.
So he would cut them on everywhere he went, man.
And fuck you, Lester, bro.
So, I mean, he's a nice kid, but he wasted a lot of money around America with all this waddage.
Erroneous wattage, bro.
Well, prisoners are wasting a lot of money.
And they keep the fucking lights on all day.
But just, could you imagine six in the morning, you have to be like it's game day every day?
You know, it's fucking nuts, bro.
You know what I'm saying?
But it's game day, you know, right?
Like, just, and we're not talking about like sporadic events.
You're talking about on a consistent basis, guys getting their ass kicked at six in the morning.
Yeah.
You know, we got into it at recreation last night.
We're going to chow.
You get your ass kicked on the way to chow.
You know, you're talking about motherfuckers getting, you know, fucking baby oil and hot water, throwing in their face over fucking card games.
You're talking about motherfuckers just intense environment all day.
What were some things that you liked about it?
Well, the one thing you like about prison is the respect factor.
And so in society, if I disrespect you or you disrespect me, we can like walk away, you know, or hire lawyers.
We can do other things.
In prison, it is the ultimate punishment fast.
So there's no lying.
There's no talking behind people's back.
There's no people bullshitting you.
There's no stealing if you can't like defend yourself or taking what you want from people.
There's no gossiping.
There's none of that.
And everything has a serious demeanor.
People in prison literally don't look at each other, right?
So I can remember like for four years walking through prison, like you don't look at people.
Because you don't want to show your cards.
Your cards are in your eyes.
If we don't talk to each other, we don't have no business with each other.
We don't need to look at each other.
We don't need to speak to each other.
So there's a sense of organization in prison.
That's fascinating.
There's a sense of discipline within the element or within the environment, right?
Did you have altercations in prison or no?
Yeah, just over, but over bullshit, over the washer.
So you just think about this, right?
So you have a washer and this is a serious thing.
Like if you allow somebody to skip you online to wash your clothes, it could be perceived wrong.
You have arguments over the microwave.
These are serious things.
You have arguments over a basketball game, right?
And so this forces you to defend like your space.
And so prison, everybody's trying to, just imagine you're in a neighborhood and all of the cells are houses.
Everybody's trying to state claim as to who they are in that neighborhood.
And it's either you're with the guys, you're with the populace, you know what I'm saying?
The majority, either be it with the bloods, Crips, Mexican guys, you know, or guys who are within a white gang.
And there's many different factions.
You have all of that within one housing unit.
And so for everybody to coincide, there has to be an extreme amount of respect amongst each other.
This is every day, bro.
Every day.
You only have three telephones.
You're telling monopoly, but with knives, bro.
It sounds fucking intense.
So you just imagine that.
So I've learned quickly when I'm here, this ain't my program.
Right.
Like, this ain't my deal.
Like, you know, what I did in the streets and what the consequences were, like, yo, this is not you.
Like, and so I had to admit that to myself, that I'm not ready to die here.
Right.
You know, so I'm not ready to fight over a fucking microwave.
I'm not ready to, well, I'm not ready to die over a microwave.
I'm not ready to die over disrespect in prison.
Like, it's just not, this is not my environment.
And so you have guys like literally who are fucking nuts.
And I can call it for what it is.
These guys are fucking nuts, guys who are never going home.
So they got nothing to lose.
My sentence is seven and a half years.
So my circumstances aren't like yours because the average person in prison who I was at, these guys are doing 15 years or better.
So the way they look at what's going on, the way I look at what's going on is two different things.
So I said, Reese, your program is to get your ass in here, read, educate yourself, figure out what you want to do and get the fuck out of here.
That's what I did.
And at this point, when you get out, who's still there that was there whenever, like, are any of the celebrities and the stars?
Is any of that still?
No.
So I give it to Mike Tomlin, the coach for Pittsburgh.
He reached out and wrote me a letter, which is beautiful because I'm like, you know, you guys are fucking, at that time, they had won the Super Bowl.
And for you to think about Maurice Clarette in fucking prison, who've never, I didn't go to the NFL around for yards, I thought, which was great.
And literally, that was it.
But, you know, you start to look at it different because you start to look at life as, you know, these people don't owe me anything.
They don't owe me the personal connection.
And you start to realize that your friendships are just circumstantial.
Right.
You know, as long as you're that guy entertaining or you have a certain status amongst peers, people would love to be associated with you.
But when you're not that guy anymore, like there was never a human connection or a human part to that.
You know what I'm saying?
And so I can't say it was the same in all cases, but you're not a factor.
You don't help me get pussy.
You don't help me get in the club.
You don't help me get an endorsement deal.
You don't help me to do that.
So we don't hold any value.
And the only people I had in my corner, like outside of anybody, are just my mother, my lady, my daughter.
And that was it, bro.
I just called it for what it is.
That was it.
And so when I got out of prison, you know, fuck, I had 400 bucks.
You know what I'm saying?
And I have, I had bunches of people who were.
And what was your attitude like?
Because would you, I mean, because you had had, I mean, fiscally, maybe you, who knows what you had in like your, you know, but you were at, I mean, just, yeah, you were at this superficial level of a billionaire.
I mean, you were a superficial billionaire, not superficial, yes.
Right.
Like not you personally, but the, you know, the, the environment inside, yeah, in your psyche.
It's like you think you're a billionaire.
Yeah, bro.
Let me tell you like this.
It was very fucking humbling, you know, and what kept you like going at that point at those moments?
Like to know after from reading from people so many success stories, there wasn't a shadow of a doubt.
Like, so if you talk to me long enough, even offside of this, you'll see I got a shit ton of confidence.
I just believe like anything I attach myself to or put my put my focus on, and I just really focus on, I feel like I can have success.
You're going to do well with it.
There's not a shadow of a doubt.
I don't even worry, like worry.
It's always been in you.
That's always been in you.
So even from football to whatever I do, I just feel like if I focus on something, I can figure it out.
So I had read so many success stories and just the process of it.
And I'm very disciplined.
I got a fucking crazy work ethic.
These are things that I just know I can control.
And so I knew I would be successful in something.
And the thing I wanted to be successful in initially was senior care services.
And this happened from, I used to have eight ladies.
I used to call them my Golden Girls.
These are old ladies who said, we identify with people who are incarcerated because as our children grow up, they forget about us.
Oh, wow.
And they start to live their families.
They start to like live their lives.
It's a huge problem in America.
A lot of senior citizens are really forgotten about.
A lot of men up in homes really not being cared for appropriately.
So I had people who told me that.
And so they said, these are just real needs.
So they all said this, but they weren't from one place.
They were just Ohio State fans and Maurice Clarette fans, right?
And so I said, man, this would be a cool deal to learn it, to understand it, but to provide care, transportation, and so on and so forth.
That was the initial thing.
But from seeing so much success or reading from so much success, I was like, I can actually do this.
And that was my motivation.
I just like, I'll put myself together at some point.
And so I ended up getting out of prison in 2010.
And I had an opportunity to play football for a minor league team in Omaha, Nebraska.
Great fucking city.
If anybody's never been to Omaha.
And so I went up to Omaha and I thought that Omaha was going to be like full of just fucking cornfields and everything else.
And it wasn't.
And it was some of the most down-to-earth American, it's the most American place that you can fucking name.
And from small businesses to people who are fucking millionaires, billionaires driving pickup trucks, simple everyday shit from people who are so successful.
But what Omaha also allowed me to do was to adjust slowly.
So I got out here.
I was able to play football, go to the gym, come home, talk to my family, and just do like simple shit.
Some safe regimen in a safe environment.
A safe regiment.
But I also talk about this.
Like, this is one of the greatest experiences in Omaha, aside from playing football.
When I was in prison, I had read so much from Warren Buffett.
Fucking shit, tons of information.
When I went to Omaha, I knew Warren Buffett was out there and things like that, right?
So our coach ended up being this guy by the name of Joe Moglia.
Joe Moglia had made probably $400 million.
He ended up leaving as the active CEO of TD Ameritrade.
He ended up becoming the chairman of the board.
So out of all things he wanted to do, he wanted to get back into coaching football.
He ended up coming back to be the head coach of our team.
So every Wednesday, he would tell guys, like, hey, if you have anything that you want to ask financially, come and meet me on Wednesdays.
Wow.
Out of everybody, only two of us showed up, right?
Every week.
So he said, fuck that.
I'm not about to keep on making this available.
The guys had no fucking clue of what he was offering.
Valuable information from a motherfucking Titan, right?
So he said, Maurice, come to the golf course with me.
I'm like, yo, bro, I can't play golf.
You know what I'm saying?
He said, just come to the golf course.
Tell me your story.
How the fuck did you go from prison to ended up here?
So I told him my whole story.
After I'm done, he said, I've never asked Warren for a favor in my life.
Let me see if I can call Warren Buffett and get him to meet you.
So I'm thinking to myself, like, motherfucker, I'm 18 months released from prison.
Like, this motherfucking about to meet with my black ass.
You know what I'm saying?
So I walk into my apartment and serious shit.
Yeah, you know it's true, right?
But this isn't funny, man.
So he's like, look, Warren Buffett ain't fucking about to meet with his black ass, right?
So I walked through the fucking joint.
I'm walking through the apartment.
He hit my phone up.
He's like, Maurice, he said, you know, this is Warren.
And I'm like, oh, shit.
You know, because I remember his voice distinctly because I used to watch Charlie Rose in prison.
I used to watch this motherfucker interview everybody, right?
And so, Charlie Rose, my man, right?
Minus the allegations, right?
I'm not convicted, my man.
It is what it is, right?
And so we end up, I end up going, right?
I end up calling him, right?
Or he ended up calling me.
I'm talking to him on the phone.
And he's like, yo, you got anything I'm going to do on Saturday?
I'm like, yo, whatever going on Saturday is canceled.
Don't even worry about that, right?
And so I'm getting my shit together.
I go to TJ Maxx at the time.
I get like a fucking outfit.
I think like it's the best thing.
You know, I'm broke his shit.
So I go over to his house.
I go over to his office.
And ironically, the person who had a meeting before him had canceled.
And he was like, yo, do you want to hang out?
And I'm like, you serious?
And I'm like, yeah.
He's like, you want to hang out?
So we sitting there one-on-one for five hours, right?
And so I'm asking this dude everything I ever like fucking dreamed of.
And it was like cool shit that happened.
Was he preaching at you or was he cool to talk to?
Yeah, dude, this dude, so he reads a fucking ton.
So it's easy for him to have a thoughtful, intellectual, personal conversation.
This was Saturday.
This dude is more fucking humble and down to earth than anybody I've ever fucking met.
This dude controls fucking a shit ton of our world.
Did you think about even asking him for like a million?
I would have asked him.
And I would have called it a small million.
Let me get a small.
But I'm telling this dude was just like, he was like fucking, he was zoned in.
You know what I'm saying?
And so the next thing you know, we end up meeting and getting together.
And I ended the meeting and fucking was like, yo, I know you got better shit to do and talk to me.
Right.
You fucking run the world.
And the next thing you know, I rolled out to, excuse me, I rolled about, rolled out back home a few months after that.
ESPN reached out to me and they said, hey, can we do a 30 for 30 on your life?
And after that, it took about eight months to shoot the show.
And I woke up one day after the show came out and I had 1,100, and I remember literally 1,100 emails from people just either talking and asking to come and speak.
I've never done public speaking prior to that.
And I end up just going on the road and starting to tell my story and ask questions and answer questions.
And from there, I end up getting into the transportation business because I got tired of, it literally felt as I was traveling.
And I'm pretty sure anybody who's traveled a lot, you can feel lonely.
As cool as it may look to the outside.
Oh, it's lonely.
You're in a hotel by yourself.
You go, you're a spectacle once you get on stage.
After you get off stage, you're taking a picture, you're talking hands, and next thing you know, you're thinking about what other city you're going to next.
And so I had done about 350 speaking engagements in three years, which is a fuck ton.
You know what I'm saying?
After a while, I feel like you're just repeating words.
And I was like, okay, let me get into another business because I don't want to depend on this my whole life.
Like I can't force somebody to book me for an engagement.
Right.
And so from there, I ended up getting into transportation.
And after transportation was doing what it did for a couple of years, I ended up going to an event in Ohio.
And I was doing the event.
And through the process of doing the event, the event had ended.
And there was a person, a gentleman who had been teaching some young men who were about like 17 or 18 years old some of the work that we had done in prison.
And I was like, yo, my man, like, where did you get this stuff from?
It was cognitive behavioral therapy.
It was an exercise with the activating event, the mind activity, the body reaction, the consequence.
And this was stuff that I had helped to facilitate in prison.
Wow.
It's one of the things they teach you in licensed clinical social work.
It's one of the things they teach in the first year.
It's like one of the CBC.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
And what ended up happening was that I just like enjoying what he was talking about.
I was like, you know, what do you do?
And he was like, you know, I run a behavioral health agency.
And I said, what the fuck is a behavioral health agency?
He was like, I work with mental health and drug and alcohol.
And for me, having so many issues with drug and college.
You're like, this is my, yeah.
This is my home.
This is my home.
But even going through that work in prison, I felt that out of everything that was helping to rehabilitate guys, the actual work, the social work, right?
The therapeutic services were the things that guys would come back to the block and talk about and have intellectual discussions or guys would become revealing about themselves in a therapeutic format.
And I thought to myself, like more kids in the intercity need to basically be involved and connected with this.
So I went through like an eight-month process of policies and procedures.
We go through that whole deal in the process of doing that.
I end up opening up our company called the Red Zone.
And at first, we went back to literally inner cities.
And I thought that there was so much emotionally, like I'm just thinking about to my childhood, the amount of murders I had seen, the amount of domestic violence or robberies and just the amount of trauma that I had been experiencing that I never processed.
I never emotionally got over it.
I was functioning from like a space of fear or where the drugs and alcohol masked like some of my childhood shit.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
You keep it inside of you.
And did you, your father wasn't present when you were growing up?
No, you know, so I was born in 83. Him and my mother divorced in 84. I see, yeah.
And so like my mother never down-talked him or made him out to be a bad person, but just through their disconnect, like there just wasn't any male involved in it.
So my mother worked as a second-year educational coordinator at medical school.
So she worked 45 minutes away.
So as a result from that, the kids can home alone a lot.
So now the neighborhood and the environment raises you.
Starts to raise you, yeah.
And so how I found, I mean, obviously I've known about you, right?
Okay.
And a lot of people, like when I said Maurice Clarette's going to come on the podcast, you know, I listen to his podcast, Business and Biceps, you and Corey and John.
And it's a great hang.
It's like, if, you know, if I recommend checking out their podcast because it's a fun, it's like, I don't know what it is.
I can't feel like, I can't tell if I feel like I'm at the gym or the office or the therapist.
That's what I can't tell.
But that's what I like about it.
But I'm glad you feel that because that's the intention.
And it's exactly what I feel.
It's like there's moments where it's like, okay, this is uplifting and this is inspiring.
And then there's moments where it's like, it's just guys like joking around.
It feels like a fantasy football league.
And then there's moments where it's like, you know, the other day you guys were talking about loyalty and stuff like that.
And even if I don't resonate with everything that's said on the podcast, and we're going to have Corey and John in in just a few minutes, even if I don't resonate with everything, there's just, every now and then it makes me think of something.
Like, oh, loyalty makes me, just hearing about loyalty makes me think, oh, well, you know, let me think back into my life, loyalty.
If I were to go back and make a list of who's been loyal to me in my life, it's just, you know, it's fun to hear just things that you hear, you're then inspired to think about, you know?
But I think one of the biggest things, we talked about this last night at dinner and what the focal point even is just to bring like real things that you feel.
I'm a real big feel person, right?
If you don't feel it as you're saying it, it's not real.
It's not entertainment, right?
And when we talk about business and you talk about growing business from our business standpoint, we try to talk about things that are actually real and not like the cute pictures and videos and bullshit bitch music on Instagram that like misleads kids.
Oh, 100%, especially young kids.
Yes.
And so you could be misled.
And so if you've given me your time, a fucking hour, just think about this, right?
So people are giving you an hour of their fucking day or 40 minutes or 30 minutes or however long the format is, right?
You kind of owe it to them if they believe in you and they're giving you ear to be thoughtful and pure with your entertainment and to give a message that's real.
And so that way, like at the core level, so I heard Denzel say this on Charlie Rose.
He said, from the specific comes the universal.
So if you can connect to yourself and get down to specific emotion, I'm pretty sure that may work in comedy, right?
You're drawing from something.
I don't give a fuck.
Like you're drawing from something.
That's how it connects to people because people are like, oh, I feel that.
I can laugh from it, right?
This connects somewhere.
And so the podcast is a format of things that like I've actually been through, things that we actually experience.
Yeah.
And having a level of entertainment that doesn't seem cheesy, phony, or like commercial.
You know what I'm saying?
But that's real.
You know what I'm saying?
And so like you have, you also have an element to where people who have come from humble beginnings.
You know what I'm saying?
Corey literally comes from the trailer parks.
John comes from a poor background in Chicago.
I come from the hood and fucking youngstyle.
Yeah, and it's a great voice that's out there.
I mean, that's one of the things that I really like about you guys, Cass, is that, yeah, it connects, like, it's the Midwest, you know, it's hardworking.
You know, our producer Nick is from Wisconsin.
It's like, and he's one of the hardest workers I know.
It's like, you know, it's a voice that's that's not out there as much these days, I feel like, or that you can't find on the coast anyway.
And so it's, you know, that's what I really love listening about it.
I've got a couple more questions for you, and then we're going to take a break for a few minutes and get Corey and John in here, and we're going to do another hour with the guys.
And some listener questions as well.
Oh, yeah, we got some listeners and questions as well.
I just want to ask you this.
Do you feel like you were always going to be...
Or do you feel like that you were always going to be good at something?
I don't know if that's a wild question or not.
No, it's not.
I don't think when I was young, I think football when I was young was a way to fit in and grab friends, right?
Yeah.
I think I didn't necessarily like football.
I like to work hard.
And I also looked at football as a vehicle to get out of my situation.
But I didn't love football.
Didn't love it at all.
I love the element of competing, but not football as much as that.
And the older I got and I started to realize the science of working hard and understanding what you're working towards and being clear at that.
I have a confidence not to sound arrogant, but I believe that I can be successful at whatever it is I choose to put my attention to.
And so I don't know if that answers the question, but I still feel like I'll be great at something because I know how to just connect with my feelings.
And I know anything that I may be connected to will be connected to what's real and not even a commercial success.
Like, you know, I'll be successful just because I'll be doing shit that makes me happy.
This makes me happy.
Like, as corny and cliche as it may sound, but this, like, sitting down makes me happy.
Yeah.
Talking to you.
Oh, I can tell, man.
Look, when I was watching 30 for 30, I mean, I was teared up at one point, like, just seeing you, like, you know, you could just kind of tell, I don't know, just that you were just a really deep person emotionally, you know.
Yeah, and that, and I'm that, I'm that same way, you know.
And I noticed when I'm growing up, if I didn't have like somebody to tell me that it was okay to be that way, then it's like I was always didn't know what was going on with my emotions, you know?
Absolutely.
And so then you have this whole life where you have these emotions, but you don't know if it's even okay to think about them or how to feel.
But just imagine you pioneer in a space for that to be cool.
Right.
Yes.
Right.
So now if I look up to you, if I look up to Maurice, I look up to anybody.
Now this guy talking about it, now like this is a real thing.
Now this is cool to be indifferent about my emotions.
It's cool to be not cool, but being sad is normal.
Being confused is normal.
Having anxiety is normal.
Feeling indifferent about different things.
And so even as you say that, it just affirms and gives confirmation that that's the road I keep on needing to travel because there's more people who fucking put your voice in the ear on a consistent basis who needs that.
And that helps them to heal or to be whole as they're moving forward.
Oh, it's an amazing gift, man.
I mean, I think you have that.
I really feel like you have that gift.
Like to a remarkable level of anybody that I've listened to or heard or, yeah, I don't know.
I just, I have this, like you just have an uncanny ability to iterate comfortably to others, like kind of how you feel and then also how it kind of fits into what you're doing, though, you know?
Because sometimes it's so hard to connect those two.
It's so hard to connect those two and still stay confident in it and moving forward, you know?
Oh, I get it.
I get it.
But I don't know.
Do you feel like that's a blessing?
Do you feel like that's a learned thing?
Yeah, I don't, I think it's learned from experience, but I believe it's a blessing because it allows me to walk as a whole person everywhere I go.
Yeah.
And I don't have to bring a representative.
I don't have to like I get to be me.
You know, like, like if I would, if I would have did this podcast 10 years ago, I would have said, man, I care about my jeans, what my shoes are going to look like.
I got on a $5 red hot chili pepper shirt on.
I don't even know who they are.
You know what I'm saying?
But like the shirt.
You know what I'm saying?
You know, it's from maybe a farmer's market.
I got on $30 Levi.
We got red hot chili peppers.
That's ironic.
We just got this plant.
Where you feeling coming from?
No, I feel you.
And this is the most dressed up I've got because honestly, I was so excited about you guys coming in.
I appreciate it.
Yeah, I just feel, yeah, like I listen to you and I feel like you really embody a lot of what we want, you know, like what we try to do here.
You know, we got a lot, a lot of our listeners are young men that have struggled, you know, and that, you know, have struggled, you know, being raised by single parents, that sort of thing.
And yeah, I'm just, I'm glad that to be able to help turn some of our listeners onto you guys' podcast because I think that there's a, you know, you guys have a wealth of knowledge in a fun way and emotional knowledge to offer people, man.
Got you.
No, I will, even so they gave me, when they told me who you were before, I purposely did not look at you because I said, okay, I looked at something on IG and I said, okay, I don't want to form an opinion of somebody.
Yeah.
And then, but because you want to, like, you want to go and have like the natural energy of something.
And even through talking, you can tell if something is forced.
You can tell the energy and you can tell if it isn't right.
But when I was on the plane yesterday, I was coming down.
I don't know where the fuck we were at, but I said, man, everything feels right.
Right.
And so, you know, how this stuff feels right?
Yeah.
Like my relationship.
Oh, yeah, 100%.
Things feel right, but not only feel right.
And, you know, we talked about this at dinner.
Like, I know why they feel right.
And I know how you can push the gas for things to get better than what they are, better than what they are.
And if anybody like has ever felt that feeling, that's like a beautiful feeling to have.
Yeah.
And to know you yourself.
I'm not drinking, drugging.
I'm not fucking being bad towards my woman.
I'm not fucking sleeping around.
I'm great to the guys and we have a good relationship.
It's powerful, huh?
You feel I'm coming from?
And the stuff that we're talking about is stuff that you can like actually say, this is what I do.
And the preservation of that in a society right now where so much is driven offside of, let me look cool and let me promote what's fake.
I think that even you, we owe it to people to provide platforms to be like, okay, like humanity still does exist.
Right.
No, I get that.
There's something about you, you almost default.
You don't like to be the center of attention in a weird way.
No.
Or you get, or the way it makes you feel doesn't land super well inside of you.
Like this, the center of attention is too much.
It's too much responsibility, my man.
And I would be the center of attention if it was simple.
Right.
You know, in that thing.
But sometimes.
But a lot comes with the center of attention.
Yeah, because you're whored out.
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying?
You become a whore and you can get involved in things that financially make sense or look cool, but just may not be you.
You know what I'm saying?
And I don't want to be anybody's whore.
I don't want to be a product whore.
I don't want to be a system whore.
I don't want to be standing next to people.
If I really don't like you and I really don't believe what you value, I really don't want to be around you.
Like and not from a hateful standpoint.
I just don't want to affiliate my being with your being.
Right.
And that's bad magnets right there.
Yeah, but I think that, but, but that comes back to understanding why I love myself and I love myself from like I do right by my family.
Who do you, can you feel you, can you feel, is it easier to feel love now as an adult than it was when you were young?
100%.
100%.
But I think it starts with self, though.
You know, because now I love myself and I know who really loves me.
And I could just tell, like, is this a working relationship?
Is this a you need something?
I can identify that clearly now.
Right.
And it is beautiful to have somebody to love you for you.
I'm talking about my woman.
I'm talking about my mother.
I'm talking about my daughter.
I'm even talking about with Corey and John.
And I think that, like, I can give you one thing about John, right?
So this is John Fosco.
He'll be in here in just a couple of minutes.
I know they're chumping it.
They're out there watching on the live feed.
So just think about this, right?
So we were getting ready to do a show that was revolved around sports.
And then John goes and watches, he watches the 30 for 30. And after he watches the 30 for 30, the sporting show that we were going to do was a little bit more hardcore and language was foul and all this other shit.
Right.
And so after watching the show, he had come back to Corey and said, Yo, I don't really think that that's direction and that serves him well to put him in that light based upon the amount of kids and people that he deals with.
And so to have that amount of consideration in doing that.
So Corey knew me already.
And me and Corey have been buddies fucking eight, nine, 10 years or however long we've known each other.
Right.
And so Corey already had like a level of like, you know, our connection.
But for John to step in and do that without even knowing me, to recognize that in advance.
To recognize that.
See the value.
Yes.
And it just, it just spoke to a lot about that.
So like you kind of know who you're around or you know what like what's up with the people around you.
So when you can do that and you can fucking sit and have a good meal and you can talk and you can bullshit.
And when you get to the airport, you're laughing like little kids because you're happy that it feels like a team is going somewhere to do something.
That's fun, huh?
Bro, it's like.
That's what you miss probably most about the sports, I bet.
The camaraderie.
There's nothing like it.
The brotherhood.
Bro, there's nothing like you and a group of guys who have a common interest and you're all working towards something and shit's starting to go right and you're figuring shit out and you're having fun.
Team.
And you get, think about this, you're getting energized off of ideas.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
That's not the cool fucking Bentley and the cute music and all the bullshit filters.
Like you're getting inspired from talking about an idea and like what this could become.
That's like fucking dreaming.
That's like, you know, that has nothing to do with nothing else other than creative thought.
It doesn't have to do with women and fucking fake titties and ass shots and all that stupid shit.
Like, you know, there's a, like, just think about how you may get excited about somebody who may comes onto your show.
You're thinking, where could this go?
Who could we affect?
How would they receive this?
What are comments looking like?
Did I give my all to the show?
That is beautiful, bro.
Oh, it's a feel.
It's a real feel.
It's visceral.
You get it in your body, in your chest.
It runs up my neck.
I can feel when things are, when it's real.
And then when you're done, you're like, this is work well done.
You go to sleep satisfied.
Yes, because you're not cheating anybody.
You're putting something good out into the world.
You're being rewarded for it.
Yes, certainly.
And yeah, it is a really different and comfortable way to sleep.
Yeah, I remember when I would go into AA meetings, one of the best times I ever had and still have are I remember sitting down between two guys that I knew in meetings, from meetings, and I sat there and they were both laughing, we're joking around.
And I was like, man, this is interesting.
All I really wanted, and I just started tearing up.
I was like, all I wanted my whole life, really, was just to sit around and joke with guys.
And I've been chasing these other things that have made me try to feel whatever this little feeling is right here, just to be in a little group and have fun, you know?
Like I've been chasing this other, you know, or, you know, you think about other stuff or do other things.
Like you're saying, you go after like the shiny trinkets, you know?
But you, but I was like, man, it just, I don't know, just to have some sort of a little bit of a brotherhood.
I was about to ask, Pastor Brotherhood, what is it else that you think that you're getting from that moment?
It was nice to know that these people cared about me because we'd all agreed to meet there and we all showed up.
And so like they cared, you know?
And I knew they cared about me.
And so that made me feel when I knew somebody else cared about me, it made me feel good.
And this is one thing I like about meetings, right?
It allows me to comfortably put my vulnerabilities in front of people.
Yeah.
You feel what I'm coming from?
Oh, yeah, yeah, 100%.
Oh, yeah.
I know I could talk to them and say anything to them, but I don't know.
There was just something about being flanked by two people that I knew were like almost like brothers, you know?
Yes.
It just felt.
Like a childlike love.
Yes.
That's what it felt like.
It felt like something I never really had that I've been wanting my whole life.
So I guess the question, like, so when we see people are more people, you know, because I always said, like, you weren't birthed out of your mother's pussy to become an abuser of drugs or alcoholic, you know, and you're chasing a feeling.
Right.
That's why I'm real big into feel.
Yeah, that's what I'm into, man.
And that's when I saw, I was just like, man, we have got to have Maurice Clarette in.
I'm just so excited.
And then when I got turned on to the podcast even more, I'm like, oh, this is great.
This is like a fun, goofy, educational, but also heartfelt place where I can hang out.
Let's get the guys in here and then we'll go to the video questions and do that then.
Okay.
They're pretty Maurice specific.
They are?
Yeah.
All right, let's rattle off one or two.
We'll just make it a long episode.
Yeah, yeah.
I emailed those guys.
I was like, we'll still do a full hour with you if you got no place to go.
And we have nothing to do.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
So we're not going to be cutting it short at all.
I have a couple quick ones.
When you had your cops, Chase, I might have gotten some bad intel.
Did you have a katana in the car?
A katana?
What is a blade?
Like a blade, a big sword?
Oh, no, I had a sneaker.
You had a bad information, though.
Got to ask.
Great question.
No, so here's the thing.
There was a hatchet in the car already.
No, so it was like a fucking, it was like a fucking, you know, like.
A meat cleaver?
We borrowed cars from, man.
Hey.
Paul Bunyan dealership?
No, it was my uncle's car.
He had like a fucking, like a little tool that he used for the yard.
I did have four guns, though.
I have four guns.
You weren't going to need the hatchet.
No, I didn't need a hatchet.
That's a more logical weapon.
The gun.
And here's a, here's a, oh, and one more.
In prison, before you realized that, like, that wasn't for you and you were talking about their scuffles all the time.
Like, I'm sure there's gangs and stuff, but were people fucking with you?
Because most, I'm sure one out of the way.
So, no, there was.
Like Michigan fans?
No, no, there was, no, there was shit talking, but then prison is also an environment that is very clear.
It's either you're into the shit or you're out of the shit.
And it was clear that I was out of the shit.
You know what I'm saying?
And so even as you walk around, I'm not being boastful for myself, but there's a lot of tough guys in prison, but I'm not a bitch myself.
You know what I'm saying?
And so you walk around with a demeanor and your demeanor is like, whatever is whatever.
You know, rather, motherfucker want to fight, rather you want to do whatever.
And so guys can feel it on you.
You know, it's an aura.
And you didn't have it.
I'm not a chump.
You know what I'm saying?
On any level, but I'm not the toughest guy in prison.
And I humbly say that because there's a lot.
anybody, you know, who really runs the prisons are Mexicans.
You know, Mexicans, Mexicans run America these days.
The guy who has the power is the guy who's willing to take it the furthest.
These guys, these Mexican guys in prison, just based upon where they're from, they don't care about dying.
Yeah, they're ready to go to heaven.
Bro, they don't, these dudes do not give a fuck about dying.
I give a fuck about dying.
That's it.
That's the finish line.
I'm 50 pounds lighter than you.
I'm not fighting you.
I'm going to stab you.
I'm cool.
I know my boundaries.
You win.
That's it.
Yeah, a lot of guys have just like so many, like the tattoo, the rosary.
They're already, they almost just have like a funeral tattooed on their chest.
Like, damn, dog, you ready to die?
You got your whole family standing around a casket on your chest.
It's a wrap.
Let's go to one of these video questions real fast.
What's going on, Theo Vong, Gang, Gang?
And then what's up to Maurice?
I'm a big fan of both of you guys.
And I've been watching this past weekend since the beginning.
And I decided to call him for a question or a video in a question.
And so my question for Maurice is, what led to you choosing Ohio State to play football at?
And is there any advice you'd give me as a running back when picking what schools I'd like to go to?
So thank you both.
And, you know, have a good day.
Yeah, well, Ohio State didn't offer me a scholarship.
I decided to go to Ohio State and told him I was coming.
And that was it.
I knew I wanted to go to Ohio State.
I knew the guys who were there, they weren't better than me.
You know, I was a lot more arrogant then.
And I think you have to be arrogant and decisive within your decision making to understand if a guy is better than you or not and go where you feel that you want to go, not where you feel like may be cool.
There's a lot of young guys who go to schools because they think the school is cool, but it isn't a good fit for their skill set.
You know, understanding your skill set.
But the biggest thing I can give advice to the guys, understand your skill set.
What do I do well?
And does that translate to this environment right here?
Right.
In my head, that's a business design.
Yes, yes.
And so I understood very well my skill set and what I did.
And then I looked at their offense and it was the same thing.
And I went to go meet the guys.
And I went to these guys.
And Mike Tyson is my greatest person.
I want to meet him and Jim Carrey.
If I can meet Jim Carrey and sit down and have time with Mike Tyson, I think that that would be like some of the coolest shit.
And literally, that's what happened.
I just was like, you know, I'm taking y'all shit.
And so Mike Tyson used to talk about the art of skull duckery.
And he said, you know, guys are, they're very easy to compete behind each other's back, but there's a different sort of reverence that you have when you tell a guy, I'm taking your shit.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
And so now it becomes like, I'm about to work my ass off.
And do you have that same deal?
And I knew that they didn't.
And that's basically how I became.
You got Mexican right there.
I got Mexican.
I was willing to die.
In that instance, in that vibe, you're like, this is what I'm putting on the line is that I'm going to do, this is as far as I'm going to go.
Can you match it?
Same thing that you do, same thing that you do in your industry.
Yeah.
Motherfucker, I got this.
You know, so I'm going to take it to a place that I know that you can't.
I'm going to take, I always call it, take a motherfucker to the middle of the ocean.
Let's see if you want to get to the shore.
Yeah, you're either going to die in the water or we're going to get to the shore.
I love that, man.
And yeah, the other questions, I think the other guys would have some good input, even though they were specifically for you.
Okay, great.
Cool.
Awesome.
Maurice Clorette, so excited.
So grateful that you guys have come out.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back with the other guys from Business and Biceps.
Business and Bicep, yes, sir.
We just had Maurice Clorette in, and he is going to stay in studio, and joining us is going to be the Business and Biceps guys, the other gentleman from his podcast.
And if you want to join something, you can join skillshare.com and you can join a classroom.
Skillshare.com, it's a place where you can, you know, take any class you want.
You don't want to drive across town and park and get a backpack and get a Capri son and call your mom and have her make you a lunch and then get beat up at recess, do you?
Well, now you don't have to, but you can still learn.
Skillshare is an online learning platform.
Over 20,000 classes in business, design, technology, photography, photography, creative writing, data science.
Man, there's everything.
You can learn how to make trap music.
You can learn how to produce music.
You can do anything.
Everything.
Think of something.
Go learn it.
And our listeners will get two months of Skillshare for just 99 cents.
That's right.
Skillshare is offering this past weekend listeners two months of unlimited access to over 20,000 classes for just 99 cents.
To sign up, go to skillshare.com slash Theo.
T-H-E-O, that's skillshare.com slash Theo.
This episode is also brought to you by Squarespace.
From websites and online stores to marketing tools and analytics, Squarespace is the all-in-one platform to build a beautiful online presence and run your business.
Quit running your business just in the real world.
Run it online as well and run it with Squarespace.
Squarespace has beautiful designer templates that make your appearance creative and give you a powerful online identity.
You can create a beautiful website with Squarespace's all-in-one platform.
Everything from domains, websites, online stores, and marketing tools.
If you have a domain somewhere else, you can bring it over to Squarespace.
That's easy.
It's award-winning 24-7 customer service.
Makes it exactly what you want.
It's simple to set up.
It's simple.
So head to squarespace.com for a free trial.
And when you're ready to launch your new site or new store or new online presence, just go to squarespace.com slash Theo Von, T-H-E-O-V-O-N, to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain.
That's squarespace.com slash Theo Von for 10% off.
Joining us now in studio with Maurice is Corey G and John Fosco.
And this is the three of them together make up the podcast Business and Biceps.
We are here.
You want to introduce your squad, your partners?
Sorry.
Yes, yes.
We are squad.
Because you're doing well on the show.
Coming from.
Yeah.
I'm going to come that Chicago Bulls pop.
Oh, you're going to get that?
Yeah.
So he has the new shoes on today.
Not them orange joints he had on.
Yeah, so my big man, Helling, all the way from the Wendy City, six foot two.
He had to sit in first class to stretch his legs out on the way here.
Motherfucker's six foot.
Yeah.
Apparently, this room takes off two inches.
Ripped to the bone.
My man, all the way from the Wendy City, the one and only who always wears his sunglasses day and the night in the gym.
I did request the glasses.
And his hat, Dotty Fosco.
Thank you, Moe.
I love you, Mo.
There we go.
Come on.
I'm happy to be here.
And his tag team partner?
And his tag team partner, the only guy I know who eats fucking chicken.
No, not chicken, because he says steak.
The only guy I know.
White steak, they call it some people.
The only guy I know who won't fucking go to the double tree and eat a fucking cookie when he goes there.
It's true.
The only guy I know who is disciplined to the bone and regimented, hailing respectfully, and he talks about it all the way from the valley, Mr. Corey G. Yo, yo, yo.
Thanks, Maurice, for introducing me to Central Parks because I'm a black guy.
Central Parks about a white guy saying he's racist.
It's funny.
Sometimes I get called, oh, and this is the, this is, these, you guys started business on biceps, right?
And then brought Maurice in.
How did that work out?
Yeah.
We was rolling for about 100 shows, Johnny.
I think about 80 shows, yeah.
And then we were going to bring Mo in for a sports podcast, right?
And I didn't know Mo well, and it was crazy.
We recorded like the pilot of the sports podcast, and it was a really raw podcast.
A lot of swearing, not that we don't swear now.
We swear a ton still.
It's a little swear.
Yeah, it's very sweary, but basically after we did it, the night we fucking did it, most 30 for 30 came on, and I had never seen it.
I had never seen it.
And I called Corey after I watched it, and I said, Corey, I don't know Mo well, but if I'm going to take in a partner, we're going to take in a partner.
I don't feel comfortable as an individual bringing him into this platform.
I just don't feel it's right.
I think he can offer a lot on business and biceps because we're trying to motivate and we're trying to talk about overcoming struggles.
And my God, you know, what I just saw touched me straight up.
So, you know, Corey was like, man.
Yeah, I mean, me and Mo had been boys for a while.
So it was like, I said, yeah, absolutely.
I'd love to bring him into that space.
You know, we were just, we wanted to do something with him.
We had already had a show that was starting to chart and do well.
So, but open arms, I was like, of course, Mo's personal development and the stuff that he's been through alongside us is now morphed into a, you know, a top five show.
Yeah.
And was it interesting, like, or was it tough?
Is it tough befriending?
And I noticed this even in my own walk out here in Los Angeles.
It's tough sometimes befriending somebody that has like a name that precedes them.
So what was that like for you whenever like you befriended Mo?
Like, because sometimes it's like you'll feel a connection to somebody and you're not, you don't care what they do or what, you know what I mean?
You're intrigued by them.
You're interested.
But when somebody has a name that precedes them, it's hard sometimes to how do you was there, did you have trouble managing your genuineness?
Or was there anything like that?
I'm not putting you on the spot.
I'm just curious.
No, I think this would be great for Mo to answer, actually, because when we connected, Mo had just come back to Ohio.
And I had a business that was doing really well in the sports supplement space.
And I told Mo, like, I was working with huge athletes and some pretty heavy people.
Sterling's sharp.
Yeah, way bigger than him.
So I was like, you know what?
I was like, Mo, here's the deal.
We have a 4 a.m.
crew.
I asked Mo to come to the gym and work out.
I said, man, I don't really need nothing from you.
But what you're going to get when you mess with me is I'm never going to miss workouts.
I'm going to be disciplined.
I'm about my business.
But I don't need anything from you.
I'm not trying to get into the club and rep you.
I'm not trying to get a cute video on Instagram.
I don't need any of that stuff.
I'm not telling you that.
I need to Uber my guns across the table.
Yeah, yeah.
You know, so I was like, but I got a positive environment.
And if you, and if you're trying to get down with it, then you should come on to the old school gym, motherfucker.
And you felt that, huh?
Yeah.
And I think that's the, I think that was like highly important where you could just go be yourself.
And I think we talked about it earlier, just going to be yourself somewhere and just be a guy.
You know what I mean?
I think that that was cool.
And nothing about our relationship.
We didn't gain anything from being around each other.
We didn't like, okay, let's connect and go do this deal.
Let's connect and go do that deal.
Let's connect and show a picture.
And it makes one of us cooler.
And I think that that was the original part.
But then also, I think that even when we started doing the first few episodes, I think that there was just a natural feeling.
It wasn't nothing like, you know, like most times you get together with people.
It's like, yo, let's outline the business.
And you're worried about everything but the actual thing of what you're doing.
And I think that we did more doing of the show and talking as an episode.
And I think it felt right.
But I think also, if you can ask these guys, I think it was something therapeutic about it.
Oh, wow.
Really?
Oh, yeah, most definitely.
Because we were doing it for the right reason.
We didn't have a business model.
We were just literally, John and I, when we started it, we were having these amazing conversations that I know all these young people would be down trying to be a fly on the wall.
I'm like, we should record this.
You add Moe to it on top of it.
It's shutting it down.
Right.
Because now you have, there's the race factor, there's the culture factor.
There's all these things that nothing's off bounds.
And we can hit every demo.
That was great.
Man, it's so necessary right now, I think, too, especially with a lot of like, you know, there's a lot more like young black men who are having opportunities these days.
And do you guys see that in Ohio as much?
Like these days?
Like, is it different than when you were growing up?
Do you find?
I think just with any young person now, I think the access to information and the wanting to sort of take control of your own destiny and be an entrepreneur or things of that nature.
I think that that's more accessible.
I think with young people, like, okay, so they see Theo Vaughn, right?
They see you on Netflix.
They see your podcast, and they may see what other people do, and they're like, I want that.
But they don't understand, and I don't even know your history, what the fuck you went through to get to that chair right now.
And they don't want to know the process.
They want what Theo has.
And what we're trying to do is say, dudes, settle the fuck down.
Take pride in sweeping the floor and say, I'm on my way up.
Don't think you're going to be driving out Bentley in two years because you're a stupid fuck.
It's just not the truth.
That's not going to happen that way.
Dude, every time John talks, I feel like I'm at WWE in 1994.
And I mean that in a loving way.
It's really straight down the middle, bro.
I was listening to an episode last night, man.
I got some HelloFresh, you know, because they're not even a sponsor of ours yet, or they are a sponsor now.
But look, I was excited.
I'm making some HelloFresh, and I'm listening to an episode in the kitchen.
And I felt, here's what I noticed.
I felt better at the end of the episode.
I felt like I just had a good time.
You know, I felt like it was you guys were talking about loyalty and, you know, and loyalty and how you know where loyalty is and how you recognize it and how you treat loyalty and how you treat your friends and business associates and stuff.
But then also there was like, you know, people screwing around and it was just like a little bit of everything.
And before I knew it, it was over.
And I was like, oh, this is cool.
It's like half entertainment.
We've added that because we're having so much fun now, but also giving people real applicable information because everybody thinks they can get a laptop and go to Starbucks and now they're an entrepreneur.
Oh, yeah.
When I started my gym when I was 20, like my friends tried to have an intervention with me because they thought I was like fucking crazy.
And, you know, coming from a business, dude?
Yeah, they're like, wait a second.
And so it's like they were tripping, like, you ain't drinking with us on Wednesdays no more.
And I'm like, motherfucker, I'm trying to open a gym.
So it was one of those things where it just wasn't as cool as accepted.
Now it is looked upon almost like an athlete or something to that level.
Oh, entrepreneurship.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
To some degree, it's way more popular than it ever was.
That's why there's so many fake motherfuckers out there trying to drain these kids' pockets, dude.
And that's what gets me fired up.
It's like, okay, so we don't need to do a podcast.
Is it a profitable endeavor?
Sure.
We do other businesses and we do a podcast to literally try to give him for, dude, I didn't go to college.
He didn't go to college.
Mo didn't ransom fucking touchdowns.
But it's like, we're trying to help people because like success doesn't happen, dude.
Right.
You got to make it happen.
And these kids don't know that.
They're told, okay, you go to high school, you go to college.
What if I don't want to?
Like, no one says, like, it's okay if you don't want to.
What do you want to do?
Right.
Motherfucker, go follow it.
But that's not safe.
Right.
Because then otherwise, then you just get the feeling as a kid, oh, if I don't go to college, then I'm a failure.
That's what the other side of that teeter-totter is.
Yeah, it's like, oh, you're going to be a bum.
It's like, come on, man.
And we're here to dispel that.
And there's nothing against college.
You know, if you want to be a doctor, an engineer, a lawyer, sure, you have to go there.
But if you love something, don't tell yourself it can't be a career.
Yeah.
Because you're fucking lying to yourself.
And you're hearing your brother.
You're hearing your uncle.
You're hearing your parents who are all afraid, afraid to take the chance that you are about to take.
And you're going to let them take you.
But fuck that.
Yeah, you guys ended up going?
No, but I just think even to add to that point, but even...
You are.
I'm not even joking.
No joke, dude.
I feel like I just morphed into my podcast.
You are now in business and biceps, Theo.
Bro, this is so cool.
I'm not even joking, man.
I love this.
Yeah, it's serious, though, but like, just imagine, like, there's, there's conversation, there's processes and systems that have to be built to build your own career.
Yeah.
And to what John was saying, people just want to jump towards the end result to be where you're at, but nobody talks about all the production that took place when we had to walk out of the room to break to the segment.
Nobody talks about the cameras.
Nobody talks about the hard work.
Nobody talks about the actual things, but how you feel during those processes and the things that you have to do to make that thing a reality.
And that conversation needs to be had because it's not had in the classroom or if it is in the classroom, it's inaccurate as to what's currently taking place.
And I think that if we provide that information, then a kid can come back and say, you know what?
I spent my hour listening to you all.
I got something out of this shit.
And you can kind of go through all the titles and find out where you're currently at in your process.
You know what I'm saying?
Library.
The other one we have, Manage Your Dick, right?
When you're successful, Manage Your Dick is a book.
That's the newest episode.
It's my latest episode.
Oh, wait.
I think I did.
I didn't click on that because, honestly, I've had enough issue with that.
Nobody will help you.
No.
Straight from Jon Fosco.
It's the MYD program.
I just pictured that guy with the megaphone in WWE back in the day, like right next to my penis.
Did erect.
What's that guy's name, Jim?
What's his name?
Jimmy Hart.
Jim Cornette?
Or the Hitman Hart?
Or Hart, maybe.
Jimmy Hart.
Jimmy Hart.
On the side of the ring.
I like Bobby the Brain Heenan.
Yeah, I love it.
Well, Bobby the Brain Heenan is another euphemism for your penis.
So, anyway, but no, I didn't click on that episode.
Let me see.
I think I've listened to four episodes.
But yeah, I just love the camaraderie, man.
I'm so grateful that you guys are here.
What do you guys feel like, do you notice a vibe in your own community from the podcast?
Like, that's what I start to wonder.
What's it like there by you guys?
Me and Corey were talking about this yesterday.
What's crazy is, so we have employees and they all listen to the podcast.
So they know how we think.
So we've completely broken a lot of employees mentally, unfortunately, by absolutely doing nothing.
So they get it in their head that we're these guys on the podcast and they say, oh shit, I messed this little thing up.
I'm going to get the John from the podcast or I'm going to get the Corey.
And they get in their own heads and like we start losing labor.
And we're like, brother, no, this is that, that, that's a show.
And yes, we teach, but we've lost people actually because they're like, man, they're so regimented and they're thinking, I don't want to get in that line of fire.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
So it's had, it's had kind of a weird effect, but there's, there's respect for people from the outside, people who don't work for us.
But it's had a weird effect with employees.
Yeah.
I just think online, just the overarching thing of we're here to teach and give back.
We've all been successful in our own regards.
We're all pushing for more success, but understanding of what's happening in entrepreneurship right now and how fake as fuck it that it is.
Yeah.
And that we're coming straight down the middle so often and that they can take it out and apply it.
And then when it works, they're writing your DMs like, yo, bro, that shit was fucking real.
I went and did this.
Like, you know, it just, those things right there are worth it all because there's no monetary value to that, bro.
You're literally, I was at Gold's gym today training and people were coming up showing love, dude, podcast, blah, blah, blah.
Hey, three out of four guys is like, I'm here to see Theo Vaughn.
Oh, that dude's so funny.
Like, you know what I'm saying?
So it's like the podcast community is just, it's cool to bring these two worlds kind of together, Theo.
So I commend you, you know, for like being open to that.
I think it's awesome.
Yeah, no.
Well, look, a lot of our listeners are, you know, in the Midwest and in rural communities.
And I don't consider, you know, where you guys are from, a rural community at all.
But, you know, it's nice to know that when I'm listening and I'm feeling inspired, you know, from a place that's a little bit more connected to America than I feel like the environment I live in is, you know, it's just cool for me.
I think real quick on the camaraderie, like one main point is I think it's so hard to trust three people like all the way to the core and have that loyalty.
And that's why you can hear us hit like hard points and then have fun with it because, you know, you may have a business partner, but like you ain't down with them like you would trust him when your back was turned if some shit was going down.
But like the three of us, we don't need each other.
And because we don't need each other, everything we do is pure.
And because it's pure, it could be serious as fuck, but then it could be fun.
And it's like, we don't need each other.
Yeah.
So it's just fucking what it is.
Right.
You know?
No, I love that.
I mean, that's one thing that podcasting has given even me as an entertainer is just freedom.
You know, the freedom to really to not live in some of these bounds of this entertainment industry, but to be myself.
You know, it's like.
No rules, homie.
Yeah.
And that's, and then people love that, you know?
People absolutely love it.
But I think that's the, I think it's one of the greatest things about it is that these podcasts have broken across all barriers, all ethnicities, all boundaries of subjects, titles, everything.
And that now you just have a platform to see the person and to fall in love with the person.
I think that that is what we bring to that.
I always, in my mind, I think it's called business biceps and culture because I really believe that I've loved some of the racial conversations that we had on the show that I know you couldn't get anywhere.
I love just the back door of the business conversations.
I love just the camaraderie amongst people.
And I just believe that that is like something that if even if I just the only one, even if I'm just the only one who cares about it, I feel like that's our gift to other people.
You know what I'm saying?
Absolutely.
When you're, his brother came in and we talked to his brother after the show.
He's like, you don't get it.
Like in our community, we don't have Wi-Fi.
And he's like, Amazon ain't even a thing in the hood.
You guys, like, like, we don't listen to podcasts.
We don't have Wi-Fi.
And I'm sitting there thinking, like, Amazon's not a thing?
And, and, and I'm like, a lot, a lot of people that I am unfamiliar with live like this.
And I didn't know that.
Yeah.
You know, but that's a really powerful thing.
I'm telling you, like, and that was probably one of the most coolest things to me is to bring an environment or a perspective to a place and to have like honest conversation about it.
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying?
Just how the state of America is.
Like the state of America has never been so intense when it comes to race.
Right.
Ever.
You know, I don't know if they feel it out here in Los Angeles, but everywhere else you go in America, you feel like that.
But to talk about a culture and to not be offended, to be easygoing, to laugh, to joke, to say shit that's normally tougher.
Now you have people in different environments who are like, yo, okay, I've had a chance to digest this information outside of like just one side.
Either it's a left-wing or right-wing wave conversation.
This is just an independent conversation.
I think that that just helps to add just to America or just to people's perspective.
Yeah.
No, I agree.
I mean, in LA, you guys also have a gift I think that like in LA and our, I feel like sometimes we can't even talk about stuff.
You know, like it would be, it's scary, like it's scary to have like race conversations and stuff out here because people also don't even understand what the rest of America is kind of really like.
You know, a lot of people out here are third, fourth generation Los Angeles people and Hollywood people.
That's the thing.
The rest of LA is totally cool, man.
You get out into some of these suburbs and like the Latino kids and stuff like that.
They're fucking, they get it.
They joke around like crazy, like ridiculous.
But then you get into some of these more like Hollywood circles and it's like, man, you have to just, you just turn into such a Muppet, man, that it's almost exhausting.
That would be a little exhausting.
It's exhausting because you got to get to be free.
Yeah, man.
It doesn't connect to your soul.
And like, at the end of the day, man, if you're connecting to vanity, you're connecting to bullshit, and you're sort of putting on this suit or this mask or this persona that just doesn't really tap into you.
At some point, that shit just runs its course.
I don't give a fuck who you are.
I don't give a fuck how much money.
It's like the beautiful girl who gets with the ugly guy because he has money.
And then after all of the chills and thrills and the boats and the planes and all that shit wears off, she wakes up like, man, what the fuck am I doing?
You know what I'm saying?
Dude named D'Artagnan.
but it wears itself out.
But you have guys who whore themselves out because, like, John's back home.
I'm in California.
Me and John grew up together on the internet.
I want to look cooler than John, and that's where it stops.
Right.
And then I sell myself, and I'm not a whole person.
You know what I'm saying?
But like, I think just the preservation of that, and I like as we're, as we're sitting here talking, I'm like, damn, we hit on a lot of topics on our podcast.
Yeah.
I'm just thinking about the shallowness thing that you said.
And I'm going through my head and running through this feeling of being able to have a partner of the opposite race that's black.
Yeah.
That on a couple of shows I've been able to look at.
And this is what I believe needs to happen more in America.
I've been able to look at them and through a conversation, use the word nigger because that's what's going on.
Right.
Like, I think it's a gift to have someone of an opposite race to have a discussion where you could be like, these are how motherfuckers are talking right now in certain places.
So we're going to talk about it.
Give them context for it.
Yeah.
So a person has to take it the wrong way.
They'd be like, yeah, take it all you want.
I even need a little context.
There goes the neighborhood.
But this is blunt.
This is blunt conversation.
It's real shit.
And in parts of the country that people are.
Oh, yeah.
People say it and some people can't say it and it's uncomfortable and they hear it.
And listen, it's come back.
Put it this way.
It's come back strong.
And that's just what it is.
And I want to know, and I'm comfortable enough and I feel blessed enough to have a guy that I could talk right to a black man and say, what is it like when you're fucking standing outside at a food truck and some dude rolls by and says, fuck you, nigger.
Yeah.
Like that's a real conversation.
And I think that's how we start maybe to make progress.
And these surface conversations you refer to that you're scared of, like the only way to like get through that is to knock the wall down.
You know, it's like, fuck that.
I ain't going to live in this world.
If I can't have a real conversation with you, I don't want to fucking talk to you.
Let me give reference to the people who may not.
So John's not racist, if anybody may.
I'm trying to defend you so like people don't know.
No, I understand it now.
Is this guy, you know, is this guy racist?
No, he's not racist, but I think his personality and his bluntness and his forwardness allows us to like, because he may have that thought in his head.
You know what I'm saying?
And he wants to know this question.
This is a thing that happened.
I lived in South Carolina.
I heard five white guys walking down the street every night, you know, going to the bars in Charleston.
I didn't hear that 10 years ago.
This is real.
And I want to know.
I'm not saying it.
I want to know how a black man feels about this.
That matters to me.
So being able to take it that far, not be offended, not feeling any way about it.
Like I'm, I feel like I've experienced enough even from prison, right?
I was in prison with this guy named Chad.
Chad was a part of the Aryan Brotherhood.
And I asked Chad, I'm like, yo, like, why do you dislike black people?
And I think I said this one in one of our early episodes.
He just liked Maurice.
I've never grew up around any.
And so I was like, well, he doesn't really not like black people.
He just never grew up around them.
No difference than like somebody who just never grew up around people.
Like he's like, I'm just choosing to stay around white guys.
And I just want to be around white guys because this is what I'm familiar with.
And so I didn't look at Chad as like a bag.
I'm like, this motherfucker is just ignorant.
You know, so he's just never been exposed.
And so like to be able to have these conversations like, or, or even to have the conversation, I'm a black guy who lives in a neighborhood where I know how I don't feel accepted.
Right.
But I don't want to be in the hood.
I don't want to be in the suburbs.
And so you have these conversations.
And so now I have people who are of a different race who could tell me like, this is how people feel.
Right.
This is a, but, but, but, so now we're dealing with the truth now.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
But then these people may not like me for fictitious reasons.
So like, actually, why don't you like that a black person is living in your neighborhood?
And who is it that I don't like or what is it that I don't like about you?
But peeling that stuff back makes this conversation real.
Yeah.
And so now we're dealing with the human side, but now we can grow if we've dealt with the reality of stuff.
But being able to talk about, but in business, these are all factors into people dealing with each other.
Right.
How to deal with other people.
And then that plays into all business.
So you take into business and biceps.
You take all psychology, bro.
That's what it is.
But we're dealing with all with each other, whether these are employees, whether these are people answering your calls to pass you off to the right person, whether these are people introducing to you, whether they have a preconceived notion before y'all get together.
These are all things that make all of us up.
But you tell me right now where are you going to go get this conversation without being ridiculed about that happening.
You know what I'm saying?
You're not going to get it anywhere, but in America, this is a fucking factor.
But I appreciate that I'm here to where it's a respectful and wholesome.
And I don't take shit personal conversation because we're trying to get to a space to where you can like, okay, let's get some resolve and grow from this.
Like that's the front side.
That's the intention.
Right.
Yeah.
Let's get some.
Yeah.
I like it.
No, I mean, I think it shows that you guys are, I mean, it's one of the gifts of you guys' dynamic is that you can talk openly about it.
It's not happening anywhere else, man.
Right.
And peeling back that poverty is poverty, man.
Whether you're a white kid from Appalachia like myself or from the hood of Youngstown, from south side of Chicago, wherever, all of that, it's different factors and it might be different parts of the country, but it's resources, it's education, it's opportunity, it's, dude, that's what it is.
Yeah, and racism, a lot of times, and hatred and stuff like that, when you're poor, man, it's just if you have nothing else.
You got no reference.
But also sometimes it's the only thing you can do.
You have nothing.
You have no education.
The one thing you have control over is...
Right is to hate somebody, you know?
And it's like, yeah, I mean, sometimes it's just like a thing that comes in poverty.
Poor people love to fight.
It's all they have to do.
That's what they take pride in.
And it's a free activity.
What's something to do?
It's a free activity.
It's a free activity, bro.
It really, really is, dude.
You know what I'm saying?
You were lucky if somebody would have cut their hose on the bottom.
Dude, I remember when if somebody cut their hose on to let you use their water, they were like keeping a watch on how much water you're getting out the hose.
Like, dude, some of this shit was ridiculous, you know?
Yeah, but I think it is a gift of you guys as a podcast, man.
I think it's one of the things that's neat.
And I think it's, I agree.
It's conversations that need to be heard, you know?
Like, I mean, I grew up, you know, they had, yeah, I just didn't realize when I was growing up, you would see black families.
You'd be like, oh, they don't care about themselves.
You know, that's what you would think.
You know, you would see a black family.
You know, it'd be like.
What would give you the thought from saying that they don't care about themselves?
What would you visually see a process?
I would see like, you know, probably their, you know, they, you know, maybe their neighborhood, they didn't try to keep their neighborhood up.
Gotcha.
Or they didn't, you know, like the parents were smoking weed or, you know, the mom was smoking weed.
The kid was buying weed for the mom, you know.
Or also things, you know, it's really a great question, you know?
I guess like, oh, the kids, some of the kids couldn't, you know, we had kids in seventh grade that couldn't talk even, really, you know?
And they were in seventh grade, you know, black kids.
You're probably asking, how could this be?
Right.
And so then it made you think, I guess actually, I didn't, it made me think, oh, they don't care about themselves.
You know, now as I get older and now I live out here and I see more of the world, you know, and I understand that like, oh, well, if you have generation after generation of a family not having any income or if the grandfather gets a parking ticket and that means that the son, you know, the grandson is going to get a Christmas gift, you know, like if it's that fine of a line.
Now as I get older, oh, you see it.
It's so much clearer.
But from me as a child being in an environment, you don't see it and you also don't get the information.
Nobody's telling me this, my perspective that I am able to see now.
And then also black and white people fight all the time or would be fighting.
So then you have this other thing where it's like, you know, are we even allowed to get along?
Like, do they hate me?
You know, and then like, yeah, it's, I mean, it's a messy environment sometimes, you know, and I feel bad about some of the ways probably that I thought as a kid, but as a child, some of them were probably survival mechanisms and they were thoughts that, you know, I needed maybe at certain points to make me feel a certain way or, and sometimes safety mechanisms, you know, like I grew up in poor black and white and those people were, there was a lot of fighting sometimes.
And so I was scared of both of those, a lot of those people sometimes.
Not all of them.
You know, some had friends in both areas.
But in poverty, there was a much more of a chance for volatility.
And that's what made me really, really nervous, you know, as far as you can.
A major thing as I'm listening to you, you know, black and white poverty are probably very similar in terms of the things you reference about not being able to speak or not keeping up your yard or something like that.
But like a crucial part to everything, whether it goes back three generations or four generations, is like everybody has to take it upon themselves.
And we talk about this a lot, to break the cycle.
And it's the hardest fucking thing to do because your family doesn't understand you.
Your relatives don't understand you.
But there's always got to be one.
There's always got to be one in the family that's like, fuck this.
No more fucking 800 square foot house with the roof leaking.
Like, I'm going to do something about that.
Right.
Like, there's got to be one.
And we are all those ones, by the way.
Pretty much.
And I think that's why I resonate, you know, with you guys' podcast.
I mean, it's funny.
Like, my, and one thing that I've learned is my brother now, you know, he started a successful business and tree business, right?
He doesn't like trees, really, but he likes business, you know?
So he realized now, he's like, damn, if I see a damn tuba for, I'm about to slip my throat with it, you know?
But he loves business.
But one thing he realizes looking back in our neighborhood is just child psychology.
And so that's what he wants to get into now.
And so he uses like the YMCA, and it's like very, it's extremely black and white kids over there.
And he doesn't really see a difference.
You know, we don't see some of the same differences we saw as kids.
But to see him wanting to help children so much, no matter who they are, you know, that's how you change a community, right?
And he's really a big inspiration to me.
But it's when I really think of it, I was thinking about this the other day.
When I really think back, the kids that I associated with the most were kids that felt the same, I could see felt the same way that I did.
Which way was that?
And it didn't matter if they were black or white.
It almost was a color that was within us.
It was some other gray color within us or a confused color within us.
It came from like a space of struggling.
Yeah, like a space of struggling and probably a space of just not really having, you know, structure within to know how to handle just day-to-day situations.
Not knowing when to be confident, not knowing, you know, because sometimes your confidence would get strayed.
You'd be confident at a time.
People are like, what the fuck are you being confident right now for?
What's a spelling be?
You know, you up here yelling and screaming about vowels, like calm it down, you know?
How'd you get the confidence to say, you know what?
I'm funny.
I'm going to go after this shit.
How'd you get it?
You know, I don't know sometimes.
I think sometimes it's one of those things that kind of stayed.
It was like this light that stayed in me that I needed.
I think it was a defense mechanism when I was young.
You know, I couldn't really physically take care of myself much, so I had to joke.
I had to be the jokester.
And then joking kind of transcended.
You could, like black kids love to joke around.
White kids, like, you know, it was, you were kind of, the jokester was always welcome everywhere.
Unless you joked too much, then you got your ass beat.
So that was the risky line.
You got to run the line.
That was a risky line, man.
But no, I mean, look, this is, I mean, even moments of this conversation have been a little bit uncomfortable for me, but not in a bad way.
Sure.
And I recognize that because I'm in a place where, you know, I know you guys are, you know, people that care about the end of this conversation and the next week and the next year and the next 20 years of young men and young women growing.
And, you know, we're not just thinking about, you know, this moment right here.
And I feel that, and I feel that when I'm listening to you guys podcasts, I mean, it's ridiculous.
You know, I still don't know if Foster should be allowed on the air sometimes, dude.
Me and Maurice are always looking at each other like this motherfucker.
But now as I see him in person, I realize he's WWE, bro.
It's real.
I thought I'm like, this guy's hamming up.
He's a contract.
Bro, I never been.
Oh, dude, he could be in the easily.
Listen, listen.
We have a disclaimer before I speak for these.
But what he does is that he pushes the boundaries on what we're talking about.
Always.
Right?
So he pushes.
So it's two things, right?
So one, I didn't realize you was that introspective and intelligent.
So they may, some people may think you're a comedian, but I listen to people what they say.
It's the same thing with him.
Yeah.
Sometimes people's personality be so harsh that people forget like they like fucking deep introspective wealth on all people.
Yeah.
His personality may be different than yours.
You feel what I'm coming from?
Yeah, I feel you.
And I'm referencing John to people who are talking about.
You got to see this John Fosco guy, man.
I can't even, this guy's something else, bro.
I'm not joking.
I never met anybody like this dude, man.
But he pushes.
Corey, would you agree?
He pushes, and then it may come off harsh and brutal and tough, but then it's followed up.
It's usually dead on, though.
It's dead on.
It's followed up to leverage it by something intellectual.
And then you can volley with the conversation back and forth.
And at the end of it, you say, okay, he may have come with me hard, but if I digest what the fuck he said, he's not fucking lying.
Like my girl listened to the manager dick program.
And you know what I'm saying?
But it's harsh, just like my man Johnny Duke.
Yeah, it's fucking kind of like makes sense.
Yeah, I mean, I think if when you gloss over things, you're increasing the probability that people do not take them and understand them and digest them clearly.
So if you come right down the middle, it may sound harsh.
They may think you're an asshole or they may love you.
They normally go one or two ways.
But at least you're giving real information.
And I don't fucking care who likes me.
I actually like to be not liked because if you like me, that's cool.
But I have like this responsibility.
I've always felt this to the truth.
And if it's not the truth, fuck you.
Fuck whoever.
Like get out of my face, bro.
Like I want nothing to do with you.
Like I don't play any of those games.
And that to me is beauty because that's purity.
When you're speaking in truth, bro, that's the substance.
That's where it's at.
We always say we don't talk about things.
I can talk about my car, my houses.
For what?
Who's that benefit?
Nobody.
Let's talk about the skills we can give people to not just get things, but become better people, help their family, and fucking be happy.
And if you don't like the way I say it, fuck you.
I think that constant, I think that being uncomfortable, though, is huge.
No, it's huge.
So like I told John the other day, coming off another venture, it'd have been really easy for me to just kind of coast and be comfortable.
John, I like him and he keeps you uncomfortable.
Right.
So some people don't, they dislike John because of that.
They just don't fuck with him.
Where it's only pushed me to be better.
And I told him that the other day, like, bro, I just appreciate it because it would have been much easier for me to just kind of coast.
And because I know what I've got myself into, that it's going, there's going to be uncomfortable moments.
And we're talking about reference to business because we have multiple businesses together.
He keeps pushing.
And the podcast being one of them, he's going to push the limits, which makes you go a little bit deeper on things and, you know, try to reverse and push him.
And that's what we've been doing, all three of us.
And to your point on changing the cycle, breaking the cycle, I wanted to ask you, is what you've been able to do broke the cycle for your family?
Is it given your family like a new breath of air that things are possible, like from where you come from?
I think so.
I mean, I think, you know, I think one thing for me, honestly, like, you know, a lot of my family's ended up with addiction.
You know, it's been like a big thing in our family.
And I think, yeah, I just have learned a lot about, you know, it makes me, I've learned for some reason, it makes me feel really sad when somebody doesn't know how much they're valued, you know?
And that really, for some reason, like it breaks my heart, you know, and I think, because I think as a kid, I needed just somebody to know that they valued me, you know?
And my mother worked really, really hard.
You know, she worked, you know, delivered newspapers and still does.
And, you know, and I think she never was taught some of those things, you know.
And so then, yeah, then I'm able to see a lot of the cycles, you know.
And then when I watch, like even when I watch like, you know, Maurice's 30 for 30, like there's a, you know, I couldn't connect on a lot of the football stuff.
I could connect like from a fan perspective, like, oh, it looks like so much fun.
And like, you know, did they really beat Miami?
And like, I could connect on how he throws that in there.
But no, I could connect on like, but then I could connect.
There was, there were some moments where I connected like, oh, man, I wonder if that young man knew how much he was valued as a kid, you know?
Like, I wonder if he got the love that he, you know, like, that's where it made me think, like, man, that might be a place that I have in common with that man.
Not that I needed him to have it in common with me, but that's a place where I could feel something, you know?
And that's the part that I really, and that's the part that now when I go back into a community where I look at a kid, you know, where I look at a family or anybody, I'm able to see it from, you know, from that.
And that's where I feel like I know in my heart, that's a place that I can, that's a place that I can start to help at, you know, find some way to let people know that they're valued, you know.
But yeah, I mean, I think for some of the race stuff, it just took getting a bigger perspective.
It's hard when you're in those perspectives.
And, you know, when you're in the, and when you're in a small place, it's hard to see the big picture, you know?
As long as you get to a place where you figure it out or at least you hear the information, I think that's very important.
And the reason I like to talk about it so much is because you deal with it on a daily basis.
You know, sometimes we only like to talk about race in like these harsh conditions or it's like an extreme view one way or another or you have some sort of police shooting or the race gets commercialized with the Carlin Kaepernick deal.
And sometimes you lose the actual message of what's going on.
But if you don't have these conversations, then you don't deal with the truth.
And if you don't deal with the truth, or you're not working towards to shift the perspective to where, you know, we all fucking people at the end of the day, like nobody's better than nobody.
And, you know, you don't have to have a harsh perspective on somebody because they're black or white.
And even, you know, you deal with racism and you deal with classism.
And just because another person doesn't have as much as you do, it doesn't mean that they're less than you.
Right.
And to and to have that stuff and to and to talk about that and to have platforms to do about it, I just think it's to be responsible with your voice.
And for anybody who's been through any hardship, like if you've been through addiction, there's no way that you can feel that you're better than anybody because you've been fucked up and you've not been able to take care of yourself and you've not been responsible at some point.
So at some point, you were like the person who's vulnerable or the person who comes from the lower socioeconomic background.
But it's the same thing with everything.
But those are the human things.
And like I say, I know this is about our podcast, but having the vehicle and the people who come from those backgrounds and to be able to talk about it and put it out there.
It's a blessing that's a huge hole.
I believe it's the only weapon to move, let's say, maybe the two hardest things in this country forward.
Having a white man and a black man talk about real issues when they don't have to.
If those conversations could happen in every county, in every house, every day, that's going to move something racially forward.
Let's say you take one political side now and the other political side.
You don't have to agree, but if you can just have a civilized dialogue, you will find, hey, I might not agree with you, but we got shit in common, bro.
You're cool.
And no one's willing to have those conversations because we're so divided.
And that is ignorance at its finest.
Divided with trivial shit.
And like, how many times we have this conversation?
Yeah, with trivial stuff.
Trivial shit, right?
And old school shit.
It's like old school stuff is like plays out 30 years later.
So ask yourself like this.
Ask yourself this.
When have you ever had platforms to have these conversations?
Right?
What these conversations are going to happen in the fucking town hall?
No.
What are these going to happen in school?
No.
What are we congregating at the library talking about there's no podcasts or platforms which you control, right?
You're not going to the radio station and say, yo, like 107.2, whatever the fuck it is.
You know, you don't hear what we can we have this conversation about.
Yeah, we can't talk about that.
You know, or just like, let me get a little further into it.
What do we have, like, some representative who think he represents all black people?
You have somebody with an agenda who's being termed.
It just is what it is.
But, you know, these motherfuckers come and they don't represent all voices.
Right.
They want to be a superstar.
And also there's a level of achievement that they're trying to achieve.
Yeah, so it's not honest.
And so I'm not about to cry about the fact that we didn't have it.
I just want to know.
So this was, I'm going to tell you what it would inspire me even more.
It's the University of Maryland, Virginia, one of those Rutgers, one of those universities I was telling you all about.
They had a session where they were hosting for white kids how to deal with racism.
And so as I'm looking at this shit, I said, on a college campus, you are inviting a space for all white kids to just understand how to process this shit.
So somebody had the foresight to say, this is a real fucking thing.
And kids may have feelings that they feel about something or incorrect information.
So how do I deal with this shit with the climate in America?
So you have to ask yourself, right?
If they're fucking giving this shit to kids on a college campus, right?
And you're hosting a safe space for these kids to express themselves, because there's probably a space where a person can't say, just like John say, you know, there's people in our neighborhood who may think or who look at you all as niggas, you know what I'm saying?
Like that's a real thing in America.
And that same person who feels that way may be the same person at fucking Starbucks or the same person at the fucking local gas station.
And until you have healthy dialogue with these people, nothing's going to change.
These people are going to grow up with these same views.
You know what I'm saying?
And it hasn't changed.
I mean, you know, a lot of the stuff, it's just been the same types of things that haven't really changed that much.
Bro, like, so.
What are the incentives to change them?
Right.
And when you really come down.
So for me, just a better fucking American individual level, but unfortunately.
Keep on me, Chris Farmer.
God bless you, Chris.
Beautiful man.
It's like a tackle drill over here.
Yeah, but like outside of individuals, what are the incentives?
I mean, you always got to follow the money and the people who control our shit, that's why voting is so important.
Hey, they make the rules and they don't have right now.
There's a huge incentive to keep us divided.
Yeah.
A huge one.
Oh, I agree.
And let's just open our eyes and say, well, what can we do about it?
Don't throw your hands up like a pussy and say, I can't do anything about it.
Have hard conversations.
You know, try to find real people.
But yeah, I mean, we're in these conditions because the people who we voted for contribute to them.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, it's wild, man.
And, you know, it's so funny you say pushes the boundaries and then growth you were talking about as well.
Because, yeah, when you said that a little bit ago, I'm like, fuck, now there was like this space in the room, right?
But then we had to fill the space, you know?
Absolutely.
And that's what, I mean, it was just, it was really, really interesting.
But yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of, I think, yeah, racism is tough because there's a lot of like white people.
I think like, you know, I grew up, I got jumped a couple times by black kids, you know, and it made me, I mean, I grew up in fear of like some of the white kids in our neighborhood and I got beat up by some of them a couple times.
But it made me, so then when I would see like a group of black guys sometimes, this is therapy session.
I would get scared though.
But it's like I would get scared, you know, and I didn't want to be, I think, I didn't want to be angry.
Like in my heart, I didn't want to be angry at black people, but I would be scared of those types of kids.
And if I saw a replica of a group like that or something in my head, it's just like, you know, if a Doberman attacks you, then when you see a Doberman, you're going to be nervous, you know?
You get the feeling.
Absolutely.
So I had a lot of those feelings.
And I think, you know, I think there's probably a lot of like, you know, other people that have had similar type of feelings.
Yeah, but it's the same.
Like, but don't get me wrong, black people are scared of black people.
Yeah.
You know, and it's not the black people, it's the behavior and the environment.
You know, white people are scared of white people.
Oh, I would get scared if, oh, there's a couple of, there's, look, there's some dudes in my neighborhood who, you know, allegedly killed a couple people with a truck, you know, and it's just like, man, I'm wasting time.
Just think about this.
So we're walking through life with these prejudices or these.
But I'm just being earnest about things that I've thought.
No, no, no, but it's cool.
Like, I mean, You say that.
It's no difference than how I may feel towards a white person who comes in my community as a young black kid, whether you're a police officer or whether you're just white in our neighborhood.
What the hell are you doing here?
You know what I'm saying?
Things that you don't know are really believing or growing up believing that all white people are racist.
They just don't like black people.
You know what I'm saying?
But that's not true.
It's not true yet.
But think about media, dude.
Okay, so I always say this, and people can judge me for whatever.
That's sad, man.
I'm sorry that that's ever been a perception.
That makes me sad, too.
But it's ignorance, right?
The perception is built from ignorance.
But like, what is, what is, I'm sorry if this upsets listeners, but like, what does Fox News put out there?
They put out pictures of Black Panthers at voting booths.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, this is what's consumed for like six to eight hours by a lot of America.
I ain't dogging Fox News.
It could be MSNBC going the other way, but like these, this is what people are consuming.
So they may not even have to get a beating.
They see it on TV and they're like, oh, I'm not going to the voting booth.
Black Panthers are there.
It's like the same with the Charlottesville thing.
Like, yeah, they had some racist kids, racist young people or middle-aged people that showed up there, right?
People that we don't need anywhere, you know, like not a type of hatred you want anywhere.
But then to make it seem like it's 100,000 people and a pop, you know, that scares so many people and makes things a lot more, you know, racist than they really are.
You know?
Yeah.
Because they keep us, the more news we make, the more fighting that the news stays in business.
If we go to war, the news will cover it and they stay in business.
And so they get better ratings.
Yeah.
Why are they standing outside getting blown around by it?
Maurice brought up on the podcast one time, Theo, that running at the track in the morning.
So I'm at the track in the morning all the time, right?
Yeah.
And I'm out there running, lunging.
He's in the early, doesn't he?
Yeah, like a three.
So I'm up there, you know, running, lunging like a Jacquelo Willing.
He's way tougher than me.
He doesn't just stay up all night with you basically.
There's really no point.
So, you know, I'm at the track and there's other people there in the morning.
I'm lunging my 800 meters and things I do.
And I don't think no different.
It doesn't matter if the person's white, black, purple, walking around the track.
Marie says, and I'm in a black hoodie, hooded up the whole nine, right?
Marie says, I'm at the track and there's a white woman running or walking by and I'm out here by myself.
Then it makes me uncomfortable.
Like, it's the thought that goes through that I never even would even think about Theo.
When he brought it up on the podcast, I was like, man, fuck.
But he's 250 pounds.
He's a fucking big dude.
And it's like those.
And he's black.
And the things that you're talking about of that.
And he stole that ball from Sean Taylor that one day.
So you know he's got the grip.
So it's like those things, those things, those things are real, bro.
And it's like a lot of people wouldn't even think that that's even a thing.
Man, just think, so just think about that.
Yeah.
That is a real thing.
Every time I go to the track to the point, I can grab my phone and show you what my lawyer, I text the lawyer and say, look, this is weird, but I'm texting you.
But I'm, this is talking to Matt.
Yeah, I can't even say that.
It's serious shit.
But I'm thinking to myself that anything can be said and my life can be altered or she can feel nervous or whatever it is.
But it's simple shit.
I can, even when I go to the gym in the morning, I can, without a shadow of a doubt, if you want a treadmill, I don't want to be by the black guy.
If I'm lifting weights in a certain area, I don't want to be by the black guy.
And it's almost weird to the point like I'm the black guy until somebody introduces me as Maurice Clarette.
And then when I get introduced as Maurice Clarette, oh, this is a cool nigga.
You feel where I'm coming from?
Like now it's acceptable to talk to me.
And so in my head, it plays like, who the fuck was I before I became Maurice Clarette to you?
You know what I'm saying?
But these are real things.
You know what I'm saying?
Like stuff that they don't ever think about.
Like even when we walk out here in LA, like I know if I'm around them and talking with them, like it's easier, it's easier for me.
It's easier for people to talk to me when I'm two white guys.
You feel I'm coming from literally, you don't, you like, you don't go through this, right?
When I go to the barbershop, based upon what event that I'm about to do, okay, I got to shave my face because I'm a little bit more softer on people.
You know what I'm saying?
The beard makes me look a lot more aggressive and a lot more.
But this is just not my story.
This is a story of preconceived prejudices and all this stupid shit.
You know what I'm saying?
And what I'm saying is like to have somebody you can volley conversations, not that business and bicep.
And I don't want to get this perception that we just deal with race.
No, it's okay.
This is good.
This is a conversation that, you know, like, this is the kind of thing is that, you know, things happen on you guys' podcasts that can be just a good conversation.
It just is just a good conversation amongst other stuff that we're talking about.
But the fact that race has been so vacant from America and people's conversation, you can look at it as if like it's this distant thing, but you deal with it every day.
And that's all I'm saying.
You know what I'm saying?
And it prepares you to work with others, right?
Yeah.
If we're digging into race and you go and get a job in an office with 10 people or 100, like this stuff will prepare you to work with the Muslim who your dad said, you know, attacked us on 9-11.
Like you hear this shit and you're like, all right, none of that.
So it's important.
It all ties to business.
It all tie backs.
There's always a meaning.
And I think the meaning should never be about any of us.
It should just be about like, hey, I'm trying to share this shit with you.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think sometimes, no, I love this, man.
I love even having the opportunity to even think about this.
I mean, sometimes I get intimidated by black guys because I feel like they're cooler than me.
And so I'm not joking, bro.
I'm really serious.
Hip-hop culture drives the cool.
But no, if I saw three black guys that looked cool, dude, I'm not joking.
I think this is a real fear.
I don't know what the fear is called.
But I'm not joking, man.
I feel really intimidated.
Like, not that they, yeah, I don't know.
I don't know what is it.
But I feel that.
I feel that sometimes.
I'm trying to identify what he's feeling.
And I don't know what it is.
I'm not saying that they're angry at me or that I'm angry.
If it was three cool-looking white guys, I would just probably think like, oh, those are rich guys, whatever, dude.
But if it was Three cool black guys, for some reason, I would feel intimidated.
And it could just be a me personally thing, you know, and it probably is.
I love this.
Maybe, yeah, but just I'm not as cool.
I can't be as cool as those guys.
Maybe that's what it is, you know?
I don't know.
I don't know.
I mean, yeah.
Hip-hop culture is cool.
Hip-hop culture is cool.
I think, you know.
Yeah, and I think it just looks better.
I think hip-hop culture looks better on black eyes.
So then maybe that's why.
Maybe that's why.
I don't know.
I don't know.
But, yeah, man.
You know what's so funny?
The first time in my life that I ever, I was out about a year and a half ago out here, I was having a tough time getting any traction in my career.
And they, you know, this is a lot of, like, a lot of during the political stuff.
And everybody out here was like, fuck all white people from the Midwest and from the, you know, and from the South.
Like anybody that I even sounded like, like my father's from Nicaragua, right?
My mother's from Chicago, from Peoria, Illinois.
But anybody that even sounded like me or looked like me, they were, oh, this, no, this is bad.
We don't want this on the air.
This is not what we're going for.
This guy doesn't have a chance here right now.
It was so liberal out here.
It was so liberal.
I mean, dude, we couldn't even, we could not even speak.
But here's an interesting moment that happened to me.
I was like, man, I felt bad about the way that I looked.
I felt bad about the way that I sounded.
And I felt like because of those two things, I wasn't going to be able to live out my dreams, which were to be, you know, in the entertainment industry.
So you felt like a black person.
So there was a moment for the first time in my life.
I was like, wow, this must be what it feels like to be black sometimes or to be maybe a woman.
Yeah, but the first thing I thought was because of something you can't change.
But I never had that much Rubik's Cube kind of shift in one moment.
So just think about it like this.
So if you felt like that in the moment, imagine how a lot of black people feel all the time.
Yeah.
That before we even get to, if I'm talented enough or skilled enough or am I even acceptable to do what you're being asked for, I got to deal with how I look and how I sound.
You just basically say the same thing I said, how I got to like, so the reason I cuss a whole lot is to let people know you can, you know, they take curse words and still make it.
The reason I'm myself all the time amongst these two is like, you can still be yourself.
You don't have to be a coon or uncle Tom or you don't have to switch who you are in order to make it in life.
Like you can still be yourself.
And I think that that in itself is my responsibility, whether they feel like it's, whether some people are turned off by it, whether they say it's not professional enough.
But even hearing you said, I was like, wow, I didn't even realize how that can be an adverse effect to you because some people may identify you as like he's a Trump supporter or he may be somebody who looks like people who hate black people.
And we don't want this to be either represented.
We don't want to be involved with this.
But to even feel like that is to feel like how a lot of people feel.
And even though in certain segments or parts of America, people don't deal with this or we shouldn't have to deal with this.
I think it's just like, just think how stupid that is, though.
Yeah.
Like, I have to like, that has to be a thing.
Oh, yeah.
I couldn't imagine that.
I can barely get out of my car and make sure my fucking shoes are tight.
I couldn't imagine.
At that point, though, from a success standpoint, because a lot of people, when they deal with doubt or circumstances that are challenging, they say, maybe I should adapt who I am, or maybe I should come at it differently when I think we all know the key to any kind of success is authenticity, pure authenticity.
Did you ever at any point in that process say, maybe I got to dial back the accent.
Maybe I got to fuck with the haircut.
Maybe I got to be less of me to make it out here, which I, it's a question.
No, it's a great question.
I did.
I mean, actually, for a while, I tried to sound like really, really mainstream and not be myself.
You know, I think I grew this haircut out because I looked at a picture of myself and I'd always had short hair and I have a big nose.
So it's like you can hide a big nose better if you got, you know, more hair or something, you know, like that.
I mean, yeah, okay.
Sorry.
But you can, but so those were things that some of this was insecurity.
But then once I started growing my hair out, I was like, oh man, I saw a picture of myself.
I said, I never want to see my, I'll never know what it's like to have long hair in my whole life because all my pictures are short hair.
I said, maybe I'll change it up a little and just try, yeah, try something wild, you know?
Love it.
And in Canada, this is like a hockey haircut.
In Canada, you think this, they think you play for the Canadiens, you know.
But here, down here, it's like they don't know what you do.
But I don't, man, I look forward to coming.
I'd love to come on you guys' podcast.
I'll be in Columbus.
I didn't even announce these tour dates yet, but it'll be in the early, early spring.
Oh, yeah.
We can't wait to watch it.
So I'd love to talk about this kind of stuff some more.
Just think about it, man.
I can't wait.
One, I've enjoyed myself.
And two, I'm glad I didn't listen to you before I came on.
Because like now.
He's like, fuck you in his head.
Yeah, no.
So like, I was like, no, one, I said, okay, is this guy cheesy?
Right.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
So first of all.
Sometimes.
No, no.
138, dude.
The level of queso is you start to get older in age, it builds up on you, bro.
You can't help it.
I was asking myself, but then like after you start talking and there's a deep sense of intelligence when you talk because I could tell people, like I've read enough and listened to enough people.
You could tell through cadence, through words, through purpose, how they use them, how they leverage them.
And you could tell when somebody's volleying back and forth with conversation.
I would say if I'm not good at a lot of shit, I think I'm good at that.
And because I think in prison, you fucking hear people talk all day.
Yeah.
And so you can like, yeah, you pick up on shit.
Well, your instincts are probably pretty acute, I bet.
Yeah, my man.
There you go.
So I don't know.
I don't know.
I've thoroughly enjoyed myself, and I'm pretty sure.
I think conversations never stop.
And I'd absolutely love to have you when you're in Columbus because that's the whole deal with our stuff.
These conversations, they don't have an end point.
We're always working to get to a better place and we'll die working to get to a better place.
I love that.
I can't tell someone when Jan talks to him.
We're like, I feel like I'm in the military.
One moment.
I'm like, what are we about to go to?
But no, it's great, though.
It's great, man.
No, I love knowing that I have people that I can talk to about business.
I love knowing that if I, you know, this is cool.
You know, I'm a big fan of you guys, dude.
And I'm really, really, really grateful that you guys came out here.
You know, Maurice, I think one thing that you do have a gift is being like a liaison to people, you know, and connecting people because, I mean, that is one of the benefits of having a name, you know, is that you get to be a bridge.
You know, you really, you know, as much as people, sometimes want to use you as a staircase, probably, I bet a lot more people probably want to use you as a bridge, you know?
Hopefully through this podcast, we can do just that.
Hopefully we get people who listen and hopefully people who, like, I've had a ton of people, I got to say now, one of the biggest, y'all was talking about earlier, one of the biggest things happens when I was in a fucking steak and shake, not steak and shake, the In-N-Out?
No, I love Shake Shack.
Shaq, God.
No, I was in some.
Chaquil O'Neill's house.
Chaquil O'Neill.
Penn Station.
They said the cheese steaks.
And a guy came up to me and the guy was like, man, and I thought he was going to say something about football, but he's like, man, I listen to y'all podcasts every fucking day.
And when he said it, he emphasized, he said, you don't realize I learned so much shit from there.
And so that, to me, and when I get DMs from dudes and these dudes are naming specific things from what we're talking about, and my dudes are sending me text messages about shit that we talked about, dude, that is the most rewarding thing to let you know that you are doing what you're supposed to be doing.
And I think in life, when you can do what you are meant to do and you can connect to people in a way that you want to connect, like that is the greatest shit.
And I think that that is like what leaves an impact on people.
Yeah.
I agree, man.
I mean, yeah, it's well said.
Yeah, I think we're...
Real good, man.
Yeah.
Awesome.
John Corey, Maurice, thank you so much.
Nick, we good?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Just super grateful you guys are here.
And I look forward to doing it on you guys' podcast in the spring.
This is the Business and Biceps Crew here on this past weekend.
Thank you guys very much.
Thank you.
But it's gonna take a little time for me to set that parking break and let myself unwind shine that light on me.
I'll sit and tell you my story just a moment.
And I will know the way to the world.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm Jonathan Kite and welcome to Kite Club, a podcast where I'll be sharing thoughts on things like current events, stand-up stories, and seven ways to pleasure your partner.
The answer may shock you.
Sometimes I'll interview my friends.
Sometimes I won't.
And as always, I'll be joined by the voices in my head.
You have three new voice messages.
A lot of people are talking about Kite Club.
I've been talking about Kite Club for so long, longer than anybody else.
So great.
Hi, Sweet.
Easy to you.
Anyone who doesn't listen to Kite Club is a dodgy bloody wanker.
John Main.
I'll take a quarter pottle of cheese out of McQuarry.
Sorry, sir, but our ice cream machine is broken.
I think Tom Hanks just butt-dialed me.
Anyway, first rule of Kite Club is tell everyone about Kai Club.
Second rule of Kite Club is tell everyone about Kai Club.
Third rule, like and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts or watch us on YouTube, yeah?
