SPEAKER_00 0:04

Ask yourself one simple question. What's one thing that I've almost been ready to start for the past year, two years, three years? What's one thing that I've always wanted to do, but I know I need to do that I haven't gotten started on? To me, that is the first step in the right direction to stop regressing in a fall off, basically. Once the first answer pops into your brain like a beach ball underwater, and it just pops right up, that is your answer. You need to get started on that ASAP because that's the thing that's undeniably been in your mind and you haven't gotten started. Failures podcast. Today we're talking about the male fall-off. How to get your life back on track after you lost all momentum and motivation. Let me ask you guys a question. Are you the guy who shows up to work on time? Are you the guy who pays his bills on time? Are you the most responsible person in your family amongst your friends? Everybody counts on you. But for some reason, deep, deep down inside, you know you lost that drive and that hunger to get the most out of life. To get the most out of your life. When you were younger, you had that drive. You had that hunger. But here's the truth: you're not in a crisis. You're not broke. But there's a version of you three years ago that you know was hungrier. What happened to that guy? Did he fall off? That's what this episode is about today. The fall-off years. This is a really interesting and nuanced relationship. Your mid-30s, your early 30s, you start getting comfortable. You conquered all those dreams, you slayed some of those dragons, and now you're sitting idle at a red light, thinking to yourself, damn, what happened to that side business I wanted to create? What happened to that fit body I wanted to have in my 30s? What happened to my hairline? This happens to most men, and it's happening a lot more given that there's so much pressure on men today. But Rich, my question to you is do you relate to this guy? I mean, you have two kids, you have a whole-ass mortgage, you have a job that you got to travel to New York for every day. Do you relate to today's topic? I have to imagine you do, especially when life be life.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Yeah, man. Like you said, I have a full-time job, wife, two kids, a mortgage, and a million other responsibilities. And I do find myself sometimes feeling like I'm drifting and we're not working towards our said purpose, mission, or goal. And it's interesting how the drift topic is not one failure or one mistake that unlocks the drift feeling, right? It's just a slow compounding issue where just little by little, week over week, year over year, you start to lose momentum. You start to lose energy and that spark that you once had to follow your goals and dreams. So I'm excited to unpack this one, just because honestly, if we're being truthful here, this is something that I deal with almost on a weekly basis.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Yeah, I mean, it's stagnation. That's what it is. It's human stagnation. It's I I think the word is called entropy. It's like naturally, as you get older, as life goes on, things start to decay. Your knowledge, if you don't freshen it up, starts to decay. Languages. If you speak a whole other language and you learned a whole other language and you don't use it every day, it starts to decay. Your muscles, if you don't go to the gym, if you don't take care of your health, it starts to decay. And when you don't prioritize maintenance, things decay. That's just natural. I think that's just a law of life. So what we're talking about is stagnation that has been codified and been said before as a fall off. Sometimes I'd be feeling like a fall-off. But the truth is, when life be life and you got so much shit going on in your life that you can't keep up with everything. So what is the solution to that, Rich?

SPEAKER_01 4:15

Yeah, I mean, listen, exactly what you just said, there's a confusion in feeling that drift because you have a full schedule and you're busy and you're doing things, right? You're going to the gym, you're going to work, you're coming back, you're doing your chores and responsibilities, and you confuse your life being an autopilot with you just operating and just living in a in a mundane sequence, right? So you don't get to follow your goals and your ambitions like you once used to.

SPEAKER_00 4:49

Yeah, I'm curious if you have any stories or you could think of anything when I say what I'm about to say. The note that I have here is the falloff is sneaky because it just happens slowly over time. You had just said it, it's day over day, week over week, year over year. And it's crazy how days turn into weeks, turn into years, it starts snowballing. And it kind of happens over time, like a small crack in a windshield or like a small leak in a boat. You don't notice it immediately, but at some point you start realizing, damn, I haven't done insert thing that I care about X in three years. How the fuck did that happen? Again, it's not a 9-1-1 emergency. It's not something that when something happens quickly, you address it quickly. But when it happens slowly, that's when the fall-off starts taking place.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

Yeah. And honestly, for me, just I felt like this a couple of jobs ago when I worked at a commercial lending bank for seven years, right? Which I never intended to be in that job for that long. But that job did help me save enough money to eventually buy my own home. And during that time, I was winning, bro. I was saving, I was getting bonuses, I was progressing in life. I had just bought a new car, I got an apartment, like all these things started to perfectly line up for me. And after seven years, I looked back and I'm like, damn, we're still here. Like we should be making more income. Why are we still stuck in the same job? And, you know, ultimately I did go out to the open market and change jobs. But during those seven years, I was very much drifting because I in one end I was winning, but on the other end, I wasn't accomplishing certain goals that I wanted for myself.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

Rich, question is that comfort or is that intentionally stalling because you know you have to do something, but you're okay with your circumstance?

SPEAKER_01 6:52

I mean, in that time, I think it's just comfort, bro.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

So you're saying comfort is where the lot of the fall off comes from because you just start getting comfortable in the thing you wanted, and after you have it, you stop maintenancing it.

SPEAKER_01 7:04

Yeah, I mean, some people might say that, oh, I make enough money to survive, so I'm good. Why do I need to get another job and work harder for more money? That's living in comfort. That mentality of you thinking that you make enough money to survive, therefore, you don't need to work harder to get more money, is the mentality of someone who wants to live in that comfort.

SPEAKER_00 7:30

My girlfriend and I just re-watched all the Batman movies because her favorite director is Christopher Nolan. And I've never seen the movie with Bane in it. And the movie with Bane, that Batman, is when Batman takes a major L and he doesn't rebound from it. So, like in the movie, the whole time, he's just like not Batman. He's like a washed-up version of Batman. He's pre-washed Batman. And he is in some weird way, I could see a lot of myself in that character. He once was legendary, he once was strong, he once was mighty. The city loved him. Now the city hated him, he was weak, he was hurt, he was hiding. And Bain starts taking over the entire city of Gotham. And in the movie, he says a line, which I absolutely loved. I had to pause the movie and ruin it for my girl. I was like, yo, that's a fucking bar right there. And what Bane tells Batman when he starts fighting him the first time, he says, victory has defeated you. Victory has defeated you. And that line, the way I interpret it was, man, you got fat, you got lazy. People love you so much, and you've achieved all your goals that you stopped training. And I came out of the darkness. Bane is a representation of the darkness. And Batman wasn't prepared for him. And victory defeated him. And I think that's the pre-wash era of a man. Is you don't realize that because you achieved all those child goals, those teenager goals, that teenager energy, that 20-year-old energy, you can go for days, you can accomplish anything. You could have two jobs, a side job, a main chick, a side chick, and you have all this energy in your life. And then you know what happens, Rich? You start getting a little fat, you start getting a little lazy, you start putting a little extra scoop of rice in there, some extra pork, you start ordering out. You don't go to the gym, and victory defeats you. And I think that is what this whole episode is about. And once I looked at it from that perspective, when Bain told Batman victory has defeated you, I felt seen in that moment. Like, damn, I've been there before. I've definitely been there before. It's not something that's obvious. It starts with little coded words like, I'll do it tomorrow. Don't worry about it. I'll start Monday. Don't worry about it. You know what we say about people who start Monday? Don't be Mr. Manana. Remember Mr. Manana? Mr. Manana is the guy that doesn't get anything done today because he thinks he has the luxury of tomorrow. And Rich, I think that is our entry point for the first part of this episode is when victory defeats you and you accomplish your child goals, but you don't have any bigger goals to look forward to.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

Yeah. And like you said, it's this weird thing that just happens very slow and gradually. And it does slow you down because if you're someone who set goals for yourself and accomplished them, you feel like in that moment you could afford a break. You could slow things down, but sometimes you stay in that headspace for too long, right? You stay in that celebratory space for too long. And then things slow down. You lose momentum, you lose ambition, and then you don't go after the things that come next after said accomplishment.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Yeah, Rich, I really relate to the young man in this episode that we're speaking to. Because not too long ago, I got absolutely flamed by my father. And he told me something that absolutely changed my whole energy towards my health and my fitness. And my father is not the most fittest man in the world. He's a little overweight. And when he told me what he told me, that shit bothered me so much. But it was the truth. And I've said this on previous episodes, and I think it's more true in this episode than any other one. Once you see the truth, once you hear the truth, you cannot unsee it. It's like if somebody said, Have you noticed the the Tesla only comes in white and red? And now when you look out in the street, all you see is white and red Teslas. That's because someone has identified a truth that you can't unsee. And my father said to me, Man, tu tapendo gold, aka translation. Damn, bro, you're getting fat. And that that bar right there that my father said to me was probably like seven years ago when I was living in Manhattan. I was living on 23rd and Park Avenue. I had a nice loft space. I was at the peak of my career. I was getting money. I was winning awards. And I can't lie, Rich, I was feeling myself. And that was the beginning of the fall off for me. Because my father took a fucking glass bottle of truth and cracked that shit over my head and was like, yo, you're getting fat. I don't know what's going on in your life, but you need to get back to it. And of course I was offended. But you know what though? He told me something that changed my life because I got my ass back in the gym. And I swear to God, I think I've been going to the gym since that day. And every time I want to take a day off and I want to be Mr. Manana or Mr. I'll do it on Monday. I think about my pop saying, damn, you're getting fat. And he's my motivation and he drove me to fix my body. And listen, some people can't handle crashed and honest people in their lives, but sometimes it's not a person. Sometimes it's like a little kid that says something about you. And that truth fucks your day up. Sometimes it's a matter of just getting on a scale, just to test it. Hey, let me get on this scale real quick. Let's see how much I weigh. And when you notice you've gained 25 fucking pounds and you didn't even realize that you gained more than 10 pounds, that is the beginning of the fall-off. That means life has counted all the days that you didn't do anything, and it's gone into the negative ledger. Not the positive ledger, the negative ledger. And all those negative days add up the same way positive days add up. And Rich and I are really zooming in on this episode because we related to this shit so much. Because when you get into your late 20s and your early 30s, the slope could get very slippery and you could end up on the other side that you don't want to be on. And it's bigger than health, it's with finances and a lot of things.

SPEAKER_01 13:52

It's with everything, Justin. You just said it, bro. How do you identify the drift? You start with the truth. Where are you at currently? Where were you six months ago? If that part of your life is not trending in the right direction, then you've drifted. That's how you identify it. You know, and one of the things that you mentioned in the pre-show that I thought was pretty interesting was like the treadmill illusion, right? Like the idea that you just overload your calendar and you believe that because you're so busy in life that you're trending and moving in the right direction. But that's not always the case. So I'd love for you to unpack that, Jess.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

Yeah, the treadmill illusion is the worst case scenario for someone that is regressing in life. The treadmill illusion is somebody that is thinking they're making progress, but they're just running in place. That's why it's the treadmill illusion. You mistake a lot of action and a lot of busyness for progress. Busyness and progress are two different things: there's effectiveness and efficiency. For the amount of time that I put into this thing that I want to get out of life, am I getting equal or if not greater value back? It's an investment on time and energy. Being busy does not always mean you're going to reach your goal. And Rich, we had admitted to this on other episodes, and I'd like you to unpack something you had mentioned to me. Bro, sometimes I get overwhelmed with being busy, but I lack action. And that's the treadmill effect. It's the treadmill illusion. You think you're moving, but you're not. And making believe you're busy only hurts one person, the person who wants progress. And that person is you. You're falling off because you're not being honest about the difference between being busy and being someone who makes progress.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Yeah. And this is why I struggle with this almost on a weekly basis, just because I'm always reminded of everything that I want to accomplish, right? Like this is what goes on in my brain. And when I think about being a father of two children, holding down uh an entire household and all of my responsibilities, plus accomplishing my goals and being an ambitious man, that recipe altogether becomes a little bit overstimulating and overwhelming for me. And I have to sort of pause and unpack like, what are the things that are important to me? What are the things that are not important to me? Where in this busy life, busy schedule, can I carve out time to work on me and not necessarily for everyone else?

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Rich, what you just said made me think of a funny ass story with my ex and her mother. I used to go down the shore with my ex's family at a beautiful shore house. Their father was doing very well for himself. Talking about very well for himself. And this guy would always put pressure on me to show him that I was capable of being with his daughter. Rightfully so, like any man should. And every time we would drive up to South Jersey, it was a two-hour drive, and we would go to their shore house. I would always be driving up there, thinking to myself, like, damn, I have to whip up some magical story about some regular shit that I'm working on just to impress her dad. I did with a few of my college friends, creative agency. And in that creative agency was an influencer agency. And it was one of the first ones that have ever been created in New York. And I basically told him a white lie that eventually became the truth. But in that moment, it was a white lie because I wanted to impress him. And he took me fishing. It was just me and him. He used to grill me when we would go fishing. And he would be like, What's up? How's business? How are things with, you know, the business? Everything was the business. So I'm just sitting there, I don't even know how to fish, by the way. I'm just in there with him. He's drinking his beer. He's talking to me. He's like, So what's up with this company that you started? Insert my ex's name, uh, told me about it. And I'm like, fuck, I want to impress this guy. So I'm like, Yeah, you know, we just we just got a round of funding, XYZ. You know, we're gonna kick it off in a few months. I'm just waiting for this one account to close. You know, it was a real business, but it wasn't that official. Anyway, I tell him that white lie, we spend the weekend at their short house. I come back home, whatever. A year later, literally a year later, because it was in celebration of like one of their family members, like an annual thing that we used to go up there for. The mother and the father tell my ex, hey, tell Justin we have a dinner planned for him and we're gonna celebrate him. So I'm thinking to myself, like, why? Why are they doing that? I completely forgot that I told this guy that I had started my own company and it was like a one-of-one in the Northeast area. And this dude took me to dinner and he toasted at the end. I was so fucking confused during the dinner. Like, I don't know what we're celebrating, but I'm with it. Like, he's paying, I'm cool. At the end, he goes, Here, toast to Justin in his first year of his new startup. I hope everything's going well. And yo, yo, luckily, I already had a guy that started with my college friends, but in my mind, I was like, yo, I completely forgot that I told this guy that I was working on this thing that I probably didn't even put no energy towards for the next eight months after I told him about it. And that right there, that little story right there, that embarrassment, that shame that I felt was the lack of progress that I made. The difference between saying something and then putting pen to paper and actually taking action, two very different things. And I think that is a core thesis in this episode. You could have the stress and the pressure and the knowledge of what you need to do, but nothing differentiates like taking action and getting it done. And that embarrassment that I felt from that man celebrating something that I didn't accomplish was the ultimate fuel for me to go back home and get this shit started. So when the next anniversary, we broke up a year, by the way. So, but when the next anniversary came up, at least I could show him some progress. So again, the world will shame you into progress. A mirror will shame you into progress, a scale will shame you into progress. Your fucking bank account will shame you into progress. A pair of pants that you used to wear three years ago, and when that button ain't really hitting the way that button used to hit can shame you into progress. So pay attention to the world. It has a weird way of reminding you that you're not doing what you need to do and you're falling off.

SPEAKER_01 20:50

Yeah, listen, that's a great story, Justin. I feel like Was it? Was it a great story?

SPEAKER_00 20:55

By the way, my ex at the time, when we rode back, she was like, yo, I did not know my dad was gonna do that. I was ashamed to tell him that you didn't make any progress on what you told him about.

SPEAKER_01 21:06

Yeah, but listen, in that story is how you identify that you're drifting when you start to make excuses about the things that you want to accomplish. Because in that moment you were ego protecting, you know, you were making excuses. So I was lying. I I just straight lied. Yeah, you were lying. But you were lying, so you didn't have to say that you fell off course or that you were drifting.

SPEAKER_00 21:31

Oh, I like that. Rich, stay right there, and I think you should just run with this. How your brain could start lying to you when you know you're drifting, but you're in denial. It's like this cognitive dissonance. You start, oh, I'm busy, oh, I don't have the time.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

Yeah, it's like this weird mental thing where you start to defend your stagnation, and you're basically telling yourself excuses either to not start or to stall the start and not. Take action. So you start saying, Oh man, I'm really busy. I'm going to get to that soon. Or damn, right now is not the season, right? The winter is when I grind. Like that's when I get the most productivity. And there's this weird thing where you're very shameful around people if you're not accomplishing what you've said you were going to do publicly, right? So there's also a lot of um things that you're trying to protect in your dream. Because if you shared it, now you need to show proof that it's materialized. And if you don't have that proof, you go back to that circle of friends or family with shame that you've drifted, you fell off, you didn't do what you said you were going to do. And that's that's just a very interesting uh nuance in this subject.

SPEAKER_00 22:50

Yeah, they call it putting cologne on a lack of progress is stagnation, is really just dressed up as maturity. It's like you keep using maturity, and I have a lot on my plate. I got a lot going on in my life right now. You use it as a cologne to get rid of the stink of you putting your best foot forward and finding the time to do what's important. And I think what happens is you wind up trying to defend yourself. And in that defense for yourself, you start making up excuses. And then those excuses turn into white lies. And those white lies turn into, man, my leg is messed up. That's when your girl's like, yo, I thought you you got this gym membership. You pay an insane amount of money for this gym membership. You have a personal trainer. What happened? Why are you gaining weight? You're like, oh nah, it's that I fucked up my leg. And you start making excuses that allow you to cope with your ego because your ego is your ego knows. I think that's a big topic here. Deep down inside, you know when you're not doing what you need to do.

SPEAKER_01 23:54

Just you know what's the biggest excuse, the most common excuse? I'm burnt out. But are you really burnt out? Are you really actually tired of working on this idea or this goal or this business or this startup? Or are you just using that as an excuse and as a crutch for not taking action?

SPEAKER_00 24:16

Yeah, I'm gonna do this when things settle down. My life is really crazy right now. I'm gonna I'm gonna get to it when things settle down. I've heard that one before. I've used that one before. What do you think that's for? Who do you think that's for?

SPEAKER_01 24:29

You're protecting your ego, man. You haven't started, you haven't worked on this thing, and you're just holding on to excuses to further delay the ass whooping of whatever results you're going to get from the things that you're working on. But that's the cautionary tale, bro. It's just like all these things contribute to that drift that we're talking about. And this is why identifying that these things are happening in your life, excuses, no proper time management, you know, not working on the things that you want to be working on or the things that are important to you, all these things contribute to the drift and ultimately delay the action that you want to take on the goals you're trying to accomplish.

SPEAKER_00 25:11

So for sure, for sure. And Rich, there was a note that I was able to pull from our research package, and it is a note from very credible source. We do pull from credible sources. I can't remember the author or the author of the book, but there's something called self-efficacy. And self-efficacy is the erosion of self-trust. Basically, what that means is every little action that you take, negative or positive, day over day, it starts compounding in your brain. You start believing that you are a person that doesn't do these things. You start destroying the trust that you have with yourself. And the lower your self-esteem becomes, the more you start becoming someone that doesn't get things done. You become the guy that doesn't go to the gym, you become the guy that is too busy to do those things. And when you destroy the trust you have with yourself, it's scientifically proven. You start becoming a person that can't get things done. You naturally start falling off. And when that fall off takes place, it's really hard to reverse. And I think we spoke about that earlier in the episode. How do you reverse the fall off? How do you reverse the drift? How do you regain that momentum? Because it's easy to keep speed going when you're running downhill. That's positive momentum. We're talking about running uphill and then trying to turn it back around to gain momentum. So this is not a momentum conversation. This is about redeveloping that relationship with yourself. You have destroyed your self-esteem. You have destroyed the trust that you have with yourself. How do you reverse that? I don't really know what the answer is, Rich, but I do think that's important to identify that. Because any typical male self-help platform will be like, bro, you got to get on it. You got to get on top of it. You got to prioritize yourself. But is that really helpful?

SPEAKER_01 27:09

Yeah, listen, I mean, that is extremely important, bro. If you're the type of person who ends up not losing that trust within yourself, like really not believing in yourself, then you're just gonna be dehabilitated, bro. Like you're gonna absolutely lose momentum, lose progress, lose urgency. That right there, just that word urgency, like I don't know what happened in your life where that you got to a point where you lost the sense of urgency to take actions on the things that you want to accomplish, but I can't stress that enough. The word urgency is so important because you should operate with urgency with everything that you're working on in in your life, right? Even if you feel like your life is on autopilot, like there's still things that you might want to be working on that require urgency. I feel like when things feel slow and you're not urgent about things, that's when you start delaying your progress. That's when you start to say, Oh, I could do it tomorrow, or I could do it next week. And if you don't have that sense of urgency, bro, you it just everything's just gonna feel a lot slower and progress is gonna feel impossible.

SPEAKER_00 28:21

Rich, totally unscripted and something that you did to me that is the exact story that works for this episode. Do you remember when I called you a very, very, very, very long time ago? It's probably two years now, and I was like, yo, I've been doing an insane amount of research. I've been reading all these books on this specific category that there seems to be a lack of help in the young male category for guys that look like us, talk like us, come from our community. And I bombarded you with all these photos and links and research. And do you remember when we got on the call on the phone and what you told me after we we had the first unofficial official failures phone call? Do you remember what you told me?

SPEAKER_01 29:07

I do remember. You were like, yo, I'm gonna call you back. I'm gonna keep doing some more research. And I was like, why do you need to keep doing more research? Let's just start now.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Bro, that's fucking crazy. I don't know if you can see my notes. I have it right here. Let's just start. That's exactly what you told me. I don't know if we can see that, but we will add it. I'll take a picture. Why does that relate to the episode?

SPEAKER_01 29:29

Yeah, and then my follow-up to that was let's start failing fast. Because the minute that you take action and you're actually boots on the ground for said goal and you're and you're in the field and you're working towards something, the failed reps over time are going to teach you all the lessons that you need to continue progressing and continue to move forward. But if you don't take action and you you're not ready for the resistance of failure, you're not going to be able to move forward and build that momentum that you need to continue moving forward.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

Yeah, I mean, listen, we say this a lot, but I think this is a great moment. This platform, the one that this young man is listening to, would have not been in existence if we didn't eat our own home cooking, meaning we took our own advice. And you are the reason why this show started that day. Not a month later, not a week later, not Mr. Manana, not I'll do it on Monday. We started our show because of something you said. Let's just start now. Those four words, let's just start now, changed everything for us. And that is in your mind. That's how you work, Rich. And I know you always you're pretty tough on yourself, but I do want to always give you a lot of credit. You are someone that's very action-driven. You do take action, you're not someone that likes to sit around and do too much research. What is it about that that relates to this episode? And remember, the thesis of this episode is the male fall-off. How to get your life back on track after you lost momentum and motivation. How does that story relate to that show title and that show subject?

SPEAKER_01 31:11

Yeah, I mean, listen, naturally, taking action is doing something, right? The more you research and more you delay the ass whoopings that failure is going to give you when you're initially learning about something, the further you're delaying the progress, right? I'm of the mindset, bro, that like life experience is the best teacher, right? You could read all the books you want, you could listen to all the audiobooks you want, you could listen to every episode of Failures Podcast, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:45

You could transcribe it, put it into Claude. Yeah. Tell it exactly to tell you what Rich and Justin would tell you to do.

SPEAKER_01 31:51

Yeah, but until you're actually in the field taking action and learning and riding the surfboard and the waves that is the resistance of life and experience and just learning things as they come, you're not gonna under really understand just how to move forward overall. Like it's funny because from once we had that conversation to where we are today, we're 41 episodes in. It's almost been a year since we've been working on this platform and building this community. And we've learned so much. And it wasn't by reading, it was by tinkering. It was about being in the field and being in the arena and sharing information with one another and being like, damn, this thumbnail didn't work. Let's try this one next week. And all those little iterations compound over time. But the most important thing is week over week we take action. So we are moving forward and we have built a system and a workflow that gives us the momentum that we need week over week to keep the ship moving forward.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

Yeah, listen, a man doesn't think his way out of drift. He moves his way out of drift, he fails his way out of drift. That confidence, like you said, Rich, that confidence, that self-trust, that ability to know I am capable to get this done, that comes from clarity and action and reps and failure, rinse and repeat. You don't need a better plan. You need to keep the promise that I'm gonna keep moving in this direction. That's how you prevent a fall off, that's how you prevent entropy. That's how you know, man, I'm capable. All you need is proof. And I love that unplanned, we brought up the inception of failures, and that's where the name failures came from, which is crazy that we kind of came back in episode 40 plus, because Rich said to me, bro, why don't we just start now? I can't wait till we start failing. And that's what failures came from because we know in the book inside of the book, inside of the paragraph, inside of the sentence, inside of the word, if you could zoom all the way into that word, failure is ground zero for progress. And you need to start convincing yourself that you're capable. And that capability is going to give you the proof to start building. Again, momentum is working against you. You are reversing, you're not moving forward. In order to get the momentum to move for you, you have to take action. And I know we're saying the same thing in different ways, but it's so fundamental, Rich. I feel like you've said this before. These fundamental truths keep coming up in all these episodes because you can't avoid them. There's no other solution to a lot of these problems.

SPEAKER_01 34:41

Yeah, absolutely. And one of the things, when I put myself in the headspace of a young guy who's might have drifted, and he's like, all right, well, how do I take action? Like, what are some of the things that I need to work on? Or how do I reframe my mindset to view my life in a way where I can move things around in order to take action? One of the things that has always worked for me, and it works for me to this day, bro, is just I have an internal dialogue with myself. And we made a whole episode on this, and I tell myself, Rich, no one is coming to save you. No one is going to give you an opportunity if you don't set yourself up to receive one. No one is going to give you money to do the things that you want to do or buy the things that you want to buy. That term right there, we did a whole episode on this, and we'll definitely link it in the description. But no one is coming to save you, helps you create that urgency because it's a fundamental truth. Very rarely do people in our community have a mentor that can carve out the path so easily for them to just follow, right? Very rarely do people in our community have a father that's present that can help them with all of their life milestones step by step, right? And give them all the money they need for a college tuition, et cetera. Like we're under the assumption that if you grew up the way we grew up, you didn't grow up with the best circumstances, you didn't grow up with the best resources. So you have to operate with the mentality that no one is coming to save you. And that urgency will create the action that you need to continue moving forward.

SPEAKER_00 36:28

Yeah, Rich, I want to paint a picture to our listener about the idea of knowing you have to change something and actually taking the action to change something. Scenario. And I'm speaking from personal experience. I'm sitting on my couch, I try to get up quickly, I feel my back, it hurts. I'm reminded immediately damn, I'm getting old. My back is killing me. I should do something about it. I don't change anything. Having the awareness that you have to change something, yet you don't take any action to change something, it creates guilt. It creates doubt. It creates this idea that I'm not someone that takes advantage of the time and the health I have to tackle my problems. So what happens is that loop happens again. My girl says we need to move storage from the patio to the front of the house. I go to pick up the storage because I'm the strong man in the family. That back pain comes back. The truth. Damn, my back is killing me. A week ago, I had the same pain, never addressed it. So now that guilt now has a spotlight. The doubt has a spotlight. That self-efficacy, that relationship you have with yourself. Who am I? What kind of guy am I? Am I the guy that doesn't take care of these problems? Fuck it. I'll deal with it tomorrow. Mr. Manana, my niece, Destiny, beautiful young lady, has a little baby boy, Ethan. Ethan looks just like me. I go to visit my family. Ethan runs up to me so I can carry him. I pick him up. Lower back pain for the fifth time in four weeks. What is the loop here, Rich? I'm not addressing the problem, but I keep dealing with the pain. At some point, the metaphor of this story is life becomes icy hot and a back brace. You never actually deal with the issue. You just become the guy that has the back brace and smells like icy hot because you never have dealt with the core problem. That is where the fall-off leads. How do I know I'm that guy with the back problem? I'm that guy who didn't do core and take care of his body. But once I realized that that problem wasn't going to go anywhere until I dealt with it, that's when I was able to start moving this shit in the right direction. And I think that's what we're trying to share with our viewer right now. Because it's not a catastrophic failure, because it's not a code red 911, you're down bad, you're living under a bridge. You get confused. You think everything's okay, but it's not. You know, you have the relationship with yourself. You know in your subconscious. Damn, I need to do something about this. Well, the first step you have to take is admitting it. It's like smoking crack. The first step you got to take in any A meeting is admit that you're an addict. You have to admit that you have a problem and it keeps coming up.

SPEAKER_01 39:25

Yeah. And exactly what you just said. The way you do that is just self-assessing like what it is about where you want to be versus where you're currently at, that's contributed to the drifting. And just I don't think this is a complicated solution, right? Like, all you have to do is start to take action. If you wanted to create uh a startup and you wanted to do this with a couple buddies that you had in mind that'd be perfect business partners for this said um startup, start sending text messages, start sending emails, start setting up coffee dates with the homies and see if they're interested in working on this idea. Like it's not that hard, right? I think the hard part is just continuing to drift and say, like, damn, I got to get to that. Damn, one day I'm going to do this, right? Or damn, I said two years ago that I was gonna start a business and I never actually did it, right? That's the hard part is continuing to drift. The easy part is having movement and taking action so that you can build that momentum. And it's not hard, bro. Send an email, send a text, make a phone call, set up a business meeting. Like these things are not hard to do, they just require for you to take action.

SPEAKER_00 40:45

I love where your head's at because we're kind of pivoting to the end of the episode, and we should give some tangible, actionable advice. And one note that I made in the pre-show prep was ask yourself a simple question. Trust me, I've been there before, and this is very, very simple. Ask yourself, what's one thing when I'm at a red light, when I'm taking a shower, when I'm taking a shit, and my phone is away from me, and I'm a little bored, bored enough to let a little doubt creep in, right before you go to bed. It happens to me a lot, right before I go to bed. Ask yourself one simple question. What's one thing that I've almost been ready to start for the past year, two years, three years? What's one thing that I've always wanted to do, but I know I need to do that I haven't gotten started on? Ask yourself that simple question. To me, that is the first step in the right direction to stop regressing in a fall off, basically. So ask yourself, what's one thing that I've always wanted to do? Once the first answer pops into your brain like a beach ball underwater, and it just pops right up, that is your answer. You need to get started on that ASAP because that's the thing that's undeniably been in your mind and you haven't gotten started.

SPEAKER_01 42:03

Yeah. And just when you think about this drift, think about it from the analogy that you're losing control, right? Like literally, in order to drift in a car, you have to lose a little bit of control on the steering wheel for the car to actually drift, right? The tires of the car have to lose a little bit of traction and control for the car to shift. And what we're telling you guys is to get back on that horse, get that steering wheel straight, and reclaim control over your life. Acknowledge that you're drifting, stop the drift, and start taking action so that you can build that momentum that you need and continue moving forward. Love that.

SPEAKER_00 42:48

Love that. Rich, I do want to play a quick game. I didn't tell you about this, but it's called the Steel Man argument and your counter response. No. This is very quick, off the cuff. Do it in a snappy kind of way. We're just trying to get through a few defense arguments that I was able to pull from Reddit, our community, comment sections of other videos. These are the four most common defenses that come from young men in their late 20s, early 30s that know they're falling off, know they're gaining weight, know they're not starting that thing they wanted to start, and they're defending themselves. You ready? Let's go. Defense number one. Man, I've been really busy, but I'm gonna get to it at some point.

SPEAKER_01 43:30

That some point never comes, bro. I look at people like the president of the United States, old as shit, but this guy gets more accomplished in an hour than most young men do an entire eight hour day. How does that happen? Because that man is motivated. You have to be motivated to accomplish. Bro, you can't sit in the presidential suite if you're not a motivated person.

SPEAKER_00 43:58

U sometimes I don't be expected. To get up and do things. But if I go to the gym at 7 a.m. and I see a 70-year-old man in there before me lifting weights, doing his little elliptical workout, I feel embarrassed. I feel this vergüenza that I'm like, damn, I have shame because I was struggling to get up at 40 years old to go to the gym. And there's a man that's double my age that's already in here getting in a good sweat. So to your point, you have to be inspired. I've been busy though. I'm gonna get to it. It's just it's an excuse. There's no other way to put it.

SPEAKER_01 44:34

Yeah. And you have to be excited to wake up in the morning and live out your purpose, right? Like that is your primary job as a human being, is to wake up and live out your purpose. So if you're not doing that, you're just delaying the progress that you should be making as a person.

SPEAKER_00 44:51

Ready? Steel man argument number two. This person usually tells you a very long story on how they're the most unique person in the world and they can't get it done. So they add a story with the closing statement that you know what? I'm just in a certain season in my life. This is my season of reflection, rebuilding. This is a season that I'm in. It's not forever. What's your counter to that?

SPEAKER_01 45:17

Man, that season could become forever if you continue being uh spiritualizing things. Like there's this mystical horoscope, and things only happen in waves in life. And right now the stars are not aligning and Saturn is not retrograded. Like, bro, fuck that shit.

SPEAKER_00 45:41

Does that what that sound like to you? It's like a flowery, uh like bullshit, non-reality.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

Yeah, bro. It's like you're too into your head, bro. Like, cut it out. Life is not a season that you'll never find the right time to do something, right?

SPEAKER_00 45:57

So if your son failed four F's in a semester and he says, Dad, this is just not it's just not my season right now. I'm recalibrating, I'm getting my things together. This is a season I'm going through.

SPEAKER_01 46:07

Yeah, that that's an excuse, bro. What are we living life like as a sport? Like, no, that's not how life operates, bro. You have the ability to make any change that you want for your life at any given moment, regardless of what you may be feeling or what you may be going through. So, this idea that you tell yourself that, oh, it's just not the right season for me. I'm actually self-reflecting on all my pain, then go to therapy, cure that issue that you may have, and then start to take some action. But yeah, it's bullshit excuse.

SPEAKER_00 46:42

My response to someone that's constantly failing and not meeting their own personal goals. Again, this has nothing to do with me. I have my own demons that I have to fight. But if you constantly tell me your goals, and then you tell me excuses why you can't reach the goals that you set for yourself. If your response is I'm in a season right now, my response and what your response should be if you're a good friend, is well, seasons come to an end. If you can't name the exact date it ends, then it's not a season. It's a story that you're telling yourself to make excuses for not doing what you need to do. Give it an end date. And with that end date, should start a new date where you start making progress on something you're insecure about. Remember, if it's important to you, you'll make time for it.

SPEAKER_01 47:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:35

You won't create this fucking lie that you're in a season. That's cap. We can see right through it.

SPEAKER_01 47:40

Yeah, and we said this earlier, just where that is ego protection, right? So you want to seem important to your friends or family, and you share this goal that you have, right? This big dream that you have, but it's tied to an excuse so that there's no friction and you don't allow someone to contest what you're working on because there's an excuse attached to it, right? So you share the dream and they're like, all right, cool. Like, when are you getting started? Or when is it launching, or when's the grand opening? And then you tie it to an excuse so that you push away all external pressure of accomplishing the dream that you've said you wanted to accomplish.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

One of the greatest blessings we are experiencing in May 2026. We have this incredible tool called LLM's artificial intelligence, learn language models that scrape the whole motherfucking internet. Smartest businessman in the world. You can pull a business plan right now from anybody on the planet. You can pull Jeff Bezos' business model for creating Amazon right now. You can pull LeBron James' entire workout routine to become LeBron James right now. There's no other time in life, Rich, where you can ask a LLM, hey, can you give me the 12 steps to becoming LeBron James today? Starting today. It's a unique time we live in. But you know what that means, Rich? We're gonna have a lot more business plans than we have businesses because gyms have always existed, workouts have always existed, cardio has always existed, running shoes have always existed. There's always been shortcuts, there's always been convenience, there's always been ways to get things done. What we see little of, and I predict we will continue to see little of, is people taking the action after they download the plan. It's not about the plan, it's about the action. And you just made me think of that. It's so easy today to have all the right answers. But if everybody has the right answers, where's the competitive edge? How do you reverse this stall that you're in in your life? No one could do it for you. So that defense of, you know, I'm in my seat, like it's almost indefensible at this point.

SPEAKER_01 50:05

Yeah, just and like you said with the LLMs, resources are endless, right? So we all have the same exact tools to research and take action on anything that we want to accomplish, right? So if you think that you are going to start something and someone else cannot start the same thing before you, then you're living in a fallacy. The world is moving very, very fast, bro. Six months from now, the world is gonna continue to look a lot different than what it looks like today. So if you don't create the urgency for yourself, you're going to get left behind.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

Like one of the great historical prophets and poets from Jamaica Queens, 50 Cent, and I quote, damn, homie, in high school, you was the man, homie. What the fuck happened to you? That quote right there, Rich, got me more motivated in my mid to late 20s than any history book, any documentary, any motivational quote has ever motivated me because it was the fear of regression. It was the fear at one point in my life I was at the peak. And how quickly I seen a lot of people that were older than me go from being people that were popping, cool, up, had money, crazy life situations. And just like that, life just took it from them. And like we've been making the same point throughout this whole episode. It happens slowly. It doesn't happen quickly. People gain weight slowly. People lose a lot of their strength, a lot of their intelligence, a lot of their charm slowly. A lot of these things go away slowly. It's called decay, it's called entropy. And if you don't get ahead of it, it can happen to you. And I think that's the cautionary tale that Rich and I are trying to share on this episode because I fight with this every single day.

SPEAKER_01 52:00

Yeah, and I think that's the empathy that we also want to share, too, is like you fight with this every day, I fight with this every day. Like there's going to be a lot of distractions in life and a lot of things that are going to contribute to that drift, right? And only until you have the self-realization that, like, damn, I ate pizza one day, you know, but I can't eat pizza again for like the next month. Yep. Right. Like, you have to have that self-discipline within yourself to acknowledge that like one small thing that compounds over time can move you both either positively or negatively. But we're telling you to make the decisions that compound for you to move forward in a positive manner.

SPEAKER_00 52:45

Rich, I have one more steel, man before we close out. And I know this one's gonna trigger you, but this was my favorite. And by favorite, I mean the most annoying one. But before I get into that, Rich, have you ever seen Breaking Bad?

SPEAKER_01 52:57

Yes, I love that show.

SPEAKER_00 52:58

Okay. I think our entire show today of drifting and falling off and falling so far behind and not really paying attention to life when it be lifing. One year could turn into two years, two years could turn into five years, five years could turn into ten years. And before you look up, Walter White and Breaking Bad, his kids were already adults. His wife had grown like a dissatisfaction with him and a disrespect towards him. And he was living a very monotonous and boring life. And he was once one of the most innovative scientists ever in that show. And he let life kind of get ahead of him. And his insanely smart mind just wound up becoming a school teacher. There's nothing wrong with that. But the show in the first season shows you here lies a man who once was unique, extraordinary, and now he's just a teacher and someone that feels like his life is passing him by. And the one scene that makes me think about this episode and crystallizes it is the scene where he's he takes the side job to make a little bit more money for his sick kid and his family. And in that side job, he winds up working with his students at the car wash and they start fucking with him, they start teasing him, they start treating him mean. And he has that realization of like, damn, when did I become old? When did I become a guy that's not like intimidating to anyone? When did I become a guy that is easily disrespected and clowned? I used to be one of the greatest scientists in the world. I was somebody. To me, breaking bad is a thesis paper written about how men can slowly drift into becoming something they never thought they would become. And I just wanted to make that point because I thought of breaking bad and I felt bad for that dude for four fucking seasons because he let life get the best of him by not correcting the things he probably should have corrected.

SPEAKER_01 54:53

Bro, I love that reference you just made because number one, I love that show. Number two, I never put two and two together. But that's probably why I love that show so much because it does highlight how a man could drift. And it's weird because in in that show, he has momentum, and his momentum is compounding for the right things and the wrong things. Yep. He's getting rewarded for being a drug dealer. But remember what he was storing money for. It was to leave his family money when he passed away from his disease. Oh, because he got cancer. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He had cancer. So he's working for the right reasons in the wrong business. Very poetic show. And I highly encourage any young person, if they haven't seen the show, to definitely put that on their he's the case study for life drift, but he spins it back.

SPEAKER_00 55:50

No spoilers. Rich, last one. Are you ready for the last steel man argument? The big defenses that we pulled from our research for people that want to push back on what it is that we're talking about on this episode.

SPEAKER_01 56:03

Yeah, that's here.

SPEAKER_00 56:04

Are you ready? Yeah. Defense argument number three. I can't lie. This sounds like toxic hustle male culture. Pushing men to beat themselves up for not meeting their potential is toxic male hustle culture. Whatever happened to being patient and getting what's coming for you and letting great things come to you rather than forcing men to be mean to themselves in order to get what they want.

SPEAKER_01 56:36

Oh man, this one triggers me for sure. First of all, what I would say to this person is being almost ready is not the same as being ready. Almost doesn't exist for a man. You will never accomplish anything in life if you almost accomplish that. You don't get praised for second and third place in a race. The guy in the middle is number one. He's the guy who won the race. He deserves the trophy, right? So I could never operate under the impression that I'm not living to my potential. I would literally feel sick to my stomach because that is part of who I am as a person. The ability that I have to work as hard as I can because I know I have the potential to accomplish said goals and dreams. And that is all packaged with my self-worth. That is all packaged with my identity. That's packaged with my life purpose. I've built this whole entire identity around accomplishing my goals, right? And that only comes by proxy of me living out my purpose and, you know, having the trust in myself that I can accomplish those things. I don't understand the idea that you should just let things come to you. Time will tell if you deserve the things that you feel like you should have. No one is coming to save you, bro. That's why I said that in the earlier segment. Who's going to come and give you the things that you want? Who's going to put cash in your pocket? Who's going to pay your rent? Who's going to pay your mortgage? Like, what is this idea that things are just going to come to you when the time is right? From who? Like, are we reading horoscopes? Like, what is this mystical reality that these certain individuals are living in? I don't understand it.

SPEAKER_00 58:35

And what's your response to this just feels like toxic male hustle culture content?

SPEAKER_01 58:43

I feel like that's another buzzword that's been scrutinized because you have your Andrew Tates of the world who have popularized that framing. So now everything about a guy hustling hard is toxic male culture, right? But these are the same guys who are scrawny but want muscles, but don't want to work hard in the gym or haven't even stepped foot in the gym. But as long as I label it something, then I get to not be that. But I would like the muscles, but I'm scrawny. Like, bro, that shit makes no sense whatsoever.

SPEAKER_00 59:21

Yeah. And you're allowing society to give you an out. And that's okay. By the way, this platform, we've said this before, this platform is not somebody that's looking for cope. This platform is not for someone that is truly happy with the position they're at in their life. If you enjoy living month to month and you have five roommates and you're part of a co-oped living situation with seven other people, and you have a cloth as your room divider with three other people, and you're 35 years old. Hey, if that's the life you want for yourself, I live in LA. I live close to the beach. I live by Venice, I live by Santa Monica, I live by Manhattan Beach. Rich, there's a lot of people that are living very comfortable, happy, beach bum lives. They live with 17 people. I'm not mad at those people. Do your thing. There is content out there for that guy. This is obviously a format dedicated to help young men navigate their ways through a lot of the tricks and trips of maturing and becoming a grown-ass man. And while you become a grown-ass man, a lot of these problems come up. And when you find yourself in the trapdoor, in the fork of the road, that is a lot of these problems. Failures podcast is for you. To that guy who wants more, who's constantly trying to find more incline so they can reach their full potential. Now, if you could jump on this platform and listen to 50 minutes of an episode, and by the 50th minute you decide this is toxic hustle culture, my question for you is why the fuck did you listen for 50 minutes? And how did you find this podcast? You obviously want more for yourself. So stop trying to cope by saying this is something that it's not. This is motivational, this is directional. This is not a place where we just give out prescriptions. No, no, we're showing you our scars to help you get through these troubling times in your life. But that's only if you want more. If you don't want more, that's fine. You can lay in your own piss and enjoy your life. I'm cool with that. No one is judging anybody. We're just saying don't come on these platforms and start using terminology that you learned about falling short. It's like, nah, bro, you chose to settle. That's not what this community is about. That's definitely not what me and Rich are about. So we're never gonna apologize for giving people good motivation, good words, good direction.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:57

Yes, bro. Well said. And if you're someone out there who feels like your life has drifted, you know, correct it. If you know that there's more that you want to pursue in life, then go up and go after. Be honest with yourself about where you currently are in life and get moving and ultimately just regain control of your life, man. That's what this whole episode is about. You you let your life drift away, and now we're telling you to regain control and get back on that horse and continue moving forward.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:27

Yeah, and I need you to drift to the share button and share this episode with any of your friends or anybody that you think needs this in their life. Or if you want an accountability friend or an accountability partner, share this episode with a friend. Tell them, yo, I'm starting today, I'm starting right now. Rich and I do not profit from any of these episodes or any of this content. So the best thing you can do is share the good word because it helps us get the word out.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:55

There you have it, Failures Podcast. Peace.