38: Bench Warmer to Pro Basketball Career, Author of 29 Books & 8,000 Videos // The Story of Dre Baldwin

Okay, nobody's really interested in you. How are you even going to do this? My mom asked me some very logical, reasonable questions. She said, well, do you have any job offers? Do you have a plan? And the answers were no, no and no. Success is not about what happens in one particular moment. Even though the show is about rock bottom and Rocking it moments, it's really about what you do every single moment. Because the only way you get to that moment of rocking it is because if you listen to both what Eric has shared and what I've shared is that it's these small decisions that we made along the way that put us in position for that Rockin it moment to occur.

Welcome to From Rock Bottom to Rockin It. I'm your host, Eric Gilbert Williams, and this is the podcast where we explore personal stories of people who hit absolute rock bottom, then got back up, wiped off the dust, kicked failure to the curb, and. And now they're rocking it like you'd never believe if you didn't hear it. Live. Right here, we cover subjects in business, sports, and life in general. If you like this podcast, please share it. These interviews are intended to inspire, to motivate, to give hope and vision. So please share this episode with someone who needs it. Use your Instagram account, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, hand signals, trained pigeon scent, smoke signals up in the air, use Morse code, whatever you like. Just share the love and share this episode. Also, email me anytime. Podcasterrickgilbertwilliams.com Send me questions you would like to have asked of future guests and I will incorporate them. Or just send me some suggestions on how to run a better podcast. Or just say hello, I'd love to hear from you. That's podcastericgilbertwilliams.com I know you're going to love today's interview, so let's get started with us here today on From Rock Bottom to Rockin. It is nine year career pro basketball player Dre Baldwin with his powerful story of persistence, his journey through repetitive failure in his early years, which he's going to tell us all about today, to ultimately honing his talents and making it in the big time where most people would have gotten stuck. The author of 29 books, 8,000 YouTube videos for TED Talks, and his content has been viewed over 70 million times and hopefully 70 million more via this podcast. Welcome to the show, Dre. How you doing, man?

Well, thank you for having me, Eric. I'm doing excellent. Excited for this conversation. Excited to be here.

Right on. Yeah. Thankfully you took the time here to share Your story with us. I was looking through your website and the about you section and watching some of your TED Talks and your YouTube videos today. So I was a big basketball fan when I was little. It was the only sport and actually similar to what you said. And I think it's related to your story and you can share it in your own words. But when I was little, my mom got me into hockey. She's a single mom. My dad wasn't really in the picture. And hockey is a Canadian thing. Everyone's going to play hockey in Canada. But it's expensive. There's a lot of equipment involved in it. And you mentioned it's similar about football. And she couldn't afford it, so what could she afford? Well, she could afford a basketball, so she gave me a basketball and I played that for years. I sucked at it, but I loved it. It was great. And I didn't make the high school team. And it broke my heart, man. It literally broke my heart. It was like I was such an awkward kid, like such a loner. And basketball was one of the things that gave me, I don't want to say a sense of purpose. That sounds a little drastic, but it kind of did in a way. It was like, okay, I'm good at this. At least if they're not my friends, then there's at least a social crowd that I get to hang out with and they pass the ball to me once in a while. But when I didn't make it in grade nine, for me it was the end. I never played basketball again. And I still love it. And I pick it up once in a while at the gym, but I just stopped and you didn't. So I'd love to hear your story. Can you share with people here in the story what your journey was like and how this all happened?

Sure. So I'll give the two to three minute version. And my background's from the city of Philadelphia, live in Miami, now from Philly. I was always into sports, tried several different sports. I tried a little bit of football, but like you with hockey, my parents couldn't afford football equipment because it's similar to hockey, all the equipment that you need. So I never actually played tackle football, but I played street football as a kid. Then I played some baseball for a while. These are a little bit less equipment, but I just wasn't talented at baseball. So after playing a few years, I realized since I couldn't hit, throw or catch, I should probably find a different sport. Then I moved on to basketball. Finally, at the age of 14. Now 14 is pretty late to be getting into a sport if you're trying to go somewhere in that sport to play in college, let alone playing the pros. But at 14 is when I started. Didn't make my high school team until I was a senior. And my high school didn't have a freshman team or a junior varsity, Only one team varsity and one coach, not even assistant coaches. So I finally made that team as a senior, sat on the bench for the most part, scored two points per game. Two points is a lot in hockey and there's a lot in maybe I don't know what other sport, but not in basketball. So maybe in soccer is a lot of points in basketball, that's not a lot. So nobody was thinking I was going to become anything in basketball. Even at age 18. I went to college and tried out for the basketball team as a walk on, which means you don't have a scholarship, nobody knows you. You literally walk into the gym and just try to play your way onto the team, which I was capable of doing. I did that, played Division 3 college basketball, which is the third tier in terms of prestige of college basketball. So these are not the players that normally populate the professional ranks. So after finishing college, I still wanted to play pro basketball. But given my background, the reality was saying, okay, nobody's really interested in you. How are you even going to do this? My parents didn't quite even understand it. It's not. They tried to tell me that I couldn't do it. It's not like they were going to stop me. I'm a grown adult by this point, even though I was still living in their house. But they didn't see the view of the vision of me becoming a pro basketball player because he saw the whole story up to that point. And you know, I'm playing D3 ball. And even then at that point, my mom asked me some very logical, reasonable questions. She said, well, do you have any job offers? Do you have a plan? Is there some strategy for you becoming a pro basketball player? And the answers were no, no and no. So it just didn't make sense at that point. So for that first year after graduating college, I worked a couple, quote, unquote, regular jobs. I was an assistant manager of Foot Locker. I sold gym memberships at Bally Total Fitness. And then after that year, after graduating, I went to this event called an exposure camp. Eric. Which is basically like a job fair, but for athletes. Now everyone knows what a job fair is now an exposure camp. Most people listening to this probably have never heard of exposure camp is the same thing, but you bring your gear and you actually play your sport in front of an audience of decision makers. So the decision makers are there, just like at a job fair, but you actually have to perform your job duties in front of them so they can see, all right, let's see what you can actually do. So basically that two days, and that was in Orlando, Florida. Me and a couple of college teammates rented a vehicle in Philadelphia, drove from Philly to Orlando, which is a 19 hour drive Friday afternoon, hopped out of the car 9am Saturday morning and walked in the gym and started playing. And I could do that at age 23. Probably couldn't do it now, but I did it then and over those two days in Orlando basically played my way into a professional basketball career. Eric those two days pretty much superseded everything that happened up to that point. Because these decision makers were seeing me play against other pro level players and I was doing really well. So that was my opportunity. I made it and I was able to sign with an agent. From my experience at that exposure camp, I didn't get signed to a contract on the spot, but I took the footage and my scouting report from that camp, marketed myself with that, which is something I'm sure we can talk about later if you like. And I was able to sign with an agent. An agent is same as any other agent in the literary world, the TV world, they're the go between, between the talent and the jobs. So signing with that agent, they were able to connect me with some teams overseas. And my agent got me my first contract that was in the summer of 2000, 2005 in Kaunas, Lithuania. So that's what started a nearly decade long pro basketball career. But then there was this sub point to this whole story that the footage from that exposure camp was on this device called a VHS tape. Do you remember those, Eric? VHS tapes?

Oh, I remember those big fat things. And you got to rewind them. Be kind rewind.

I remember that exactly. From Blockbuster Video, right? So I had this VHS tape and this is the most valuable asset that I own as far as my basketball career goes. Because you got to remember, you know, that up to this point we're talking 2005. It's not like everything we do is on video because we don't have cameras on the phones at this point. We still using phones where you can call and text and that's pretty much it if that. So I knew that this footage was really important. I needed to keep it. And with a VHS Tape. If you lose the tape or you drop it or it gets wet, or you leave it in the sun too long, that footage is gone. So I took that tape to an audio visual store and I paid for them to transfer it onto a data cd. I put that CD into my parents desktop computer and I uploaded the footage to this brand new website that I had just heard about. And they said on this website that you could upload as much footage as you want for free. And it was called YouTube.com and that was my first YouTube video. Now, I didn't really think that much of YouTube itself. The footage mattered a lot of. I just put it there because I knew the Internet. I figured the Internet would be around, but I didn't really care about YouTube at the time. But after a few months I went and checked on the video and I noticed that there were comments on the video. And these are random people who I do not know, and I know they don't know me. They're saying things in the video. They're saying, well, how often do you practice? Or who taught you how to play? Or where do you play? Or can you make more videos? Can you make videos about shooting, about jumping, about defense, about dunkey? And I realized in short order that these players weren't really looking for Dre Baldwin, because nobody knew who I was at this point. And I'm playing overseas. So it's not like Americans don't watch overseas basketball. They don't know anything about overseas basketball. So they were just an underserved audience of people who were just like me that growing up, they wanted to play basketball, they wanted to get better, but there was no one to teach them now. Whereas people like myself growing up in the 90s, there was nobody to teach me. I was on my own. But now these kids, a decade later, they could crowdsource their knowledge from the Internet. And Internet was not even anything close to what it is in 2005. So that's how I kind of started two parallel careers at the same time. It was only four or five years later when you could actually make money from content. We weren't even calling it content at that point. And that's when I really, really started to focus with the YouTube videos. And the thing is, these days, even though I've played nearly a decade of professional basketball, nobody knows me from playing professional basketball. People know that I did it. Very few people actually saw it. Because I'm in Europe, I'm in places that a lot of people who are from where I'm from couldn't find these countries on a map if you paid them, unless they had Google, right? But Everybody's been on YouTube before. Everybody's seen a YouTube video. So when I'm outside anywhere, even here in Miami, and somebody stops and they know me 100% of the time is because they saw me on YouTube, not because they saw me play basketball overseas. So it's just funny how those things work out. And it was around 2010ish, Eric, when the YouTube was purchased by Google and you were able to run ads on your videos. So now I became a somebody because I had all these videos out already. And now you can make money from it. And now everybody's smelling the money. They're like, oh, well, I need to make content. And I already had kind of a leg up on people because I had been doing it way before. It was a cool thing to do before there was business to be gotten from doing it. So people just started asking me questions about that. And at the same time, they were asking me just about my story, because I started to tell in the comments, and I would make little videos just telling the story, piecing together the story, what I just told you over the last couple of minutes. And these players would hear the story, and they would just get curious. They would say, well, wait a minute. Why did you keep coming to the park and practicing even though you were getting cut from the team every year? Because these players were going through the same thing. They're getting cut from the team, and they're like, well, I'm going to quit. Why would I keep playing? Or they would say, well, how did you have the confidence? You know, you go to that exposure camp. That exposure camp is basically a tryout, right? You only got two days. You might spend a whole year practicing, working on your game. You can be the best player possible. But then if you don't shine just during that two days, who cares what you. For the whole year? It doesn't matter. You have to perform in that moment when the lights come on. And a lot of players had a challenge with that. They have, I guess we call performance anxiety. They would do all the work, but then when it was time to perform, they would kind of choke up and not perform up to their potential. So they would ask me about having the confidence to perform when it mattered, or they would just ask Dre. Just looking at your overall story, like you got cut all those times you played at a D3 school that had never produced a professional player you worked for a year after graduating with, Nobody was checking for you in a professional ranks, how did you even have the wherewithal to keep thinking you could make it with that kind of background? Because it's a really far fetched story, honestly. And I would start talking about it. I was talking about mental toughness, about your ability to just keep seeing the vision in your mind even though there is nothing in your reality that says it's actually going to happen. And then the last one was just personal initiative, being willing to go and do things, saving up my money. And by the way, that exposure camp, unlike most job fairs, was not free. You paid to go to an exposure camp, they don't pay you, you pay them. And then we had to pay for that car, we had to pay for the hotel, pay for our food. And mind you, we're just a year out of college, so we're broke and we're saving up this money for a lottery ticket that we might get signed to a contract from going to this exposure camp. Just going doesn't guarantee you a damn thing. So people would ask me, how did you even have the. No, why'd you even do it? How'd you try? And at the same time, I'm starting to become a somebody because of these YouTube videos again, ironically, even though all the work was to play Pro Ball, the YouTube videos was just me in the gym practicing by myself in an empty gym so I could play pro ball. But everybody knows me for the empty gym practicing and not for the actual pro ball. So again, just funny how that worked out. And that's how to work on your game philosophy came about. Eric was I was just talking about discipline, confidence, mental toughness, personal initiative. When I started talking about these things, then I started to draw an audience of people who weren't athletes in addition to the athletes. And they would say, well, look, I'm not a basketball player, Jerae, but I still like this stuff because everybody needs it. It's not just for sports. So fast forward to today. I stopped playing ball 2015 and I already knew exactly what I was going to do.

Yeah, I was building. Your audience was growing.

Exactly. And I had the 10,000 hours because I was making all these videos. I was putting out videos every day and many times, 2, 3, 5 videos a day at its peak on YouTube way before the floodgates opened and everybody was doing it. So when I stopped playing in 2015, I knew I wanted to go into something where I could kind of speak and share things. I didn't even know that professional speaking was a thing. I didn't know that people would pay somebody to sit down with them like on a zoom call or one on one and kind of help them with their mindset, known as coaching. I didn't know these things existed. This was not taught to me. I just learned these things over the last, let's say seven to 10 years. So once I saw that it existed, I found a mentor, they showed me some ropes and since then I've just been learning, implementing and long story long, here we are. Work on your game. I'm the CEO of the company and what we do is take the mental tools to get you to the top 1% in the sports world world and we translate those tools over to the business world serving business professionals, entrepreneurs and athletes.

Let's talk about that for a second. Mental toughness, the mental game. I think about a bit about my story that you may or may not know is I dropped out of school when I was what, 16? I failed. It's weird, I just failed everything. And I was such a loner, I didn't have any friends. And it was a tough journey for me personally. And you could probably say I struggled with my mental health back then. So I left school, left home as well when I was 16, got arrested a couple times, got in a lot of trouble. It was tough. And When I was 18, I met my first business mentor who took me under his wing and he's like, look, I don't care what you did yesterday, I just care what you do tomorrow. And by then I had seen a bunch of my friends get arrested or get hurt or just kind of disappeared. I'm not exactly sure what happened. And I was like, wow. And then we were partying, right? We were partying with these. And there was a lot of grown men that were around us too, like 40, 50 year old men who were getting just as messed up as we were and stumbling over furniture. And it was funny back then as a kid, wow. These parents, they get us. They're just like us, right? They're just like me. And then I realized, no, no, no, I'm going to be just like them. And then it was a big moment. It was like, whoa, is this where life's headed? And I wanted to change that. And I guess I'm fortunate to have the wherewithal to understand that that's what was coming up. So by the time I met this business mentor, I was like, wow, I can actually change my life here. I can actually go and build an empire. I can go get my motorcycle, I can travel the world, I can do that. And this is a vehicle. But what the heck did I have to offer in a business startup back then? I was high school dropout and never had any experience, had big chains around my neck, ripped jeans, and a wannabe badass. I wasn't actually a badass. I was just a wannabe. And ultimately I ended up soon thereafter running my first company, which was an event production company in Toronto. We brought in hundreds of people from the business community to come to my events. And I was an emcee, I was a host, fluent speakers from around the country. And, you know, we had a trade show thing and entertainment. Why the hell would I ever do that? It's madness, right? What does a high school dropout, wannabe badass have to do with building a trade show? Who would ever go to that event? It doesn't make any sense. Like, when I go backwards and think about why anyone at all would ever listen to me, it doesn't make any sense. And I had so many friends, my family, that just didn't understand and obviously didn't support it at all. And I don't understand sometimes myself what it is that pushes people through to continue on. Something that seems impossible, looks impossible by all rational means is impossible, but then it happens, right? So, like, what else other than mental toughness can we talk about here? Or maybe let's expand deeper into mental toughness. Like, what does that even mean for you to go back after sport after sport and then basketball and then tryout after tryout and push the empty gym? You're sitting there like, why would you even. It's almost insanity, right? Like, there's almost no reason, but there is a reason. And we never would have had the success on the other side if we didn't go through it. But what is it that actually pushes people to do these things that don't make sense, to do?

Well, it requires a balance. Eric, of. I'm not even a fan of using the word balance too often, but it requires that mix of rationality and irrationality is that you have to be rational enough, irrational enough to say, okay, I've had all these setbacks and given my pedigree up to this point, I'm probably. It doesn't make sense for me to think that I can go from here to here. All right? That's rationally understanding that, but being irrational enough to say, you know what? I'm gonna try it anyway, I'm gonna go for it anyway, and I'm gonna move forward on it as if it is going to happen. And having the discipline and the confidence to go and put effort behind it and have any initiative to even get started, and putting the discipline and confidence into it, that effort and that work behind it to the point that you can take an idea out of your mind that is completely irrational and make it into something real. And the thing is, no. People who become entrepreneurs, people who become innovators, people who make change have to be irrational on some level. Because if all we did were rational, reasonable, logical things, then we wouldn't get anything new. Every moment just fit into the spaces that are already created for us. And it will be fine. I guess. I guess we would all live happily ever after. But it takes somebody being at least a little bit irrational and unreasonable and illogical and nonsensical to create something new that previously did not exist. And those are the people who are the change makers in these worlds. These are the people whose names we remember, whose they get statues built about them and books written about them, and they live a life worth reading about because they are willing to be irrational. While at the same time, let's throw out the disclaimer that just because you're being irrational and unreasonable doesn't mean you're going to create change, doesn't mean you're going to succeed.

That's exactly what I was going to ask you about. Exactly.

There are plenty of irrational, illogical people who have failed. So just because you're doing it doesn't mean you're going to win. It just makes you eligible to win. So now that you have made yourself eligible to win by being illogical and irrational, now you need the confidence, the discipline and the mental toughness to keep going and strategizing and doing the actual work. Because if you're going against the grain in this way, kind of like what you said, being a high school dropout and you're going to go do some business stuff with people who have, they did all the things that you were, quote, unquote, supposed to do, why would they listen to you or follow you? And that's not going to work out. I'm sure it didn't work out the first time you tried it. I'm sure you had many roadblocks along the way and many times those very things that made your story kind of rock bottom, those things at some points become roadblocks that you had to figure out. How were you going to navigate those roadblocks. And if you didn't have the mental toughness, then there's no way you would have been able to make it through to the point that you could tell this story in a way that you are proud about it. You can tell the story in a proud way now because we know the ending. But when you didn't know the ending, it required mental toughness for you to keep going to get to that ending. And now you can tell it in a way that people can be awed and inspired by it. But there were points, I'm sure along the way when it wasn't so awe inspiring. Not even to you.

Yeah, and let's talk about that for a second. The concept of the ending, you know, is it about the end goal or is it the journey? Are we talking law of attraction? Are we talking about science, or a big mix of everything together? My ending in that particular business was, depending how you look at it, a huge success or a huge failure financially. I mean, you gotta remember I failed math twice in high school and didn't understand anything about accounting, even probably how to spell it. Is it two Cs or one C? I didn't really know. And at the end of the day running that company, I hired my first business coach and we bartered. I bartered marketing and exposure at the show in exchange for business coaching. And that was my first coach. And he taught me that I was. He taught me I was about to go bankrupt because we were losing money so fast. And I just had. I didn't know at the time, you know, how to really forecast it properly. I was just so sold myself on the vision that, you know, I was crossing into the insanity realm. I did 12 events with a bunch of volunteers, a bunch of sponsors, thousands of people, great guests. And at the end of it, I ended up extremely in debt. I had, what? A credit card that was maxed out, overdraft, maxed out, a loan that was maxed out. And I was swapping hundreds of dollars within them just to pay the minimum balances. And I ended up going to work at a nighttime janitor job cleaning up the puke on the floor from the bar that closed at 2am And I did that because I didn't know what else to do. And I was embarrassed to go out in public because I felt like I had failed. And I also say that with pride because this was a moment of real rock bottom that I found this inner peace to come out of. And the point I'm trying to make is because the experience to not go and do that event would have clearly filled my life. And I probably would have carried that forever with a what if and a coulda. And what would have happened and perhaps more importantly, a shame that I didn't have the guts to just go and do it and see what happens. And for me, that whole experience of getting out there, putting myself out there, win or lose, the experience in and of itself, like, we had thousands of people. I was a loner. I had no friends, couldn't speak to anyone. I'm speaking on stage and people are laughing at my jokes. Right. I sat there in front of a mirror and practiced for hours, recording myself and watching it. And it was crazy. Coming out of that, though, felt like a success. Even though it was a failure financially, it was a success. And I built on that success. To my next business and then my next business. To my next business. Right. What do you think about the subject of the end goal versus the process? Did you have such a crazy passion for basketball that going to the gym by yourself forever was an enjoyable experience, a reward in and of itself, or was it painful? Or a mix of both? Like, what do you think about this? The journey being the reward versus the end result, or maybe a mix of both? I'm curious.

Great question. And what my passion was and still is for, is for winning. It just. Basketball just happened to be the vehicle for doing so. So basketball just happened to be the thing that I played because I'm six' four, athletic, you know, I'm black, so I guess I'm supposed to be good at basketball. So it wasn't specifically about basketball. It could have been baseball, football, no music. Who knows what it would have been had I been a different person? But that was always the passion. And as far as the journey and the destination, the thing is, what makes. Whether you are. When someone is coming from a rock bottom position, whatever they consider to be rock bottom, and they're looking to, quote, unquote, make it. Some people, as we just talked about, some of them will become visionaries because they reach the top of the mountain and they can look back and say, look at all these things that I went through and I made it anyway. Here's how I did it. You can trade on that. You can build your name off that. You write books, you can sell your framework to anybody and tell your inspiring story to the world. And there are also people who are going to try it and they're going to fail. So how do you know when you're down there at rock bottom? If you are either A, a visionary who should keep going because you're going to make it, or B, you're an idiot who should probably quit because you're going to Fail no matter what you do. The answer to the question is it depends on the end of the story. We won't know whether you were a visionary or a fool until we get to the end of the story. And the good news is, each one of us who is listening to this right now, you get to decide when the story is over. As long as you're alive, the story can keep going. So you could hit rock bottom 10 different times. That doesn't mean the story's over. As long as you keep going, the story can continue to be written. What I tell people is putting a comma at the end of a failure instead of a period as a comma means there's more that needs to be said, whereas a period means that's the end of the statement. So really it just matters. How much do you want to keep going? As the cliche is you only fail when you quit. So as long as you keep going, you have the opportunity to keep writing that story and you can make it into the success. So then you can finally look back. Because it's like some people are going to become. I talk about this in one of my books that you either become a story or a statistic. The statistics is, okay, this percentage of high school dropouts make this much money and this is how their lives end up. And nobody knows them, but they're all part of the stack, right? 98% of people end up like this. The stories are people who go through the exact same stuff as all the rest of them. They dropped out of high school or they tried out for their high school basketball team three years in a row and didn't make it. And the 2% of them, they keep going. They go through all the same stuff. They keep going, they get to the top of the mountain. Now what do they get to do? They get to tell their story. They get to tell everybody, this is what I did, this is what I went through, and this is how I ended up getting to this point. So everyone gets to decide, especially when you're at that rock bottom point, are you going to become a statistic or do you want to tell your story? And the only way you can tell your story is you have to win. And the only way you can win is if you're not winning right now. You got to keep going until you do. And that's a choice that each one of us gets to make. Not one time in life, that's a choice you make every single day to continue showing up and continuing to do the work and continue trying it's not a one time thing. Every time you're faced with a challenge, sometimes it's a challenge just to get out of bed. Sometimes it's a challenge just to go to work. Sometimes it's a challenge to just keep picking up the phone and dialing numbers. Sometimes the challenge is just keep turning on the mic and recording. Sometimes the challenge is just keep writing. As long as you answer that call every time and keep showing up, that's really what makes you the champion, is that you keep doing it. And eventually those add up and. And then we can look back at the big picture and say, wow, look what this person did, Dre.

That's powerful, man. The comma, not the period. That's my biggest takeaway right now. I love that. And when we come back from this short little break, I want to ask you the tough question and hear what your rock bottom was. I talked to you about me picking up vomit on the bottom of the bar floor because I had a financial failure. I'm curious to hear what your rock bottom was that maybe no one knows or that we don't like to talk about. Perhaps let them ask you that when we come back from this short little break.

Eric here.

I hope you're enjoying the episode today. This is a passion project that I put together. I really wanted to do this. I really want to help people out there. I had so many people reach out to me when I was younger and when I was having a tough time and struggling. I've written a book about it. You can check it out on my website. Please do. But most importantly, reach out to me. Give me some feedback. What could I do better with this podcast? What am I doing that I should stop? What am I not doing that I should do? Tell me your experience. Give me some tips and suggestions. I really want to design this to suit your needs. And all you got to do is send me an email. It's ericericgilbertwilliams.com or use the contact me button that you'll find on my website. Just send me an email. We'll have a phone call or we'll chat online. Doesn't really matter. I would love to hear from you and figure out how to make this show even better with your help. So please reach out and don't be shy. And we're back now here on From Rock Bottom to Rockin it with Dre Ballinger. I think you're giving away a free book, aren't you? Anyone that comes to your website and wants to hear what you have to say and read what you have to say in writing. They just go to the website, they pay for shipping, and that's it. Right. You just send them. Anyone a free book? Anyone listening to this podcast right now? Is that how that works?

Yes. This is the book I have right here in front of me. I think we're on video.

Oh, you got it right there.

Yes. It's called the Third Day. Now, this is a. This is an author copy. So this little ribbon here says, not for resale, but your copy won't have this. But this is the decision that separates the pros from the amateurs.

That's the limited edition, man. That's the one I want. That's the limited edition one?

Yes. Yeah. You know, as a matter of fact, somebody on Instagram paid me to autograph one of these, not for resale ones, and sell it to them. So somebody asked me for these because they know they can't get them. But, yes, you can get this book for free. All you need to do is cover the shipping. That's all we're asking. And we'll ship this to you worldwide. And this book is about the very thing that we were just talking about before you went to break, about the decision that you make to show up every single day and deliver. That's really what makes you a pro. That's really what makes you a champion. And every day could be that third day. The reason that I use the third day kind of as a euphemism for any situation in your life when the newness has worn off, things are not exciting anymore, but there's still a job that needs to get done. What decision do you make in that moment? So the third day is not an occurrence or situation. The third day is actually a choice. So what choice do you make? And when you keep making that, the quote, unquote, right choice to get you where you want to go, that's what makes you a champion. So, third daybook.com. i don't think I even said the website. Thirddaybook.com is where you get that book.

We'll put that on the show notes to the episode here. So everyone listening. Remember, you can just check out the show notes to the episode. If you didn't catch the URL, it's. Say it again, though, because your website is dre allday.com righT-R-E-A-L l--a-y.com. what's the book website?

Yes, that's my personal website, but I have, like, 50 domain names. So this book, I have a Domain name almost for every single book. So the domain name for this book is thirddaybook.com spelled out just like the title. Thirddaybook.com guys.

So everyone listening, check it out. You get your free book. It's just information I believe about in sharing information. I have. I do a bit of business coaching on the side just because I think it's fun. And sharing information like that is akin to my business mentor who helped me out for nothing when I was little. Just sharing information with me and helping me get to the next step. And speaking of the next step, you know, starting from. Well, from my own rock bottom. I'd like to ask you, Dre, if you're comfortable sharing. You know, what would you say and how would you describe your deepest, absolute rock bottom? Like that day where you're like, you know what? I don't know if this is gonna work. And even though I've been through all this and I know all this mental toughness stuff, I still don't think it's gonna work. I think I'm done. You know, did you ever have a moment like that, or what would you say is your rock bottom?

Of course I have more than one. I'll probably say the time when. Because as much as someone wants to become a professional athlete, making it is a great thing. But what's worse than making it is tasting it and then being right back out of it. So when I signed my first contract to play overseas, I was in Kaunas, Lithuania. I was only there for a couple months. Came home, I'm back in the United States, the contract is done, and it's kind of like the fall, maybe October, November. And this is in Philadelphia. So this is when the weather starts to turn. So you can't really hang outside anymore or even play ball outside. Now here I am, this 23 year old young man. I don't have a job. I'm unemployed. I tasted what it was like to be overseas playing basketball, but I'm not there right now. You know, I'm calling my agent every day, what's going on? He's saying, I'm working. Just stay patient, stay ready. But now I need a job. My parents are probably not that happy because I'm back in their house, this adult, and I'm eating the food, and I'm taking up space in the house. I think they maybe thought that I was gone forever. My sister's older than me, so she was already out of the house. I think my parents were thinking, okay, we finally got the house back to ourselves after 23 years. And here I am right back there, unemployed, trying to figure out what to do. So I ended up getting a job. Took me about a month actually. Before I even do that, I would take my mom to work because she worked as a school teacher. So I would drive her to work in the morning and then she would let me use her car during the day so I could go around and look for a job and I could use her car and I would go to the gym and work out because I'm still trying to stay in shape in case that call comes in from my agent. I ended up getting a job at a supermarket, working overnight, restocking the shelves. So anyone don't really understand the value of that job or the purpose of that job? You think about how many people come through a supermarket in a day and buy stuff. There's a whole crew of people. There's like 40 of us who overnight every night. There's this big truck that comes every day. We unload the stuff off that truck and then we open the boxes and we put the cereal back on the shelves and the coffee and the toothpaste and everything. It's an overnight job.

I did that too, man.

Oh, you did that? Okay, so you know what it feels like.

Yeah, I did that. I got fired.

How'd you get fired?

Because I was an idiot, man. I was fooling around. I didn't understand life at the time. I was young and I just wanted to make some money and I didn't want to work for it. And I hadn't understood, I didn't know the concepts of mental toughness at the time. I didn't know what it meant to follow through and to put in real work. It took years for me to figure out, you know, what that even is, how it works and what kind of results it got. And once I got a taste of the results that it gives to sit there and actually do a good job, you know, what are the moral implications of putting an all in effort or a half assed effort? Once I really started to digest this stuff, you know, it was a different story. But yeah, you know, I was stocking shelves nighttime, and I feel you. I just didn't mean to introduce your story there. I just was like, oh yeah, I've been there.

Yeah. So all right, so in that story, I'm stocking the shelves. Good thing about it is that you don't have to wear a uniform. You can wear whatever you want. You don't have to talk to any customers because the customers are not there. It's overnight. But the bad things is that you are very isolated, and you realize how much isolation can really destroy you when you get too much of it. I can only imagine someone with real isolation. I wasn't really isolated, but I was. And I remember the first night that I was working there, they told me, hey, you can bring a radio or something, like your personal. I bought my ipod. This is days of ipods. My ipod died the first night because it was eight hours straight of listening to music, and I didn't have a battery backup. So that first night, the last three hours, I was just talking to myself while I'm stocking shelves of Frosted Flakes, while the sun is coming up. And it's an overnight job, so you're working the graveyard shift. So it's not even like you're awake when everybody else is awake. I felt like a real loser because a lot of the people I was looking around at, the other people who were working there, and most of them didn't. They weren't like me. They weren't younger people. These are guys in their 30s and 40s, and they look like construction workers, but they were older guys. And this is what they did. They stocked the shelves. And here's the crazy part, Eric. I got hired for the job as a manager. I was supposed to be one of the managers of the overnight shift because I had a college degree. And I guess that was enough to qualify me as a manager. And what they told me was the same thing they told me when I was working at Foot Locker. Is that for the first month or two, yes, you are being paid as a manager, but you have to do the regular person work. You have to do the regular staff work, because you have to learn the job. You don't know the job. So I had to do the regular work so I could learn the job for the first month or two. And I remember the first night we had break. Break time came, and everybody's going to eat lunch. You know, in the supermarket, they have a little section where they sell food, and there's benches. People are sitting down. And I'm looking at these guys. These guys are in their 40s. And I'm looking at me, and I'm like, I have nothing in common with these guys. I didn't even want to sit over there and eat lunch with them. I hadn't even brought any food. And I remember the manager who was training me said to me. He pulled me aside and said, dre, look, I know that this is your first day. You don't know these guys, but look, you got to sit over there and eat lunch with them and bond with them and talk to them, because if you don't talk to them, they're not going to respect you, they're not going to listen to you. And I remember him saying, I still remember him saying that to me. And I remember looking at him and looking at them and saying, I have to earn these guys respect. Like, I just came from being overseas getting paid to play basketball. I had to earn their respect. And they're. I mean, I mean, not to be disrespectful to the job, but they're stocking shelves at a grocery store. I just came from playing overseas. I was in college a year ago getting a degree and it was just surreal. I could call it surreal now looking back at it, but it didn't feel surreal in the moment when I was working there. And then when I get off of work at 7 o' clock in the morning, I had to drive home real quick, pick my mom up and take her to work, then come home. And then I would try to sleep for four or five hours in the middle of the day. And any of you try to sleep in the middle of the day knows that it's not easy. And you don't get the same kind of sleep you get when you sleep at night like normal people do. And it was just a slog. And I didn't. The crazy thing, Eric, is I only worked there for about a week and a half because after a week and a half my agent called me and he had a new playing opportunity for me. But that week and a half was long enough that I still remember it to this day. I remember exactly how I felt. And I was sleeping on the couch at home because when I moved out to go play overseas the first time, my parents took the bed that had been in my bedroom and they got rid of it because they were like, we won't need this anymore. We got our bed. He ain't coming back. Yeah. So when I come back home, there's just a couch in that room. So I'm sleeping on the couch, not getting great sleep, going to LA Fitness and working on my game, playing ball as much as I can. But this was my life for that period. And I really felt like a damn loser at that point because I'm like, all my friends are graduated there into their careers. And then I have friends who play ball, they're overseas, playing. Then I have friends back at college, they're in school, enjoying school life. What am I doing? And I really did feel like it can't get any worse than this. And actually, I was right. But I was able to recover from that point. And then the rest of the story happened.

Kind of just had it. When I sold my first company, well, I was unemployed and all my team around me, I didn't have them anymore. And the income and the comfort and the prestige of being a boss, that was gone. It was like, well, who am I now? To me, it robbed me of my identity. Robbed is too powerful a word. Perhaps I forfeited my identity at the time. And of course, that opens up a personal development opportunity. Okay, well, obviously, I'm not the business, so I have some work to do on myself here. There's more to me and life than the business, but it felt like I had no idea who I was. Is this kind of what you're describing at the moment, or like, is it a little different?

In part, yes. Because there's no guarantee calls going to come through. You get another job playing professional basketball. Who knew if that would be my only chance? So my identity was tied to, I'm going to get back on playing basketball. But when I'm sitting there working that grocery store, nobody cared that I had just come from playing ball. And all they cared about was, all right, well, you here with us now. And that was the reality that I had to deal with until or unless that phone call came from my agent.

Did you tell them you played ball?

I don't think anybody asked. I don't think they really gave a damn. I think they were just looking at me like, all right, here's another worker. We seen them come, we seen them go. And the same thing with me. They saw me come, they saw me go. But I was trying to get out of there as quickly as possible. So luckily I did.

Did you end up doing any bonding? Did you end up bonding at all in that week and a half or just flat out?

No, I never talked to any of those guys. I never spoke to any of them. I didn't bring lunch with me. I don't even know what I did during a break hour. I would sit off by myself and yeah, that was it. I only got one paycheck from there. I think it was for maybe 85 hours, and that was it.

And did you quit in person or by phone?

I quit by phone because as soon as I got the call from my agent and then they told me what the team was, and then the person from the team called me and they confirmed, like, yeah, you need to get a plane ticket to come to this place at this time. And as soon as I confirmed that I was getting that plane ticket, the next call, I called them, my boss and said, hey, the basketball called. I'm done. But I did go back up there to pick up my check, but they didn't care. I mean, grocery stores, people come and go all the time. So it was nothing special about me.

How did you feel when you got that call? You know, you're sitting here, you're in a rock bottom. You're like, man, I have to figure out how to earn these guys respect, and you don't want to. And then all of a sudden, in the middle of all this, you get this call, and your life changes.

Well, I wasn't thinking I needed to earn those guys respect. I just thought how crazy it was that the man told me that he was right. He was right. But I wasn't planning on following through on what he told me. I was not going to do that. And then my agent had dropped hints to me, like, hey, this team is interested, and I think this is going to go through, but they want to talk to you first. So my agent already planning in my mind that they were going to call, but I was still working until they called. So when the manager from the team called me and said, hey, yes, this is happening. You just need to get a. We need to get you on a flight to come to this place at this time. Yeah, I was in the middle of sleeping because they called me, like, 11 in the morning. So I'm trying to sleep, and they woke me up. And, yeah, when I got off the phone with them, yeah, I just. My head's hitting the ceiling. I'm jumping up and down. I'm celebrating because I'm like, I can quit this job at the supermarket. And the job that my agent got me wasn't even that great of a job, but it was better than what I was doing at that time. And I'm like, I'm never going back to doing that. Whatever I got to do, I can't go back to it. So I just knew, all right, let me quit this grocery store job and get out of here. And I knew my parents would be happy because it means I'm leaving the house again and hopefully never come back. So that's how it ended up going.

When I started at the grocery store, I was fine with it. I was just trying to make it work. But I had my manager one day gave me a pep talk, what he called a pep talk. And he Said, you stick with this for long enough and we're going to make you a shelf packing soldier in no time. You're going to be one of our soldiers here in our shelf stacking army. And it scared the crap out of me. He's like, what? I'm going to be here a long time. Is this what you're saying? I'm training for a life of this. It scared the crap out of me. Right.

Is it training you to become him?

Yeah, basically. And now, you know, if that brings someone happiness, if someone is happy doing that and they get gratification out of this because I tell you, I found peace in my soul when I was a janitor. It was very difficult, but by the end of it I had actually found peace in my soul where I was happy with life. I found a way to meditate in a walking state and go around and find inner reflection while I'm mopping floors. And it was only after I found that that I quit with peace. But there's other people out there who are, you know, let's say that they're happy doing their shelf stacking or janitor job and that means I'm happy for them because to me all that matters is that you're happy with what you're doing Now. There's other people who are not happy and doesn't even have to be those kind of jobs. It could be a high end executive. I'm in Calgary where I spend a lot of time as an oil and gastown and I know some people that are making 200 grand a year or more and they are not happy people.

Right?

They're miserable covering it up because they're getting a big paycheck and they do not know what to do. Right. And whether someone listening to this show right now is stacking shelves or whopping floors or in a high end exec position, the emotional experience is very similar. They don't want to be there, they don't know what to do. They're scared of making change. What do you say to them, Trey?

So this person has a vision of where they want to go or they already are kind of at that place.

That's a good question. Why don't we see if we can fit in both scenarios of someone knows what they want to do and someone actually doesn't know. They just know that this isn't it.

You know, and where they are isn't it. Even though where they are is good enough for some people. So the person who knows where they want to go, what you want to do is deconstruct your outcome. You know what your the thing is. But for whatever reason, you haven't moved yourself to action. Let's just start at the ending. In order for you to get to this point, what would need to be true? This is the question you're going to keep asking yourself. What would need to be true? What would need to be true is I would need to have done this and this, and this has to happen, okay? In order for that to occur, what would need to be true? And then you get the answer to that question, and it may be more than one answer, usually will be more than one thing. And then you want to ask the question again, okay? For that to occur, what would need to be true? And you keep doing that working backwards until you get to where you are today and you get to an action step that you can take right now. So you're going to keep asking the question until you have worked backwards to an action step that you can take in the presentation moment. That's the only way that you can actually get started. Because this is the reverse breakdown of creating a strategy. All right? These things have to happen, okay? Now these things have to happen. Now, these things. You already have your whole plan mapped out. If you break this down, break it down this way, and it will probably help you to write it down and get it in some format that you can look at. And if you're talking about a person who doesn't know where they want to go, then that's the first question. All right? Where do you want to go? Because we can't get anywhere without a map. Now, you can have a car with a full tank of gas, but if you don't know where you're going, well, you're never there. So where is there? Where do you want to get to? Why do you want to get there if you can't answer those questions? Because sometimes people can't answer that question, they say, well, yeah, I get that, but I don't know what I want. I don't know where I want to go. All right, well, let's ask a different question. Where do you not want to go? Where do you not want to be? Now, I know when I was working at that grocery store, I did not want to be working at a grocery store. But it wasn't really about the grocery store. What was it about? It was about, I don't want to be around these people who seem to not really have aspirin going anywhere else. I don't want to be around people who don't have big ideas and big dreams and goals about where they want to go. I don't want to be in a situation where I'm doing something I don't even like doing for my well being just to pay bills. So you can make a don't want list, even if you can't make a things that you want list. So anyone who ever has a challenge of what do I want or where do I want to be or what type of person do I need to be or where do I want to go, figure out what you don't want. Because often we're pretty keen on one or the other. If you can't figure out what you want, you can figure out what you don't want. If you can't figure out what you don't want, you probably know what you do want. So that's where I would start with either person on either end and just. And then when you get to that outcome, that person gets it clear what they don't want. Okay, now let's look at the inverses of this. All right, here's some places that you could go and start deconstructing the same way all over again until you get to a current moment. Action step.

Thanks for sharing that. Remember, everyone listening. You can get a free copy of the third day book@thirddaybook.com and where would you want people to check you out by the way too, other than, you know, is that where you tell people to go check you out? Or I mean you can just go on YouTube and Google your name, right? Dre Baldwin. And you got tons of stuff. So where would you want people to check out other than the book?

Yeah, I'm on every social platform. Usually that's where people start is social media. So Instagram is the one I'm probably most active on as far as me actually being on there responding to people. And my Instagram story is usually where I'm the most active on a day to day basis on social media. But I post videos of YouTube every single day as well. So YouTube and Instagram probably the two social places where I'm at as far as website Now I do have dreallday.com but that's just a static website has my info and blog posts and third day book is really the place that.

I send everybody now flipping notes here. When you got that call, was that your rockin it moment or was there a different one? Would you say what would be your all time highest high? Like man, this is it. I've made it all that Struggle is in the past, and it was worth it. And this is the moment that I was dreaming of, you know, what would you say that is for you?

That'd probably be the moment when, man, there've been so many, but that'd probably be the first one. Would be the moment when my first agent called me and told me, hey, I have a contract for you to go play in Lithuania. Because at the time I was at Valley Total Fitness selling memberships, and I actually liked that job at Valley, but I knew what I wanted to do was go play basketball. So when that happened, I'm thinking about all these years, 23 years leading up to playing basketball, failing in high school, being okay but not great in college, and it looking like my career is pretty much over a year after graduation. And now I go to that exposure camp and then things start working for me. So that probably be the first one because that opened the door to everything else that led to the career, that led to YouTube, and both of those led to what I do now. So I had to say that moment.

This is a question I ask basically everyone that comes on the show after being through everything you have been through. Imagine we had a little time machine, like hot tub time machine style here, and we go back in time and you find yourself standing like your today self, standing in that same grocery store, looking at yourself back then, and you're watching yourself put these Frosted Flakes back on the shelf, and you can see the struggle in your own eyes from back then. And you had 60 seconds to, like, say something to your former self back then that was struggling and didn't see a way out. Now, what would you say to yourself back then in your own rock bottom moment?

I would say to myself, stay in the game. Stay focused on where you want to go. That any place that you're at, that is not where you ultimately want to be, is just temporary, that this is just a part of the sentence. There will be a comma after this because there's still more story to be written. So stay focused, keep doing what you're doing, keep your vision on where you want to be, and you're the one who ultimately has to decide where you're going to end up is not anybody else's decision, is not even anybody else's business. Just stay on the path that you're on because you know where you want to be and you will be there.

I felt that, Joe. I could feel the power of that. And I appreciate your courage to share your rock bottom. This show is about paying it forward for me. I had people help me when I was struggling, and I listened to and read about people who struggled as well and got through, and it's what helped me get through.

Right.

And the whole point of me doing the show, I mean, there's no sponsors. I don't make money for this. I pay for it myself. I am the sponsor. In fact, I usually give money away in the charity spots while I'm paying for the show, because I think this is. Well, this is just something that makes me feel good, and it makes me feel like I'm able to help people when people helped me similarly. So sharing a rock bottom story to me and to everyone listening on the show, it takes guts. Not only just to share it with your friends and people that you're close and trust with, but publicly, you know, going out there and saying, look, man, this was my toughest moment, and I've had guests that were gonna come on the show, and they said, you know what? I'm just not ready to talk about my rock bottom moment. And if you're not ready to talk about yours, that's totally cool, because it's a personal journey, and everyone's got their own steps to walk, And I'm very respectful of that. And I'm equally respectful of people like yourself, Dre, that have that courage to say, look, this was my absolute rock bottom, and dive into it deeply and share that story. It's through stories that I feel like we learned the best. So I really appreciate you taking the time to share your rock bottom and coming on the show, and I think I can say it. On behalf of everyone listening, thanks for doing what you do, man, and for giving away a free book and for sharing your knowledge.

I appreciate you for giving me the opportunity and sharing your platform for me to do it. Hopefully, your audience gets some real value, and some things here today resonate with them, and they can definitely let me know about it.

Yeah. And, you know, on a parting just before we wrap up, sometimes we do these shows and, you know, maybe I get interviewed on another show or whatever, and there's, like, there's a written script. You know, we have to stick to it and hit the points and da, da, da, da. Some of my favorite moments is when we're just, like, speaking whatever the heck's on our mind. Right. And I just wondered, is there anything on your mind in the show or people listening or in your story or, you know, things I said? Is there anything on your mind that you want to throw out there for people listening before we wrap up well.

I think we covered a lot, Eric. I think one of the main things that I want people to remember is that success is not about what happens in one particular moment. Even though the show is about rock bottom and rocking it moments, it's really about what you do every single moment. Because the only way you get to that moment of rocking it and now everyone in the world recognizes you as a success is because of all the work you did to build up to and create the opportun for that moment to exist. Because if you listen to both what Eric has shared and what I've shared is that it's these small decisions that we made along the way that put us in position for that rocket moment to occur. And that's really what the Third Day My book is about is making the decisions, moment to moment, day by day, that set you up for that big success when it finally happens.

One thing I remember watching on one of your TED talks, you said that it was something like this. You said, professionals do their job even when they don't think anyone's watching. And I've said a couple times on the show in the past, and I do believe that the true nature of a person comes out when they think no one's watching. So my challenge to everyone listening right now, once this show is over and you turn off your phone or you turn off your headset, you're sitting in your car or you're walking outside or you're making lunch or whatever you're doing and no one's watching you, I'm going to challenge you to what could you do that's going to move you one step towards where it is you want to be? Because no one's watching, so it's all you. Men or women. I'm here to suggest that you have an opportunity every single second. Just like Dre said, every single day is another day to make these choices. And I think you guys got a lot in you that hasn't come out yet. And I hope you find that courage, too, to take the steps forward in your path and on your journey. And I'm here to support you, and so is dreaming. And maybe on that note, I'll just say, thanks, everyone, for checking in on another episode from Rock Bottom, the Rockin it. My only ask is, please share this with someone who you think needs to hear it. Someone who you think would benefit from hearing Dre's story. Please share this episode with them. Because if you don't share it with them, they're never gonna find out about it. And that's my only ask for you. So thanks for tuning in. And Dre, again, thanks for your time. Appreciate it and hope you stay in touch, man.

Thanks a lot for having me on, Eric. I had a great time in this conversation.

And that's it. My friends, for this episode. We will see you next time. Please send me an email, say hello, give me some feedback, let me know what you think, give me some tips and suggestions. I'd love to hear from you. Also, please share this episode with whoever you think needs to hear it. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, doesn't matter. Just get it out there. I really appreciate it. And we'll see you next time on From a Rock Bottom to Rocking It. Have a Rocking it.