#128 The Power of Delusional Self Belief | 2 Chainz

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The new king of Atlanta hip-hop. He's a hustler's hustler, a man of the people, and a unifying force in Atlanta. 2 Chainz! I have this voice in my head every day that I kind of use it as like navigation.

Interesting.

It tells me the smallest thing. I'm trying to push the narrative to have people tap into that source that they have.

What if the voice inside of your head will actually tell you if you will be successful or not? That is what I am exploring on this episode. If you don't know the rapper and artist 2 Chainz, you're about to meet him.

My book is not It's not really a memoir, but it has many stories on how I use my intuition to actually get things done, to come up with these ideas.

What about a time when you didn't listen to your intuition?

I call that the fuck it voice. We all have had that fuck it voice. We literally have said, fuck it. Once upon a time, I looked at my phone, and I had people who I knew were millionaires. And I said, why can't I be one? So I really was, like, realistic about what I could be. I'm really dope like that. I'm really good like that.

What do you tell somebody listening, who wants to achieve high levels but doesn't know how to find that belief. People know you as a larger-than-life artist. Like, you collaborated with Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne, to name a few. You've won Grammys, you know, you've had this giant career. But I don't think people realize, one, where you came from, and then two, all the things you've done in business. There's a story about you where you turned like a $500,000 piece of land in Atlanta into a bunch of restaurants. Is that how that went down?

The properties in Atlanta, and about 15 years ago, they were, I mean, prime location properties for sale for $400,000, $500,000, which is a lot of money.

Right.

And so my realtor would tell me that compared to the rest of the United States in comps, that One day we're going to look back and we're going to wish we bought certain things because that's fairly cheap for prime real estate. So after I get this spiel over and over about just trust me, man, you're going to regret certain things, I bought a couple of pieces of, um, land in downtown Atlanta in this historic place called Castleberry Hill. I had like 3 buildings, don't have any ideas at this point, I'm just like hoarding Really, I'm just hoarding properties. And so, uh, I met a young lady who had a business and she was, you know, making good money out of a very small location. She needed a bigger place to, to take her business. I mean, I looked at her P&Ls, you know, she actually went to school for hospitality. She like was very passionate about this space. And before that meeting was over, I said, partner. And she looked at me like, and you know, that was over 10 years ago. And we have locations and franchises, but I think I'm a, I'm good at identifying passionate people in certain positions and identifying talent too. And anybody that I work with, because a lot of the businesses that you're going to speak on or that you research, none of them are solely just me.

Yeah.

It's always like a partner involved. And so when I first did this restaurant business, I realized that, you know, first I realized that most Black-owned restaurants don't last 10 years and stuff. Then I also realized that in that space, it has to be more than, you know, your grandmama's secret recipe or that it has, you have to really understand the hospitality space. And so with, you know, me and this partner, I've been able to grow and learn a lot from her. And then at the same time, kind of build up my portfolio as an entrepreneur.

So now you have 9 locations, is that right?

Man.

More than that, maybe.

We have maybe a little bit under 9, but we should, 'cause we're franchising now. Memphis, the Memphis Esco is doing really well. We have one in Dallas.

I got to go check this place out. Is it true that you went head to head with the Pablo Escobar estate?

I forgot what they call these lawyers that just go around fishing stuff. But— Oh, yeah. So during the pandemic, everything was shut down, right? Yeah. So except Atlanta, except Georgia. Governor Kemp was like, "We going to work. We're going to stay open. We going to work," all this. So half the people were like, "This man is crazy." The other half was like, "Let's stay." So it was this whole thing going back and forth. The whole time, the United States is watching us and they're just coming to Atlanta like, "I guess we can—" And this is middle of the pandemic, everybody wearing masks, 6 feet away, no hugging, people spraying you down with Lysol. It just was crazy. Temperature, hand sanitize. So I give back to the homeless during this time. I have something set up outside. I have like pasta, something like that can fill you up and it's not, you know, so I like this pasta noodles. I got chicken. So across the street from Esco, a little bit down the street is a homeless shelter. So I was like, man, let's just take this outside and feed the homeless. While we're feeding the homeless, of course they're broadcasting this on the news. Somebody from somewhere else says, Esco, we can't. And they tried to really like, you know, sue us. I think we end up settling this whole thing. It was a picture. So it was called Esco Bar, but I'm like a rapper. So when I came up with it, I was like, bar, like we got a bar, you get it? Like Esco, like Esco is kind of like dope, right? We got a dope bar. I'm just playing with words at this time, right? And so to say that we, became successful off Pablo Escobar's name was so far from the truth. We was like, okay, you talking about this picture? Let's take this picture down. And we put my picture up and business has been just moving just how it always has been. But yeah, somebody tried to, you know how it is.

But I kind of like it. I think my dad always used to say, you're not really in the game of business if you haven't been lied to, stolen from, cheated, and not known what to do next.

Okay, well, I passed this course. That's happened to me on numerous occasions. That's the part nobody tells you.

Right? They're like, "Oh yeah, it must be so easy, 2 Chainz. You're like famous, you start a restaurant." You're like, "No, no, that's humbling." It's not easy, man.

And I thought about it because I thought about making this post, and I can say it here because I am trying to get my pre-orders up for my book that's coming out on March 3rd, right? So I was like, you know, I did all this content on like creating awareness, and then I just thought, why don't I just tell these people that if you have worked at any of my locations, if I've helped you indirectly, directly, any kind of way, it was once upon a time that the Esco franchise had over 100 employees, 130 employees. Some I know, obviously a lot I don't know, but from me owning a nail shop, even an adult entertainment place, it seems like one of my callings, one of my callings is helping young women, right? So I'm saying that if I've ever done anything to help any kind of way, then my book is only $20 and I would just like your support. I love it. That's all it is. That's really it.

It also has a great title though, by the way. Like, "The Voice in My Head Is God." Yeah, it's weird.

You don't think that's weird?

No, I think it's good. Okay, me too. I mean, I'm not surprised because you're good with words, but every so often you hear words, you hear a sentence and you're like, "I'm gonna keep that." Yeah, it hit me out the blue.

It, it just— I mean, I had the idea. Well, I have this voice in my head every day. I've been had— I've had this voice in my head just that I kind of like use it as like, imagine like navigation. It tells me the smallest thing, tells me, "You should wear this today." And then they'll tell me the largest thing on, "I don't think that's a great business decision." So it has this wide range, but it's filled with love and I know it's coming from a positive place. So when people say God is within you or you're a reflection of that, that's where I got the concept for that book title from. Like the voice, it has to be God. Cause like I came, this happened, like, you know, I listen. And then also speak on the eff it voice. We all got that. Know we shouldn't be doing it, know it's gonna be consequences, and we do it. So, you know, it's kind of like the kind of cliché thing we used to see back in the days when it was like this angel on this shoulder, this angel on the other shoulder. But I start to believe in one of those angels. Do you believe in God? I do. I'm not afraid to talk about it. I make people uncomfortable sometimes. I go to those big dinners and I just start praying over my food before I eat. And they like, I just do that. My belief and my guidance and my faith has gotten me this far, so I don't think I should just, like, try to change it or come up with any— anything else.

You know, the way that you've done music and the way that you've— you've kind of, like, created movements around your music. And I don't know if that's that normal today, but I think about, like— and you seem to care a lot about your community, which is, like, one of our— my core things. I like to own businesses by where I live because That makes sense to me. Like, I want to go to a coffee shop that you own. I don't want to go to one that some CEO 100 miles away owns and he's never come in. You know, you had one of the most genius marketing ideas I've seen that really didn't cost you much money at all, but blew up. You basically lease sort of an unremarkable house in Atlanta. You painted the color of Pepto-Bismol, right? And then in 24 hours, you write Trap on it. You park a pink car in it, a stove in the yard, and you use it to promote your album, which was huge. And then it became one of Atlanta's number one tourist attractions. People flew in from other cities to take pictures. You had galleries and events, you know, even a free HIV clinic. What were you thinking when you started creating this, and why did you create this trap house?

So I had an album that came out in 2017. It was called Pretty Girls Like Trap Music. Trap music Or the word trap means in Atlanta, it symbolizes hustling, and most knowingly it has to do with selling drugs. Okay? When you hear a lot of people in Atlanta, they talk about trapping, it's hustling and selling drugs. So it's a type of music that some, that people listen to. It's bass, it's heavy driven with bass, and it has these like lyrical connotations dealing with scales and just, it's an underworld type of thing. So I had a project that was called Pretty Girls Actually Like This Type of Music. You just, you know, like it's just not for like, and it's just this old thing, like when you used to, when I used to come up, used to be like, damn, the good girl always wants the bad guy. That's kind of like what it was. And so we actually rented out a house, we painted it pink, and we used it like a live immersive experience. And that's what it was. And we had art on the inside. So it was about me actually making the word "trap" a positive connotation instead of it always being attached to something negative. And so we did everything from church to HIV to art shows, and it lasted a couple of months, but the neighbors couldn't handle all the traffic, so we had to get rid of it.

Yeah, I think I saw a great line from you too, uh, which was basically you were trying to save the house 'cause— they were trying to tear it down. And you called it the Eiffel Tower of Atlanta.

Is that right? It was though. Like, once upon a time, it was one of the most visited, you know, sites in the United States. So that's just about something that is like this voice thing to me. It's an idea. And a lot of people, I don't think, understand how many people don't have ideas. And I am someone that, gets these cool ideas all the time. And I just, I feel like ideas are currency. Like people pay for ideas, people steal ideas. So you have to be careful who you even sharing with. But ideas are, it's like, it's something that we don't really speak about. 'Cause a lot of people in our position, people come to us with ideas and stuff to do. But for me to actually come to my team, man, this is my conversation that, man, I got another one. Man, before I even tell anybody, I'm like, boy, I got it. I did it again. So ideas is something that I don't think people really give a lot of credit to because they can spark, you know, a generation worth of just a wealth or whatever. If it's a really— we've seen good ideas go, you know, for eons. So yeah.

I think you're right. Well, especially think about it in this world today. Like everybody's kind of freaking out about AI, right? What's going to happen with tech? But man, In some ways, the execution now is not the hard part. It's like, what idea are you going to do?

Imagine taking your idea and pairing it with an AI who can actually show you the steps on getting— because we've all had ideas and just kind of left it as that, right? Just get so discouraged. Don't know where to start. Don't know where to look. Don't know who to talk to. Don't, you know, but yeah, AI has opened up that, like, you got an idea? Well, let's, let's, you know, push it through. So That is a good thing.

Do you believe that— maybe it's Rick Rubin who says, "When an idea's time comes, you either let it out of you or somebody else will"?

I saw that. And he was like, "Yeah, you keep playing something." It was like wind. It was like somebody else will catch it. I was like, "Dang." When I heard that, I thought about how many times I'm like, "Man, I thought about that. Man, I—" You thinking that your thoughts is traveling. I swear. So I'm— when I saw that message from him, it stuck to me in the fact that I thought, I know I saw somebody's idea and I've had that same thought as well, but just didn't bring it to fruition.

So. But you have really been pretty prolific as an artist, as a business builder, as an idea generation— generator for, God, I mean, decades. So I guess I'm curious. For somebody that's listening that's like, "I'm not a creative," you know, we always hear people say that. What do you say to them?

I would tell them to quiet down the noise, maybe get my book. My book is not necessarily a memoir, but it has many stories on how I use my intuition, which is like a sixth sense in a sense for me. How I use my intuition, my discernment, that inner monologue to actually get things done, to come up with these ideas. To shut down the outside noise. I've actually used that voice in my head to get out of that rut. Like, you know what I mean? Sometimes you have to self-motivate yourself. That's one of the hardest things to do. And I know my peer group, some of my peers like, man, how do you do it, man? You know, it's like, man, one of my friends was coming to the studio, much younger than me. He texted me and said, man, I don't know how you do it, man. You go to you go to your kid's practice, you go to— he's like, I'm tired, I'm gonna come over tomorrow. And I saw the message, I said, man, I'm just self-motivated. Like, I don't really have that battery pack, no one just like— I'm just like, I can look in the mirror and say, and just give myself that pep talk I need to go further and get my day done.

What do you say? What's your pep talk sound like?

In a nutshell, it's no one else is gonna do this for you. I don't have, like, I don't have— No, I don't have anybody else. I don't have anyone. You know, like, I got people I love, but if I need something, like, it's not love that I'm needing. I won't need it. I have enough love. I have a lot of love. A lot of love. I'm getting a lot of love. I'm giving. Are your parents still living? Mm-hmm. All right, what do they do for a living?

My dad's an entrepreneur. He wouldn't even call himself that. He'd be like, "I worked my whole life." You know, he was like, didn't go to college. He worked in a slaughterhouse. He built up a marble and granite business.

If you needed something though, would you— Do you think you can call your parents for something?

Yeah, I could call my dad to at least be like— I've had a time in business, I don't know if you've had one, I call it the head in the hands moment where they're like, I don't think I'm gonna make it and I have no idea what I'm gonna do. Like, I don't know, and nobody else can know, and I might not make it out of here.

And he's not— But you did know you can call your dad. You did know. I did. Yeah. So these are different levels of stress. Yeah. All right? It's like, I'm stressed out, man. I know he'll do it, but I don't want to call him. Hey, Dad. But then it's like, I'm stressed out, man. I don't have nobody. Was that you? Yeah. So that would be me if I sat down in my own— like, mope, and you know what I'm saying? So, 'cause I don't have, like— my dad's not alive anymore, but if he was alive, I was never able to be like, you know, "Front me some cash for my business," or anything like that, you know? And my mom— so I don't have anyone. So when you don't have, like, a person on top of you, you are the apex. You're the person that everyone comes to. Then you have to find ways of motivating yourself. So are you now—

the person for your kids.

My kids were going to be straight whether I was, like, successful or not. I think when you become successful, you attain more things, it's more responsibility, and that's where it kind of gets a little static and stuff.

Yeah, it can be hard. I don't have kids. I hope to one day.

You should. I think you'll be a great mother. Well, thanks.

I hope so. You know, I have— I got lucky. I won the birth lottery. I have great parents, you know, and I didn't do anything for that. I just got to show up. I mean, but don't get me wrong, I'll take every fucking advantage I can in life. And then you should figure out what to do with it, right?

You should. That's— I think you should. I'm trying to get that in my little nepo babies. They don't want to say my name. Like, you should totally use my name to— Yeah. To the best of your ability to get whatever you need. They have a problem with that, but—

Well, kind of good on them. As long as they do something real though and are builders.

Yeah. I remember talking to the Hawks owner. He was like, "Man, you better tell them to use your name." Like, 'cause it's a, you know, everybody's like, "Pfft, what? What are they thinking?" 'Cause it's like, if someone finds out in my line of work, if they find out that I have something to do with it, then the price automatically goes up and think, yeah, yeah. So it's like, "Oh, this is nice. This is nice. This is a nice rug. This is a very nice rug." "It's 2 Chainz rug." "Oh yeah, it's gonna be like $3,000." Yeah. It's gonna be, oh no, it's Codie's rug? No, it's some 200.

I'm sure you've had a lot of haters over the years.

Ah, man, I wouldn't say haters.

What do you say? Like, how do you handle it? I think that's a lot of like, when I see the people who follow us, a lot of the comments I get are like, I'd be too scared to ever do that. Like, I care too much what people think, you know?

But that's the thing, you don't. So then that's why it's perfect for you and not perfect for them. They're literally answering their own questions. A lot of times, if you look at the comments, they're already, "Um, what made you, you know, I wouldn't wear nothing like that." That was the answer. You wouldn't wear anything like this. You wouldn't, you know, you wouldn't. So a lot of times comments don't really, you know, bother me. The hate stuff, I don't even, that word is kind of like overly used too. Like everybody can't be hating. Sometimes it's constructive criticism, you know? And so it just depends on how you're listening to it. But I don't get a lot of hate 'cause I'm pretty much a, what you see is what you get kind of person.

I kind of get that vibe from you overall, especially because I was looking at your background. Your first solo debut that kind of blew up, you were 34 and had been working for 15 years, but then you completely rebranded. Charlamagne was telling me later in your career, he was like, "That was super impressive." And I was kind of wondering what kept you going for the 15 years before you felt you had made it?

I knew I had something special. I knew I was a star, and it was hard to— explain it to somebody what you have inside of you without actually proving it. So with me, it was like I had been around stars. I had, once upon a time, I looked at my phone and I had people who I knew were millionaires. Like I knew these people were millionaires. Like I didn't, I never saw their account, but I just know. And I said, why can't I be one? Somebody number, why can't I be one? So I really was like realistic. About what I could be. Like, I just, I just knew it. I just knew I could crack the code. I just knew I would change. Just like when I walk in here, I walked in here, I could just change the room when I walk in. I just knew I had something, I had the it, and I just had to stay at it and not give up. I just knew I was special. I knew it was something to me. I just, God took his time with me, and I know that. And, and that's, and can't no words or comments or anything like that kind of derail what I know is inevitable. Like I'm a real, you know, I'm a superstar.

There's this wild study from 2016 that found that gut instinct outperforms careful analysis under pressure, but only when it's built on years of real experience. Turns out intuition isn't a feeling, it's a database. So 2 Chainz has been running that database for 3 decades, and the best operators I know apply that same thing to how they build, knowing when a tool is working and when it's quietly costing you. So if you're running a newsletter on anything other than Beehive, it's probably the latter. The analytics alone change how you operate. You can segment your audience by engagement tier, track which content drives paid upgrades, see revenue attribution at the post level. That's a beautiful feedback loop that makes every issue sharper and every decision faster. The monetization stack, totally unmatched. Beehive's ad network brings deals directly to you, and they just released on-demand ads, which gives you access to countless ad opportunities. Plus, they handle sales, reporting, invoicing, paid subscriptions, boosts, referral programs, all native, all compounding inside one platform. No patchwork, no margin bleed. And the growth tools are structural, so not cosmetic. Beehive newsletters grow 2.75x faster than the industry average because the infrastructure is built for scale from day one. Serious newsletter operators have already made the switch. Use code CODIE30 for 30% off your first 3 months at beehive.com/codie. And I was talking to this guy before this. His name's David Senra, and there's all this data. That actually proves that in a lot of ways what you believe is what you become. And so anyway, we were talking about that. Like, you know how some people say you shouldn't believe it if you don't have proof, you know, like give yourself some proof and then believe it. But you seem to believe the opposite. What if somebody like, let's imagine there's somebody out there listening to us right now and they're like, one day I want, I don't know if they wanna be 2 Chainz, but they wanna be their version of you, you know, like their most successful self. What do you tell somebody listening who wants to achieve high levels but doesn't know how to find that belief?

The voice in my head is God. Like, this is how I feel. I'm not trying to, like, persuade, but this is how I feel. This is what I think. This is what I think. I'm an individual. This is my independent thinking. This is what I think. And so when other people do that, and then you get people around that understand, like, this is what she believes, and it's okay. This is her thoughts. Now, sometimes we look at stuff and we be like, that's pretty wacky. Like something's wrong there, you know what I mean? And I get that. But with me, I don't let stuff like that bother me, man. You know, I just came so far, man. I can't do nothing but just be happy, you know, about whatever engagement I get, whether positive or negative, you know what I'm saying? I'm still like recognized, been in the game so long, 15, 20, who's even counting anymore? I'm still recognized. I'm still not able to just walk outside and walk down the street. Like I'm still like, very much in it. I'm still in my legacy phase of just really, like, putting the chairs on top for the things I did in the past with the entrepreneurial thing, the music thing, everything I'm doing. I did— I shot my own short film. This book is coming out. So I'm just really— I'm building out the 2 Chainz, you know, legacy stamp more than anything.

Yeah, you know, it's interesting. It seems a little bit more normal now. Like, you see, like, Taylor Sheridan owning sort of like the vertical integration of his business. Like, he owns a ranch where they film the show, and he rents out the cows and the horses that he owns back to the studio.

It's really smart. See, see, that's different. That's so different. And that's what we got to get in us. See, we got to get that. I just— I had to do somebody else's part, and it was at their house by the pool in the attic. And I was like, "Oh, you got some tax write-offs going on." You know what I'm saying? And it's like, and you just like, man, that's information that needs to be shared. And it's just smart.

Well, I think you, like, I don't know if you give yourself enough credit. Like, I heard a story about how you spent money on like a tour bus. And on a studio. And like, one of the reasons why you could record was for Nicki Minaj when she called you up, because you were smart enough to already have the studio that you built inside the bus when nobody was doing that.

Yeah, yeah. So I bought my tour bus before I got my record deal. Before I got my record deal, first of all, in order to— when I signed my record deal, basically it was— I was— the questions that I was asking labels was, I was asking about their international presence because locally, domestically, I was already doing shows. So I went through 3 bands, these little conversion bands. We were just going, they call it the chitlin' circuit where it's like Memphis, the Carolinas, Alabama. You just go around and you just go around this little chitlin' circuit, the Southeast. You could become a millionaire. You go to these places every weekend, you pick up I don't know how much money doing 3 or 4 clubs and then a few. And so I was going through vans. I said, man, I'm gonna need a bus because I was getting larger. And I'm just going through these vans. So I'm gonna need a bus. And then plus I started, you know, what I talked about, about convenience. It had a stove on there. It had a bed. It had a studio. So that's everything I need. Whether I had a hotel or not, I could really like make it work from there. So I bought that. I bought the bus, I don't know, it was maybe $300,000, a little bit over $300,000. You know, it was used, but it was well kept. And then I would go on the road and still work. Like, some artists, not most, but some artists go on the road, and then when they're on the road, they can't work because they're not near a studio. That wasn't my problem. I'd literally be doo doo, we'd be riding, I'd be working, you know? I'd be working. So the incident that you talking about with that song, She called one night, was like, "I really need this song done by tomorrow." And she offered to get me studio— "I can get you studio time. Where you at? Whatever." I'm like, "Nah, you don't have to do that. I'll knock it out when I get off stage." So that was one of the many stories where I literally— somebody gave me something, and I just sent it right back because I was in a position of just having everything I needed near me.

It's really smart. Because if you think about it, like, basically what you did, you vertically integrated the music. If you own the studio and you can rent it to other people, and if you own the bus and you don't have to rent it out to other people, there you go, then you under—

you get the first dollars. You get it. You, you get it. Got a chef on there cooking food. Got the chef— we let the, we let the windows open, man. People entrap it like, what y'all got on there? What y'all cooking? You know, you get to put them onions and garlic and, man. So yeah, this was something I did earlier. This is actually what I did before I got my record deal. I got tour bus. And then when I got the record deal, I went on tour. Obviously I already had the bus, because most of the time you have to rent buses to go on tour, and they're expensive.

I saw the markup, is like 60%.

They're, they're very expensive. So you have to get the, you know, the driver or drivers depending on where you going, you know, you got to get them room, you know, whatever. But yeah, I did that. When you reach a certain level, um, I think convenience is something that we can't have enough, enough of. So when I reached a certain level, I hired a driver, I hired a chef. You know, you just hired, you put these things in place where you can just focus on the main thing. Work. And you have people who do what they do at a high level, you know, help you out in different areas that you need help in.

Yeah, there's this, do you know this guy Sam Zell? He was like this big real estate investor. He wrote this book called "Am I Being Too Subtle?" But he's kind of this cool, weird old dude. And he was billionaire a bunch of times over, but he had this gray line that was like the difference between a $10 million house and a $30 million house, like doesn't really matter. He goes, "But the jet, the jet matters." The jet matters. Yeah, 'cause it's about convenience.

Yeah. I have a great relationship with the owners of the Hawks. Cool. So they invited my son and myself on like a recruiting trip. We went to like this Kansas versus BYU game and we took like a jet jet, like a—

Not one of those tiny ones that I've been on before.

No, big one. Nah, it was, you know, it was massive. It probably seated 12 to 14 people or something like that. So that was, it was cool and it's cool for my son to experience that, but it's a difference in, in jets. There's a difference in everything, but yeah.

It's true. Also, I like when other people pay for the jets. Why? I like that way better.

Jets are so expensive. I know.

I don't want to be paying for that.

Man, they're so— I'm so happy. I'm not happy, but when people started wearing masks in the airport, I was able to cut my jet bill by more than half because I was able to— because I would get— I don't really get anxiety or nothing like that, but sometimes people just yell my name in these crazy places, and the airport is one of them. And I would be in the airport and somebody would be like, "You know 2 Chainz?" And I'd be like, "God, Lord help me." I'll just, so the next time I'll tell somebody, "Yo bro, just book me a private. I don't feel like," 'cause it's like one person does it. But when people started wearing masks, I just kind of put my mask on. I think I'm hiding, but it doesn't work like that. I can tell.

No, that's not gonna work. And then didn't you also buy back all of your masters?

Yeah, I did that. They don't come back. I bought them back, but they don't— they literally can't give them back to you for— I don't know if it's 7 or 20. I don't know the date, but yeah, they're supposed to revert back to me, you know, soon.

But yeah, I did that. Will you explain how that works? Because I don't think people understand.

It's negotiating more than anything. You have to have leverage. That's— it's not like you— it's not nothing that works. You got to have Like with any business, if you got leverage, then the conversation can be had. If you don't have leverage in any business, if you ain't got leverage, you want to, you know, I want to do this podcast at Times Square. They like, you know, you can't just tell people, you know, whatever. So with me, in these different phases of my life, I had a certain amount of leverage where I was able to get certain things. Normally for syncs, and say if we were using my song here or something like that, we would have to go through the label. 'cause they own it until it's reverted back to me. And then songs like Birthday Song is something I made that I'm sure someone plays somewhere in the world every day. It'll just be a bigger cut at the end of the day, a bigger split.

That makes sense.

Because some artists don't even have a— they didn't even have a great negotiating when they did their splits for their pub. Somebody else may have it in different— I have my pub, I have all of that. So it was just about getting the masters back.

That's so interesting. Do you like the business side more or the creative side more? Do you think that they're all the same?

No, no, no, no. Nothing is the same. Nothing is the same. But I love the creative side more because that's where I get my ideas. That's where I get my, "Ooh, I can't believe." That's when I start talking to that voice in my head. That's when I get to say, "Boy, I can't believe you came up with this." Like I'm talking to somebody, "I can't believe you just came up with that." Like, "Yeah, man, that was, you know, that's pretty good. That's a good one, man." And then, "Ooh, what if we do that?" Oh man, you know, that's me. The business side frustrates me and it makes me want to go out to the car and smoke one sometimes. So yeah. Not your favorite side. Even when you got leverage, it kind of makes you a little bit cockier than you should because you like, come on, man, I know y'all. You know, so it's just messy. Business is messy to me. Tomorrow morning is knocking.

Stock your fridge now. How about a creamy mocha frappuccino drink?

Or a sweet vanilla, smooth caramel maybe, or white chocolate mocha.

Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits. Find Starbucks Frappuccino drinks wherever you buy your groceries. You know, there's, there's a lot of people out there today that have, that have had a really hard life, that have struggled in their background. Maybe they're thinking like, I got nobody but myself, it's all on me. And then they could look at somebody like you and go, well, he got out, how could I do the exact same thing? And my question for you is, like, did you always have this type of confidence in you?

What does that look like? Well, I work every single day, so when you work every single day, it becomes effortless. So if I needed to do a verse for somebody right now, I don't need to, like, figure out a headspace to get in. I'm literally activated. This is what I do for a living. Rap and music is like a job that you never really truly clock in or clock out. This is ongoing. This is what I do. This is my professional. I don't need to have a certain candle or a certain type of water to get my ideas. I'm really dope like that. I'm really good like that. So when people ask me for things like that, they get it right back. I don't have to like, ah, it's going through a, you know, I don't, I'm literally, I'm moving around, I'm ideating all throughout the day. So I have ideas, I have metaphors, I have different innovative ways to say some of the same things I've already said before, just in a different way, a different pattern. So for me, It starts first, you have to be highly confident in yourself and what you do for a living. And then I think everything kind of falls under that umbrella. And for me, confidence is like, I didn't fall short in that at all. No, you seem very confident. I put a lot on myself. So even though I'm recording songs every night, they might not see the day of light because I have a high— a higher expectancy for a lot of my things or a lot of stuff that I'm putting out to the world. But like, if I'm doing a feature, if I'm working with somebody, I'm just comfortable in what I do. I'm just, I'm just, I'm comfortable in my skin, and it starts from there. I'm someone that didn't have much, and when you come from that kind of space, majority of the time you want what you never had. You want these— you have all these screenshots in your mind of your driveway and your 3-story house, or what's your garage, or whatever that's going to look like. So coming from where I, you know, the environment I came from, I just aspired to have larger than life things. When as you get older, you realize you don't even need all of these things. You don't need all these bedrooms because everyone can't sleep in them. You don't need all these cars because you can't drive them all. And you've heard this getting to that point, but until you get to that point, you can't truly respect it and honor it. Because when you're working hard, when you're doing whatever, when you working, putting the work in, how else do you, I'm speaking for me and my community, how else do you celebrate yourself? How else do you, you know, I've seen people, Charlamagne, he's just reached an incredible height. It's everywhere. He's just being so, what are you talking about? 200 million? I don't know. He's making up, lying on me. Everybody's lying. It's all up to him. But I could tell you that if I got $200 million, you would know. You would know. You know, this guy just bought a jet. So you would know. Charlamagne, like, hey man, y'all stop spreading these rumors, you know. But, um, you would know. How would they know? You would know, right? It's like, Codie Sanchez has $200 million. It's like, Do these little yellow cups, they might just suddenly be gold one day. You ain't gonna tell it all. Like, damn. And then this little table like marble. Honestly. It's just small little changes. And so that's me. I get this money, these chairs gonna be different, the carpet. I'm going marble, the glasses. We going gold straws. We gonna have— Bond candles. I don't even know, different candles, live plants, live vegetation. It's just a difference when that money come. Yeah, and certain people with certain people, I don't know, you might can get the money and still just keep it nice and subtle. And but I'm gonna tell you honestly, like, I'm— when you, you'll hear me pulling up like, yo, he's— the chains is here. I come in, you know, it's just different, man. It's just different, man. I think it's just Nature versus nurture. How have you been raised, really?

You seem like a man of faith regardless. Who knows? Like, that's not going to define you, but you could have fun with it.

Got to have fun. Right? Life is short. I know. Why we not having fun? For real, though. I know. We supposed to be enjoying life.

I mean— Have you ever struggled with anxiety from all the attention?

The things that kind of get on my nerves is people who, just drunk people.

In general, yeah.

Around me. Yeah. If you over there drunk doing stuff, I don't mind. I could look at you and laugh. But like, if you drunk and like, I don't mean like my friend drunk, like over there doing, I'm like somebody that's like, yo, come on, Chance, man. You don't know how strong you are. You don't know how, you don't know, you slurring, you don't know, you spitting, you don't know. That just makes me be like, You know, leave me alone. You know, that kind of messes with me a little bit. It's the alcohol, but I'm not a big alcohol drinker.

Yeah, me either.

I like a little red wine, but I've been doing my red wine thing too. My friends put me on red wine, some of my basketball friends. So I've been trying to like cab myself and Pinot myself here and there. For real.

Well, now I know what to send you for coming on the vlog.

You got to come on, man. Send me whatever you drink.

You know what my secret is? This is so unrelated to anything, but I really am into French and Italian wines. And I'm kind of, I'm a little bougie in some ways. I mean. But the fun part about those, you can get incredible wine. It's actually cheaper than US wine often, but it's way better, it's way cleaner, there's no pesticides in it. And it's just like more complex. So we'll make a little note, David. I'll send you one of my favorite. There's this like, do you ever do like Barolo? Yeah. Or like, I love a Brunello. Yeah. But I'm actually not that cool or classy. It's all my husband. He's like kind of fancy. And then he taught me 'cause he was fancier growing up than I am.

That's another thing. You should absolutely get with a man that could teach you something. Yeah. I think all females should do that. I mean, yeah. So that's good.

And you're married. I am. And do you feel like, did you teach her something? What? Would she say you teach her something? She better say it.

Yeah, man. I think that's what it's about. You get in a relationship with me. Of course, a dude can bring, you know, money and all this stuff, but like, he gotta be able to put you down, put you on something. Like, you know, I think that's important. And especially for somebody like me, I'm always traveling. I'm able to like, hey, guess this is what's going on, you know? So yeah, I think that's important. I have another business partner by the name of Joe. He's running, my adult— I have a strip club in Atlanta called Candyland. Yeah. Be open 3 years this year. So Joe is handling a lot of that stuff. So in Atlanta, I don't know about anywhere else, in Atlanta, the license to have alcohol and nudity, they put that out of commission in like '93. So you have to get grandfathered in. You have to actually buy that from somebody else. Yeah. So just that whole process of doing that, —then getting this facility. I'm from Atlanta. Adult entertainment is a major part of how the city moves. It's not just for one group of people. You see all different types of people in these clubs, whether they are getting drinks, you know, watching TV, listening to the music, looking at the girls, eating, whatever it is. And so that was something that I couldn't have planned it, but it just happened like it was supposed to happen. And It's not many in the city. It's, you know, 2 or 3 or whatever.

Whoa, and you own one of them?

Yeah. That is cool. That is cool. You and your husband can actually come. You can get some habachi.

Do you think I'd like it?

I think you'll love it. Really? Everybody that's come to my club will love it. I mean, I've had friends from out in Cali. I've had friends from Germany, Russia.

And you have habachi in the strip club? Yep, I have habachi.

I have— You know, tacos. I have vegan burgers. My vegan burgers are delicious. I have vegan burgers. And that's another thing. When you have these type of places, why go out to eat when I could just call my, one of my businesses and say, though, I would like some salmon with some okra and spinach.

Unless you want to pay yourself. Yeah, yeah.

I would like a bachi. I would like a shrimp and chicken abachi or shrimp and lobster abachi. I go get it and I watch ESPN, I watch a game and a young nice female walks past and we speak and, you know.

No, I'm Latina. I told my husband he's not allowed to talk to women, you know, like at all. I'm kidding.

Okay, because I've heard, I don't know, like, I don't know, I hear some Latino women are a little aggressive. I don't, I have no clue because I'm from a place where it was just all black people. Like College Park is— I'm from College Park, then I went to a Black school, HBCU. So I went Black on Black. My elementary was Black, then I went to a Black middle school, then I went to my own Black, then I went to Blacks. And then I went to New York and LA, and then that's when you start seeing the diversity. And then early on, when I started seeing the diversity, I had to learn how to be, you know, this is just, this is sure ignorance, like, So what you is? You know, just don't even know that. Just be serious. Man, what are you? Like, what do you mean? So then having to learn how to ask people, you know, their background. So yeah, so I, you know, and I'm gonna tell you, I'm very intelligent, but just not knowing is just not knowing. You only know what you see and what you, so.

Experience and intelligence are very different. Yeah.

One of my best friends that passed away, Johnny, Mm. He was from Puerto Rico, but he was like my real brother. We was the same person, so to speak. We had some of the same— we did some— a lot of the same things. So rest in peace to him too. But yeah. But so you hear different things about, you know, the passionate Latinos, and then you'll see how they portray them in movies, just like they do Black people and everything else. So you just never know until you—

We women are crazy.

I believe you. It's a certain way you just looked at me, and I just believe you. And I just want to tell your husband, bro, do right. This little— this girl from 11 years old, she is not playing with you. Yeah, it's funny.

You know, but it's good because you have a son and a daughter.

I have two little girls. I have a 17-year-old and a 13-year-old, and I have a 10-year-old son. So I have three kids total.

Yeah, because dads are super important to daughters. You know, I'm really close with my dad.

Okay, quick question. Tell me. Was it a period of time that you was like smelling your own whatever or just being like, okay, cool. Oh, I was a nightmare. What was that, 13? What age was that? Right about what you are. I just wanna make sure I ain't—

You're right, you're right in the box actually. Yeah, in fact. Okay, cool. Yeah, I was a bit of a nightmare. But now my dad and I are the closest. He actually works with me now and he's amazing.

I feel that with my oldest too. Me and her are like— I'm the oldest too. She, she, my, but you know, girls are just, they go through a stage where We're psychos. Yeah, they don't, they don't want to be bothered or whatever it is, and I have to understand that and give them some of their space. Because when you go through this stuff in your house, it's like technology knows it. So then all of a sudden you start getting this stuff like teenage girls are going through. It just pops up on your, on your while you're scrolling. Stop. Do you have teenage girls that are in their room not speaking? Like, oh. You know, so this is going on right now. So I'm learning how to just, you know, just be understanding and let them develop.

Yeah. Well, it's interesting. Does that end up coming into your music now? Like, is your music always sort of a reflection of where you're at in life?

That's a good question. Yeah. And a lot of my music is— I reminisce a lot. I use past tense. I used to. I had a lot of it is me, like a reflection type of thing to a lot of my music. I used to, mm, mm, mm, mm, you know, so I'm not like saying I'm doing it right now. I'm not like, I'm not lying in any of my stuff. So yeah, but when it comes to, I guess like something that's personal is something like that I wouldn't, although my newest album, I do have a song dedicated to my pops that has made a few of my friends cry. So I can't wait to that. So it's very like, just like plucking this heartstring.

I do want to talk a little bit about intuition because it's kind of the backbone of this book.

Yeah, let's talk about that.

I think in business, intuition is so important, but it's important in every aspect of your life. So I'm curious, like, what's your favorite point, story about intuition from this book? The book is—

it's a lot of tales, a lot of stories about my journey.— and when I used my intuition, or when I listened to my intuition once I discovered it, and the times that I didn't. And so, you know, out of all the stories, it's just like— or how my mom or someone tried to— maybe she had the intuition before. I feel like women are born with it, you know. I have a chapter in the book called "Women Are Superheroes." I feel like women are just— born with intuition. You know, women are just be like, I knew I shouldn't have, I knew I shouldn't have listened to you, you know, or I should have did whatever. So, you know, and my book is about discernment. It's about that discernment. It's about the inner monologue. It's about quieting down the outside noise, tuning in to like the inner your inner connection, your inner Wi-Fi to the highest source, whatever you believe in, and listening to it say, man, I think you should give it another shot. I think you should go try to do this. I think you should, I think you should leave that alone. I think it's time for you, it's about time for you to leave. You know, this is, I think, and that's, that's my voice talking to me all the time. Like, ah, you've been here long enough. It's like, yeah, I have friends sometimes, don't know why, I just might get them to start walking out the club. I just might get up and just, "Ah, it's just time to go." So I think I'm trying to push the narrative to have people tap into that source that they have. I'm just trying to affect one person who may have sat up and said, "You know, something told me." If they've said that one time, if you've said, "Something told me," one time, then this book is for you.

What about a time when you didn't listen to your intuition?

I call that the fuck it voice. We all have had that fuck it voice. We literally have said, "Fuck it." And I think it's okay to have that voice, but you just got to be able to distinguish between them. But I think the fuck it voice has maybe gotten us into some trouble or maybe had us live on the edge and not even trouble, but we've We all had that, man.

And have you ever had a time where you're like, "I really— if I had this book, I probably would've not done that thing because I would've tapped into my intuition." I think it'll help people navigate life differently.

That's my ambition. I want people to be like, "You know what, man? After reading your book, man, I realize sometimes—" I didn't need to be in certain places, and other times I needed to be in certain places and things of that nature. The Voice in My Head Is God, which comes out on 3/3. I want to be a New York Times bestseller so I can add it to the rest of my accomplishments. And last but not least, I have the— my audiobook is a real true experience. I cannot wait till you hear the audio part of this. Of course it's me. I'm an excellent, exceptional reader. So I did my own reading, but I also added production. So when you hear certain things that I'm describing, you can hear the sound effects that's attached to this actual scene. And I was listening to my audiobook in the car on the way home, and it's actually really, really riveting, and it's really cool. And I think people will enjoy that audio experience as well. It's by yours truly, 2 Chainz. I'm here, I'm happy to be here, and just thank you for you guys locking in with us.