723 Give to Receive with Russell Simmons

This is Five Minute Friday. Welcome, everyone, to this podcast. Very excited about this one. It's with the American business magnate Russell Simmons. He's the chairman and CEO of Rush Communications and co-founded the hip-hop music label Def Jam and created the clothing fashion lines Fat Farm and Tantris. Simmons most recently launched All Deaf Digital, an original content channel on YouTube with over a million subscribers. He's also been described as the third richest figure in hip hop.

What did you learn from that whole phase of selling drugs and how to translate it into... You never know. Selling music.

I understand your question. But you never know how bad your life is or what risk you're taking when you're surrounded by people who seem to be taking greater risks. Say, I'm not killing anybody. They're killing people. I mean, you always feel safer than the neighbor, you know, who's doing something maybe a little bit more risky. But what I learned was, you take something for a dollar, you sell it for two, especially as I used to have pounds of weed. I sell, you know, you make, you make so many nickel bags out of a pound of weed, it's ridiculous. And you can make some money. And that was something that in the black community, at a low middle class place like Hollis Queens, like the only job was maybe if you can get out of school and be a teacher or something like that was an education. It was not a culture that promoted entrepreneurialism.

Right, right.

So if you notice some of the great entrepreneurs from the black community, especially ones at least my age, they were inspired by their street experiences because that's what they had to learn to fend for themselves and create one dollar that turned into two as opposed to working for someone else. So that's the only cultural thing that really reminded you like the guys who owned the store. It's like Johnny was a number man and he owned the store, but he was his own man. And whoever owned the store seemed like they used to be drug dealers or something, but now they own the deli or now they own the, you know, so that's the kind of interesting experience.

Sure.

A lot of what came out of our community, you know, where, where People moved in, integration destroyed the fabric of the community, economic fabric, because you don't have the black doctor, the black pharmacist, the black whatever you just got now, or not at that moment, but you have Rite Aid, for instance, you know, you have whatever it is that moved in, you know, so then that integration thing was always troublesome to a lot of people because it destroyed the fabric of the community, economic fabric, and took the money out of the community.

Right.

Okay. as an entrepreneur, I learned from having some experiences selling drugs. Yeah, it's true. But music was a totally different thing. I was selling parties, I was promoting parties where great artists performed and, and we booked the ballroom for a thousand dollars. And we, as a ball guarantee, we get the money back because they drink a thousand dollars and we keep the door. It was a very lucrative business for me as a, you know, a sophomore in City College. So it was a way to really fall in love with rap, but there were no rap records.

Right.

In 1979, I made a record, and that record was Christmas rapping. And it became a big hit. It plays every Christmas. And since then, I've been on, you know, I've been really inspired to give artists opportunities. I mean, that's what I've done my whole life. Even now here at All Def Digital, we have all these young writers, directors, producers who I get to say, yes, go shoot it every day. at least once a day, say, Go make it. And I couldn't do that. That is a very, very great thing to let people express themselves and be part of that process.

Now I heard that Dara told me that you are really passionate about a number of giving back causes and you give back a lot. I'm curious, what are the top one or two things that you're most passionate about in giving back and why do you choose to give back so much?

'Cause he can't take this shit with you, and as long as you can make it to the finish line, and my kids are so rich anyway, and I mean, you know, I mean, why would I not try to do good things for good people? I mean, I'm involved in four or five philanthropic social organizations and other political movements that help underserved communities, because we are all connected, ultimately, and what we do for other people is what we do for ourselves. So we should lift other people as part of our process. What we give the world, the world gives us. It's true. Good givers also are great get us. You know, Jesus taught two sermons, one to the masses, give and you'll get. And when you get, you can pay the Romans their taxes. People went out, masses, and they did that. And he told his disciples, give without expectation. Be focused on the giving itself. And the more focused and present you are in your gift, then the more effective you are in your giving. You're a great, great giver, and they keep giving. And you're more like Lakshmi, the Indian goddess, so you just, Give and they, everybody's got to pile shit up at your feet because they want you to keep giving.

Right, right.

So that's what the good givers do. The great givers give without expectation.

Right.

So that's, did you, were you always.

A big giver or is this like something that you learned over time or.

Over the last 20 years or so? It's been more prevalent in my life. But I, you know, if you want money, you got to give money. You got to make money for somebody else to get money, you know, and to really be a money maker, you got to make money for someone. to really be a good or do something, you know, equal to make real happiness. You have to promote happiness for someone else.

Yeah.

Anything you want, you have to give.

Yeah.

You have to give what you want to receive. So, you know, I, I learned that. I believe in that. I believe it's a cycle of giving and getting that is continuous and that you should participate in it without fear.

Yeah.

And that, if you do that, then you will be a much more prosperous person even in terms of junk in the world and stuff and return on your investments. But you will be more prosperous if you are focused entirely on the gift and the honest service. Because if the man in front of you don't pay you the man next to him will. So you guys gotta do it. Just do your job and forget. Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, you have control over the work alone but never its fruit. and he said, go out and give.