724 Do What You Love with Mike Holston: The Real Tarzann

This is episode number 724 with the real Tarzan, Mike Holston. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Harriet Tubman said, Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. And today we've got a young man who is reaching for the stars and changing the world literally through the use of all of his education and his massive social media following. The King the jungle and the real Tarzan. Those are the names that this exotic animal specialist, teacher and zookeeper Mike Holston from Miami calls himself. He's got over 4 million followers on Instagram and a massive following on YouTube. And he's used his huge social media following to teach others about exotic animals and wildlife and our part in conserving this wildlife and maintaining this wildlife. He's inspired by Steve Irwin, who he calls his idol and the best man to stroll this Earth. The real Tarzan uses visibility that he gets for the good causes that he's a part of. He loves to educate people about animals, and he often visits schools to teach kids. And now he uses his platform to teach people all over the world. And I've become obsessed with watching him on Instagram. He's literally grown, I think, 3 million followers on Instagram in the last six to eight weeks alone. It's amazing what this guy is doing and educating us. And I realized how uneducated how educated I am about animals until I watch some of his videos. And this is really inspiring stuff. And I think sometimes we lose perspective of wildlife and animals in our own backyard or around the world, what's actually happening. And we talk about this today on some of these things. We also talk about his background growing up in a rough neighborhood and how his family made it out of that background. He talks about how the love of animals saved him from depression, the power of what one Will Smith Share did for him on social media and reaching out to work with him and how that impacted people seeing his social media videos and actually being a part of this moving forward. We discussed the differences between animals in captivity and in the wild and how Mike would like to help save animals everywhere. We also talk about how following any dream, even if everyone says it's the craziest thing to do, Mike has built this incredible life for himself by talking about wildlife animals and by showcasing animals, playing with animals, connecting with animals. He has built a life for himself, a business for himself, a brand around something that most people said to him, this would never work. And so if you ever have had a dream, maybe you've got something crazy in mind right now where everyone is telling you it's not possible, don't do this, you're wasting your time, go get a steady job, Here is a great case study and example and he's going to talk about how he's been building this and how it keeps growing. The more he dives into the dream, he attracts even bigger people to support him manifest it. So this is a fun one, guys, a powerful one. Again, lewishouse.com/724 post that link out to your friends, text your friends who have crazy dreams to listen to this, share this on your Instagram story and follow @ The real Tarzan, Mike Holston. This is a powerful one, guys. So without further ado, let me introduce you to the one, the only, Mike Holston.

All right, welcome back to one of the School of Greatness podcasts. We've got the real Tarzan in the house, Mike Holston.

Good to see you, sir, brother. Thank you for having me.

Thank you for being here, man.

So much fun.

You've been taken off over the last month. I found out about you from Will Smith. and it seems like everyone's been talking about you.

Thank you, Will.

There you go.

Yeah.

You are just like taking over the world with educating us about animals, all types of animals.

Yeah, man.

From domestic animals to the wildest exotic animals to reptiles, to snakes, spiders, elephants, anything in between.

You, if it's an animal and breathing.

And walking and moving, you love it.

Absolutely.

When did you get into this, like, passion for just. all types of animals.

Honestly, I was born with animals, you know, like, not born with things, but there's already two dogs in my family born in my family. So I grew up with two dogs, you know, had no siblings. So those are, like, my best friends. Really?

Yeah.

Only child. I was at the time, you know, but I'm the oldest of 10. Wow.

Yeah.

10 big family.

Brothers and sisters.

Brothers and sisters. I was gonna say, like, nine animals or something. No, animals is way deeper than that. You're the oldest of 10. Always a 10.

Wow.

What is that like? It's just the best feeling, man. Me and my siblings were real close growing up. So it's just like I always had that brotherhood, that sisterhood, and I had a bunch of cousins. But there's nothing like having your brothers and sisters, you know? I love them tremendously.

And you grew up in Rhode Island.

Yep. Well, I bounced back from Rhode Island and Atlanta for most of my life 'cause my dad lived in Rhode Island. My mom lived in Atlanta. So holidays, my birthday, or I was over there and then I would go, you know, I would be in school in Atlanta, living my life, my mom, my two brothers, and the rest of my family was up north. Yeah. So every holiday, any break we had, we was home.

Yeah.

Four, five, six times a year, you know.

And you had a couple dogs growing up. When did you really start to explore out?

I got my first snake at four. Four, turn to five.

What kind of snake?

I got a ball constrictor. Oh, really?

Yeah.

I mean, I've caught snakes. you know, like garter snakes and, you know, decay snakes and rough green snakes, you know, growing up. But I never actually had one as a pet.

So you would catch them?

Yeah.

And I'll bring them home. Mom's like, what the you doing? My mom's like, dude, you can't have any, you know, and it was in my freaking house. So I just kept begging and begging and begging.

And then a four got a boa constrictor. Yep.

Is it like a yellow one? Like, it was a regular Columbia red tail. Had, like, a tannish. you know, brownish body with a red tail, you know, with, with dark brown straddle on top of him. But he's evil, bro.

Really?

He was mean. Fight you a lot? Yeah. Yeah, it hit me a lot. Really? I didn't know a lot.

You know, all I saw was TV stuff.

You know, I had.

You saw Steve Irwin?

Yeah. You know, when did you first see him? Or see? Well, I actually first saw the old school Tarzan movies first. My, my grandma is an older lady. She passed away a couple years ago, but. you know, 70 year old lady was sitting in her big, huge chair every day and watched his black and white TV. And I loved my grandma. That every time I came, we lived in the same house. So my dad lived on the first floor, and then my grandma lived in the second. My great grandma lived in the second floor. And then my grandma lived on the third floor, you know? So I was always up and down hanging out with my family every day. So when I go see my grandma, she would watch these stupid old movies with black and white. And I'm like, dude, this is so boring, you know? Like, I don't want to watch this. And then one day, She had a old school like 1950s Tarzan movie on black and white horrible I look at it now I'm like dude, this is so bad but back in the day as a kid I was like yo, this is amazing. Yeah, you know and swinging a little rope. Yeah, you know fighting cheetahs and lions in the jungle with a youe know chilton us like dude, this guy's amazing and then I got a lot of stuff animals after that and then I found but I knew it was off youf know I knew Tarzan was a fake movie and my stuff animals weren't real so when I finally got my snake, you know, I thought it was gonna be a walk walk in the park and it wasn't, you know, because he was, he was mean. But that's when I started watching Steve Irwin and then I went from looking at something that was fake to looking at a real person who was really, was really doing this stuff. Exactly. You know, wasn't a cartoon. I had to be, I mean, anywhere from five, six, seven years old.

Yeah.

You know, probably, probably younger or older. I can't remember from watching PBS kids and Zaboomafoo and National Geographic Channel and David Attenborough and animal planet, you know, you name it, dude. I was engulfed in animals every day of my life, you know, from a kid up until this day, you know, and it's just, it stuck with me. Really?

Yeah.

Like, once I love something or like something, I'm all in. Like, I eat the same food over and over. Me too, man.

I eat the same restaurant, like, every three days.

Dude, it's like, it's, how can you get bored with something you love? I know.

It's like clockwork, you know? See, you have the snake at four, four or five. How long did you have this mean snake for?

And did you ever get a place where you were, like, able to tame it or.

Yeah.

I think he bit me, my brother, my aunt, my mom, and my uncle. And they were like literally days away from getting rid of him. I kept going in there, you know, I was nervous as a little kid.

Yeah.

You know? But I was like, it's my snake. I had to conquer this fear. You know, every time we go to hang up and handle this snake, everybody's walking away with tears or blood. And I'm just like, dude, this is just horrible. And one day I picked him up and he didn't bite me. I was like, we're best friends.

Really?

And then- But isn't it scary to like have something that's biting you to.

Like put it up next to your face?

Yeah, it takes time to do that, you know.

Right in your eyeballs. It takes time, man, you know, like-.

If you don't want to just pick.

It up and be like, oh, hey, snake.

Oh, yeah, no, not at the beginning. Uh-huh. You gotta basically make him trust you, you know, trust him. You have to trust the snake.

Exactly.

How crazy is that? It's biting you. Exactly. When you're nervous, you're scared, you can't trust them. They have like a defense the same way with you. If you were walking down the street and some guy came to you and he's like, Hey, what's up buddy? You're gonna be like, Yo bro, I'm gonna knock you out. I'm gonna run away or call the cops. But if someone approaches you and says, Hey, how you doing? Shakes your hand and keeps it moving. It's a harmless. It's more calm. It's more calm. So when you walk up with a snake, you're like, oh man, am I gonna grab it? He's like, Yo bro, are you trying to eat me? You trying to fight me? I'm gonna bite you, just get away from me. 'cause they're more scared of us than we are of them. But if you walk up to a snake and you're like, hey buddy, what's up? How's it going? He's like, oh, all right, cool. Just chilling. Versus, you know, you're going in here and you're like, oh, you know, you're trying to grab him. The snake's looking at you, you're looking.

At him, you know, it's just, but.

Versus if you literally do this, that's it.

Calm.

Calm. You become a tree branch versus something trying to eat you. You know, it's just a harmless figure. Wouldn't Steve Irwin be like that? Like on the TV show. Of course, there's different snakes. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. you know, you gotta bring the viewers in.

Yeah, right.

You know what I'm saying? But like, it's just everything's like, it's like ballet. You ballet with the snake and then if you got a breakdancing, you got a breakdancing of course, you know? But it's all just simple, slow motions of trust and if he's moving, you.

Move with him and he moves this way, you move that way. The same thing with like a dog, you know? I feel like I do really well around dogs. Like a lot of people who are dog owners are like, eh, they don't really like big guys, right? They get like skittish around big guys. But I'll just like kneel and like just put my hand on calm. Get down to your level.

And let them come to me and.

Then they start sniffing me and like start like putting their head on me and then it's just like, all right, start playing. Yeah, best friends just like that. Yeah, and these people always like, they never do that with strangers or whatever.

I'm like, well, I'm just trying to be calm and relaxed. Yeah, everybody's so nervous and scared of people's dogs.

That's why they freak out when they get to their houses. See if it was a 30-foot boa.

Constrictor, I might be, I might not.

Be like, hey little snake, like, Maybe.

Like touch the tail. Yeah, for sure. That's crazy, man.

Okay, so you conquered the fear of your first snake that bit you. Did the snake bite you again after this?

I'm pretty sure he did. I was so happy, you know, that I finally got to, you know, even interact with this animal. I didn't even care after that, you know. I just kept duplicating the same thing.

And doing it over and over. It was less and less probably or whatever. Really, you started researching about snakes in.

General or about all snakes, all boa constrictors. You know, at first I started doing, I just want a snake, you know, because I was just so young and naive about it. But I finally realized there's thousands and thousands of different species of snakes that get bigger and smaller and different colors and different places they live and trees, live on the ground, live on the water. It's just like, when I figured that out, that it was so many more than just, you know, pythons and boas, I was literally like, oh, my God, I freaked out. Freaked out, bro. Imagine having your favorite food, right? And you ate it your whole life. And then one day you found out that food had millions of options that tasted just like that but better. You know, you're like, dude, that's amazing. It's like an endless buffet of greatness. Oh, my gosh. So when I finally figured out at a young age that there was like thousands of different species of snakes, even in the same species, you know, like a boa constrictor has seven or eight or nine or ten different species inside just the boa constrictor of that country. And then you go to another country, they got different ones, then another country got different ones, but they're still boas. They look different, they have different patterns, some get bigger, have different head shapes. It's literally so interesting, you know? Some are more aggressive than others, some are calmer than others. And that's what really, you know, intrigues me. And I'm like, dude, if I could learn this about snakes, how many other animals-- and it's like that with every single species.

That's why I'm addicted to all animals.

'Cause I love to learn.

And you can never stop.

I mean, there's so many things you can learn. Yeah, bro, like, literally-- Probably not like 20% of-- Bro, 20-- no, I don't even know, like, 4%. Not even-- I don't even know if I know 1%. That's my opinion to the outside world. I'm a genius. You know a little bit about a lot of things. Yeah.

But to me, I'm a student to the game always.

Yeah. I love to learn. I'm an open book. So when I get around different people, like, you know, I was at Cesar Milan a few days ago. He's been on the show. Yeah.

He's an awesome guy.

You know, I looked up to Cesar Milan for a long, like a long time, you know. You went to his dog psychology center. Yeah, I went to the dog psychology center. And again, I told you I was raised with dogs, you know, so I trained dogs and worked with dogs my whole life. But the moment I got with Cesar, I have no fucking clue what I'm doing. Teach me. That's how I am.

I'm like, Give me all you got.

What was the greatest thing he taught you the other day? How to sit, how to make a dog sit. I've been doing it wrong this whole time. I've been doing a great job for myself, you know? But like, he explained stuff to me and I'm like, Holy shit, dude, that's real. Like, how do you do it? So, when you tell a dog to.

Sit, what do you do? Sit. Yeah, right.

But it's more about the energy, right? It's more about that. Not even, bro. He explained this to me. It's so freaking cool. It makes total sense 'cause it's applied in other animals too. when a dog is born, they have the nose, their eyes, then they're hearing. So they're born blind, they're born death, but they can smell. So the first thing they can do is they can smell first. That's your first natural instinct is to smell. And then, like, a few weeks later, they open their eyes, they can see.

Yeah, start hearing.

And then they can start hearing. So when you go to teach them, you don't teach them through here, you teach them through here and then here and then there. because once this goes, everything else goes. Because this is instinct number one.

How do you teach them through the nose?

Treat, smell, attention, stuff like that. I'm still learning because I just learned a few days ago. So I'm going over the process of watching all his new stuff and like, okay, this is how it does it. So when I go home, I can train my dogs totally different now because now, again, I'm a new book. Everything I did know about that I thought I knew, it's now an old book and I have a new book. So one day when I get around another dog guru from another country for somewhere else, I can completely erase, put that book on the shelf and they'll go learn something new again. So one day when I can give out information, I say, oh, here's three books. I learned this and I learned that. I learned that. So here's your methods of, you know, that's how I like to reiterate things. I basically become a sponge.

Yeah, of course. How many animals do you have right now, personally?

41.

What are they?

I have three dogs. This is in Miami or is this?

It's in Miami, yeah.

Okay, three dogs.

I have a fox.

A fox? American red fox. Like a wild fox or like?

Like a fox.

Like it's tame now? It's like... A lot of animals I have, like 95% of animals I have are like rescues. You know, besides my dogs, the dogs gave to me for free from people from Instagram. It's like, I worked at a reptile store back in the day, and then they sold animals, of course, to the public. And I'm in. I'm into the animal education and conservation space. You know, I really don't care so much for selling animals. I don't have a problem with people having animals as pets as long as they have the, you know, the proper education and stuff in captivity to duplicate their enrichment and natural environments. Yeah, but my fox was a rescue, and I raised him on my pit bull.

No way.

Yeah. It was like a baby fox.

Yeah.

They were both the same age. Seven. I think the fox was like eight weeks old and my dog was like seven and a half weeks old.

You raise it together.

So I have a 100 pound pit bull that looks vicious. He's sweet as can be. Sweet. Like the calmest dog.

And I have this fox and they're best friends.

Shut up. So and then now- the fox like- the why you did that? No, the fox is completely like- Kane. Even though- Never bit me ever. Never bit anybody. What?

Even though it's like- It's like that socialization is like the- more aggressive.

Not even more aggressive. You gotta think, you know, in the wild, they're like at the bottom, not the bottom of the food chain, but they're like, they get killed by cars, hawks, you know, if they're small enough, snakes eat them in different places. Coolers, you know, I mean, not Jaguars, but coyotes, bobcats, they battle with all these animals territory, you know? So in the wild, people are like, oh, Fox is aggressive. It's like, no, he's just defending himself. You know, he has a lot of problems out here.

Yeah.

You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So. But the cool thing is he was such a, he was so young and my dog was so young. They bonded together. So my dog loves me. The fox is like, okay, I can trust this guy. I love him too.

Wow.

So my dog was, that's why I love pit bulls so much. People just, they're so underrated. You know, people think they're so vicious, but they actually are the best dog, you know what I'm saying? Like they live to please you. Gosh, I love that. You know, and whatever you do and whatever you tell them to do, whatever you teach them, they're gonna do it. Wow. You know what I'm saying? So I just teach love, kindness, happiness, patience with this giant dog. And he has love, kindness and patience with everything and everybody, even a fox and a lizard and a baby monkey, you know, that he could easily eat in one bite. He just, he loves it. No way. Yeah, I got, you know, he's 100, he's, I brought him to the vet. He was like 88, not like 90 pounds. He's only like eight months old. Oh my gosh. So I got puppies, like, 15 pound puppy pit bulls, you know, he got his heart, I'm like, dude, this is gonna be, I gotta watch him, you know?

Is he calm?

Dude, he's just the best big brother ever.

Wow, see you got monkeys, a monkey play with the dog and the fox. Plays the dog.

Fox doesn't eat the monkey? No, or the fox doesn't go next to the monkey. There's just certain things. Certain things. There's certain things you can put together and if I grew him up from babies, of course, but I can't. Otherwise, I would kill a province. Yeah, you know, and then you don't wanna stress the animals out by trying to, they're not supposed to be together anyway. Sometimes it happens just naturally. I know I have a friend that has, the dog just passed away like a couple months ago, but for 10 years, this guy raised a St. Bernard with an adult male lion.

No.

I got video of it.

It started as a baby lion.

They both started together.

And then they would just like lay with each other and hang out.

Best of friends. Just 600 pound adult lion. Lion. has a little 60 pound Saint Bernard. That's a best friend. And actually, the Saint Bernard was older, like by a few weeks, so he was more dominant than the lion. No way. I swear. They would get in fights and the Saint Bernard would win every time.

What?

He would back down, you know, it's his brother.

Oh my gosh. Even though he was bigger? That's crazy, man. Yep. And I remember my friend was telling me 'cause they were so close for 10 years together. You know, that's like literally every single day of his life, he's. He had this. This dog, you know, so how long.

Does a lion live for?

A lion can live, like, 20, 30 years, you know? So, I mean, in a while, they don't last long, but it's been lions. The captivity that's lasted about 20 years and, of course, more.

So what other animals do you have?

You got foxes. I got Arabian dwarf mountain goat that just rescued from, like, a little cattle farm where it was gonna eat them. So I got him, and he's, like, actually the best pet I have.

He's the best.

Why? He's recently, he's new to the family. He's just so, you never think a goat would be just so loving and you think dogs are affectionate. This goat wasn't leaving my side. No way, dude. Dude, he's the cutest. He's like this big. What? Yeah. Baby goat. Baby goat. You know, he drinks whole milk. I'm feeding him, giving him some milk 'cause he's still a baby. He's only four weeks old. Oh, wow. You know, and he has just the best personality ever, dude. He has like these little horns that are growing in 'cause he's a baby. You know, he just had a little butt, a little bit. he's just the cutest thing.

He's gonna grow big though, huh?

No, he'll be small. He'll be like 15 inches high.

Okay, so you can go. What else we got?

I got a slew of snakes and lizards. I just got a bunch of spiders in recently and scorpions.

Yeah. I saw a video of you holding a bunch of scorpions and letting them pinch you or something.

It's like, aren't they venomous or people don't know, man? You know, it's a little. I feel like I want to hold those things, man. Yeah, they're just all. They're like, they're harmless. why not all scorpions, but that species? And that's where I go back to with the snake stuff, you know, is when I finally figured out that there were so many different species of snakes, some had different characteristics and personalities, some were super aggressive, some were super chill. Same with scorpions, you know, you think of scorpion, like, oh man, this thing's gonna pinch me and kill me with venom. But there's like thousands of scorpions and everyone is different.

Different.

So the ones you have aren't venomous or? They have small venom, but it's like, It's like a beast thing to you. So a human. It's pulled into like a cricket or a, you know, it still hurt for sure, yeah. But versus something that can sting you and kill you to be dead in an hour or something that's like, oh, that just hurt a little bit, you know? So that's the gradual scale of it.

How many times have you been like bitten or stung or...

I'll show you. My scars have scars and scars.

Oh my gosh, man.

This is one of my favorite things to do. People always ask me, so I take pictures My scars are fried. So you see those scars there?

Yeah. There.

What are those from?

Just random bites and scratches. Scratch there. All up on my wrist up here. Oh my gosh.

There.

Here. Probably your fingers are causing the damage.

Yeah, fingers.

The little anything that's like discoloration. Oh my gosh. It's just like old scars. Scratch there. Yeah. Yep, there.

So what are the types of animals that have bit you or scratched you or everything?

Really?

Yeah.

But it's like, I don't talk about it on a show because it's not like, it's everyday life. It happens. You know, it's like 95% of the time it's just an accident.

Have you ever been scared for your life? Like, oh, I'm in a bad situation. This is not plenty of times. Give me a couple moments.

Like, when? I don't like sharing those moments with people. I guess animals are bad.

Yeah, sure. There's enough. You're also doing way more than most people would do.

Yeah. And putting yourself out there. I think one day I have a lot of stuff documented. I'll go through and share some cool stuff. near-death experiences or accidents or.

Can you share one? What was like one incident that you were like, oh, this was, maybe nothing happened bad, but it was like, oh, this could have been a bad situation.

I went to the Bahamas. I was swimming sharks for the first time.

Oh my gosh.

And I'm the type of guy, I'm like, literally, I'm either all in or I should have been there in the first place. Not at all.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And if I'm there, it's happening. So I went on this boat in the Bahamas about a year ago. I never swam my sharks before, my first time. So, you know, of course, you see the Shark Week on TV, you see Jaws, and you see all this crazy stuff, but I know, like, I'm an animal guy, so I have to accept- you- gotta do it. Everything. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Even if I'm not educated on it, I have to educate myself on it. Wow. You know, and learn and embrace it. Even if I don't like it or want to do it, I have to do it because it's my job. I can swim like a fish. I love marine. sharks and turtles tattooed on my leg.

Wow.

But dude, I got underwater and I never had a scuba tank before. So the dude was like, you can't come, you can only free dive. I'm like, dude, I want to go deep and I want to see these sharks, bro, like, stop playing with me. So he went underwater with the tank and he had this bigger nurse shark and he went under there and then I think some black tip reef sharks were swimming by. which are a little more aggressive shark. The nerf sharks are like, kind of like puppies, you know? So I wasn't worried at all. You know, he said, there's reef sharks coming. I'm like, yeah, it's gonna be gangster. So I wasn't worried about the sharks. It was more so the breathing apparatus. You have to, you know, I'm on a scuba tank. So you go 15, 20 feet under water, and I'm walking on the ocean floor, and there's sharks swimming, there's stingrays, and there's fish, and I'm having, lucid experience, you know, walking on the ocean floor. You have to take a class and get certified to do stuff like this. I never did it. So I was breathing, but I got kind of a little excited. Yeah, yeah. I breathe in water, you know, and I'm underwater with a scuba tank that I have no clue about what to do, you know? Do I swim to the top and catch my breath? Do I? So I swallow the water and started trying to breathe in the water. No. Freakiest thing, bro, like. Salt water. Yeah, you know, and there's sharks around, so I can't like panic and like, you know, I don't want to freak out. So it's literally like I can feel.

My eyes tightening up and just it's weird experience, bro. So not from an animal, you got almost near death.

It was from just like, but you gotta think, situation like that is where accidents happen with the animals, you know? 'Cause they can feel the fear, my man. They can feel the fear. After I start freaking out, the shark's like, okay, is this something hurt? Is it, it's time to eat? you know what I'm saying? So I start freaking out someone at the top, I'm bringing attention to myself rather than being something that's just natural. Moments like those, you gotta compose yourself for who could fucking compose themselves underwater, you know, when you're swallowing water 15, 20 feet on the ocean floor with someone holding on to you with the tube in your mouth that you have nothing, no clue about, just telling you to breathe. You know, these guys are licensed divers and I'm Joe Schmoe that made him bring me down, you know? So you have a split second, you're like, dude, this is a bad idea.

And then you're like, All right, fuck it, I'm here. We're all right. You talk about fear. You say that fear is a generational habit that can be broken. How'd you decide that?

It's more so of like, I've seen it with animals. People are, oh my God, snakes are horrible. My grandma says, not my grandma, but people say, you see a snake, a good snake's a dead snake. So you have all these people that are for years, years and years, just, passed down fear, passed down fear. Spider snakes, whatever. Spider snakes, my grandma's the same way. She doesn't like to drive on the highway. And I'm just like, dude, you drive on the street, you're just going 10 miles an hour faster. Yeah. You know, what are you scared of? It's a psychological thing, but her mother didn't drive that much, you know? And then her sister didn't drive that much, so they passed down the fear of driving on the highway. And it's like, dude, you're not giving me that shit. I don't want no fear that you guys got over there. Yeah. But it's like, once you get past a fear, It's such a great feeling. You know, it's like the best thing you've never had. Freedom.

Freedom.

And that's what I apply to everything, a podcast. You were scared to talk in front of the camera. Never did it before, but fuck it, we're here. Make it magic, baby.

Make it magic.

Why do you think it's important for.

People to see someone who looks like you doing something that's unexpected? Because most of the, you know, Steve Irwins of the world, the zookeepers of the world, are all white people.

Oh, white people.

Yeah.

He never sees a black person.

Exactly.

Wrangling animals and hanging out with snakes.

I got more so the confidence from my family, my white side of my family. I have a Cape Verdean background, so Portuguese and Black, and then my grandma's, like, Russian, Polish, and some other crazy stuff. Oh, cool. So you see this Black family, and then my great-grandmother, this, like, blonde hair, blue eyes.

Really?

Yeah, like the soul of my family. You know what I'm saying? So when I saw those growing up, I'd never seen, like, Black and white. Of course, I knew the difference between people, but. my family just as much as my mom and dad, 'cause I grew up with them. They were the same bloodline as me. So when I saw that animal space and I noticed it when I was like 14 or 15, there was not a single Black person that ever did anything that I wanted to do. I'm like, dude, I can use that as my advantage. Wow. You know? And it's also an inspiration because I inspire everybody. I don't care if you're Black, white, Spanish, Asian. I got literally love for everybody. every religion, you know, I don't care what you believe in, I still love you. You know, we're just, I just spread nothing but love and positivity and peace to everybody, you know? And I feel like that's what wins, you know? I feel like people are like, oh, I can't hang out with this person because they're Jewish or they're Muslim. Dude, I don't care, bro. I wanna learn. Teach me your language, you know? Teach me your culture. I wanna, let's be friends. I hate barriers with anything, you know?

I just love to be free like animals, you know?

Just be free.

Did you play sports growing up too?

Yeah.

You was like an athlete? Yeah. Play football?

I actually hated sports my entire life, but my whole family's full of athletes. And I was the only weird one 'cause I liked animals, you know? So you got my brothers and cousins. My dad was a McDonald's All-American in high school.

Wow.

And my older stepbrother went to the league, NBA, played for the Mavericks. I got a slew of like, athletes and then you just got old animal boy over here.

Yeah.

You know, so they're like, dude, why you not playing this? Why you not playing that? Why you not doing this? I'm like, bro, leave me alone. So after years of saying no, I finally said, yeah, I started playing football, started wrestling, started playing basketball.

Really?

Yeah.

And I got pretty good at it, you know, because I got addicted to.

The progress and the process. Yeah. You played high school.

You play, you go to college, too? Yeah, I played one year of college. Where'd you go? I played slot receiver at Georgia Military.

College and Atlanta Sports Academy.

All right.

Pretty cool.

Nice man.

I played wide receiver too. Nice. I played in the Arena League for about a year and a half. How was it? It's tough, man. It's different, man. It's indoors, you know, you got walls.

Yeah.

So I broke my wrist diving into a wall trying to catch a football. It's just like the roughest sport. I mean, it's the guys who are pissed that they didn't make the NFL or they dropped in the NFL and.

They'Re trying to get back up and it's just like, I'm gonna kill you.

Yeah.

And I'm gonna work my way back up there. It's crazy. It's crazy thing like that, you know? It's so tough, man.

It's like wild. I love competition, though. I love it, man. On an athletic level.

Yeah.

It's like something that I crave. Like, I crave it, man. Dude, I can't miss it. I can't lose, you know? Yeah. I can't. I hate losing, too.

Dude, I hate losing more than I love winning.

Yeah.

I was the worst loser for many years. I would like be so upset for hours, days that I lost. Even like the simplest little competition, ping pong, basketball, didn't matter what it was. But now I've learned that anger, if I hold on to it or frustration, doesn't serve humanity. It doesn't lift people up. It doesn't support me or the people around me. So I've learned how to take a loss as a learning experience quickly and just reapply the education from that loss into, okay, how can I be better?

Exactly. And people should think like that. I mean, you know, it's, you win and you learn, you don't win and lose.

That's it.

You learn how to win. that's it. You know, you figure out what you messed up and how to get better.

Yeah.

Tweak that mistake. Neglect it again. You keep going at it until you win. That's, that's the way of life. That's what people need to understand. Yeah. You don't lose. And when you, people lose and they say, okay, I lost, I'm done. And then you go, you're losing something else and you're done with that. And then you lose something else. You create a cycle of yourself of just quitting, you know? And when you, when you finally figure out why you want to win and where you're winning at, you can apply that. and your spiritual life, your mental life, your finance life, you know, your relationship, everything. Just straight winning.

Yeah. So did you, did you start working? When was the first job that you had where you got paid working with animals?

First job. How old were you? I was 17 years old.

I got a store.

Is that what you're working at there? Not, not this one. But in Atlanta, I got a job at this place called Petland. It's a regular mom and pop shop that sold dog food and dogs and cats and little mice, little mice for snakes and goldfish, you know, like three or four snakes and, you know, just regular pet store. Dude, I got in there and I felt like a million bucks. They actually didn't hire me at first. You're just working for free? Yeah. They were like, why is this kid here every day? You know, like, I want a job. But, you know, at the time I had long dreadlocks, I had tattoos, fresh out of college, well, going into college and stuff. So, you know, like, what is this black guy with tattoos and dreadlocks, nobody animals? And I'm like- you- probably taught them a lot, didn't you? Dude, I learned a lot. You did not. I thought, you know, that's when I, becoming in a real open book. You know, I started helping customers and, you know, just seeing the joy in people's faces. And I'm like, man, I want to be able to give them so much more. But I can't give anything more if I don't know more, you know? So I would start every time we would have animals come in, I would pick certain animals I never had before, and I would study the out of them. And I would order stuff for their stuff in captivity, like their habitats and stuff. And then when someone came in and they were interested in that animal, I'm like, you want this? Okay.

You know everything about him now.

Here's what you do. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And they're like, wow. But you can't get that service at Petco or PetSmart. They're like, go out to aisle three.

Or yo, Billy, go back to fish for him.

If he drops a fish food, change water once a week. Boom. Right, right. Unless they have someone who was there.

That was like you.

I'm here giving you when they breed, how they breed, what they eat, why they eat, why you gotta turn the light off, how many times you gotta spray them. Wow. You know, like, climate, hibernation, like everything. And they're just like, wow, that's so awesome. And then that person goes home with this animal. They come back for checking. They come back, they get crickets, they buy new light bulbs. You ask them how's your animal doing? He's doing great. And then seven months later, oh, I got another one, you know? And then you talk to him, he's been talking for three years. And then you find out on Facebook that they have the biggest reptile collection in Wisconsin or something. You're like, holy shit, dude. You know, it's like, It's awesome to be able to give something that I love to someone else and they love it too. It's just a beautiful thing.

It's amazing. What about the people who say, well, we shouldn't be buying animals or having animals in our home or in our backyard. We should let them be wild. They're wild animals. Why do we have them in captive? What do you say to people like that?

I agree to a certain extent. Animals, of course, should be in the wild. But you gotta think sometimes in the wild, they don't have homes because of us. Ooh, you know, and a lot of people forget that concept. And then another thing is if people don't have animals here, you lose touch with them.

You lose touch with nature.

You become oblivious.

Yeah.

To the problems that's happening in the wild. You kind of don't care, you know, versus if dogs are being slaughtered in China. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? If you've never had a dog in your life, if whole United States never had a dog, you're like, who cares?

You know?

Because you're not connected to it.

Exactly. But being a dog lover, you know, like, you're like, oh man, that hurts.

Yeah.

It hits home. What can I do to help? You just think about it, you know, even if you're not doing something actively or physically, it puts that thought in your mind. So if I can put that thought in that mind of everybody, I'm not saying I encourage people to have animals in captivity, but in all reality, the reality of it is people will always have animals in captivity. you know, it's not a what if, or why can't they? It's just they are. Humans are gonna have animals in captivity. So if they are gonna have them, it's the reality of it, it's the realness of it. We need to be able to educate these people on why they have these animals and what can we do to better their lives in captivity. Because some people have animals in captivity that they breed them, they help them, and then they release them into the wild to help the populations go.

And then they're screwed because...

It's not set up the right way.

Or they weren't educated. Exactly. Wow. What's the most endangered species right now in the world? Do you know?

The most endangered species? I know the most trafficked animal is the pangolin. Rhinos are critically endangered. Elephants are hitting a rapid decrease. A lot of animals, especially in the African area, is getting hit hard.

A lot of people are hunting, right?

Hunting, you know, they band hunting. illegal poaching went up and, you know, it's just, it's horrible. And that goes back to having that, that heart for these animals. You know what I'm saying? So some people see these things like, it's been happening for like six years. Hey, wake up, guys. These animals are rapidly dying by the thousands. Like, you guys don't care. You guys, you're not seeing it. What can I do to say, hey, yo, look at this. This is not right. This is happening. you gotta fix it. So I like being that voice for the voiceless. That's good. You know, because these animals can't tell you, hey, man, I need help.

I need help.

You know what I'm saying? The numbers just keep decreasing and decreasing, decreasing. And by time it's the global news when they want to pick it up, when there's 10 rhinos left, it's too late. You know, it's like, where were you guys at four or five years ago when we had 10, 10, 000 left from a hundred thousand? That's even dressing difference. But don't make, don't. headlines when there's 10 left. It's too late. It's sad. You don't wanna wait to that brink of extinction to make a change.

What does working with animals teach you about connecting with humans?

Humans are crazy. I look at humans and like, man, you guys are dangerous. Me being around animals so much and seeing how they live and adapt, you know, and survive and eat and and breed and just everything about animals. I'm so obsessed with it. Then I look at the human species and I'm like, we are dangerous. We are animals, bro. Whether people want to believe it or not, we are animals.

Yeah.

There's a lot of good people out there. A lot of good people. But, you know, you look at the globe, and I remember, I think it was in fourth or fifth grade, I remember looking at the world population, like 3 billion or something like that. you know, now I'm 20, 25. It's like 7 billion. It's like, man, we're growing, like, fast, fast, like a lot. Imagine, you know, another 25 years from now, there's 14 billion people. Where are we gonna go? Yeah, we go on this animals land. Go on, you know, go up, you know, frick. So I just. I don't like humans. Not like humans, but, you know, like in general. I'm an animal guy, so I spent my whole life with animals. So I've been kind of anti-social my whole life, you know? So social media has brought out the social side of me, you know? To connect with people. Yeah, exactly. And it's cool.

It's definitely like- You started to like.

Humans more a little bit? Yeah, a little bit. Certain humans.

Yeah.

I started off with children first. I worked in the school districts for about six years in Miami and Broward. So I got to educate the children on animals and real life with the kids. to animals. It was such a dope feeling and experience, you know?

Where were you working at the time?

Yeah.

Where was that you were working?

South Florida. So I had a job at a reptile store called Underground Reptiles. I worked at a zoo called Zoological Wildlife Foundation.

In Miami?

Yep, in Miami. So you worked at the zoo for how long?

About a year.

About a year and a half. You were working with the kids at the zoo or? Yeah, well, I was working with the kids on, like, every aspect. I had my own small iguana business. I was rescuing iguanas. Yeah, I did educational shows and events. I did my regular management work at the reptile store, building cages, helping customers, picking up shipments, the whole shebang. I worked seven days a week for like three years straight, not a day off. Of course, when I went on vacation or something, but dude, I'm so like involved in my niche of work from children to rescuing iguanas to working with monkeys at a zoo and learning as a young zookeeper. working at my old job, answering the phone, going out, feeding 700 lizards outside in the hot blazing sun and coming inside and pulling eggs and checking incubator temperatures and down data. Just all stuff that I love to do. So when I can generate 100 hours a week, seven days a week, working for somebody else, and when I finally birthed my whole Tarzan project, I was able to put all those hours for somebody else into my own craft. And it's just been an amazing thing.

So the Tarzan project, is that what you're working on now?

Yeah.

Is that the brand, the business? When did you start that?

We started Tarzan.

The real Tarzan?

10 months ago.

And so you just started it. This is your brand, your company. What is it? What's the mission? So, besides all the crazy videos that.

I see, it's more so of me being a mirror. I'm a walk-in mirror. This is my motto to the world. People want to ask me what I do, why I do what I do. My business, whether it's Tarzan or King of the Jungle or just Mike Coleman, the name doesn't matter. I want people to see me and my brand and whatever I do as themselves. I want them to look at me and look directly back at themselves. Because I come from nothing. It was just a regular street hood kid from the smallest state in the United States. If I can do it, you can do it. That's my motto. So people see Tarzan, and I want people to see themselves in their arts and crafts, or they want to open up a wine business, or they want to be a chiropractor. I want you guys to put that same effort that you see me do into your stuff, because I believe in you, because I come from nothing, and I want to see you make it. So that's what my Tarzan project is, of course, educating people with animals.

Etc.

Etc. But the whole project's way bigger than just myself. It's about the people, you know, and inspired, encouraging people to be bold. It was first, I am Tarzan. And then, because I was wanting to be Tarzan as a kid, so I never stopped thinking about being Tarzan. Now that I'm Tarzan, it's like, okay, everybody's like, oh, Tarzan's so cool. It's like, no, you're cool. Go do your own shit. You know, that's just, I want to be able to inspire these people from a real level. you know, and I feel like I can touch people because I'm young, 24 year old millennial kid that lived in South Beach, that's still parties, listens to rap music, does all this stuff, but I'm just so focused on my dreams and goals that can't shit break me. So I want to be able to reiterate that to the younger people, the younger generation, the people in middle school, people in high school now, in college now, people that are struggling, I already have degrees, I want to be able to give them that motivation like, look bro, go out there and get that shit. Don't take no for an answer. Don't take no L's. You just win and you learn.

Yeah.

You know, that's what Tarzan's about. Tarzan as a project is just basically being a giant mirror of yourself.

I like that, man. And what's the business model for you? Is it events? Is it curating?

I wanna educate on the highest platform. Of course, Instagram has gave me such an exposure and I'm very grateful for.

It, you know, but- Was Will Smith the one who launched it into more heights? We're building it on your own and.

Then- yeah, I still to this day hustle hard on it. It feels good to be able to work and work and work and work. And then one day you get an email from Will Smith's company and I thought it was spam. Honestly. What did it say? It just said, Hey, we're from Will Smith's team. We love what you do. Will's a big fan of your work and we want to do a collaboration. And then I'm like, yeah, right. Okay. And what happened? So of course I replied to the email and I said, Absolutely, I would love to work with you guys. but I had the thought, you know, that thought in the back of my head, like, it's never gonna happen. It's Will Smith, bro, you know, like, who has just Will Smith emailing them?

Yeah.

You know, it just doesn't make sense, you know? So I had that hope, but then again, I was like, this is not real. A few weeks pass, and I actually, I didn't forget about it, but I kind of, like, just kept moving, you know? And I ended up coming out here with one of my friends, Austin, and I was, I got on a plane at, like, one o'clock from Miami, East Coast time. I had 1.2 million followers when I got on the plane.

Pretty big on your own in like 10 months doing it on your own, right?

Yeah, it was insane, dude. So I got on a plane and I had like, well, I just, I remember, I remember making a post on Instagram saying thank you all for supporting me. We just hit 1.2 million followers. I love you all. I can't wait to continue to see what's next. So I get on a plane. I take off, and I usually always buy Wi-Fi when I'm on the plane so I can keep working, answer emails, reply to text messages and DMs. I'm like, you know what? I'm just gonna rest on this flight.

A few hours of chill.

I'm gonna take a few hours of chill, go to sleep, and then I'll start fresh when I land, 'cause I was gonna, when I land, I'm back working again. And dude, I land it, and I.

Turn my phone on.

I'm like, yo, why is my phone, like, blowing out? It's not even blowing up yet. It's, like, freezing.

You know?

So I opened my phone and it's just, so I picked my phone up and like- you-'re at 1.2 million when you took off. I'm like, dude, why is my phone not working? You know? And then I put it in my pocket, I go get my luggage, I feel my phone go like, I open my phone, bro. I have like 200 text messages. Like, yo, what was Nip just post to do? Literally everybody I ever had, like, in my contacts texted me.

Oh my God.

I haven't talked to you for years yet. I got a text message, you know what I'm saying? I was like, no way. So I go on my Instagram, I got 1.8 million followers. Oh my God. Within like three, four, five, a LA flight from the East Coast to the West Coast. I went from 1.2 to 1.8, just like that. One post. One post.

And they kept going.

And you never met him.

You didn't meet him yet.

I didn't meet him yet.

No, I never talked to him on a phone call.

You didn't know they was gonna post you? No, I didn't even see the video or anything. 'Cause he just reshared a video, right? No, no, no. He made his own compilation highlight reel of me. Yeah.

And then he was like, this is.

Mike Holston, the real Tarzan. He's incredibly, like, Will Smith talking, like, saying this stuff. Like, in my mind, I started crying when it happened. I didn't tell nobody about it before. It's the first time people hearing that, you know? But, like, I cried, too.

I was like, Dude, I sat there and I, like, literally started crying, you know?

Like, how did it make you feel to know that you really, like, cared about your mission, your message, your, for so long, bro, you know, I've been, working on my Tarzan since I was a little kid, you know, I had this vision of being Tarzan and I got plenty of doubts from, you know, my family, from friends, just everybody like, yo, don't do that. No work animals. There's no money in it. There's no this, there's no that. There's, I've heard it all. It was cool to be able to have someone that I looked up to, like Will Smith, like, yo, I support you. I love what you're doing, you know, and that meant a lot to me because I put so much blood, sweat and tears into my little small craft. to have someone at such a high level. And not even from being Will Smith, I was at a dark place in my, not a dark place, but I was like depressed and lonely for a certain, like a long time in my life. And Eric Thomas and Will Smith, I watched their videos on YouTube. I cut all music out of my life for like two years. And I listened to straight motivational podcasts and speeches. And it basically like cleansed me. And Will Smith, Eric Thomas, C.T. Fletcher, this guy named Bradley Martin, I went through this whole like fitness, you know, phase and working hard in my craft. That's when I developed working 100 hours a week, that's when I birthed all that stuff. So to stay focused, I didn't go out to the club, I didn't hang out with chicks, I didn't do nothing but work out, go to the gym, listen to those guys, Will Smith. So when it was, you know, that time hit, you know, it brought back everything, you know? As soon as I heard his voice, like, this is Mike Holmes and Real Tarrs, and dude, it's just like, came like a ton of bricks, you know, of happiness. And I'm like, holy shit, dude. this is really happening. Because, you know, seeing these followers is cool. You know, they're just numbers of people that are interested in what you do. But it goes to a whole other stratosphere when you have people of that caliber, like, okay, this guy's dope. And they publicly go do that. You know, these guys are busy. They don't have to do that.

They don't have to do that.

They have millions and dollar of dollars. You know, they have so many projects at work. They have families. What do you worry about? Little Tarzan for? the same thing with Pete Diddy. You know, Diddy's a big part of my life, you know? And it's like, it's so cool.

Did he find you after Will Smith? Did he reach out and all these.

People start reaching out after that? I'm not sure the process of how he found out about me, but I remember seeing him and he's like, we got to connect. I was hanging out with his children already.

You were? Before Will Smith was.

Yeah, yeah. I would see his kids every now and then when I went out to go network and stuff.

And show them animals and snakes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I saw him here in LA at the same exact time that Will Smith posted me. I was in LA, I went to a day party, had no clue that he was gonna be there, that he's there. You know, he's like, hey, what's up, Tarz? And I'm like, how the fuck did he know who I am? You know? He's like, hey, we gotta talk some business, man. I love what you do. We'll chop it up one day. P. Diddy, billionaire, Tarak, bad boy, Sean.

John, you're just hanging out with snakes. Just crazy.

Killing, you know? And that just, it's all history from there. This was what, like a couple months ago or something?

Dude, like two months ago, three months ago.

So what has happened in your life since then? Like, what are the-- Just the business operation. Post Will Smith.

Yeah.

Everything like-- changed.

Changed.

What's been happening? Nothing changed for me as far as.

Like-- you-'re still doing the same thing. Well, stuff behind the scenes that I'm.

Working on, it's just-- what can you share? What's changed? Who are the people that have reached out to you since then that you've connected? It's already got a TV show coming 2019, that's all I'm gonna say. I'm right, my man. I like it. So I can't say where, can't say when, just know, you can see this bright smile with a bunch of animals.

I like it, man.

Coming soon. And I guess going back to saying, once you get here, you gotta keep going. Of course, I can say, oh, I got a TV show, I made it. Fuck everybody, I'm done. But the real me is like, dude, this is it. This is where you- Now you gotta go hard. this is where you really block everything out and you really focus. You really start studying, you really learn different languages, you really start mastering your physical aspects of just everything. So this is, this is scary for.

Like- It's scary, but also- People think.

Like, yo, this guy, you have no clue what I'm about to tap into. They thought Eric Thomas and Will Smith did something years ago that made this way till now, you know, like, I like it, man. It's fun, man.

What has kept you motivated to pursue this dream even when the money hasn't been there or it's not this profitable.

Like, I've been broke this whole year.

Until now.

Rich at heart.

Rich at heart.

Rich at heart. There's nothing. I've been homeless. I've struggled. I've lost everything. I've lost animals. I've lost people.

Yeah.

You know, so when little stuff happens in my life, little problems, it doesn't bother me because I know I can overcome it. It's more so of a mental thing. and I lost my dad when I was 14. So that's probably my main focal point of why I drive hard every day. Because me and my dad was real close, you know? So when I lost my dad, I lost love. I didn't love nobody, didn't love anything. That's when I told you I was in that dark place from 14 till about a few years ago. And dude, it just, I had to transition that anger and that hurt and that pain into something positive. So once I made that It took a while. It's still hard for me to this day, you know? But I made that small turn and dude, it just like, I don't know where it comes from. It's like, you know, I pray a lot. I ask God for strength and guidance and motivation, you know, and open doors and closed doors give me signs. So whatever happens in my life, I just flow with it, you know? And I'm always, always working. And I made a promise to myself and God after I was homeless before, I said I would never go hungry again. I would never go homeless again. And I heard something inside of him, he said, as long as you work hard, you'll never go without food and you'll never go without shelter. So, I've said that day, busting my fucking ass every day. And I've never been homeless and I've been hungry sometimes, but it ain't to the point where like, you know, intermittent fasting.

Yeah.

Just call it a day off, you know? Exactly. You know?

What's the greatest lesson your dad taught you?

If you're gonna do it, do it. and what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. That's one thing he always told me growing up, you know, and I didn't know what it meant until I needed to know what it meant. And that was actually one of the first tattoos I got across my chest. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. So when he was killed, it broke me, but it made me unbreakable in the same sense, because I loved him so much, you know, he was. A hero. We have a dad, right? You know, so your dad's like, bro, it's like, Dad, what kid does he want? His dad. Love your dad. So when that was taken away from me, everything was gone. My love for animals, my love for, I didn't love my own family.

Really?

You know? So what brought me back to reality was the animals, which should save me because I was depressed. I was lonely. I didn't have anybody to come to, you know? So once I got back with these animals, I started praying a lot. Dude, like, I felt love again. I felt myself come back. And that's why I go so hard for the animals, because animals is what saved my life. Wow. Without even knowing. I knew they'd bring me happiness my whole life. But when I was in my darkest place in my life, I didn't care. I love myself or anybody. They loved me. Wow. They brought it out of me. And I'm like, dude.

And they needed you.

Yeah.

You know, just as much as I needed them.

Yeah.

You know, so, like, It's cool to be able to, people don't know the real story of my life because nobody knows me. They just know Tarzan and cool videos, apes and lions and snakes and stuff. But this whole animal stuff is what keeps me going every day. It keeps me happy. I don't know anything else to do. You know, I have small hobbies, but every day, every second of my day, every thought is around animals because that's what keeps Mike happy. that's what changed my life. So when I get to this point in life where these animals have brung me, it's like, I gotta do everything in my power for them.

Yeah.

So that's why I go so hard on the education. It's not even from a aspect of education, it's understanding. People just wanna be understood. So do animals, they just wanna be understood. I don't care to be understood because I let the work speak for itself, you know? I don't like talking much. That's why I never done, like, any podcast or interviews. I've always had dreams my whole life to do stuff. And every time I told people, it was like, ah, dude, that doesn't sound good. You know? So I was like, okay, how about I can show you?

Yeah.

And then you give me your answer afterwards, you know? So that's good. It's cool to be able to do it. Great, man.

I love it, man.

I love it.

What about the biggest lesson your mom taught you?

Biggest lesson my mom taught me. My mom is a hell of a woman. strong, strong as shit. And my mom taught me without knowing she taught me was it's okay to leave and do your own thing. My mom comes from the same hood my family comes from, but she was the first one to leave. When everything was bad in my neighborhood, my family, she was the first one to leave Rhode Island to Atlanta to give us a new life. Wow. She had nothing. She just went with her gut feeling. You know, she knew an opportunity was gonna make something out of it. And she brought two of her kids and herself, but like 100 bucks in her pocket. And we drove 18 hours from Rhode Island, packed all our stuff up, and went down to Atlanta, never looked back. But it was the best thing she could have did for us. Because if we stayed home, we wouldn't have made it. I'd have been dead easily. All the kids I grew up with, all my friends, went to the Boys and Girls Club, played football with, went to elementary and middle school with, they're all dead. Every last one of them. That's why I take this stuff so serious because like, I ain't supposed to be here.

Yeah.

You know, and it kind of makes me emotional now.

Yeah.

But it's a good thing 'cause I like to inspire people to show them the realness of it. Like, I lost a lot. But I gang a lot, 'cause I get to show them there's life outside of whatever you go through. You can always make it. So I like to show people that strength you can have without knowing you have it. Seeing my mom, she had the strength to leave, but she didn't know she gave me strength to leave. So when I left Atlanta to go to Miami to live with my dreams, it made it. It gave me that strength to go. I was like, okay, Mom can do it. I can do it. And the same thing with that fear. It's so generational. It just keeps going. But then you look at it, my grandmother, my mom's mom, back in the day, left from Rhode Island and moved to California. No friends, no family, no nothing. With all her kids, my aunts and my mom, and so my mom got that from her. Then I got that from my mom. Wow. It just, you look at that effect in life and it's like, holy shit. It's crazy. I take all this shit real deep and serious. You know, I get, I have a lot of fun on social media, but there's like, there's so much behind it that there's so much in the gas tank and the engine that keeps this going. And it's lovely. Yeah, man.

Thanks for sharing that.

Definitely. Sorry for getting all choked up, you know?

It's all good, man. That's what we do here. We get real here. Real talk, Zane, real life, you know? What message would you have to young kids who grew up like you, who maybe are afraid to adventure out and try new things, whether it's being with animals or just trying new things in general?

Pray. Pray for strength, pray for guidance, and believe in yourself. Everybody doubted me. I never doubted myself.

How would you believe in yourself when everyone doubted you? how do you believe when you don't have that belief?

It's hard to explain. It's more so of, that's where I feel like praying comes into play. And again, this is going to, I don't care what religion you are. I love everybody. So I give this advice to people, if you believe in Buddha or you're a Christian, you're whatever you are, I don't care. I still love you. So what I'm going to say is to apply to your life is pure faith. You believe in the higher power, you should believe in yourself. If you can pray and see stuff and want to achieve stuff and you're going to work hard towards it, whoever you pray to is going to help you. You're going to help yourself. You know, you're going to have enough strength and motivation to keep going. So when the world tells you, no, whatever you read in the Bible or whatever you're doing in your life, God is going to give you signs that you're going to see. And only things you're going to see is what you prayed about. so when I pray and ask God for signs and he puts signs in my life, I'm like, okay, here we go. Here we go. I always ask him to open and close doors in my life. So when he closes doors, sometimes I'm like, fuck, I wanted that door to be open. Then it's like, I prayed for it. I prayed for it. You know, and you're late. And you're late. I realized, I realized I'm like, oh, that's why.

That's why.

Totally get it. It hurts sometimes to close doors. Yeah, bro, it does. God always got a better door open for you, you know? So just have faith in yourself, you know, work hard. And I'm telling you, you can become a very scary individual.

In a good way.

In a good way.

I like that. You love animals so much. Do you, do you eat meat?

Yeah. What's your, this is a great conversation. What's your, I want to have this conversation. So my mom's a vegan.

I have lots of vegan friends. You know, I eat meat, but. I also believe in being more plant-based.

Yeah.

If possible, the more conscious-minded I become, it's like thinking about where the meat comes from and everything like that. So why do you eat meat if you love animals that much?

Well, I grew up on meat. And of course, now, like I say, I get educated in things. Of course, with all the great publicity I'm getting with animals, people are asking, why do you eat meat still? But then again, I'm real about it. Of course you have, and again, I don't mean to offend anybody what I'm gonna say, but I got these vegans, not all vegans, they kind of attack certain people. You know, like, you need to do this and this, you know, it's like, that's not how you approach situations for one. So the main- I come from a loving place.

Yeah.

The main reason I'm not a vegan is 'cause of the people. I've been bullied a lot my whole life. I got kind of like PTSD. When that shit, I don't know if it's the right terminology for it, but like when I feel like people are attacking me, I get on a kind of a whole different person. It's just naturally like a snake.

Yeah.

It's gonna bite you. You wanna fucking fight, let's fight. So it's wrong for me to do. I'm learning to have educational conversations without being on the defense. You know, I have this cool conversation with a lot of vegans. It's been working. pretty cool. What is it? You know, and it's like they asked me about, you know, the animals, why you meet. I'm like, you know, you can't really. I don't waste food. Every time I eat food, I have food in front of me. I eat it. That's how I was raised. You know, I don't waste anything. I'm gonna try to go vegan next year. Really? I'm gonna still eat meat, but I'm gonna hunt for myself. Really? So I'm gonna work for my food. That's what Zuckerberg did. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's awesome, but for, like, the vegan community. You have to be a little less harsh at your words and try to educate a little more. I know it'd be a different way. The same route I took with animal education. So much you can do for so long. So you gotta switch it up.

You can't shove it down people's throats.

Exactly.

You gotta entertain and educate and make it fun and do it a different way.

Yes, of course. I don't agree with animals that's killed. are slaughtered inhumanely for, you know, food consumption. But we are all animals. We're on a food chain. We have canines in our teeth. That's not for eating plants. Of course, you can eat meat.

What do they say about, like, well, a gorilla eats vegetables, right?

Just like.

Yeah.

Well, a lion just eats meat. You know, it's the same thing. It goes hand in hand. We've got canines, right?

Yeah.

We've got canines. But it doesn't need meat, right? But they have. They have more so of.

Where they come from, too.

You know, their DNA, how they're wired, is just different, some different animals. You know, of course, like, I can't, you couldn't switch and eat for a gorilla to eat meat 24/7. He'd die. Why is that? He can't get the proper nutrients. You know, his stomach can't hold it. He doesn't have certain acids to digest certain things. Versus a lion, I can't just feed lion kale and lettuce and plants all day. He'd die. He'd die. Really? You wouldn't get the proper nutrition. Really? You know what I'm saying? Of course, you probably like blend up proteins and stuff like that and syringe feed them, but you know, naturally, he just can't do it, you know, so.

But humans can. Huh?

We can survive on just plants. We can. We can bounce back and forth. Going back to my original statement, they're like, oh, these animals, this and that. And I'm like, okay, you can't sit there and say that you're, 100% for these animals because where do you live? We live in a house. Yeah. What are you wearing? What are you wearing? You know, like the makeup, the shoes, all that stuff. You know, there's leather on your car, you know, like all that stuff plays into back until you're a vegan stuff, you know what I'm saying? So you can't sit there and say, Hey, you, hey you, hey you, when you have a bunch of hey yous behind you in your life in order for us to be one, be able to spread your message because it's not just for me, a lot of people don't like the way they approach people. And I'm pretty sure there's tons of people that can have educational, fun conversations about their way of life. And it needs to be done in a better way, of course. But just for me, it's like, I'm gonna try it for my own benefits, you know, of hunting for my own food. I like challenges, you know. If I want to buy food, I'm gonna buy only fruits and veggies. But I'm gonna go fishing. I like to fish, you know. So I'm gonna go fishing. I go hunt. If I want to eat, I'm gonna go hunting. all next year, that's my motto.

Just a lot of time and energy.

Hey, if I want it, I gotta do it.

That's true. If you want to ban it, at least try it for a year. Yeah, I always take the approach of, no matter what stance you have or what you're trying to come at someone with, whether it's veganism or whatever, just how you show up in general. If you are trying to attack other people on one topic, you better have your whole life figured out. You've got to be on every other topic. you better be in integrity all the time, a good person, you better be like, you know, in shape, all these other things like, 'cause then they can just come and attack you on something else. Exactly. Learn to educate and connect with people on something you're passionate about, but don't make them wrong.

Yeah. So when they come at me, I just say, I love you.

Yeah.

And I don't want to argue, I love you, we're on the same team, have a good day. That's a good response.

Is it?

Yeah, it's a good response. You know, people always want to fight, but why would you fight your teammate? If you love animals and I love animals, and I'm educating and you're out here educating, leave me alone. Yeah. We can have educational conversations, but it's negative. I love you. Have a good day.

What's a couple questions left for you? I'm curious. What's the best animal to rescue or have that is not like the normal domestic animals, the cats and dogs, the. I don't know. Rabbits.

I don't know.

If there was, like, an exotic animal that you wanted to have, whether it's a fox or a monkey or, you know, iguanas. Iguanas. why is that the best?

Iguanas are so such dope creatures, dude. Oh man, like so... you catch a lot of them too.

I saw a video of you catching like 30 in a night or something.

I was like, this guy's crazy. It tastes like 300 in a night. Crazy man. Yeah, it's like nuts. They're all over Miami. Yeah, it's like they're invasive species in Miami. I've had iguanas my whole life growing up. So I've already had a natural love.

For them, you know, so but then.

Moving to Florida when I was 17 and seeing everywhere more iguanas than there were people, it's like, They're all over.

The place, buildings, trees.

Everywhere, bro. Trees, they're in the city, they're at the beach, they're at restaurants, they're on.

The highway, bro, they're everywhere.

So why are they a good animal to have? I mean, I wouldn't say a good animal, I would just say in a rescue animal. Gotcha. 'Cause it's exotic, but they're real personal. Really? Yeah, they have such personalities, you know, and like, not seeing a wild iguana, but like, once you have an iguana captivity, they're just so smart and intelligent. They understand you. You pet them, they raise up, they want you to pet them. Really? You scratch them on the head, you're like, oh yeah, that's just like a dog. They're affectionate. They go through their mood swings, you know? They're just awesome creatures. And when it's your friend, you know, you have a lizard that's in your living room, you sit on the couch and he walks across the whole house and crawls up your leg and falls asleep in your lap. No way. Dude, how? A lizard does that? Yeah, bro. You gotta come see your animals. It's sick, bro. literally sick.

I gotta come see them.

My lizards, I have two rhino iguanas that are like almost 30 years old. I rescued them from this guy. When I say rescue, like sometimes people, they don't want animals anymore, so I'm like, okay. I take them in and I build them like these giant huge enclosures and feed them tons of fruits and veggies of all different kinds and just I have so much fun with it. I don't breed anything. I don't have anything like to resell. Animals I get are like, I think out of all my animals, I think maybe four of them are nice.

Really?

Yeah. Four.

What are the four?

My dogs.

Two dogs. And your fox?

Yeah, I got a chameleon. That's pretty cool. But everything else is just like, just evil.

They're not nice.

Just rejects for people they don't want. And I love the challenge of taking on the challenge.

None of them are nice.

None of them.

Are they nice to you or no?

Over time, so certain animals take a few weeks, a few days, a few months. I have an iguana at home, you know, and I've caught over almost 50,000 iguanas in the past couple of years easily.

In the wild.

In the wild. You know, so I have one in captivity that you would think that I've had so much experience with iguanas, I would know. I got one iguana, bro. He's just a dick. You know, just recently, the weather's changing, you know, they're going into hibernation and brumation till he starts to eat a lot more to fatten himself up.

Slowing down.

I used to put food in this cage, and he would run to the back and just look at me. And now I'm going to his cage, and he's sitting there staring at me. He's not moving. And then he's walking close and licking the fruit. As my hand's still in there, so I grabbed some banana. He's still smacking me and biting me. Really? But just that little bit of him not running away, the same way how I have my snake as a kid. There's that one day I went and picked him up. He didn't bite me. So I kept duplicating that, building that trust. Same thing with the iguana. even till today, he's still mean. But a couple days ago, I got it, and I've had this thing for almost a year now. Oh, my gosh.

You got a lick.

You know, I got. I built them this huge cage that costs me, like, you know, and a lot of my animals, they have cages that cost way more than them. I have a monkey, a rescue monkey that's evil. I can't touch him or anything. Really? And the thing cost me 300 bucks to rescue just to give the family a feed to cover some expenses.

But his cage costs, like, four thousand dollars.

That'S just the type. You can't even touch it.

You can't touch it.

How long have you had it? I had it for like three months now. We're getting closer, you know, but animals go through psychological and tragic experiences from other homes, you know, and they don't like humans. And you got to rebuild that trust again. You know, that could have been a good monkey for seven years, and then it took one bad instance. Oh, man. You know, you broke the monkey's trust, and he's just freaked out by you. and you gotta start from day one. Oh man. So people were like, man, fuck that process. I'm not going back through that again. I wanna get big again. You know, I don't wanna keep cleaning up his shit. I don't wanna keep buying fruit and, you know, I don't wanna- no affection back, no point. Exactly. You know, so that's where I pride in my at home collection, 'cause I have animals that just don't like me. But I give them the best life possible and ended up loving me. And I showed that on social media. If you scroll back, I got this giant six foot lizard from New Hampshire. and when I got him in, his mouth's open, he's smacking his tail, and it's literally sending him to the hospital, literally like the smallest bite possible. Took you to the hospital? No, I'm saying he can. Oh, wow. One bite. One bite. I'll go straight to that. I can rip ligaments in my hand. Really? It's a thing. Oh, yeah. It's a six-foot water monitor from Asia, like a Komodo dragon. Oh, my gosh. But it's not a Komodo dragon, but it's a close relative of it. So I got this thing in, he's just evil, and then. Feeding them, taking a couple smacks, and huffing and puffing, and then you just start petting them and hanging out. Now, I can go in there, I can pick them up. No. I can kiss him on the face. I can pull his tongue out. I can be in front of him. I have videos. I go on live all the time. Trying it out. And I chop a raw chicken, right, with my hands. And I take the chicken and I'm like, here you go, buddy. And he grabs it and doesn't touch my finger. No way. I swear. And then my hands are covered in juice and chicken. He won't bite it. And I'm putting my hand in front of his face. he's looking at it like, what?

Do you want to pick a chicken up?

He grabs it. So that's how intelligent these animals are. You know, he knows, even though he smells my hands full of chicken, he knows that I'm not food. Wow. Mm-.

That's sick, dude.

I got these giant lizards from Dominican Republic, five foot called rhinoceros iguanas. They have rhino horns, like a rhino, but on an iguana, you know, and they got these big, huge, Big huge face, these teeth that are back. Scary looking, right? If you grab a little blueberry, and you give this blueberry to this fucking lizard, his head's this big, he reaches out with his little tongue, grabs a blueberry, and chooses it. It's literally insane, bro.

Dude, I wanna watch some of this.

It's insane, bro. If I come to Miami and you're there, can I come to your place? We're gonna have stuff here, I'm moving here. Okay, great. So I'm gonna go home, pack up, and I'm gonna road trip all the way over here.

No way, with all the animals?

Not all of them. Some of them. I'm gonna, I got a couple friends. Got other stuff here too, yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna say, you know, here you go.

Dude, I want to come experience this.

It's gonna be sick right here in your backyard. It's amazing, man. Sick, bro. I can't wait. And like, see stuff like this, you know? Excited me. We can set your podcast up in a monkey cage and have a podcast.

In there for one day, you know?

It'd be crazy. For real. Be sick. Monkeys are amazing. I feel like. Oh, they're intelligent. Yeah. Just. I raised. I helped raise a chimp chimpanzee. Probably one of the coolest things I've ever done in my life. Like a baby? Like a baby chimp. Like a baby ape. What was that like? Bro, it's insane.

They're just hanging on you and playing with you.

It's so intelligent. It's like a human. He's literally a human with extra hair. And he can't talk.

But everything that we do- He's signing.

Can he like- Dude, he's just, you show him how to blow a candle out in a couple minutes. Like, it's hot, don't touch it. He's like, oh yeah, it's hot. It's like, it's like you're brushing your teeth. You can turn the water on and you just turn it off. he's like, turns the water on, he drinks it and turns it off.

You're like, this is crazy, man.

It's insane, bro. You put an iPad and you show them how to swipe and hit apps.

Now, swear.

It's literally mind-blowing how smart these animals are. Wow. They shared. I think they share, like, 98 of our shareable DNA, you know? So. Wow, man. It's just having a knowing it's an eight. but it's like a human.

If you could only have one animal that wasn't a dog, let's say for five years, you couldn't keep any other animals, hypothetically, right? It's like you could only choose one. This was gonna be the one that you were gonna be with and train with and hang out with. Any type of pet, what would it be?

Black Jaguar.

Why is that?

It's what my spirit animal is.

Okay. Do you have one now?

No, I've raised some before. Wow. Like, helped adopt some and gave some money towards their food and cage builds. But I've never personally owned one. You've been around them, though?

Yeah.

What's it like? It's just.

Dude, those things are powerful. I've been around jaguars before, but I've always loved, you know, from the movie Black Panther. I've always had an obsession with Black Panthers, even though there's no such thing as really a Black Panther, but Black Jaguars. It's just been my spirit animal since a kid. Actually, I'll show you a funny clip. This is where-- Black Jaguar, okay. This is where it gets funny for me. This is how I know these are my spirit animals. I started working with this little Jaguar. He was confiscated from some smugglers, and he was freaked out. It's a Jaguar. It's an apex predator in the jungles of Central and South America.

These things are big, man, right?

Yeah, bro.

They're just muscular, strong.

Muscular, strong. I was down in, you know, working with this Jaguar, and he was just not having a good day and. Which is understandable with the situation. And this is, I think this photo is the first time me interacting with him. I got videos. I'll show you. He was just totally freaking out.

How big was it?

He's only probably about this big.

Baby or.

No.

Yeah, his baby.

Like six months.

No, I'd say, like, three months.

Oh, young.

Yeah. And he is not freaked out. Humans. just horrible people.

Yeah.

You know, but that's how he's supposed to act. You go in a cage and he's in the back of the cage showing his teeth, hissing, growling, which is, you know, what he's supposed to do.

But you take him in the water.

Took him in the water, calmed him down, fed him, gave him some space, said it again, fed him, gave him space. So after he's swimming and swimming and swimming, and he's about to had enough of me.

Is he biting you or now clawing you?

Oh, yeah. He is.

But his baby doesn't hurt.

That's him. After four days.

Look at his claws.

Oh, yeah. Like they have full teeth, full claws and everything.

Is he scratching you a lot or now?

What?

In captivity?

The first day?

Oh, yeah. They distracted her on accident. Yeah, just wasn't breaking the skin.

Yeah.

So could you grow up working with a black jaguar? Was that one? I've worked with jaguars as far as standard color jaguars, but I just feel like my spirit animal is that.

Do you think if you raised it as a baby, would it be tame.

Around you as an adult? It's more self-trusting. Of course you can't be like playing with rolling around. Yeah, I never encouraged. Like a bear. Playing with any wild animal, you know.

Or apex predator in captivity. What about that guy who's like always with the lions? Which one?

There's a few of them, but there's.

A guy who did like a bunch.

Of GoPro stuff that was like.

Oh, Kevin Richardson.

To the guy in South Africa. Yeah, some badass dude.

He's like just walking out with the lions, like, and then playing with them and grown lions.

He spends hours and hours and hours. Doesn't matter one every single day. Yeah, in one instance you're doing what that's the. But he probably raised. Look how much awareness he's raised in our line of work. We have to make that sacrifice, you know what I'm saying? It's your life.

It's your life, you know, but I do it any day.

But you do it in a safe way. You're not like. And it's the same thing. You're not just walking. You're gonna inspire.

Yeah.

The safest way possible.

I look at it as if we can, if I can make a sacrifice for myself and I can work for 10 years and say, God forbid something happens to me, but I can inspire 100 million people to love animals and only 10 people are gonna fully chase that dream hard like I did. Just imagine what 10 Tarzans can do in 10 years from now, you know? So, that's the sacrifice we make to inspire, encourage and Consciousness. Sometimes you get caught in the fire and stuff, you know, but it's okay, because that's what we do. It's like playing NFL. You're gonna get a concussion. You're gonna break a leg, you know, if you're a race car driver, you're gonna get an accident happens. Of course, you don't want it to happen, you know, but that's just life. That's why the bites and scratches don't bother me, because it's.

Every day.

It's like getting fouled in basketball.

Right, it happens.

It's just a hard hit.

It's a hard hit, it's a bruise. This is your contact sport. Exactly. It's getting a little nip by the iguana or something. Okay, final couple questions for you. This one is called the Three Truths. I ask this to everyone at the end. So imagine it's your last day on earth. You choose the day as many years out as you want it to be. You've done everything you want to do. You've accomplished all your dreams. It's all happened. But for whatever reason, you've got to take all the information with you. All the videos and content and work you've done, TV shows, it goes with you when you pass. So no one has access to your information anymore. But you could write down the three things you know to be true about your life, your experiences, the lessons. There's only three things you can share with the world. What would you say are your three truths?

That's cool. I like that question. The three things that would be the truth if I could take everything away. Love always wins. That's the truth of my life. I could easily hate a lot of people for a lot of things, you know, but if I love you, what happens after that? You got nothing. If I go negative about it, we can go on for years of negativity, fighting back and forth, you know, all types of crazy stuff. But at the end of the day in my life, what's been making everything happen. It's love, you know?

That's great.

Love always wins. God is good all the time. Second truth. Third truth. The truth I would love to leave.

Is.

We need animals more than they need us. Because if they go, we go. that's the reality of it. Really? Truth. So if I were able to leave this earth and not have anything I've ever done be shown, but leave three truths behind, love always wins. God is good all the time, no matter who you believe in. And animals. If there's no animals, there's no us. Wow. That's the truth.

Wow. Those are powerful, man. well, what can we do to support you? What's a project that you want us to follow? Where can we follow you online? @therealTarzan on Instagram. You guys got to check this stuff out. If you guys aren't following, make sure you follow and, and just see the videos. They're inspiring. So what else is going on for you?

A lot of charitable work. We're going to be giving a lot of money and a lot of, we're gonna do stuff different. A lot. I feel like a lot of companies, organizations have billions of dollars from charity and give back, but they only pinch out a couple hundred thousand dollars. Maybe a couple thousand dollars. I want to be known as the dude when I die, like, yo, that motherfucker Tarzan was giving away big checks and doing big work and just doing real humanitarian loving work, like going to Africa, really rebuilding shit, you know, documenting it, showing people where their money's going, where my money's going, my time's going. I feel like we missed, we're missing that aspect of reality. You know, I feel like us as Americans, we're so comfortable and cool here, you know, but there's a whole other world out there that needs, that needs us. And at the end of the day, we can be Americans, we can be Africans, we can be Europeans or Australians. But at the end of the day, we're all brothers and sisters, we're all people, and that's where the love comes at. Where can we go out and help these people, you know? and that's where, like, I feel like the love is going to be just so real that we're going to be able to show it, you know, help build on it. I'm starting own nonprofit 2019. So, you know, I believe using a lot of my own money to go out and do this work, you know, and bringing people along with me, whoever wants to tag along, that's why I feel like I've been building these relationships. Will Smith, Diddy, giving all these eyes, these people, once we start hitting these real, projects and showing real progress. It's gonna be a beautiful thing, man. And start a trend of just helping and showing love. That's great, man. So, just, I can't tell you what to do now. Just follow you on social media right.

Now and stay tuned. Yeah, stay tuned, man.

You know, there's a whole lot of stuff coming. A whole lot of gangster shit coming your way in a fun way. I like it, man.

You know, so.

Yeah, that's cool.

Well, I gotta acknowledge you for a moment, Mike, for for being authentically you because you grew up in a place that wasn't supportive of your dream, but you did it anyways. You did something that most kids that look like you don't do.

Exactly.

And you're doing it anyways with a lot of passion and love and generosity. You give back constantly, which is really inspiring. So I acknowledge you for your efforts, your work, your care for Animals that don't have care and you constantly show up in a big way, man, and your heart is infectious. So I acknowledge all that you're doing.

Thank you, brother.

I really appreciate that, man. Yeah, man, of course, man. My final question is, what is your definition of greatness?

Definition of greatness. Definition of greatness. I love this. So this is the best way I can explain it. I look at Mike Tyson, I look at Michael Jordan, Michael Phelps, Michael Jackson, Michael Angelo. And you get these people that share a name, Michael. This is just me. This could be anybody. Greatness is when you look at these people's lives and you parallel them and they never cross paths in their actual line of work. and they all have one thing in common, relentless hard work. Like Michael Phelps, what he does every day, swims, he masters his craft. He doesn't worry about anybody else. He worries about himself. He masters his fucking craft. And that's why he's the best Olympic gold medalist swimmer for whatever swim thing he does. I don't know exactly what he swims with, but I know he puts in work in. You know what I'm saying? Look at Michael Jordan. sickening work ethic. He's great. So true greatness lies in hard work. No matter how talented you are, if you work your ass off every day, non-stop you become great. But you just gotta believe that. If you don't believe me, look into these great people's lives, the real greats, the real goats, and you see what they look at the documentaries, look at their work, look at their passion, how they move, they have relentless hard work. I was working hard all year, but I thought I was. I met Will Smith and I think I met him a month and a half ago.

After the video came out. Yeah, yeah.

So I've been traveling the world and doing my Tarzan stuff and I talked to Will Smith and they were like, yeah, Will Smith hasn't been home since Christmas.

Working.

Working. Just out there getting it. Another country, another day, another project. And it's just like music video, TV show, YouTube, drumline, helicopter, you get your voice doing it. And it's like, that's the hard work. What do you think Tom Brady does in his off time?

Studies, trains, games.

What do you think Michael Jackson did with his music?

Just mastering his craft.

Mastering his craft, you know what I'm saying? these people, greatness lies in hard work. You'll be talented all day. Tell my little brother. My little brother is a talented young man. His name is Randy, my favorite little brother. And he's so talented, man. Just naturally talented. But it could be a blessing and a curse.

'Cause you may not work as hard when you're talented.

So I tell him, I'm like, look, kid, you're very talented, but that doesn't mean shit. I said, you,'re already ahead of everybody just by talent wise. I said, eventually they're gonna catch you just by talent wise. I said, imagine when you put relentless hard work on top of your already God-given talent, no one will ever be able to catch you. It'll be far ahead of everybody for a long time, for forever. And I tell them that at six years old. and we win five state championships in football. And then he leaves football and then goes wins another four state championships in basketball. Then went to state championship in baseball. And it's just like, that's my boy.

What's he doing now?

He's playing basketball. He's 13 years old. Just turned 13 on October 12th. He's six foot one with a size 13 shoe. He's a monster. So everything I'm talking already? He damn near here. I haven't seen him in like a couple of months, Close. Every time I come home to see him, he's like, taller.

Yeah.

So it's amazing, man.

I love it. Good stuff. Make sure you guys follow this guy, the real Tarzan. Appreciate you, Mike.

Thank you, brother.

Let's grab, man.

There you have it, my friends. I hope you enjoyed this one. LewisHowes.com/724 Mike Holston in the house. Super pumped about this because He's doing incredible work. Again, make sure to check him out. Tag him on your Instagram stories @michaelholston, the real Tarzan, powerful stuff. And his videos have been crazy the last couple weeks. So check out his videos, his photos. They're gonna inspire you to want to be more a part of this conversation and engaging in wildlife as well yourself. So check it out. Tag him as well and share this with your friends, lewishouse.com/724 and again, if you have a dream, if you have a passion burning inside of you, this is another example that you can pursue that thing and make a full-time living.

Doing what you love.

That's what this life is about. It's not about doing something you hate.

For your whole life.

Listen, I get it. For years, I had to do things I didn't love in order to gain experience, the skill set, earn the money, to have the freedom to then pursue things that I did love. But don't ever let someone hold you.

Back from saying your idea is too.

Crazy because there are examples every single day of people doing things they love. They're making big impact in the world like Mike Holston and making a full-time income doing it. So again, use this as an example. Share this with your friends. Let me know what you thought of this over on Instagram, @lewis.house.com/724 for the full video interview. Check out Mike Holston @therealTarzan and Harriet Tubman said, Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. I love you so very much and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.