908 Kobe Bryant on Life, Love and Legacy

This is episode number 908 with one of the greatest of all time, Kobe Bryant. 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. Kobe Bryant said, you know things are never perfect, but through love, you can continue to persevere. You move through them and then through that storm, a beautiful sun emerges. This has been a very challenging 24 hours for me. Kobe Bryant just passed and My condolences, thoughts, love, prayers to his family and the families that were involved, the other passengers who passed and their family. I had the honor of sitting down with Kobe about a year ago and talking about love, talking about life, talking about beautiful things. And when I heard the news, I was like most people in shock. I checked to confirm that it was not fake and then I laid around for almost 24 hours and reflected and really just heard stories about how much he meant to people, watched videos, thought about my time with him, reflected on the pain that the family must be going through and the families of the victims that were involved in this accident and just really sad. really sad about the whole situation. And I can only imagine, you know, me being sad as someone who barely knew him. I knew him for an hour of time and a few text messages afterwards. I feel sad for the people that knew him very well and can only imagine the pain that they're feeling and the hurt and the confusion. And I just want to send lots of love to everyone involved. who truly knew Kobe in an intimate way. And a lot of people have been asking me to, to reshare the interview that I did with him. They said it was one of the most powerful interviews that I'd ever seen with him. They said they never heard him talk about the things he talked about. Again, we talk about love and intimacy and the questions that he is yet to answer for himself. We talked about so many different moments in his career, moments from his childhood, and so many people afterwards told me that it was one of the most powerful episodes. ESPN cut up multiple clips and shared it all over social media and their website. And I was flattered by this. I just, you know, was a curious person. I loved his work. I loved his, the way he thought, his mentality, his, his work ethic. And as a fan, I just wanted to do a great interview. And I remember getting the opportunity to sit down with him. And I wanted to share with you my lessons from what I learned about him and then make sure that I, we're going to post the full interview as well attached to this. But I wanted to share my thoughts of what I experienced and the type of man that I experienced when I got to sit down with him. And it was crazy. I was talking with Tiffany who films and edits the podcast. 'Cause she went to his office with me. And so I was reflecting with her, saying, Man, what was it like for you? And we were going back and forth. So here's what happened. Here's the story. And I want you to know how powerful this person was and how humble at the same time he was. Someone on our podcast team had said, Hey, Colby's publicist reached out to me and is looking to do some press to talk about his new podcast, the Punies. and he said, he's only free like three weeks out. He's got a couple of windows that are open of time that open in a few weeks. Are you available? And I said, call them back, tell them I will be there first thing tomorrow morning. Because if we don't book this right now, three weeks is what I got to pass and they're going to reschedule and reschedule and it's never going to happen. So I said, do not hang up the phone until you get them to confirm. I will go anywhere, anytime, anyplace tomorrow morning. You just tell me when and where I will be there. And I said, do not hang up until you get them to confirm. And they get back to us and say, okay, tomorrow morning, his office, which is in Orange County, 7:30 a.m. I think is when it was supposed to start sometime early, sometime before the work day, it was like 7:30, 8:00 a.m. or something. I said, great, done. Now this was about five or six o'clock at night. the night before. And I'm going to a concert this night to support another guest that we had on, Lindsay Sterling. She had a concert in LA. I said, I'll be there. So I end up going to her concert. She doesn't come on till late. And I don't get back till about 12:30. Now, I've got the biggest interview I've ever done in about eight hours, right? And I haven't prepared yet. I haven't prepared. And I'm kind of like nervous, but I'm also like, This is going to be amazing. Like, I'm so excited for this. It was almost better that I didn't have a week to prepare in my mind because I think I would have built it up too much. It would have been maybe a little nervous or not sure. And it was actually perfect. So I, Tiffany, who's filming, comes over, grabs the camera gear around 5:00 a.m. or something. And I'm like, we gotta get there early. We need to make sure we're set up an hour and a half early. Like the publicist said, we only have 20 minutes. We've gotta be ready. You need to turn the camera on. the lights on, the mic's on, it's gotta be ready to go so we can get the most out of this in 20 minutes. Now, she comes over, we get the camera gear, we hop in my car, and I start playing the first two episodes of his podcast, the Punies, which if you haven't downloaded the Punies, it's amazing. And parents, you gotta have your kids listen to this, and it's really going to continue to further the legacy of what he created because they're really inspiring. cartoon episodic cartoons for kids to overcome doubt and insecurity and fear and all these things that we talk about in the School of Greatness. So I listened to the first two episodes and I'm just like, wow, this guy is talented as a storyteller, as a director, as a writer. He is talented. He's not just a great basketball player. He's a talented storyteller. And I go, Tiffany, you know, we got about an hour and a half drive. So I go, Tiffany, Find everything you can, any unique fact, any detail about Kobe's life. What do I need to know? Early days, parents, living in Italy, how many languages does he really speak? Just tell me everything you can think of. And she's downloading me, and I'm just taking it all in as I'm driving down there. We're taking the 405 down to Orange County. And so then we finally get there. It's probably, I don't know, 6:30, 6:45 a.m. and this is one of the most memorable things that I'll always remember about Kobe. So we get there, we're waiting in the lobby of this building that he's in, his office is in, and we're there for maybe 10-15 minutes. I call the publicist or the person coordinating his assistant at the time to let us in, and she lets us in about 10-15 minutes later. And so we go into the office, there's no one there. There's no one there, she's turning the lights on. It's this nice media business office, right? We go in there and she's like, okay, here's where we normally film. And this location where they normally filmed was not, in my opinion, up to standards of the visuals that I wanted to have to represent this interview. So I said, can we look around the office and see if there's any other space to maybe set up a little mini studio? She said, sure. So we walk around and we go down this long hall and this long hallway has all these kind of offices to the sides, to each side of the hallway with big windows that you can see inside these kind of like board room looking offices. And as I'm walking down, I see that the lights were off in most of them. And I don't think anything of it, but I keep walking down and I see the other end of the office. I'm like, nah, I don't like this over here. Let's walk back. And as we're walking back down this kind of glass hallway, of offices, I take a glimpse over to my left and I see this one office, all the lights are off, and I see just a figure in the back corner looking up, no computer on, no phone on, just sitting at a desk looking into the ceiling is what it looked like. And I'm like, that's Kobe. I'm like, that's Kobe. He's in the office at 6:45 a.m. sitting there. dreaming. I don't even know what he was doing. He was just looking up and not working, not on any device, just there. Lights off. And I was like, what? And I asked her, I go, Is that Kobe? And she's like, yeah. And I go, How long has he been here? I thought no one was here. She goes, oh, he's been here for at least an hour. And I go, what? Are you kidding me? An hour? I'm like, what's he doing? She's like, you know, he's preparing for the day. he's got a lot to do today after you. Who was coming in? Little Wayne was coming in to do an interview, to interview him after me. He had a bunch of different meetings and projects he was working on. And I was like, little Wayne's coming in right after me. So his whole production crew was there setting up about an hour later, and it was crazy, right? So I go, wow. So he's been here for at least an hour. She goes, oh, yeah, he's always the first one in. And typically the last one to leave.

I go, what?

This is, and so in that moment, I was just blown away because here's a man who has done it all. At this time, he'd already won an Oscar. He had, you know, five NBA championships, Olympic gold medalist. He had 20 years in the league. He'd done it all, made a ton of money. He had nothing else to prove. And 40 years old, first one in the office, hours before anyone else. He told me afterwards, he's like, oh yeah, I was up at 4 a.m. working out this morning, you know? And I was just like, you are a machine. This is unbelievable. It was just a inspiring moment. He probably had no clue who I was, you know, I'm just some little podcaster. He's got little Wayne coming in after me and big companies coming in for meetings. He probably had no clue who I was, but he was there at least an hour before I got there. to prepare, not only for me, but for the whole day. And that really impressed me. And as we got set up, we were setting up, right? So I'm setting up and we're, I can look into Kobe's office, essentially. I can't see him, but I can look into his office at the location we're setting up. And we're setting up for an hour, hour and a half, getting ready. And, you know, people are starting to come in. Eventually we have the whole thing set up. I'm talking back and forth with Tiffany, going over my notes, just making sure I have everything prepared. And I'm wondering, is he gonna come out at any time? Is he gonna say hi? is he gonna walk to the bathroom? I have no idea, but I'm gonna be ready. And someone goes in, it's about 10 minutes before we're about to start. His team's there now. It's like there's energy happening in the place. The lights come on in his place. And I see someone walk in, they have a conversation, the man comes out, and I'm thinking to myself, okay, he's gonna be out here right on the dot. It's gonna start, and then the publisher's saying, you've got 20 minutes, because Little Wayne is coming up right after you and they need to have their schedule and then everything else. So I'm thinking to myself, I've got to really make a great connection with him as we're putting on the mic, as he's sitting down in order for him to really open up because 20 minutes, you guys know if you listen to my podcast, 20 minutes is not enough time to get in deep with someone, to really connect with someone. You ask three questions and 20 minutes blinks. So I'm saying to myself, what can I do to truly connect with one of the greatest athletes in the world of all time so that he and I can create an interview that impacts humanity? Every time I sit down with someone like this, I'm like, we need to create powerful moments that can change lives, that can save lives, that can impact people, that can truly benefit and add so much value to people's lives that they remember. they take action in their life and they become better. And I remember him walking out and just walking right up to me. And he knew what was happening. He knew we were about to get started. He knew there's a chair that was right there. You know, Tiffany's saying hello. He goes right up to Tiffany and shakes her hand and says, how are you? Looks her in the eyes. He's super present, caring, thoughtful, says the same thing to me, we connect. and as I'm putting the mic on, I just say, Kobe, before we get started, I want to acknowledge you for how kind you've been to so many, you know, Olympic athletes. I play with the USA men's national handball team, and a lot of my friends who are Olympians say that you were always so nice to them, to all the USA athlete members and other sports that are much smaller than basketball. You're always so nice to people. You always went to watch other sports and supported the other athletes who took photos with people whenever they You were engaged with people. And I just wanted to say, I really acknowledge you for showing up for other athletes and for inspiring so many of us. I really appreciate it. He goes, My man, you play handball? And I go, yeah. He goes, Man, when I was growing up in Italy, that's all I love to play. We played handball all the time. And I used to watch the game. And those guys are so amazing. The athletes are incredible. I'm like, I know. That's why I love the sport. And so we jive on handball. and his love for it in Europe playing growing up. And I was like, wow, I had no idea he was a fan of handball. And then his publicist is asking me, who are some of the other people that you've interviewed as we're in this conversation as well? And I was like, I've had Novak Djokovic and I start to say a few other names and he goes, no way, Novak, he's my brother. I love Novak, he's such a great competitor and his mindset and he's such a great champion and he's like a brother to me. I'm thinking to myself, wow, this guy is really engaged. He's really connected. He really cares to have a conversation. It's not just, okay, let me sit down. Let's get through this. Tell me your questions. On to the next, like promote my thing. He was truly wanted to create a connection. And that's the thing that was powerful for me. And I remember just sitting down and he made me feel so comfortable. The whole time he made me feel so comfortable. He never made me feel nervous. He never made me feel insecure. He never made me feel scared or worried about what I was going to say. And I remember sitting down, right, the last thing I asked him beforehand, I said, you, know, your publicist told me, you know, a list of things, what not to ask you. And my whole intention is to put you in the best light. But is there anything else off limits or that I shouldn't ask you? And he looks me dead in the eyes and he says, Ask me anything you want. and I was just like, wow, this guy, you know, I'm sure he's been asked a lot of different things and maybe some things bug him or some things annoy him because they were like, don't ask about his parents and don't ask about a relationship and don't ask about this. And so I mentioned that, you know, I'm not going to talk about these things. And he just looks at me and says, ask me anything you want. And I thought that was really cool that he was willing to go anywhere. And at that moment, I remember thinking to myself, this is gonna be a great interview. And all I gotta do now is convince the publicist and the whole team watching us and surrounding us that I need more than 20 minutes because 20 minutes isn't enough. You're gonna hear this interview. The interview goes I think about 40 to 45 minutes. And I do something towards the end that without asking the publicist because they're kind of standing there with their hands up of like cutting it off and they'll walk in and literally like say, okay, we're done if you go past the limit. and I start to say certain things and he gets so engaged and so into it. I'm just like, I can't end this right now. And I'm looking at the clock, I'm like, there's no way I'm ending this. And he's so engaged and he opens up about love and intimacy and relationships and his relationship with his daughter and so many other beautiful things that I was just like, okay, we're moving this on. They didn't put their hand up, they didn't cut me off, and they start to whisper at each other. and I do something and that moment when they start to come in, they're about to walk in and I say something that allows it, in my opinion, to get some of the best parts of an interview I've ever had in these last six or seven minutes of this interview that really just, he said things I never heard him say. And so many people emailed me and this is, you know, ESPN picked this up and NBC.com and olympics.com and Sports Illustrated, they all picked these things up at the end because they never heard Kobe say these things. At the end, he was so gracious, so giving, so caring. He started following me on Instagram. He messaged me a few times, and I was just like, wow, this is a guy who's connected to the biggest stars in the world.

And he.

I remember even saying, like, wow, this is, you know, I wish I would have got this on film, but he was like, this was. Thank you for this interview. It was really special for me. It was one of my favorites. And I was like, dang it, I should have got that on footage, you know? But the moments were powerful and we packed up. It was just me and Tiffany and a couple of cameras and a couple of lights and the production company for Little Wayne, it was like this massive, like 30 person production company with all this gear setting up an interview and, you know, all these black cars outside with Little Wayne security. And I was just like, just little old school of greatness, you know, popping in, setting up and packing up real quick and popping out. and, you know, they were probably there for a few hours setting up and doing everything. And I was just like, man, I'm just really grateful. And I remember the whole drive back, me and Tiffany were like, little kids. We were like, I don't know a time where I've ever been that excited. And Tiffany as well, because Tiffany is a big NBA fan. She played basketball. She worked, did video for the WNBA for a little bit, and we were just like, that was amazing. We just did it. You Kobe, like, and It wasn't just doing the interview, it was just everything about it. It was the moments that he shared with us. It was the things that he said that you'll hear pauses where he doesn't answer for like five, six, seven seconds because he's thinking about these questions. And I just thought there was something about it was so magical. And people always ask me, I've done over 900 episodes, they'll say, what was your favorite episode? and I'm always like, it's really hard to say like your top three out of 900 episodes, hundreds of interviews. And I'm always like, Kobe, he's in the top. Kobe has been in the top for the last year, year and three months since this episode came out. So I'm just great, you know, it's sad because I was actually supposed to interview him again. He had a book that came out a couple of months ago and I was scheduling another interview with him. But something had came up and I had a trip already planned during the time where he was available. Because he told me, he said, I'm looking forward to the time just to do this again. And I said, if there's ever anything I can do to promote you, he's like, yeah, I've got a book coming out. I would love to come back on. And I really wish I would have had that time. And I wish I would, you know, looking back, canceled that trip and done whatever I could to make that time happen. I thought I would get more chances. And highly unfortunately, that did not happen. And I'm just sad for his family. I'm sad for his friends. I'm sad for the families that were involved. And I just know he would have created some incredible stories, some incredible magic with all the talents that he has and the hard work and the commitment he has. So, I want to share this interview with you and I just listened, re-watched it on YouTube, on the video and was just like smiling. You know, I was sad, I was smiling, I was laughing. There's moments where we're laughing about different things and I was just like, Man, he's so smart, he's so talented. And here are some brief thoughts that I had about him. He really relied on the fundamentals. You know, you'll hear him talk in this episode about the fundamentals. and he talks about simple math, you know, having simple math in the work that you do towards your dreams and being obsessed with the thing you love. And the stories about how he said, you know, when people are resting, that's when he would go to the gym to work. He talked about transitioning from a great talent to becoming a great leader as well and impacting the people around him, his team around him, and talking about how he changed behavior. to make people better, how he changed people's behavior. And at the end, you'll hear some powerful stuff about what he wanted to create, his mission to tell great stories. And he's definitely told all of us an amazing story. If you don't know who Kobe is, again, he's an incredible athlete, five-time NBA champion, to Lakers, 20 seasons, 18-time All-Star He's just a machine. The machine won an Oscar, Olympian, medalist, and just really sad about everything that happened. In this full interview, we talk about his greatest moments in 20 seasons of basketball. And the moment he talked about, he said, I'm not proud of, he said, this might be a superficial moment. That was my greatest moment, but it was a powerful story. We talk about the Mamba mentality and how he strengthened his physical and mental abilities, his definition of love and what he hoped his legacy would be, his workout training routine with his daughter and why that was so important to him, why he had a passion for storytelling and how it impacts everyone throughout history. That and so much more. I hope you enjoy this. If you did, please let me know. share it with a friend, lewishouse.com/908 or you can watch the full video on YouTube as well if you want to watch that. It's really cool to watch his mannerisms and his responses on video. It's just really special for me. So, I hope you enjoy this. This is the Kobe Bryant interview and life lessons.

Welcome everyone to the School of Greatness podcast. We have the the incredible legendary Kobe Bryant. My man, it's good to meet you.

Pleasure, man.

Congrats on everything. You're an icon, a legend. And the thing I love the most about you is that you really care about other human beings. Your heart is so big, even though you've been known for this focused mentality that is just almost psycho in some ways. But you care deeply about human beings. And I think that's why so many people love you as well. So I want to acknowledge you for your kindness and your generosity towards humanity. My first question for you is, I'm curious about who was your greatest teacher growing up? Because you had an interesting childhood being in Italy for a while, coming back to Philadelphia, I think it was.

Yeah.

Who was the greatest teacher for you in those early days?

It was funny, man. I had a lot of them. My parents were great. You know, growing up, they instilled in me the importance of imagination, of curiosity, understanding that, okay, if you want to accomplish something, I'm not just going to sit here and say, yes, you can do whatever yes, you can, but you have to also put in the work to get there, right? So they taught me that at a really early age, man. And when you grow up as a kid thinking that the world is your oyster, all things are possible if you put in the work to do it. You know, you grow up having that fundamental belief. Yeah.

Who was more influential for you, your father or mother?

Both were influential at different points. Yeah. My mom was there on a daily basis. My father was really influential at a really critical time where I had a summer where I played basketball when I was like 10 or 11 years old in a very prominent summer league in Philadelphia called the Sunny Hill League. Where my father played, my uncle played, and they were like all-time greats and stuff. And both Chamberlain played in the league, Earl Lloyd played in the league. Here I come playing and I don't score one point the entire summer. Really? Not one.

How old were you?

11? 10-11.

And you're playing against other 10-11 year olds, or? You didn't score once.

Not one.

Were you in the game?

I was in the game. How'd you not score?

'Cause I was terrible.

Really? Yeah. That's 10-11 years old, you were that terrible. Awful. I mean, you know, and I had these big knee pads on 'cause I.

Was growing really fast.

I had socks all the way up here. And I had, like, the pod top. Skinny, yeah. Like, skinny as hell. And I scored not a free throw, not a nothing, not a lucky shot, not a breakaway layup, zero points. I remember crying about it, being upset about it, and my father just gave me a hug and said, Listen, whether you score zero or score 60, I'm.

Gonna love you no matter what.

Wow. Now that is the most important thing that you can say to a child, because from there I was like, okay, that gives me all the confidence in the world to fail. I have the security there. But to hell with that, I'm scoring 60. Let's go. Right, right. Right, and from there I just went to work. I just stayed with it. I kept practicing, kept practicing, kept practicing.

Is that when you think the mentality of hard work started to come in for you at that age when you failed so miserably, I guess, that summer?

I think that's when the idea of understanding a long-term view became important because I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn't going to catch them in a year, right? So that's when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some thought, all right? What do I want to work on first? All right, shooting. All right, let's knock this out. Let's focus on this half a year, six months, do nothing but shoot. Right, after that, all right, creating your own shot. And then you focus, so you start, I started creating a menu of things. When I came back the next summer, I was a little bit better, right?

And then you'd be like, I've got.

My jump shot from 15, I've got my- yeah, I got my jump shot from 15, I got my three point shot, like just open shots, not miss open shots, right? And be able to shoot it with speed, 'cause those kids are so much more athletic. And then the next summer I came back a little better. And the summer I came back, next summer I was a little better, I scored. You know, it wasn't much, but I scored. Missed 12, 13. 12, 13, and then 14 came around. back half of 13, 14 years old, and then I was just killing everyone. And it happened in two years. And I wasn't expecting it to happen in two years, but it did because what I had to do was work on the basics and the fundamentals. But they relied on their athleticism and their natural ability. And because I stick to the fundamentals, it just caught up to them. And then my body, you know, my knees stopped hurting. I grew into my frame.

And then your athleticism once you have the fundamentals, the hard work, the mindset, and you tack on the athleticism, then.

It was game over. Exactly. Then it was game over.

Wow. So from 13, you're good average still?

I was good, I was good. And then about the end of my third, like right when I was turning 14, I became the best player in the state.

At 14. So from 12 to 14, you went from scoring zero to being the best in the state of all ages.

Yep. But it's simple, like if you do the math on this, right? Like if you're thinking about how often kids are playing, Mm-. I tell this to my daughter and my daughter's team as well that I coach. It's a simple thing of math. If you want to be a great player, if you play every single day, two, three hours, every single day, or course of a year, how much better are you getting? Most kids will play maybe an hour and a half, two days a week. Right. Do the math on that. It's not gonna get it done. It's not gonna get it done, right? So if you're obsessively training two, three hours every single day, over a year, over two years. You'd accelerate. You make quantum leaps, man.

Just doing a summer camp for two weeks, you see a difference. I remember playing basketball going, I mean, you see it. You get a lot better and you come back more confident playing on the.

Playground with guys who used to beat you. Yeah, and I tell the parents with my team, I say, your kids are gonna become great basketball players. And they're like, really?

Yeah, it's not, there's no- It's math. That's it, show up every single day. Show up every single day, do the work. But you have this mamba mentality, your book's coming out soon, How did you develop this? There's a beautiful story that I love from Jay Williams. I don't know if you remember Jay Williams.

Yeah.

Where he did an interview a while back and he talked about how when he played you, I think the first time, or one of the first times he played against you, he was like, I'm gonna show up so early to the court to warm up and practice like before anyone. And he shows up at the court, I don't know if it was in LA or where it was, and you were the only one there already shooting free throws, already doing your fundamentals. And he goes, I'm gonna stay here until Kobe leaves. And then he was like, Gosh, an hour and a half, two hours later. I gotta go. I'm tired. And Kobe's still shooting free throws, scoring, like just going over the fundamentals. And then we played that game and you were lights out. And he came up to you afterwards and said, like, Dude, why were you in there for so long? Or how'd you do it? And he said, this is what he said, you said. He said, I knew you were watching and I wanted to show you that I was willing to outwork you.

Right. Something along those lines.

Yeah, yeah. I don't know if you remember this.

I remember it.

You remember, yeah.

And I thought that was so powerful that you have this mindset, but how did you develop that?

And I don't know if that's what.

You call the mama mindset, but how did you develop that? And when did it start?

It started in, in middle school and high school because a lot of the kids that I was playing against were inner city kids. And so you're looking at me as if, okay, this kid's soft, right? He's from the suburbs of Philadelphia. His father played in the NBA, played professionally.

Got it easy.

Got it easy. Born on second, you know, all this other stuff. Right. And so they felt like they could try to be physical or try to intimidate me and do all this other stuff, which they couldn't, right? But now I'm saying, okay, well, you're trying to attack me. How am I going to attack you? How can I mentally figure out ways to break you down? How can I show you that, no, I have the edge, right? And so that's when it first started for me, is figuring out how to get the upper hand on an opponent that way.

And what would you do to mentally.

Break people down then? Well, I mean, We used to have an all-American camp that I used to go to. And at the time, when I first showed, I was a sophomore. One of the things I would do is while everybody would be at the cafeteria work, you know, eating and doing that sort of stuff, I'd just go back to the gym. I just go back to the gym. They'd be resting. They'd be resting. And they'd see me leave. But now you're in a tough position, 'cause you're like, okay, I wanna be like, I'm following the kid to go work out. But I know he's working, he's up early and he's doing all this other stuff. And so that was my way of showing them Yeah, I may be from the suburbs, but you're not gonna outwork me. Wow. And I'm mentally gonna beat myself up. Did someone teach you that?

Was that just a thing that you decided, like, I'm gonna get in people's minds?

It's just figuring out ways to be better and to win the game. And it started as a defense mechanism because they were the ones talking trash to me and kid from Italy, blah, blah, blah, and all this other stuff. And it was like, okay, I can't let them, I gotta defend myself, right? And then it became, okay, Pretty witty, I can say some pretty witty things.

Yeah.

And an Italian.

And an Italian. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's interesting, you know, I never was physically gifted to an extreme level. I was always really good, but I was never like the fastest or biggest or strongest. But I remember my edge was, I'm not going to go party and I'm not going to drink alcohol.

Right.

So I've never been drunk still, 'cause I was like, I need every edge when guys were out partying late at night who were better than me. and drinking and showing up hungover, I was like, I'm gonna be more focused and have a clearer vision. But I wasn't waking up at 4:00 a.m. like you, so.

That's interesting because when I played, one of the things I had to learn is how to get the best out of my teammates. Yeah. And most people think it's a simple thing, you know, pass them the ball. But that's not how you make guys better. You have to really affect their behavior.

How do you do that?

I would tell guys, you know, Back to backs, you know, I don't care if we're in Miami, I don't care if we're in a great city or Chicago, you can't go out, we gotta get rest, right? Back to back games. Back to back games, right? Monday, Tuesday, you play Monday and play again Tuesday. Guys aren't gonna listen, right? You don't, you know, a few times say, all right, we'll all go out. We go out together.

Really?

I'll drink with you. But the next morning, I'm banging on your door at five in the morning. Let's go. They're not getting- Where are we going? I hung out with you, now you come hang out with me. This is what we do. All right, let's go. Air at the gym, we're working out, right? We hit the bus, we go to practice, we play that night. And they're dead. And they're dead. And they're like, lesson learned. Really? Lesson learned. So you take them out once. Listen, if you're gonna do that, do that. But don't let that compromise what we're here to do.

This is why we're here. This is why you're here in the first place.

Yeah. Right? And if we're gonna win a championship, we have to have that championship mentality and work ethic. That's it. That's it. So you gotta show them, Cobe can do that and still has the energy to get up and do this. So either I gotta meet that same.

Energy or I gotta keep my butt moving. Go to bed early, yeah. Wow, what are some other things you did to rise the level of your teammates? What are some other ways you can, and what do you think people can do in general with the business team or any sports team?

I think you have to listen, pay attention to what your colleagues or teammates are saying, and what are certain things that drive them, certain things that motivate them, that trigger them. One of my favorite ones, Powell hates it every time I tell this story. He hates it. He hates it. But we lost to the Celtics in '08. And it was a physical series. I mean, they beat the crap out of us. Yeah. And so we go into the Olympic year that year. We wound up playing Spain for the gold medal match. And we beat them. And so now we come back to start training camp. And Powell shows up the first day of training camp. I have my gold medal hanging in his locker. Oh, no. And he, I mean, like the one thing that he truly, truly loves is his country. Of course. That is like everything to him. So it just drove him crazy. I said, pal, listen. He said, you're an asshole. I said, listen, pal, you lost to the Celtics, you lost to us in a gold medal match. Let's not make this three in a row this year. Wow. That is win this thing. And that was it for him.

And he probably stepped up at a whole nother level.

Pal was a phenomenon to begin with. And then for him was just, step it up to a level of physicality that we needed him to get to, which he did, and we went on to win back-to-back championships.

My man. How important is understanding human psychology and human behavior to work with a team, as opposed to just relying on your gifts and talents?

It's probably the most important thing. You know, when you're in this culture in our society, you can do some phenomenal things individually, but they'll never reach their full potential. unless you do them collectively. And you have to figure out how to do that. And Phil Jackson was great at that. He wouldn't just coach the team or coach the game, but he'd read everything about every single player. He'd learn about your history, how you grew up, how you were raised, where were you raised, he'll read every interview, he'll learn about you and gives him a better understanding of what's motivating you or what your insecurities are, right? And then it just helps them communicate with you better or even push a button here if he needs to.

When did you learn that it was important to understand who your teammates are, what their likes or dislikes are? Was that in high school for you or more?

No, it was. I learned it from Phil. There was a stretch in '03 where Shaq was out with an injury. and Phil called me up to his office and said, okay, we need you to really turn on the afterburners and start scoring the ball if you have to win. So I did and I wound up scoring, I think it was nine straight games with 40 plus points. Nine straight. Nine straight games. And then Shaq comes back second to last game of that. And then Phil calls me up to his office and says, Kobe, okay, I need you to dial it back. I'm like, why? Like we're winning, I don't understand. It's because our goal is to win a championship. and we can get through the Western Conference with you playing this way. But in the East, you know, we can dominate them inside with Shaq in the post. But if you continue to do this, we'll lose Shaq. We'll lose him.

His motivation, his excitement.

What triggers him, right? So I need you to pull back so we can pull Shaq forward for June. Wow. And I just looked at him like, he's a smart dude. Wow. He's one smart dude, man. So I pulled Pull the bag. Wow. Yeah.

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What do you think has been the greatest challenge you've had since leaving the game?

I think it's, you know, I mean.

You won an Oscar, you're launching podcasts and shows and you got a book coming out.

Yeah, it's different though. We were just talking about it here in the office the other day. When you play the game, you hit a game-winning shot, you miss a shot, the reaction's there. You can see how people are responding to it, right? You can feel it.

The energy is there.

The energy is there. What I do now, you don't. Like, I don't see how people are affected by De'er Basketball or creating the Punies and you put it out there. Like, I wish I could see a car ride of a family the first time. Their daughter here's Lily's Lemonade and what she's doing, you know, she's singing along to it. That's not there, right? So that's the challenge. That's the one thing that I miss is being able to feed off of the energy.

The instant feedback that you get from shoot missing or scoring a shot, winning or losing a game.

It's like either way you're getting a result, right? Yes, yes, yes. That's the one thing. And I went to, 'cause I spent a lot of time with mentors as well. I've been Pixar and Disney Studios. It've been absolutely wonderful animation, Disney animation. And I've talked to them about Frozen and Moana and how our kids love them. And they're always like, oh, that's awesome. And they want to hear it because they don't ever get a chance to truly see it. Like, they're not sitting in a movie theater. No, no. And they don't have time to go to Disneyland and walk around the park and see how many families are enjoying the content that they've created because they're busy making the next one.

Creating. Yes. Yes. So that's the one thing. What do you think the biggest challenge.

Is for most athletes?

After they retire?

I think it's the fear of starting anew. And that was certainly present for me as well. Really? Yeah, identity, you mean?

Well, it's starting from scratch, right?

Because when you play for 20 years, I played for 20 years, you reach a certain level. You're like, okay, wait a minute, I have to start again at the base of a mountain and try to climb the top of this mountain. First of all, what mountain am I climbing? I don't even know, like, what the hell am I gonna be doing? And it's very scary.

Even for you.

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And the thing that helped me actually was hurting my Achilles. Because that forced me to sit there and say, okay, the day could be today that your career is over.

At any time when you were playing, you mean, yeah.

Now what do you do? You have these ideas about doing something with your life after basketball. But what if today is the day that you, that's it. Now what do you do? So I had all this time sitting there with my Achilles injury and contemplating and thinking and I said, I better get to work.

Wow.

That was that.

What was the vision for you afterwards then? Was it to do what you're doing now or did you have other ideas or what's the vision?

I struggled with it at first. 'Cause the first question I asked, which is the wrong question, is what's the biggest industry I can get into?

Was it more money thinking or? Yes, money thinking.

Saying, okay, athletes are saying you can't make more revenue when you retire. This is your source of your income is here. Saying, okay, that's a challenge. What can I do? And I remember going for- Didn't you launch a fund or something? I did, I did. And so I started, I went for a ride and I said, okay, stop thinking of it that way. You're thinking of it the wrong way. Why'd you start playing basketball? 'Cause I loved it. All right, what do you love to do? Oh, I love to tell stories. All right, let's do that. And then that's where it started for me. And then on top of that, it became things like, you know, you start learning more about the financial industry and about players going broke once they retire and saying, okay, how can I minimize the chances of that happening? What are things that I can do to invest my money smartly? Also help control some of that outcome to a certain extent. Right. and that's when I called Mike Rapaport, who Mike Rapaport was an entrepreneur who built Vitamin Water, Pirates Booty and some other companies and started learning from him. And then from that came the opportunity to invest in body armor. Yeah.

Yeah.

Which we're drinking now.

It's delicious.

But all that came from the injury, really having to self-assess face that, that really dark room of what comes next.

Storytelling is something you're really passionate about. What's a story over your life that's been a constant theme that you go back to? Is there something you heard as a kid that really resonates with you, or a book, or a movie that just feels like, this is me?

Yeah, that's funny. Movies, there are plenty, but there's a quote from one of my English teachers at Lower Marion named Mr. Fisk. He had a great quote that said, Rest at the end, not in the middle. And that's something I always live by. I'm not gonna rest, I'm gonna keep on pushing now. There are a lot of answers that I don't have, even questions that I don't have. But I'm just gonna keep going. I'm just gonna keep going and I'll figure these things out as we go, right? And you just continue to build that way. So I try to live by that all the time.

Rest at the end.

Rest at the end.

What's the question that eats you alive the most that you haven't answered yet?

The question that eats me alive that I haven't answered yet.

But you're still looking for the answer.

I'm still looking for the answer. how to tell a good story? I don't think anybody has that answer. You know, like when I sat down to write your basketball, I was like, okay, what do I want to say? You have certain acts and how you can structure certain things, right? The ebbs and flows of story, certain formulas that have been there since the beginning of time. But it's such an exact science.

So challenging, yeah.

Right? And so, That one question is really interesting.

Why do you want to tell a great story?

I think stories is what moves the world. Whether it's an inspirational story, it's an informational one. Nothing in this world moves without story. Be it from the political world, sports world, nothing that we have moves without story. And so I think that is the root of everything. And if we're going to try to make the world a better place, Stories are right places. Yeah, I agree. Most people don't understand, like my last year people would come up to me and say, okay, what are you gonna do? I said, I'm gonna be a storyteller. Really?

And they go, what are you talking about?

All right, man. So, what are you really gonna do? Yeah, like what's gonna happen when you retire is you're gonna go through like a week of depression. Yeah. Then the second week is gonna be like denial and all sorts of that. I'm like, dude, seriously, I'm good. So after a while I just got sick a bit and I just, just, I said, I don't know. I'll go play golf or something.

Right, you just tell them a line.

I'm not gonna do anything.

I'll best real estate.

Whatever, I'm not gonna do anything. I'm just gonna sit around.

What does losing feel like to you?

It's exciting.

Why is it exciting?

Because it means you have different ways to get better. There are certain things that you can figure out that you can take advantage of, right? Certain weaknesses that were exposed that you need to shore up. So it was exciting. I mean, it sucks to lose.

Right.

But at the same time, their answer is there if you just look at them.

'Cause you get the information from losing more than from winning probably.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, the answers are there when you win too. You just have to look at them, right? So it's a constant process. It's exciting when you win, it's exciting when you lose 'cause the process should be exactly the same. Whether you win or you lose, as you go back and you look and you find things that you could have done better. you find things that you've done well that worked, figure out how did they work, why did they work, how can you make them work again? But the hardest thing is to face that stuff. That's a really, really tough challenge. You mean face it, you mean look.

Yourself in the mirror and say, okay, this is how I showed up or this is what happened. I'll give you an example.

So Katie Lou Samuelson is one of the best college basketball players in the country. She plays at UConn, she's gonna be a senior. Right now. Right now. She's from Huntington Beach out here by us. And so she comes down and she works with some of my girls on the team and she helps coach. They just had a really tough season last year where they lost to Notre Dame in the final.

That's right.

Really tough. First loss in life. First loss. Years, right? And so I asked her, I said, have you watched the Notre Dame game? She was like, no. Well, why not? I said, I don't wanna watch that. I said, I know you don't, but you're gonna play Notre Dame this year, yeah? Yeah. What's the chances you see him again in the final? Well, you probably see him again. I said, well, you can't show up and play them. without knowing why you lost that one, right? So, you know, the mistakes that you've made in that game, you have to do the hard stuff and watch that game and study that game to not make those mistakes over and over again just because you weren't brave enough to face it. So she came down to the office. I brought down the office and we sat down, we watched that game together, right? And you gotta, you gotta deal with it.

Face it.

Gotta deal with it. Face it, learn from it.

Wow, it must have been cringing for her to just be like, oh, replaying.

Like we could have won all these things.

That's exactly it, isn't it? I just did that one thing. Exactly.

If I didn't get that foul, if I was scoring that layup. That's exactly right. You're looking at it and say, oh, there's the mismatch. Oh, there's the gap, you know, and all those little things and it sucks, but you don't want to have that feeling again, do you, right? So you gotta really study it, face it. Not to say you'll win the next.

Time you face it, but at least you'll give yourself a better chance.

Yeah.

What was your routine and ritual like after every game? Would you watch almost every game over or certain games? All of them.

Every game you ever watch?

Every game.

The whole game back?

The whole game. No way.

Yeah. So it started with me when I was, when Phil Jackson's, his first year here with the Lakers, one of assistant coaches, his name was Tex Winter, and I call him Yoda. I mean, he was like 82 when he got here. Wow. He was responsible for teaching me the triangle offense.

How old were you then?

I was 21. So three years, four years in the league? Yeah, so about my fourth year in the league. And so I go up to his room and this is when there were no iPads or anything like that, right? So when you're on the road- you- have to call down to the front desk and they have to bring up the TV. But the whole, you know, the rollie thing and the VHS and the cassette tape, you pop it in. And I thought we were gonna watch what we call touches. So watch all your touches when you have the ball, all the decisions you make, good ones and bad. No, we're watching the start of the game to the end of the game. Not like the TV feed, watching the in arena feed, the layup line, the timeouts.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah, rewinding, stopping, fast forward, rewinding, slow motion, every little thing, every game of that season with the 82-year-old Yoda.

Oh my gosh.

Who is as brutally honest as you can get.

What did that teach you that season?

Oh, it taught me to look at detail. Right. Look at things at their smallest. Look at body language. Look at the energy between players, our team and the other team. Right. Look at the tactics, you know, look at the overall strategy, and they'll look at how tactically things are manifesting themselves. And because I watched so much film, then it gave me the ability to see game in real time as if I was watching. W, or I can see boup, up pu upp pu upp 'cause a of times game starts moving really fast. But if you train yourself to watch hours and hours of film, the game's not moving that fast any or you can really recognize who's doing what and why.

Then you can position guys in the right places in real time. Hm Seeing it before it happens, yes.

Yeah.

We in on football we'd watch it once a week, game film, but not after every game. it was only one game a week.

You got it like three three weeks Yeah.

Yeah, you gotta you gotta go. I know what I know Tom Brady' is obsessive over game him as well in watching his that came out, Tom Hanks' time, was all about him just in there studying. Even months after the game, he's studying to prepare, right?

It's just like, he's a boss.

That's one of the keys, you think? It's like, if you're not watching film, whether it be as a speaker on stage or a performer and a musician, if you're not watching yourself back.

You gotta learn, man. I mean, Beyonce's same thing.

Really?

After a performance, she's immediately on her laptop rewatching the performance. No way. Yes, seeing how to do things better. What could we have done differently? It's an obsessiveness that comes along with it. You want things to be as perfect as they can be, understanding that nothing is ever perfect. But the challenge is try to get them as perfect as they can be. And what can you do? It's in your control. So control what you can. I can watch film all day long. It's gonna help me get better. Yes, yes.

Now, did you have your teammates also follow on this obsessiveness that you had as well? Or did you just encourage them or.

What was the- no, you can't push somebody to do that, right? But what you can do is alter behavior and also change the vernacular of how they speak about the game. So on team buses, team planes, in a locker room after practice, I would look at the film, I'd pull Powell, Lamar, D-Fish, pull them aside and say, let's look at this. Right, we probably should have done this, that, and the other.

So you'll show them the game film.

A little bit here and there. Yeah, and then you speak to them in executional terms. It's never, come on guys, we can do better. Come on guys, we can do better. That's rah-rah stuff. A leader must give very tactical things that we can do, adjustments. Okay, the defense is doing this, that, and the other. That means we should probably do this, this, this, and the other. By midway through the season, through that behavior, you start seeing them communicating the same way back to you. Right? And it's like, okay, Kobe, they're doing this, that, and the other to you. Maybe we should do this and that.

And you're like, okay, yeah, awesome, great. Let's do it. Yeah, yeah. What about season 16, 17, 18?

Are you still watching every game film as obsessively as the first 10 years? Not now, no. Well, when I was playing- When you were playing. Yeah. So when I was playing, what I would do is study the film, but study our younger players and see what areas do they need to develop in. and how can I help them develop? That was the big challenge, as you move from being the single dominant player to understanding, okay, I have to help these other guys.

How do I lift everyone else up?

It's tough.

You were so dominant in your whole career, one of the greatest of all time. Was there a weakness that you had? Or did you, because obviously you're always trying to master your weaknesses so they became strengths, but did you at the end or towards the end, did you ever feel like, gosh, I still haven't Mastered this one part of the game.

The challenge for me was always compassion and empathy.

'Cause you're like, Guys, let's go. Get results.

Shut up. Don't complain, right? I don't wanna hear your whining. I don't wanna hear it. No excuses. Don't tell me how rough the water is. Just bring the boat in. You know, I don't wanna hear it. And it's, that's funny. It's understanding, like, okay, these guys have lives. Right. Outside of that. They have other things happening. They have other things happening to them that may be affecting the way that they're practicing or the way that they're performing, right? And it was hard for me to understand that 'cause nothing bothered me, anything personally that never phased me when I was a player.

You compartmentalized it.

Very well. So I couldn't understand how my teammates couldn't do that either. So I had to really work on that aspect of it.

That's hard. Did you feel like you never really had the compassion you wish you would have had? Like until the last maybe couple of.

Years, yeah, I think about '09 things started changing for me. I started really making a conscious effort to better understand. And that doesn't mean, I mean, you have compassion and empathy, so you go softer on them. It's more like you put yourself to the side and you put yourself in their shoes and understand what they're feeling. And then you have to make certain decisions of, okay, what buttons do I need to push for this player to get them to the next level? So it's never It's not sit around and all, it's all happy-go-lucky type of thing. Your leader, your job is to get the best out of them, even if they may not like it at that time. Yeah.

Wow. What are you most proud of from your 20 seasons?

Honestly, it was, may sound a little shallow, but I gotta say beating the Celtics in Game 7. That's what I'm most proud of, 'cause it was the hardest. They were playing with Rajon Rondo, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, All-Stars. Ray Allen. And it was myself, Powell, and players that other teams didn't want. And how do we figure out as a group what to do? And the reason why I love that series so much is that we went down three games to two against Boston. And now you got two games coming home. I remember sitting in the locker room and they beat the crap out of us too that game. So we're sitting in the locker room, And it's really, really quiet. I'm sitting there looking around and we just lost the Celtics in '08. So this is like revenge, right? And they're kicking our butt again, right? So I sit around, I just started laughing. I started laughing and then I remember Derrick Fisher looked at me like, and Lamar looked at me and goes, what is funny? I said, dude, they beat the crap out of us. They just beat the crap out of us. I said, I'm missing the part where that's funny. I said, man, listen, if we start this season and they say all you have to do is win two games at home and you're NBA champ, what'd you take that?

Yeah.

They'Re like, right, that's all we gotta do.

Yeah.

Go home. Win two. We're NBA champions. All you gotta do is win two games in a row. That's it. We'll take care of the first game and I promise you they're not winning game seven on our home floor. It's not happening. So we all just laughed about it. and then we went out and we figured it out. But that game seven was, we're down 15 points in the fourth quarter. Right? And that's when you have to collectively look at each other and say, you know, the spirit of your team must be good. Because at that moment is when teams fracture. If the energy amongst each other isn't there, that trust isn't there, you're done. And we were able to collectively dig deep together and say, all right, we're going to figure this thing out. And I wasn't playing well. I wasn't shooting the ball well at all. And so my teammates picked you up and they delivered.

Yes. Wow. I saw on Instagram that you're up at like 4:00 a.m. lifting by yourself in the dark. And again, you've had one of the most incredible careers arguably of all time, made all the money in the world, got a freaking Oscar now, you've got all these other things happening, and yet you're still waking up, or at least you're in the gym at 4:00 a.m. working out. and you just turned 40, right? Which congratulations, by the way. Thank you. I hope I look as good as you. Why still wake up that early and train at this level in your life right now? There's several factors for that. Like when I first retired, let myself go a little bit.

Really? You got a little. Oh yeah, oh yeah. A little chubby life. It was awesome.

You enjoyed everything.

I was like, man, I'm eating. What? Bring it to me. Let's go. Steak. Oh, let's go, right? Milkshakes, let's do it. Let's do it. And then the challenge was, okay, can I get back in shape? And it's really hard because there's no end goal. There's no game.

There's no season.

There's no- Right, so how do you.

Motivate yourself to do that? How do you? And so for me, it was like, okay, I have to aim for something. So I said, I want to aim for size. I want to aim for bulk, right? So that's a tangible thing. I'm going to go for that, right? But then also it's, you know, my children. Because, like, you know, your kids can't see how hard you work. You go to the office, I come in the studio, they don't really see the effort. right? So how can we teach our children what it means to work hard? Well, you do it through training. So when I get up in the morning, my daughter goes with me.

4 a.m.?

4 a.m. My 15 year old goes with me. She goes with me before school and it becomes a daddy-daughter thing.

That's cool.

She just got her permit. So she drives in the morning. It becomes a cool thing, right? But through that process, she understands the value of hard work and things taking time. And the same thing with my 12 year old, right? She practices every day. Right? And so it's through those behaviors is where I find the motivation to do it.

And what brings you the most joy right now?

Being with my family. Really? That is, man, that is the most fun. It's just, you know, it's hanging out with them all summer, being able to do things that I ordinarily couldn't do. Yeah. 'Cause of training, 'cause of season and stuff like that. So being around them and watching Bianca grow up, 'cause a lot of things that I miss with Nathalie and Gianna, because I was playing. and so being there every day with them is so much fun, man. So it brings me the most joy.

That's amazing. And what does love feel like for you?

What does love feel like? Happiness is such a, I think I would describe love as happiness. I think I'd describe it as a beautiful journey. You know, it has its ups and downs, right? Whether it's in marriage, whether it's in the career, Things are never perfect, but through love, you continue to persevere and you move through them. You move through them. And then through that storm, beautiful sun emerges. Yeah. And inevitably another storm comes. Guess what? You ride that one out too. So I think love is a certain determination and persistence to go through the good times and the bad times with the someone or something that you truly love.

You've got a new podcast out right now called the Punies, which I started listening to. I'd listened to the first two episodes. It's incredible. They're like 13 to 15 minutes episodic storytelling cartoons, I guess, for kids. And the thing I love about it the most is it's funny, it's entertaining, there's original music, there's all these different characters. You're teaching history, like, in a fun way, which I like the last one, where it's like, We talk about history so we don't repeat it in our own lives. And then you teach lessons about overcoming failure for kids and insecurities and challenges we're facing. And I think it's beautiful. Can you talk about the Punies in the podcast and what it's all about? Yeah.

So the Punies came to me from, you know, we have our family tradition where we watch the Sandlot every Fourth of July.

God, it's the greatest movie in the summer.

Squints. Oh, my God.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

-S'Mores, baby. -Dude, come on. Give me some s'mores. So like that's our family ritual. Oh my God. Every 4th of July. Sandlot. Sandlot, right? And so after watching the Sandlot, I was like, we need a new sports movie like this, right? So I started kind of concepting ideas and stuff, but nothing I truly loved. And then over Thanksgiving, our other ritual is to watch Charlie Brown. Uh huh.

Right.

In the pumpkin patch, right? So we watched that and then I go, whoa, wait a minute. Let's just put those together. put those together, right? And I already had written some stories, individual stories for Puny Pete and BB. That's how I see it.

Two of the characters.

Two of the characters and the Punies. And I said, well, let's combine those. And then from that, that's when the Punies started coming to fruition. And I started thinking about the characters and, you know, why does this show need to exist? And what are some of the deeper messages that can be there that consciously you may not observe, but you can sense and feel. And that's when I started constructing the show.

And are you part of the whole process? Are you helping write the script? Are you helping?

So we have a young producer here who actually started here three years ago while he was still at SC and has since grown into a position.

Greatest film school.

Greatest film school. And so he and I worked together hand in hand on outlining every single episode. So we outline each episode, the story beats, And then we found a great writer named John Holler. He's a great writer. And so we gave him the outline and he just made it a thousand times better. And then I just, I directed each episode.

You oversee it all.

You edit, you direct, you- yeah, yeah, yeah. So the other challenge was finding great actors.

Voice acting is a different skill.

Yes, it's a challenging art form. I mean, you really have to be able to communicate a lot just through your voice.

Essence and energy with your voice.

Yeah.

And so the trick was finding actors that have not lost that childlike quality, right? They can still imagine themselves being children, being at the park and playing, right? And once we found them, they really brought the characters to life. And now here we are with the Punies, man.

It's amazing. I want you guys to go download it right now, subscribe. It's the Punies on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and anywhere podcasts are at. I'm telling you guys, there's a lot of parents listening to this show. Download this, listen to it in your car, and do me a favor. Take a video of your kids in the car and send it to me. Tag me on Instagram. Tag Kobe on Instagram.

Yes. That would be amazing. Because that's what's going to give you great feedback.

Oh, gosh. That would be amazing. Seeing how kids react. So put your phone again, don't film and drive. Do it when have someone else filming it, right? But make sure, or put it on a GoPro and just press record. It's about 15 minutes long. Take your kids to school.

It is like, take them to the park too. Like on Saturday, we made them on Saturdays. Like every Saturday it's a new episode.

Because Saturday is normally the day us.

Parents drive our kids to different sporting events. To the pool, to the games, the park. Yes, that's why every episode has to be between 12 to 15, 16 minutes, right? 'Cause that's normally the drive.

Sometimes it may be longer. And in that case, you can play multiple episodes.

That's something you can listen to on.

Your way to an event. It's like many frozen and Moana episodes. It's like little, with original music and all that stuff. It's really cool. Go download it. Again, take a video and tag Kobe on Instagram.

Are you on Instagram a lot? I am on Instagram, yeah. Tag him. Especially Lily's Lemonade.

Listen to Lily's Lemonade.

And I would love to see kids.

Out there trying to do the Lily's Lemonade song. Love it.

Hopefully we'll get a bunch of video clips for you. And your book is out in October. It's called Mamba Mindset. Do you want to talk briefly about that? well, the mentality book is really about process and craft. I've broken a book up into two sections. And process is really about the process of preparing through injury, recovery, studying of the game. And then the craft is the actual performance and the tactics. And so a lot of things that I learned through the game were through photos. You can look at a photo and see like a player making a move and look at the angle of his feet. Look how he's using his hands on defense. and I can really break down things to the smallest detail through that. And that's what you'll see in this book. I mean, it's really a basketball Bible. Yeah.

Mama, but it's also your mindset Bible, right?

Yeah. Yeah. When you see how I break things down, like how I'm looking at things to the smallest of detail. Yeah. And that's the best way to understand how to have that kind of mentality is to ask questions, then find answers, and then that lead to more questions, and you find more answers. And that's what the book is.

I love it. Make sure you guys get the book. you can pre-order right now, download the Punies, follow you on social media. The final question is, what's your definition of greatness?

I think the definition of greatness is to inspire the people next to you. I think that's what greatness is or should be. It's not something that lives and dies with one person. It's how can you inspire a person to then in turn inspire another person that then inspires another person. and that's how you create something that I think lasts forever. And I think that's our challenge as people, is to figure out how our story can impact others and motivate them in a way to create their own greatness.

Well, I want to acknowledge you again, man, for the inspiration. You're just a symbol of truth and inspiration to so many people.

Thanks, man.

And I just appreciate you as a human.

So.

Thanks, man.

Appreciate it.

And that is the Kobe Bryant interview. I hope you enjoyed this. I've just been reflecting a lot in these last day, all day, haven't been able to stop thinking about it, talking about it with friends, reflecting on it. Our whole team meeting today was about an hour and a half talking about how impactful his life was to us, what we learned from him, the lessons. You know, he's not a perfect human being. but he continued to grow and learn. He looked like he was really making a lot of progress in his personal life and his mentality about happiness and love and family and everything. And it's just a beautiful reminder for me that there are a lot of things that I get frustrated with too quickly, get triggered by too easily. A lot of things I get angry with that I don't need to. My girlfriend, Jeanette, she's always saying, you know, baby, you stress too much. All we have is this moment. She says this over and over to me. She's like, baby, you stress too much. It's good to think about the future and dreams and goals and plan, but all we have is this moment.

And.

Sometimes, It's really unfortunate that things like this happen to hit us even harder and remind us. And I'm just grateful, grateful for my life, grateful for the people in my life, for my health. I'm grateful for Kobe and how he impacted the world with what he did. I'm grateful for the time he spent with me, the impact he made on my life personally. And there are so many lessons that he taught me through his example, through his symbol, and through the time of meeting him again, just being there, him being there an hour before me when no one was there to prepare and visualize and dream. I just thought it was, I still can't, I've never seen anything like that from someone at his level that didn't need to be there. Usually people just walk in last minute. and it's kind of like, okay, let's get through this. He truly cared.

And.

Again, if you enjoyed this, spread the message. Lewis house.com 908, the Kobe Bryant interview. Feel free to tag me on Instagram or Twitter or social media. I'm seeing a lot of people sharing this out right now. People are finding it, discovering it, sharing it, cutting up clips from the YouTube video and posting it everywhere. So Feel free to share it out. If you know someone who was a fan of his, a friend of his, that maybe didn't hear this perspective of him yet, please share this with them. And let this be a reminder of the inspiration that he was and the inspiration he is for so many people. I know he truly inspired the world globally. Some great quotes he shared again in this interview. He said, You know things are never perfect, but through love you continue to persevere, you move through them, and then through that storm a beautiful sun emerges. Kobe Bryant, thank you for everything. I love you all so very much. And go out there and do something great.