If You Want To GUARANTEE SUCCESS In Your Life, WATCH THIS! | Emmanuel Acho

When you don't set a goal, you can't fail. Right. And so many of us combat failure in our lives. So many of us are trying to figure out how can I become the best version of myself, but we can't become the best version of ourselves because.

We'Re-- I think you gotta have a dream. The School of Greatness.

Really? Yeah.

Please welcome Lewis Howes. What's been the biggest lesson in the last couple of years of taking your shot, of putting it out there, being on a limb, and then learning about how to handle the opportunities of success, the fame, the recognition, and also how have you learned how to say yes and no to certain things that might be big but not right for you at the right moment.

Two lessons.

Yes.

I'll give you one pre-success, one post success. I'll start with the post success lesson because that one I'm learning right now as I'm talking to you. Everybody will not like you and that is okay. 'cause you don't like everybody. And you know, I've had to realize like, yo, people don't like me, man. Like, this person's mad at me, a black person's mad at me because I'm too nice to white people. A white person's mad at me because I'm a race baiter. Why don't people like me? And then I kick back and I said, wait a second, I don't like everybody. So how can I expect everybody to like me? It was something dude, I've had a hard time to reconcile with because... 'Cause.

You'Re a nice guy, right?

You want to be liked by people. That's it. At least I try to be a nice guy. And in the midst of trying to be a nice guy, I'm still like, why are so many people upset daily? And I have to reconcile with that. Pre-success, I think it's, you know, the old phrase, Noah didn't wait till it started raining to build a boat. Right? Like, we don't wait until things get crazy to start building. And I think what you've learned, what I've learned, what I hope people learn through this conversation, It's what you do in private and in silence that ends up getting praised in public. It's the wood that you're chopping when nobody's looking. It's the paintings that you're drawing when nobody's buying. It's the words that you're saying when nobody's listening. It's the character you're developing when nobody's watching. Like what you're doing in private is ultimately what ends up getting esteemed in public. And what I've learned now retroactively It was the work in private that ended up getting praised in public.

Ooh. And you worked for years on developing these skills and... Everything.

Everything. Well, what I've learned, dude, in talking to you and watching you, my own life studying from brilliant minds that have come before us as we try to achieve our own, the greatest creations individually and collectively are the synthesis of different creations. I think about Velcro. Velcro was created, and I'll paraphrase, but Velcro was created was somebody was walking through the wilderness, if I'm not mistaken, and those little annoying pricklies, those little pricklies got stuck to a sock. And they were like, well, if a prickly can adhere to a sock as an adhesive, why can't I create something? So you take the concept of a prickly and the concept of a sock and you create Velcro. And my life was the synthesis of NFL locker room, predominantly a white private school, a predominantly urban NFL locker room, synthesize those together and create content.

Perspective. Here's a perspective.

Bingo. So everybody just has to figure out what two things can they combine together to become that greatest version of themselves.

You really became a bridge for a lot of people that didn't see the other side of the river.

Correct, right?

There's a river, there's a separation of ideas, thought, understanding, whatever you want to call it, connection. And you were able to see different sides and bridge the gap with your own Velcro. Now, for someone who has a gap in their imagination, they see a future that they want to create, they see an idea, a vision, a goal, whatever you wanna call it. But they don't know how to become the Velcro and bridge it to get to the other side. What has been your thoughts or your philosophy and your advice on how to accomplish, set, and achieve goals?

Man, I love that question. I love that question. Dude, I don't believe in goals. I no longer believe in goals. Crazy, because I know we're told for so long, Set a goal, write it down, live by it. True story, y'all. Maybe one of the most depressing moments of my life. After my junior year playing football at the University of Texas, Texas a top flight college football program at the time, I submitted my name to go to the NFL draft. I wanted to go professionally after three years. But I got back from the NFL a report. Emmanuel, you will not be drafted in rounds one through three. you will be drafted in rounds four through seven. There are seven total rounds in the NFL draft for those watching and eventually listening. I'm not going in the fourth through seventh round. I'll come back for my senior year.

Oh, this is a junior year.

Junior year. Gotcha. So what I said was this. I took that sheet of paper that said a manual you won't be drafted in rounds one through three and I highlighted that line you won't be drafted in rounds one through three and I hung it above my bed and I put one of those little sticks through the wall and the paper in my bed. I looked at it every morning I woke up and every night before I went to sleep. You know what they say about goals.

Look at them.

Commit them to memory. Well, while at the NFL Combine, I'm running my 40 at the conclusion of my senior year. The NFL Combine again for those watching listening, it is the ultimate job interview if you want to go to the NFL. I'm running a 40-yard dash which will dictate essentially where I will be drafted. What round you're in, yes. Exactly. As I'm running, I'm running, I hear this. Boom, boom, boom, boom. I thought my heels were clicking. They weren't. My quad was tearing off the bone. Oh, man. I clutch it, my man. I fall to the ground in sheer agony.

During the 40s? During the 40s.

When every scout and coach is watching.

Everyone watching. I still have the ESPN. NFL TV is filming.

It's on ESPN. My bones blowing up with text. Are you okay? X, Y, and Z. Terrible. I clutched to the ground. I'll save you all the rest of that details of that story. I end up getting drafted in the sixth round. I learned a valuable lesson that day. Stop setting goals. Here's why. At best, if you set a goal, you will achieve it. But what if you could have achieved more? At worst, if you set a goal and you don't achieve it, you ruin your self-esteem and your self-efficacy. My self-esteem and my self-efficacy or your self-worth, how you look at yourself, We're ruined that day. We're undermined that day. So instead of setting goals now, Louis, I have an objective with no limitations, small difference, but that small difference will make a huge impact on your life. A goal by definition is an end towards which energy is aimed. An objective is simply directing energy towards something. So why if I'm gonna have a goal, would I focus on the end when I'm at the beginning? Instead, I direct all of my energy towards something. I start my book, Illogical, which you and I are going to get into, Imagine a Life Without Failure. Why? Because when you don't set a goal, you can't fail. And so many of us combat failure in our lives. So many of us are trying to figure out, How can I become the best version of myself? But we can't become the best version of ourselves because we're still mourning our former self. We're still mourning our failures from our past. We're still mourning our defeats from our our past, we're still mourning our scars from our yester years. I'm done mourning my scars. Now it's all about having an objective with no limitations, similar to that quote, if you shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you land amongst the stars.

So, as opposed to creating a goal then, what are you creating? Are you not creating something, you're creating an objective?

Correct, I'm creating an objective. So what would it look like then? Beautiful. People would always ask me when I got in the TV, Hey, Emmanuel, you want to be like Michael Strahan, right? For those that aren't familiar, Michael Strahan hosts Good Morning America, co-host NFL Hall of Famer. He's that guy. I said, no, I don't want to be like Michael Strahan. Because if I say I want to be like Michael Strahan, I might just be like Michael Strahan. And while that's great for Michael Strahan, he's already taken. So why would I want to be like this man who's already taken? As great and as great and as great as he is, Michael Strahan's already taken. I gotta be a Manuel Lachao. So when people ask me, what do you want to be? I just say, I want to be considered one of the most creative people the industry has ever seen. My objective is subjective. My objective is subject to people's opinion.

It's like art.

Bingo. It's exactly like art, bro. And let's speak of art.

Yeah.

Lil Wayne. One of my favorite verses. He says, when you mentioned Pac, Biggie, and Jay-Z, just remember Wheezy Baby. Or when you mention Pac, Biggie and Jay-Z make sure you mention Weezy Baby essentially saying, when you mention the greats of all time, just make sure you mention me too. You're not saying I want to be the greatest. You know what I'm saying? He didn't say the best rapper alive, all that. But his objective was subjective. When you mentioned Tupac, when you mentioned Biggie, when you mentioned Jay-Z just make sure you mention me too. And where I am now at, with my desires in life, I don't have goals anymore, bro. Because if you have a goal, you can fail. And I'm done failing. While people say, Yo, Acho, that's crazy. Remember, our greatest accomplishments in life are typically crazy.

They're not rational.

They're completely irrational. They're completely irrational. And a quote that I'm hung up on now, I'm hung up on it, Will Smith said in his latest book. He said, Remember, when somebody gives you their advice, it's just that. It's their advice based on their limited life experiences. You and now are a unique combination of which has never occurred before.

That's true.

By which you are the best metric of success. You and now, unique combination, never occurred before. You're the best metric of success. So me and this present moment, in this conversation with you, It's never occurred before.

Right.

So how this conversation is going to go is dependent upon you, dependent upon me, me and writing a book. This new book's never occurred before. So why would I be limited by someone else's standards? It's kind of like what you and I discussed off camera. We can bring it on camera. I know you wouldn't mind. Don't let insignificant people have such significance over your life. Yeah. And that's often what we do, bro.

Why do you think so many people focus on the insignificance of other people's thoughts and opinions.

Because we all want to be liked, man. And, and, and.

And how have you learned to let go of that feeling of being liked or loved or thought in a positive light when people say things that you don't like?

Well, my favorite quote, maybe for the last decade, top three favorite quotes, because I'm a huge quote guy. One of my favorite quotes. And those who were dancing were thought to be crazy by those who didn't hear the music. Imagine, and we've all been in this situation before, imagine walking on the beach, biking through the city, and you see somebody just dancing. You'd be like, yo, what the heck are they doing? Exactly. But maybe they're not crazy. Maybe they just had headphones in and you couldn't see. those who were dancing were thought to be crazy by those who didn't hear the music. What I've realized, there's come a point in my time, in my life where I'm dancing and people think I'm crazy. They just don't hear the music yet. You're dancing. You start, you're 1200 episodes in now. People think you're crazy. They just didn't hear the music yet. So many people watching this are dancing and people think they're crazy. No, the people that think they're crazy just haven't heard the music yet. So we have to understand we're not crazy. They just haven't heard the music. And that is what keeps me going, realizing, Yo, I'm not crazy. I'm on my path to greatness, and eventually they will catch up. Yeah.

So when you see someone saying something negative for whatever reason or anything, how do you handle it internally? And then how do you handle it externally? Do you reply to certain things? If someone's saying something, maybe it's true or it's inaccurate. Do you take the energy to defend yourself or respond? Or you just say, you know what? Okay, this is their opinion. I'm gonna focus on my vision.

It's really good. Sometimes I do fall into that cesspool, if you will, of social media. It's the worst.

Tough man.

At times it could be the worst. Social media does great things. It clearly has for you, clearly has for me. But it can be the worst. I think about this. In the jungle, not all animals want to be patted. Some just want to roar.

It's true.

And Twitter is the jungle. Social media is the jungle. In the jungle, not all animals want to be pet, man. Some just want to roar. And you have to understand when you log on social media and when you are in those spaces, some people just want to roar. And then I also remember, and this is from a movie, another quote, A person is smart, but people are dumb, angry animals. Individually, collectively, you and I are smart. But when you get amongst a crowd, then all of a sudden you have that crowd chaos, if you will. And I said this because I've been thinking so much recently that cowards turn courageous when they can remain anonymous. Cowards turn courageous when they can remain anonymous. Oh, wow. And so often on social media and in life, people can remain anonymous. In group settings at stadiums, people can remain anonymous.

Say it to my face. Come say this to my face and let's have a conversation.

That's it.

We don't need to fight.

We can have, I can talk.

We can talk.

Bro, I reached out to somebody the other day because, you know, he reached out to me and he was like, he didn't reach out to me. He tweeted at me, this was a clown take and not surprising considering the source. I'm like, you got a million followers on social media. We used to work at the same company. You can get my number. I called him up, oh man, my bad, I regretted it as soon as I said it. Man, I shouldn't have said it. It's on me. And I'm like, do we got issues? Just let me know. But I think people get in the midst of that mob mentality and it's sheer chaos. I will say to your point, it's been hard, as you know. Like that journey-- It's tough. Up the mountain top. And I'm still trying the journey, but it's gonna be depressing.

How do you manage it emotionally? And manage your emotions when you see something that maybe is seeming unfair or just mean?

Man.

And maybe you're not doing it the best way yet, but you're on the journey.

Sometimes you just gotta step away.

Yeah, don't respond.

Don't respond. And honestly, log off. I think we have such a mental health crisis right now in society in large part because of social media. We are seeing things we were never meant to see. We're hearing things we were never meant to hear. And we're reading things we were never meant to read.

And we're seeing, hearing, and reading them in a very elaborate manner with a lot of, I don't know, emotion. It's like we used to read or see things or hear stories without watching the news in such a way that was dramatized to its worst point to get the attention. This is one of the reasons I don't really watch the news ever. I want to be informed and educated, but I don't want to be entertained or captivated by my emotions, overwhelmed by watching information as entertainment. And so I try to step back and say, Tell me the facts, tell me the data, so that I can have a rational thought around it. Otherwise, I'll get tied into just watching the news and be like, the world is ending.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think we all have to do a better job of protecting our own minds, our own spaces, what we can take and what we can't take. Because you only get one mind, dude. And I know you pride yourself on your mind. I pride myself on my mind. Dude, we only get one. And I think we all have to do a better job of protecting our own mental health.

I grew up in a religion called a Christian Science and the founder is a female. Her name is Mary Baker Eddy and she had a quote that said, Stan Porter at the door of thought. Don't allow these thoughts to enter the mind continuously because then it'll damage everything in your life. So Stan Porter at the door of thought, be a guard. at the thought, at the mind. And don't just allow anything to be consumed by it. So, what has been the biggest struggle then for you mentally and emotionally in the last couple of years?

The biggest struggle is trying to ascend to the mountaintop. And the reason I say that, bro.

Is to get to the mountaintop.

Yes. Trying to climb the mountain.

What is the mountaintop?

I think the mountaintop is different for everyone.

Is that a goal?

For me, the Mountaintop is checking boxes.

Okay.

Right? Like, it's checking boxes.

Give me an example.

An example.

Okay, great.

Now I host my own show on sports. Speech for yourself. Check. Okay, great. Now I partnered with Oprah on a book. Oh, another book. Oh, a third book. Check. Okay, but the book has to bestell. Check. It's just like, it's just trying to ascend, trying to do and not being dejected when you don't. And then, bro, I also think trying to figure out our place on this earth. I think we're all trying to do that. When we remove the masks and the makeup, figuratively speaking, of our life, we're all trying to figure out what value am I providing to the people I'm interacting with? What value am I providing to society? Where is my place in life? And I've been constantly, my biggest struggle the last couple years is trying to really figure that out. And now that it appears I figured that out, trying to sustain the heat, excuse me, the hate that comes with that.

The heat and the hate, huh? 'Cause I don't think people understand that once you have audience and attention, there will be heat and hate. No matter how pure your intentions are, no matter how kind you try to be, there'll be hate.

You know what I've realized, man, and my co-host, Marcellus Wiley, says this, criticism is the cost of praise. It is. We don't realize that enough. Like recently, for those watching sports news, Naomi Osaka, number one tennis player in the world just a couple of years ago, she tried to stop a tennis match 'cause somebody said you suck. Somebody yelled you suck and she went to the judge and was like, and went to the umpire and was like, yo, can we stop the match? Can we get them kicked out? Recently, two days ago.

She tried to stop the match. They say, Kick that person out.

Correct. And at the end of the postgame presser, tears came into her eyes for different reasons. And I was just like, Criticism is the cost of praise.

And if you don't want criticism, don't play the game.

It's like you don't have a choice.

Don't play, don't show up.

You can't play if you don't want criticism. It's not even like you were advising Donuts, like, Yo, Criticism comes with it.

Here's the funny thing, not to cut you off, is that you're gonna be criticized at the top or criticized for doing nothing. You might as well do something you enjoy. 'Cause if you're sitting on the couch and you have all this potential, but you don't do something, the people closest to you are gonna say, what are you doing? This person has so much potential, give me their potential. I could do something great with this, but they're just sitting on the couch depressed, worried about people's thoughts or opinions. There's a price either way.

You got to pay it either way.

You got to pay it either way. Maybe it's greater price as you're climbing and dealing with the more attention, but there's a price either way.

You know what else, man? And I've realized this too, and it's hit me in the face. You can't call for attention and hang up.

Yeah, so look at me. Oh, but always say nice things about me.

You can't. And whether we intentionally call for attention or we don't, you can't call for attention and hang up like the boy who cried wolf, like us in our friend groups, like a child in a house, cries and cries, mother asks, what's wrong? Father asks, what's wrong? Nothing. And what are you crying for? You can't call for attention and hang up. And so I think there's just a lot of learning and discovering that I'm doing on this journey.

Yeah. The emotional regulation, it's funny, I was just interviewing neuroscientist slash brain surgeon. He's an expert in both areas. So he studies the brain and the mind, right? The thoughts. And after this two hour conversation, the whole thing came down to the number one skill to have is the ability to emotionally regulate your feelings and how thoughts, the brain and the mind are connected to feelings and the ability to emotionally regulate them. not saying that you're not going to have wide range of emotions, but the ability to regulate under pressure, under stress, so that you can get into flow, that you can get back to your, your mission, your vision and not be in chaos mode. You know, you can defend yourself rationally, essentially, in times of chaos. And he said, that's kind of what it comes down to. If I could teach a skill, it'd be the skill of emotional regulation. And I think the the farther we try to strive to unlock our potential, the more we need to learn that because the more people are going to be coming at us, it sounds like.

Yeah.

Yeah.

One, I think that's a phenomenal thought. I think it was Michael Jordan's trainer who said emotions are dangerous, but controlled anger or controlled aggression is, like, the.

Most dangerous of all. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Is that Tim Grover? Yeah.

Yeah. It's, like, the most dangerous of all.

Yeah. Because being emotional and reacting, you're gonna fell out.

Danger.

You're gonna do something.

Correct.

Which I did many times in multiple sports. And then you learn the lesson, oh, my emotional reaction gets me on the bench or hurts my team. And you know what's interesting?

We're talking sports, but this is a life- Life, man.

Yeah, it's life.

Because while you can say foul out literally, figuratively speaking, if you're at the grocery store and then you get upset and then you get emotional and then you get into it with the cashier emotionally fouling out, if you're talking to a friend, and then you get into it with your friend and then you say something you shouldn't have, emotionally faltering out, relationship oriented. If you're talking to somebody and you're dating and then you get into it. So we're talking a sports conversation, but it is the controlling of your mind. But to me, bro, everything starts with the mind. Both our greatest limitations and our greatest accomplishments, to me, it's all up here.

Absolutely. What has been the biggest... You talked about living a life without fear. Failure or fear of failure?

Living a life without failure.

What is the biggest fear for you in the last couple of years then? And now that you've, let's call it broken through, right? You were already really successful. I mean, you're an NFL player and had a career in sports TV and all these things, but broken through to a different level. What is now the greatest fear?

Ooh, that's why I like talking to you, man. I like talking to you. My biggest fear is becoming complacent. My biggest fear is not realizing I am living inside of a box that is around me. My biggest fear is not realizing, hey, there is a door you haven't yet opened and what you think is a world is actually just a locker that you are inside of. One of my greatest, one of my favorite scenes of any movie. It's the end of Men in Black, I believe it's Men in Black 1. And at the end of the movie, they open up a locker and they open up the locker and they realize there's an entire another world out there. They thought they were living in their world, but there's such a bigger world out there. And my greatest fear is not pushing beyond a boundary, because I don't even realize the boundary is set, because I didn't set it, because somebody else set it. And I've been living inside of somebody else's box or somebody else's boundary. the reason we don't achieve our highest ties, bro, isn't because we're not skilled. It isn't because we're not talented. It isn't even necessarily because we don't want it. It's because we don't realize. Realize how high we could achieve, right? I think that's the biggest limiting reactant, realizing our eyes. One of my favorite stories, if not my favorite story, story of Roger Bannister.

Four minute mile.

Four minute mile. For those that aren't familiar, Roger Bannister. Scientists believed it was physically impossible, impossible to run a mile in under four minutes. Quick history lesson for everybody. That's my favorite story. Scientists believe it's physically impossible to run a mile in under four minutes. May 5th, 1952, it had never been done in 2000 years, but by May 6th, Roger Bannister, Oxford, England, runs a mile, three minutes, 59 seconds. Within two years, 10 people ran a mile. in under four minutes. Now, the world record for the mile, three minutes, 43 seconds, and roughly 1,800 people have done so. Why? Because one man, Roger Bannister, removed the barriers that other people set around him. One man said, you, know what? I'm not gonna subscribe to that barrier. One man said, I'm not gonna subscribe to goals. One man said, I'm not gonna subscribe to that. and he broke the dam open for everybody. And after that dam was broken for everybody, the whole rest of the running world proceeded to run through it. So my biggest fear, bro, is living inside of a box that somebody else set before me.

So if you don't have goals to break or reach, what are you reaching for? Like, what's beyond a barrier that you're not trying to accomplish?

For me, I'm reaching for movement.

Okay.

That's all it is. I'm reaching for progress. I'm moving forward.

I'm moving forward.

So it's not reaching an end goal. No, it's moving. It's moving forward, man. Like you, you're gonna do another episode tomorrow, and hopefully it's better than today, and then the next tomorrow, and hopefully it's better than that day, and then you're just gonna keep moving. Like, let's not get so bogged down by, but I didn't get this. Oh, but I got that. Just keep moving forward. When you go to a beach and you end up standing in the ocean, eventually after about five minutes you'll look back and be like, yo, I done drifted way far away. And you just drifted further than you ever thought. That's where I'm at now. Let's keep moving forward. We get so caught up in I want to be married by 26 and I want to have two kids and I want to have bought my first home by 29 and by 35 I want to be done having kids and I want to have four kids, two boys, two girls, preferably twins, 'cause that would be easiest.

Yes.

Bump all that. Forget all that goal setting. Goals lead to failure. I want to live the most impactful and significant life I can possibly live. And if I happen to live that life with somebody else, great. And if I don't, great. and at 35, I want to see where I am. And at 30, I want to see where I am. And I want to just continue to move forward and make progress as a human being. But at the end of the day, bro, the reason we have these goals isn't even because of us. It's because of other people. This blew my mind. This blew my mind. You're a sports guy, so this may as well, this might blow yours as well. This truly blew my mind. We often debate, LeBron James, Michael Jordan. Greatest basketball player of all time.

Who do you say, sir? I mean, I'm from Ohio, so I go for LeBron.

Go for LeBron.

I just saw LeBron last night, two plays, so.

So right?

I mean, he's still playing at what? He's 37 years old. Dude, 37 years old, ball.

He just had 10,000 rebounds, 10,000 points, 10,000 assists.

Beast.

Let me blow this Michael Jordan, LeBron James debate open for a second. For those that claim Jordan's the greatest basketball player ever, They claim it primarily for this reason. He went to six NBA championships and he won six. But outside of those six NBA championships, Jordan never went back to an NBA Finals. He went six times and he won all six times. LeBron, on the other hand, has gone 10 times and he's only won four.

It's more like Tom Brady, you know?

Gone 10, won four, Jordan went six, won six times. Okay, great. Now let's talk about the same exact sport, basketball. Let's talk about the same exact result, first place and or second place, Jordan and LeBron. But now let's talk about a different measuring system, a different metric system, the Olympic Games. In the Olympic Games, Michael Jordan would have six golds, no silvers. LeBron would have four golds and six silvers. On an Olympic scale, four golds and six silvers is abundantly and clearly greater than six goals. But in the NBA scale, six goals is better. So the question simply comes down to whose metric system are you using? And the problem is we let other people's metric systems dictate the happiness in our life. 'Cause in the NBA, you finish in second, you leave the court crying and weeping, devastated. The Olympic Games, you finish in second, to a degree you're elated, depending on what country. Why? Because somebody else dictated how we should feel about a certain situation based upon their metric system, not even our own. Absolutely. And I'm just done subscribing to other people's metric systems.

I go to the Olympics, that's an accomplishment. I go to the Olympics and get a bronze, I'm like, I medaled, you.

Know, it's one of the three best in the world. Exactly. At what I do. Exactly. But in the NBA, you get third in the NFL, you finish in third. In the MLB, you finish in third or fourth, you're like, you're petrified, you're distraught. And I realized, bro, we just subscribe to other people's metrics systems. And we let it dictate our happiness.

Now tell me, okay, I love this approach. I love the philosophy and the mindset. But for someone watching or listening who's like, okay, but I really want to accomplish some goals to feel like I'm accomplishing something, because I wanted to build my, because it's always built my confidence when I do accomplish. But I hear you say, but if you don't accomplish this, they're gonna hurt your self-esteem. So how do we, If someone's like, I want to write a book this year, do I set a goal to write a book or is it a journey of writing the book? Do I create micro goals on a weekly basis and have accountability? There's gonna be deadlines or how do we think about the process of like completing a project, launching something we want to launch, doing our artwork, creating our music, whatever it might be. How do we then set these things and make them happen?

Great. So I got my master's in sports psychology and I dedicated my final thesis paper, if you will, for my master's degree to this concept. I elaborate and expound on this concept in a logical, but I will give you a snippet. Because I studied goals so long, I understand there is a use for goals. When you are talking about the micro in order to accomplish something, there is a use for goals in a relay race, the stick and Olympic sport of track and field. It does not matter how fast we run if we do not get the baton around. So the micro goal needs to be to get the baton around. When I say don't set goals having objective with no limitations, I'm talking about a larger principle of life. When you're talking about macro things such as, Hey, I just want to write a book. In the macro of writing a book, sure. I want to finish a chapter on Monday and I want to finish my, I want to write a chapter every week. every Monday. If you have a employer who's like, hey, we need this done by this date. Well, within that stance, there is a means to set a goal. You talked about talking to the neuroscientist. You mentioned this pivotal word, flow. In order to achieve flow, flow is simply when you no longer are conscious of time in the midst of a task. In order to achieve flow, you need automatic feedback, autonomous feedback. In order to get that feedback, you need set goals. So there are principles, objectives in life within micro constructs where goals have value. I'm talking about the macro look of life where goals will do more damage than they will say.

Yeah.

Or at least goals will just be a limiting reactive.

Gotcha.

Because I always think, what if Roger Bannister wasn't just trying to break the four minute mile? How much faster could he have gone? You never know. He went 359.8. He broke it barely. Literally two-tenths of a second was the difference. How much faster could he have gone? Maybe no faster. But maybe. If my goal, Lewis, was to write a book, I would have wrote a book. I would have wrote the second one, and I might not have written the third one. So that's where I'm thinking, like, bigger picture. I just want to see people be the best version of themselves.

So how do we, I mean, people are going to fail, but you're saying to reframe failure or to not even look at failure as an option, because if you don't set the goal, you can't fail in that sense.

Bingo. I thought about this the other time. I don't think people fail. What I say is this, and I thought about this, I didn't fail, I fell. And as long as I get up, I win.

Ooh, yeah. Like a child. A child falls hundreds and thousands of times, And they never think to themselves, maybe this walking thing isn't for me. The dude. They fell, they fall and they get up.

We didn't fail, we fell. As long as you get up, you win. The winning is in getting up. So many people think they failed. They didn't fail.

They stopped. You stopped.

You didn't fail. You just failed. Failed.

And you just never got up.

That's it. A relationship didn't work. You didn't fail at that relationship. You didn't fail in that relationship job you got fired, you didn't fail. You fell. Get up. You'll look back, you win, as long as you get up. So when people keep talking about failure, I don't subscribe to that, but I don't subscribe to goals, because ultimately to fail is to put a period where a comma belongs. I ain't doing that no more, big dog.

Exactly. To be continued.

I ain't putting periods where commas belong anymore, and then we do that too often in our life. It was like, ah, this relationship ended, period. No, this relationship ended. I found somebody who was more suitable for me, who I am more suitable for, and I now ended up significantly happier than I was before.

That's a good way to look at it. I mean, I feel like it took me a long time to learn how to walk in relationships. I was just falling and wobbling all over the place. I just needed some coordination sooner. But it took me a while to be able to look back and learn the lesson. and I feel like I'm in a much more stable place. You know, I have coordination with my body now in relationships in terms of walking. And some people learn faster in certain areas of life, but it's not about giving up on love, giving up on your career, your books, or your message, or your art. It's about learning. A friend of mine posted this video, his name is Devin Rodriguez. He got big on TikTok. I think he's got like 30 million followers in the last two years. he started drawing people on subways in New York City. And he would just see them, he would draw them and he would hand them a sketch and people would be blown away. He did a video recently where he started learning in 2010 how to draw. And he posted a photo from 2010 to 2020 every year his work. And it was ugly the first five years. I mean, it was, you would throw it away. It was so bad, right? It was like a five-year-old sketch. It was like something I would do right now. It's about how I draw. But now it looks like you take a photo of someone and he can draw it perfectly. But it took him 10 years to master the skill. He didn't fail the first five years, seven years. He fell forward but kept improving. I think it's a beautiful lesson you're talking about. Don't think of it as failure.

Think of it as falling. Bro, and so many people in our life, even our loved ones, want to tell us that we failed and we begin to believe them. And that's the problem. We've all committed to believing the lie that we have failed in life. We failed in our school, we failed in our relationships, we failed in our jobs. We haven't actually failed. But if you believe and listen to a lie long enough, you will be convinced that it's the truth.

Yeah.

And what I now practice is detangling so many of the lies that we've been told over time, deconstructing so many of the thoughts that we've believed over time, because it's those thoughts and it's those lies that bog us down. Yeah. And, bro, this also blew my mind. The Mona Lisa. I went to Paris last summer. I went to Paris, went to Louvre. And bro, you been to Louvre?

I think I went to the outside. I didn't go inside. Yeah.

So I'm in the Louvre and there's art everywhere. There's art on the ceiling, there's freaking art on the walls, art on the left side, there's art everywhere. As I'm walking through this, you know, hundreds of acres seemingly, I see a huge long line. For the Mona Lisa. I don't know yet. I don't know. So I'm like, what in the heck is this line for? There's art everywhere, y'all. Why y'all stand in line to see a piece of art? Just look left. I turned the corner, huge line for the Mona Lisa. I was like, I ain't waiting in the line, so I'm gonna just walk by and see.

I look at it.

It's nice. It's nice. It's a painting. It's a painting. Painted somewhere from 1503 to 1518, I believe, historians suggest. You realize if the Mona Lisa were painted today, might go to garage sale for $20. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. But why? Because the Mona Lisa back then depicted a, pale woman with thin lips and a large forehead. And that was the depiction of beauty back then. Depiction of beauty in 2022, sun kissed skin, you know, thin waist, nice build. But why, bro, do we subscribe to a definition of beauty that somebody else set? Because you can never catch it. The definition of beauty in the 1500s vastly different than the definition of beauty now. What was beautiful then, we don't value now. What we value now, we don't value then, but either way we didn't even set it back to why do we let such insignificant people have significance in our lives? And man, I'm just like, what all are we believing that we just don't need to?

So what would you say people can do to build self-confidence if they're doubting themselves? What are some things if it's not setting and accomplishing goals, what can we do to build it?

Well, like you just said, self-confidence starts with self. And I think, and this is what I will tell, I will share, I believe you and I have had this conversation either off or on the, on or off the record. June 9th, 2020. Get that call from Oprah. -huh and when Oprah calls me, she says these words. Well, okay, true story. Let me not lie to you. I missed the call.

Okay.

Oprah and I did a conversation on Apple TV, Uncomfortable Conversations Meets the Oprah Conversation. I missed the call. Oprah's right hand woman rushes in, Hey, great job, Emmanuel, but I think Oprah called you. I scurry to call her back. I call her. This is what she says. You have the thing, my friend, you have the thing. And coming from someone who had the thing and has the thing, you, my friend, you have the thing.

So I'm like, yo, Oprah just told.

Me I have the thing. She just anointed me with the thing. So what is the thing? She said you have an ability to communicate. with people, difficult truths, and they still want to hear you. So what would my advice be to people who are trying to get that confidence without setting goals? I would tell them what Oprah told me. You have the thing. The question is, what is the thing? What is the ability that you are uniquely skilled, gifted, and/or excel at? We all have it. I promise you you have it because we all do. Your thing might be an incredible painter. Your thing might be simply being a servant, a great listener. Your thing might be being great with kids. Your thing might be being great with animals. You might be great with secretarial tasks. You might be a skilled mathematician, but you have the thing. So for those that are lacking confidence, you don't need a set a goal to know that you're skilled. You just need to believe that you're skilled and you need to figure out what is it that you are skilled at. I shared this story today on my social media, but you're my boy. Share it now. Yes. 2014, I'd been released by the Eagles for the fifth time. By them or by the Eagles? By the Eagles. Holy crap.

How do they keep bringing you back?

They cut me, they would sign me back. They cut me, they would sign me back. Oh my gosh. They cut me, bro, for the fight, by the, the Eagles cut me for the fifth time by the age of 24. When I got cut this time, my coach Southern draw accent, he said this. He called me E. Yeah, I wish I could buy stock in your future. He said, I wish I could buy stock in your future. I said, Coach, you wish you could buy stock in my future? You all just released me for the fifth time.

That's crazy.

In the last two years, and I'm not even 25 yet. Fast forward seven years, eight years. I realized what he was saying. He saw in me what I hadn't even seen in myself, not as a football player, but as a person. My coach texted me about three months ago and he said, Stock price is too high.

Oh, that's pretty cool.

And so what I would just tell people is like, Man, I wish I could buy stock in your future. Because my coach saw in me what I didn't see in myself. And I think sometimes it's our job to see in people people what they don't even see in themselves.

You know what's interesting is we should be reinvesting in our own stock daily and like pouring back into ourselves, buying into ourselves so that we appreciate over time. The more we do that by acquiring skills or learning how to heal traumas of the past or mending friendships or forgiving people or, you know, being consistent with the habits that help us live a better life. we will ultimately be more valuable in the future.

Correct.

So start investing now. No.

That's it. Investing in yourself and learn to fall in love with yourself.

Absolutely. On a scale of one to 10, 10 being the highest form of self-love, one being the lowest form of self-love, where are you on that scale? If you stripped your ego away, the shell, and you looked within your heart and you said, I love myself unconditionally this much on the spectrum of one to ten, where would you be at?

A six and a half.

Where were you two years ago?

Huh? Pre- Pre- Pre- An eight?

Okay, so you love yourself more before you love yourself now.

Why I believe that...

This is interesting.

Expectations minus reality equals disappointment. Expectations minus reality equals disappointment.

You didn't have expectations before that.

Oh man. Before Uncomfortable, there was no expectations. It's not by the world. I had my own expectations, but the world had no expectation of me. Now, my expectations are freaking through the roof. Now you're number one bestseller. You've won an Emmy. You gotta show. Sit down with you. Expectations are through the roof. So now I've gotten harder on myself. Because you and I spoke about this and our off-camera combos was just as good as our on-camera combos. It's so hard to maintain excellence. It will keep you up at night. It will take years off of your life. It will cost you burst blood vessels in your vocal cords, which I have. It is so hard, unbelievably hard, to try to maintain excellence. And that is why I'd say instead of six and a half, because I'm just hard on myself now. And I'm hard on everybody around me. Now, I believe that the fun isn't winning. You know, my coach told me the fun isn't winning. I've never met too many happy people that don't win.

You say the fun is or is not? Fun is.

My coach, linebacker coach, no one's having.

Fun losing all day.

Nobody. And so instead of six and a half, because I'm just, but you're winning.

You're winning more than two years ago.

Yes, but bro, and again, Will Smith.

You'Ve got three books in two years. An Emmy, massive press over the world, massive social media following. You're changing lives, you're impacting people, you're spreading your voice to the world.

The biggest fear, and you love yourself less, the biggest fear dude, isn't in non-attaining and not attaining. The biggest fear is in having it and losing it.

So how do we let go of that? How do we let go of that fear?

Well, to let go of that fear.

What are you gonna lose? What could you lose?

And theory. Reputation or like- Right, you could lose reputation. You could lose emotional comfort, you could lose financial stability, emotional stability, and thus you could ultimately lose spiritual stability.

And then what? Lose it all, then what?

Honestly, it probably wouldn't be all that bad.

Where were you five years ago?

What was I two and a half years ago?

Exactly, man. You were fine. You were at eight. Honestly, here's the thing now. Now what you're saying, this is a powerful conversation. What you're saying is with success, you love yourself less.

Yes, twist. I would say that my highs are high and my lows are low. My highs are significantly higher and my lows are lower.

Okay.

And I think that is what lands you, bro, two and a half years ago, just chilling. Not much good, not much bad, just here. Now Emmy.

There's more at stake.

Solitude. Number one bestseller. Isolation. Oh man. You know, it's just, it fluctuates.

So how do we become the Tom Bradys of life? You know, where it's just more even keel.

Well, here's what's interesting. Let's not be bamboozled by Brady.

Oh, yeah, he could be emotional Tom.

Well, here's why I say let's not be bamboozled by Brady. If you are married to someone for 22 years, and then you file for divorce, and you go back within two months, there's an issue. either internally with you or you didn't think through your decision. Tom Brady was married to the game of football for 22 years.

Right.

The course of the game of football.

Now he's coming back.

And then within two months was like, you know what? Give me this football back. It makes me wonder, like, how happy was Brady without it? Clearly not.

Maybe he just wasn't done. Sure. I mean, he can still play at the highest level. He's still one of the best in the game.

But the question that you just asked me is what I would ask him is like, what you still, okay, what happens if you don't play? What happens if you lose it? Right? Like, yeah, I think Brady's greatest accomplishment was walking away playing at the highest level. No top five or top 10 player in the history of American sports has done that. None. The late great Kobe Bryant, one of your best interviews on the show, the late great Kobe Bryant, His last year played 60 games at 82. Second to last year played 35.

His last game, however, went crazy.

Was a bad game.

60 points on 40 shots.

Was a bad game. Went out on top then.

Went crazy, phenomenal.

But the Kobe the last three years, wasn't a championship, yeah. He was just hurt. I mean, think about our greatest of greats, Peyton Manning, albeit his team won a Super Bowl, he was hurt. So I think you go out on top, but I think back to, the crux of this conversation, there's a dichotomy of success. And I love what Oprah says, and I believe she says it best. You can have everything, but you can't have it all at once.

Oh man. You can't have all of what though, because I feel like you can be healthy, you can be fulfilled, you can have love in your heart, you can have a beautiful relationship, and you could be on your journey of a fulfilling life mission. Yes. So what does it mean you can't have it all? I mean, I can't, what, I don't know, what is this all?

I think all is, in the context of which he's speaking, is like, there are no, there are no, what should I say? It's like, okay, having it all is like, if you want to be the best Media mogul.

Yes, you can't also be a, you can't full-time traveling musician or something or like an athlete.

Or even like you, Tom Brady, you can't be the greatest quarterback of all time and also be the greatest husband. Something's gotta give. It's only 24 hours in a day. So the time you're putting towards football, you're taking away from your kids. Time you're giving your kids, you're taking away from football. Like something has to give. And so when I think about it.

It'S like something's gotta give. well, I mean, if you've been tra, I mean, just, I don't know. I don't know Brady's life or what, what is going on there, but if you've given so much to one thing for decades and you've built momentum, you don't ride on it, but you've laid the groundwork. So maybe you can have more time for family or other things down time once you've done 20 years of effort to master your skill. So there might be, you know, at a certain point, you can transition into, okay, now I have more with friends or family or whatever it is. Again, I don't know, his personal life. But... So maybe not all at once, but I think...

Correct. But it's an interesting exploration.

Absolutely.

It's an interesting exploration that so many people, when they hang it up, retire from their profession, I just want to spend more time with my spouse and my kids.

I mean, Oprah hung it up, right? I mean, she stopped her show. She transitioned into different shows and projects.

Correct. And now, you know, she'll do three, four conversations a year. She'll produce a couple things.

She's got her Apple show, right? Correct. Whenever she wants to do it, I guess.

But she, you know, when she was banging out her show 260 days a year, I mean, just go.

Just crushing.

Going, going. But I think even she would admit, like, and her and I spoke last week, I think even she would admit, like, didn't have the same level of downtime, didn't have the same peace about life, didn't have that same tranquility. Even you're grinding away, dude.

We're in the grind phase.

You're in the grind phase. You finished one conversation, you're having another conversation.

But at one point, at one point, I see a evolution, and it's been evolving over the last nine years, and I see a evolution of when you bring in an amazing team and you're able to systematize and you're able to create other parts of a network and shows, it doesn't have to be you grinding in the same area. Correct. You can evolve.

I can't wait for that.

You know what I mean? It's like if you wanted to do 10 more books, you aren't gonna be the one that has to write them all yourself. You can have support. A ghostwriter to help with you or an editor or something. So it's not just all you. You can evolve beyond it. Correct.

But there is a period of time.

Where we must go all in on this foundation. Lay the foundation. Absolutely. For years to do, if you want to do anything at a high level, you've gotta obsess over something, you know, an instrument, your art, your craft, whatever it might be. So 100% agree that you can't have it all. I can't be the greatest public speaker in the world and a media host and this and then playing the guitar on touring around the world or whatever. It's like, but I feel like you can have your all.

So then it comes down to if people's all like my all right now is significance. People say, Emmanuel, how'd you get so successful? I don't care about success. I care about significance.

What does that mean? Impact.

Being service. Impact.

But significance, I feel like, when I think of significance, it's me being significant as opposed to being of service and creating significance in the world.

I say they're the same. Why would I say they're the same is you being of service is significant to you.

Sure.

Like for example, it was 2014. I'm laying in my bed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and playing for the Eagles at the , and these words came into my head and I never was able to shake them. And I literally, I end a logical with this. That's the last thing in the book. My desire is to inspire those to go higher, pastor required. So those I admire can also admire whom they've inspired before they expire. Oh, that's beautiful. And it was like, I was like, wait a second, I was laying in there and it was literally what you just said, impact, significance. My desire is to inspire those to go higher, pastor required. so those they admire can also admire whom they inspire before they expire. I was like, that's my life. I didn't even come up with it. It was imprinted onto my heart. My true desire, I just want to inspire people to be a better version of themselves.

Yes.

So that the people who admire me, I can admire them before I get up out of here.

Wow. So you mentoring or supporting others, You can go. Yeah, exactly.

Dude, one of my favorite things is when people are like, I saw your uncomfortable conversations and I use that and we've now built a curriculum around it at our job. I'm like, y'all admired me for sitting down and having these conversations. Now in turn, I'm admiring you for having conversations based upon a conversation I had.

That's cool.

That bro is my deepest desire and love.

Now, here's my, I'm going to get back to this because I want to put a bow around this topic of self-love. What's it going to take for you or anyone as they start to break through certain levels of success or accomplishment or whatever they might be looking for? What's it going to take for people to increase their level of self-love with criticism, with the weight of gold as the Olympians call it, I don't know if you've seen that documentary, the Weight of Gold. Powerful about how Olympians, not all, but some of them get extremely depressed after they accomplish the gold medal or the Olympics. Some even commit suicide and it means different things because what's next? And I'm living from this past now as opposed to something greater for myself. So how can we, when we accomplish, when we succeed, when we get recognition, significance, develop deeper sense of self-love as opposed to you go from an eight to a six and a half. Not saying it's bad or something, but how do you stay at an eight or improve as you make more impact in the world, as you accomplish more and have more that you've received? That's my question for you on how you can do that personally and how we can support others in doing that as they accomplish.

I think it's a constant Journey. I'd be lying if there was answer. I think it's a constant journey. And again, I've referenced it so many times, but I felt so seen in reading Will's book because he was like, I was my own drill sergeant. His own drill sergeant. And I think it's a constant journey, man, of trying to say like, Hey, it's okay to fall. It's okay if one of your books don't best sell. It's okay if a conversation doesn't go as great as you thought. It's okay if this date didn't go as great as you thought. It's okay if this relationship ends. It's okay as this job isn't for you. It's okay. And I think it's that constant exploration of saying like, yo, it's okay not to be okay.

Yeah.

And what you just said is like, dude, what happens if you lose it all? You're back where you were two years ago. Yeah.

And I think- where you were an eight, self-love.

I think it's reconciling that. I think it's reconciling like, let go of that. fear of failure. Because I've let it, that's why I stopped setting goals is to let go of that. But now it's like, now that you've achieved, it's okay. Just to me again, it's just a matter of like, hey, you've made it. But if we're being honest, there's just a dichotomy that I'm figuring along this.

I think this will be powerful for you over the next few years or whenever you figure this out to share with me or share with your audience how people can accomplish, achieve and have the responsibility of success and continue to have immense self-love. And I think it comes to, for me, what I've learned is letting go of the expectation of the accomplishments. my last book, my first book was a New York Times bestseller and then there was an expectation. I gotta make the next one a New York Times bestseller. Probably the same for you. I gotta make this just as big, if not bigger. And I remember going into it saying my last book, I was like, you, know what? I'm writing a book that's probably not gonna be the biggest thing ever because it's talking about how men can be more vulnerable. And it came out right when Me Too happened. So I was writing this a couple years before and it came out during it. I was like, this could either be the biggest thing in the world or this could be the last thought people have. It's how men can heal their hearts. And it did well, but it didn't hit New York Times best seller list. And I remember for a day, I was like, if I'm being honest, I was upset and angry and frustrated that it hit the numbers, but it didn't hit the list. And then I said, what was the reason why I wanted to write this in the first place? It was to be able to help one man who might be going through mental challenges or struggles. to heal and improve the quality of their relationship with their partner, their friends and family, and then their community and the world. And it's been doing that. It's been continuing to do that year after year. And I'm just like, I gotta keep focusing on the impact and the significance, like you call it, the service to one human being or thousands or millions, whoever wants to listen or read or consume. And when I, it took a few days to kind of let that go. My ego go of being hurt or frustrated or angry, and when I did that, I just said, okay, I'm going to just really appreciate the people that are reading it, that are messaging me and take it in and be like, wow, that was impactful to that person. And that's been a big game changer for me. It still doesn't mean I don't want to accomplish goals and all these things and succeed in my own right, but letting go of the expectation of it needing to look a certain way has been extremely helpful. for me still loving myself, even with the success.

And I think it's hard to do.

Though, because the bigger you get, people expect it. You expect it.

That part.

It's the expectation.

People expect it.

And they'll look at you differently. Oh, why didn't it get New York Times this time? Or why didn't it do a million copies this time? If it did half a million last time. Or that video, you got 5 million views. Why did this one get a million?

To me, there's such a fear of in life in general in my mind, of other people's expectations of you.

Gosh, so how do we let go of that?

I've journeyed with it, and at times I do well with it, at times I don't. I'll say it in story form. Mortuus cuus phobia. Mortuus cuus phobia. The fear of ketchup. True thing. Sixth grade, bro. Sixth grade, I'm at my friend's house eating a burger, and his older brother walks in and he throws something at the table. My friend runs and hides behind of the chair. I'm like, what the heck just happened? I look at what his brother's through at the table and I see it was a ketchup packet. And after checking on my friend, I bust the packet open. I finish eating my fries and I was like, wait a second. I've rethought about that story and learned a lesson. We can't be afraid of other people's fears. And so often in life, we're afraid of other people's fears. Imagine if I would have ran and hid because of a ketchup packet like my friend did. Friend was afraid of ketchup, more choosophobia. I am not. But I'm not gonna hide because he was hiding. And I think what I've done at times is being afraid of other people's fears. So we all do. Like we're afraid of getting into a relationship because our friends are afraid of commitment. We're afraid of getting out of that toxic relationship because our friends are afraid of being single. Well, we've never left a small city in Texas. Our parents haven't, so we're not going to. And I think the only way to get rid of that is to let go of other people's fears, let go of other people's expectations. Because truth be told, it's other people's expectations that kind of dictate the weight of our own imagination.

Absolutely.

When you think about one hit wonders in the music industry, they're one hit wonders because we called them that. We called them a wonder and we said that song was a hit. So I think it's a matter of not being afraid of other people's fears. and letting go of other people's expectations, which dictate our own man.

If you could go back, when was the post you did? First post? Two years ago?

It was June 1st, 2020.

June 1st, 2020. If you could go back the day before June 1st and have a conversation with yourself from where you are now to that day, and you're about to go in and do this thing, or maybe it's the morning of and you're about to put this video out that you've been thinking about and you wrote the script to, or you didn't write the script, I think it was all off the cuff. But you've been organizing in your mind for a period of time and sit down. If you were gonna literally stand face to face and have a conversation with yourself almost two years prior, what would you say before you jumped in and did this video? With everything you know now, what would you say?

I would say two things. The first would be breathe, it's gonna be okay. Because I couldn't eat that morning. I didn't say anything. I'd say, breathe, it's gonna be okay. And then I would say, buckle up, your life is about to change forever.

Wow.

Because when I recorded that video, I lived in Austin, Texas. I now live in Los Angeles, California. When I recorded that video, I worked for another sports network. I've since switched. When I recorded that video, I had no team outside of a broadcasting agent. I now have a team of like five to ten people. When I recorded that video, I wasn't in partnership with Oprah. I now am. I would say buckle up, man. Your life's about to change forever. And I'd say prepare yourself because it's about to be a roller coaster of good and bad.

What did you need to prepare yourself for? How could you have prepared yourself more?

Emotionally. Emotionally. I could have let go of my desire to please all people. I think it's Abel Lincoln. You are either please all people some of the time or some people all the time. I could have prepared myself. Nobody prepares you in my mind for like how to be well known, unless you're the son of somebody famous. Right. And famous, you know, and it famous relatives. That's why I said well-known. Nobody prepared you for that. And nobody prepared you for the constant opinions of other people, bro. It's hard. I hit a depth of loneliness after I first saw you maybe a month later. Really? In December of 2020. Just depressed. Really? Yeah. Because thousands of people, I love you. Thanks for the conversations. But then I'm sitting in my house in Beverly Hills just by myself, just You know, no friends, middle of a pandemic, just isolated. Nobody prepares you for the constant comments, AchO, you're a sellout, constant comments, AchO, you're a race baiter, AchO, you're a race grifter. Nobody prepares you for that. So I would have told myself, buckle up. It's gonna be tough, but it'll be worth it.

And if you were sitting in front of yourself right now, your two-year-old self older than today, what would you say to prepare you for these next two years?

-So now, -Your future self. -Yeah. What would it say to this self?

-Yes. And with everything that you've created and learned and are going to learn and you have this experience now, your future self, what would your future self say to you?

-Enjoy the process. Enjoy the process. I think The biggest thing I've forgotten, and I think the biggest thing so many people can forget, we forget to enjoy the process. We forget to enjoy the journey. The fun isn't winning, but you can still find joy in the journey, win or lose. And at times, I don't enjoy the process because I'm so focused on moving that I don't enjoy where I am. When you have an objective without limitations, it's all about movement, man. It's all about movement. But you gotta enjoy the journey, these conversations, enjoy them. Your third book, dude, I'm the only person not named Oprah to have multiple books under the Oprah imprint.

That's right.

It's crazy, man. Enjoy it. Enjoy it. I didn't know Oprah 17 months ago. She'd walk right by me. I got three books. No, I got three books.

So enjoy the journey, enjoy the process. I think everyone needs to hear that for sure. Illogical saying yes to a life without limits. Manual Acha. This thing is going to be inspiring. Lots of great lessons, wisdom, stories. Yeah, don't let other people's fears become your own. That's what I just opened up. So the first thing I opened up right there. So don't let other people's fears become your own. Powerful stuff, man. I got a couple of final questions for you. I asked these same the last time. before I ask them, I want people to follow you on social media. You got great content over there. If you love sports and life lessons, you always have these great moments when you're out the sports desk, sharing your life lessons, which I love that stuff. Get the book, Illogical saying yes to a life without limits. Make sure you guys check this out, get a few copies for your friends, share with people. And if anything, when you're reading it, you get a handsome smile in the.

Back of the book.

So make sure you you spread the light and love with your friends. This is called the three truths. I asked you last time and I've got your three truths here. I'm curious if it's changed. If this was your last day and you've accomplished everything you want to accomplish and you've lived as long as you want to live but eventually you got to turn the lights out and you can't leave anything behind. Your message, your content, your books, there's none of this behind. So all of your words and content goes with you somewhere else. But you had three things you could share with the world, three lessons. What I like to call three truths. What would you say were yours?

Woo, that's so funny, because it's been, what, 18 months, and I don't remember what I said last time. I can't wait for this. I think my most important truth, love God, love others. I think I'll never forget flinch or waver on that. Love God, love Jesus, love others. That's. That's just. That's me as a man of faith. I can't waver from that. I think my second biggest truth, man, I love this, and I forever loved it. You're worth getting to know. -huh you're worth getting to know, man. I think that's hit me more now than ever, bro, is like, people don't realize they're valued and people don't realize, like, you are. worth getting to know.

Absolutely.

My third biggest truth. Where would it be right now if I could only leave a truth? You have the ability to change the world. You truly do. And I just wish people would believe that. Changing the world looks different for different people. But you have the ability to change your world. Those would be my three. What were my three last time?

If people want to know, they have to go listen to the podcast. You had two of the three identical. So if people want to know what they are, they'll have to go check that out. We'll have it linked up for you to go listen to that. Before I ask the final question, Emmanuel, I want to acknowledge you, man, for your constant growth and your commitment to service. I think people could get scared of success or they could get scared of the growth as fast as you've had it and the fact that you keep showing up, keep delivering and I think learning about yourself in this process is really beautiful and keep serving. It's really cool, man. I just am excited to know that you're continuing on this journey that you're going to keep showing up. I don't see you stopping anytime soon. No matter what happens with books and projects and other stuff, just keep serving and I really acknowledge you for being authentic to who you are, man. It's a beautiful, beautiful thing to witness. My final question, what's your definition of greatness?

Ah, that's definitely changed since my definition of greatness. Oh, my definition of greatness would be stepping outside of the box that others have built around you and constantly becoming the greatest version of yourself. I don't like using a definition of definition. So stepping outside of the box that others have built around you and constantly becoming the best version of yourself, constantly evolving. We have to constantly evolve and learn to fall in love with the evolutions of ourself. So now step outside of these boxes, bro, because there is a box there. Step outside of it. Let's evolve. and let's just become the best version of ourselves, man.

My man. Appreciate you.

Freaking brother.

Good stuff. Let me know some of your biggest takeaways in the comments below and make sure to share this with someone you think needs to hear it. And stick around for more inspiring content coming up right now. What was the biggest culture shock for you being a black person at a white school system than being in black culture in the NFL?

Yeah, man. So my big, really like white school system I speak of is high school. Yeah, so I went to a private school from grades, it goes from grades one through 12. I went to this private school from grades five through 12. And so I show up and I'm like, where are black people at? So I show up, my graduating class for example, bro. 75 people, like three or four or five were black. And so for me, I'm getting all the time, Emmanuel, you don't even talk like you're black, right? Emmanuel, you don't even dress like you're black or Emmanuel, you're like an Oreo, black on the outside, white on the inside. And so I started to become confused because I was like, wait a second, maybe I'm not black. Because I remember I'm Nigerian culture. My parents born and raised in Nigeria. There's a difference people between color and culture. You can be black and be white cultured. You can be white and be black cultured. We see it much less frequently because America is a white so it's very hard to be white and live in an exclusive black world, but you can be black and live in an exclusive white world. So I was questioning my own blackness because everybody was like, oh, you're not that black. I'm like, I mean, I don't have a band-aid under my eye like Nellie, so maybe I'm not that black. So then I get to college at Texas, and while Texas's campus is still white, my world is black. My college experience was black. 'cause we playing football, 80, 90, 90 people on that roster that are black. Coaches, you know, besides your head coach, coaches, they black. Strength coach, black. Like, you know, my culture there is black. Then you get to the NFL and the only difference there is now it's the same black people, but now they have money. And so it's just like, it's the black, it's culture on steroids. Not literally, but figuratively speaking on steroids. And so there were so many transitions for me, bro. Like, I was so confused when I got to College. It was a wild time.

Did you ever feel like you needed to become, you needed to do things to fit in more in college or the NFL, in that black culture that you weren't doing from growing up or high school? That's a good question, bro.

We're like, oh, I don't know.

I'm just putting out there, guys are getting more tattoos. I feel like I gotta get a tattoo. Guys are whatever, doing their hair a certain way.

I gotta do my hair a certain way. That's good. No, but I felt like I could finally be me. Okay, I didn't have to do anything more, but I thought, oh, I can finally be me. In my high school, for example, dudes weren't really just rocking dreads, you know what I'm saying? In my high school, again, we had certain strict, stringent rules. I don't know how public schools were, but dress codes all the time. I went to a proper high school, too. We wore gray slacks, white button-downs, couldn't have facial hair, for example. Couldn't have long hair, all that jazz. All that jazz. So, I draw the parallel to Tarzan. Remember the movie Tarzan? You ever seen Tarzan? We all love Tarzan. Tarzan, remember, although he was fully human, he grew up around animals. So he lived his life believing that he was an animal until he saw humans. Then he was like, wait a second, y'all look like me. See, I grew up around white people. Now on Sundays, I was going to church in the inner city. And on Wednesdays, I was going to church in the inner city. And my house was Nigerian culture. But Monday through Friday, I'm growing up around white people. Then I get to college, I'm like, wait a second, y'all talk like me. Y'all walk like me. Now, there are some cultural disconnects, you know what I'm saying? Like, now I'm around black people from the country, black people from the city, black people from the hood. But I didn't have to change me, I could just be me a little more. I'm gonna end kind of even as an adult, I have my hair kind of in a mohawk now. When I first started on TV, fade all the way even all around, because that is more appropriate for kind of the white world in which we live. So I didn't want anything I did, it's called code switching, we can go into that later, but I didn't want anything I did to be perceived by a white employer as a different way. So it was very similar. It was like, okay, now I can be, but now everybody knows I'm intelligent, so now I can just be me. So now I can be like my father. foolish version of myself.

Without having to worry about what someone's gonna say or do or whatever. Correct. What's the most uncomfortable conversation you've had.

With a white person so far? Oh, that's a good question. The most uncomfortable, so here's the kicker. People hear uncomfortable and they think like, I'm gonna be uncomfortable. Right? Like, just because it's uncomfortable doesn't mean I'm gonna be the one who's uncomfortable. What's the I think that there are two. The first, I was doing this show with Oprah. It was called, it was an Oprah conversation on Apple TV. Y'all should watch it if y'all haven't. And I get, it's 10 people on Zooms and they're asking me different questions. Oprah is facilitating the conversation. And one person says, Emmanuel, Jewish people suffered the Holocaust, which was more recent and more lethal than slavery, and they got over it. How come black people can't get over slavery? Mind you, you know the question is uncomfortable, bro, because everybody else was on camera and asked their questions. This person chose to not face her face. No, no, no. Didn't even show her face. When I heard that, I thought to myself, yo, that's wild. But here's why I loved the question. Because the only bad question is a question not asked. She's thinking that whoever this person was, I believe it was a woman, she is thinking that. So I would prefer you You ask it so I can answer it and let's have an honest conversation as opposed to you just living your life like, I don't know why these black people can't get over this.

I mean, you're thinking what you're not talking about.

Let's talk about it. Let's talk about it. Outside of that, I did an episode on my show Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man. I did an episode where I had white parents raising black children. They had a biracial son, they had two black children and they had a.

Natural born white son. I think that's probably the adopted black kids.

The adopted black kids. And I asked the black daughter, the adopted black daughter, and with her white parents sitting right next to me, her name was Story. I said, Story, do you wish your parents raising you were black?

What did she say?

Regardless of how she answers that, Louis is about to be awkward. What did she say?

But you regard, how old is she?

She's 12. So, you know, Taylor, you know, 12 years old aren't great liars. So I'm like, do you wish your parents raising you were black? And she was like, she paused. She's like, no, I just wanted them to love me for me. I said, yes, good answer, girl. Wow. But now I look to my left and now mom's crying.

Oh.

Mom, Jamie Ivey, her husband Aaron Ivey. One of the most powerful episodes I've done. Again, if y'all haven't seen it, check it out. Not for my sake, for your sake, honestly, 'cause I do a show for the people.

That was uncomfortable.

Because that could have gone south real quick. Think about this, I do my show and the book based on questions from emails and whatnot. So, so many parents who have adopted children lay their head at night wondering if they're adequate enough. Wondering if they're loving enough. Wondering like, man, I know I'm white and my child is black. I'm doing all I can, but I can't provide exactly what they need. I don't know what they're going through. My hair ain't like their hair. I don't even know how to do their hair. I'm black, my child is white, I'm doing the best I can, Maybe I'm falling short, parents sleeping at night restlessly. And when Story, the Black daughter, answered that question to her, me and her mom, I could just imagine adopted kids answering that question around the world.

Yeah.

Like so many parents getting that answer that they wanted, that they lay sleeplessly at night wondering. So that bro was powerful.

Yeah, I have a good friend of mine who's adopted, I believe, two kids, two Black kids. He's a white guy and he's very white looking. And he's had to deal with a lot of challenges from just like taking his kids to the park pre-pandemic to black women, mothers coming up and being very scared for these younger black kids thinking that the white parent has kidnapped these kids or something has happened and worried for them. And he has to deal with, I don't know if that's reverse racism or if that's, so that's funny.

It's not reverse racism. But it's one, I hate the concept of reverse racism. Racism is racism, right? Black people can be racist. Now a group of black people would struggle to be racist, 'cause I say three things are imperative for racism, power, privilege, and prejudice. And at large, black people don't have power. But that would just be kind of, it would be stereotyping. Stereotyping, you feel me? It would be like stereotyping, but bro, it's real. We have a human inclination of like, wait a second, If you see a white person with two young black kids, what the heck is going on here? Because the world has told me if I see a black person with two young white kids, you're probably the nanny or you're probably the help. That's what the world has told us. It's what movies has told us. Let's go back to slavery. That's what it was. Several of the black women were used to raise the master's kids, if you will. And so the world has told us black, older person, white, younger kids, you're probably walking gum, whatever the case may be. When it's reversed, It's like, what's the wires not crossing? Firing correctly. What is going on here? So yeah, man, it's real.

Do you think white parents should be focusing more on adopting white looking kids or is it, you know, if there's a lot of white kids that still need parents as well, should parents only be focusing on their race so that there's not this cultural, that's a really good question. Or Is it acceptable to adopt any kids you want?

For me, I would say adopt who you want. Bro, what we know is needed in this world is more what? Love, is more what? Peace, unity, harmony. That's what we need. So, if someone is willing and has the ability and empathy to look beyond their skin color and love someone, who doesn't look like them, I will never, ever, ever, ever try to put a rule restriction or boundary on love. I will only adopt someone who looks like you. No, no, because that in and of itself is undermining achievement and improvement in our society. Now, what I will say is, and I've said this on my episode and I'll say this now, 'cause it is imperative, do not remove your kids culture your child's culture if you adopt them. Don't do them a disservice. Because again, I said it in jest, but don't make them white.

Now, if they wanna hang out in.

White culture... Now let me say this, let me say this, 'cause let me clarify, let me clarify, 'cause this is an issue we have in our society. You can't make them white. You can make them white cultured. When I was young, Louis, I finally realized when people would say, Emmanuel, you're not even black, what they were saying is, Emmanuel, you're not black. black culture. And we need to do a better job delineating between the two. A black person is black as black. It don't matter if I'm white cultured or not. If the cops see me, I'm black. So you're black. It doesn't matter whether what your culture is when it comes to oppression. But you can make them, you can not make them white culture. Just remember that they should be black cultured as well. I grew up in a Nigerian household. I am now, I understand white culture, I understand black culture, I understand Nigerian culture. My parents would try to speak to me in Igbo, our native language, to make sure I maintain my Nigerian culture. We would go back to Nigeria to make sure I maintain my Nigerian culture. That's not to say, hey son, don't go to this white school. Hey son, don't go to this black school. No, do that. But also remember who you are. And so I would say make sure your children- Remember, remember, remember. Also remember who you are, bro. Because genuinely speaking, and some white people don't know this, and I've said this in the book, it's funny, black people's hair is different. Black women can't just get into a pool and get out the pool. Hair is different. Black people, we use lotion all the time because our skin is different. Our skin will get dry, we'll get to what's called ashy. There's differences in color and there's differences in culture. I just want everyone to acknowledge that.

Yeah. What's been the biggest challenge for you from putting out one piece of content that you were hoping that would inspire a few people that inspired tens of millions and turned into a really a phenomenon in 2020 to serving and educating people who were very ignorant around this topic. What's your life been like since that one video came out and now within six months a book with Oprah and New York Times bestseller.

Say that again, bro. Say that again.

New York Times bestseller.

Let's go. Let's go.

You know we both debuted number three on the New York Times bestseller list.

The hardest part, I will say this, I understand why people are one hit wonders. I understand it because it is hard to follow up.

It's hard.

Dude. My first episode, people, y'all don't understand. Go back and watch the very first episode of Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man. It's me sitting in a burgundy tank top and a burgundy Zara long sleeve in a white room. I say this, Welcome to the first of hopefully many episodes of Uncomfortable Conversations.

With a Black Man. The operative word there, Louis, is hopeful.

I didn't know. You were like, this might just be one video. This might just be one video. Gosh, I had no idea. So, okay, we do the first video. I act, I don't, I don't know anything about anything. So I do it, I drop it on a Monday.

On Tuesday's Blackout Tuesday.

For those of y'all that aren't aware. So everyone's posting a video on the next day. And nobody's posting any content. Wow. Because Blackout Tuesday. The timing. The timing, incidental. I had no idea Blackout Tuesday was a thing. So the reason it went so viral was so many incidental pieces. Blackout Tuesday occurs, now everybody's posting it. So now I have 25 million views in four days. Six days later, I get a call. Achy. McConaughey speaking. What the hell? How'd you get my number? It's no caller ID call. McConaughey speaking. I want to have a conversation. McConaughey, like, mad at me? Yeah, man, let's have a conversation. I'm like, all right, well, I'm gonna record my next episode in four days, man, would love to have you. Hint, haven't told this before. My second episode was gonna be Instagram Live. I didn't know how to follow up. My first episode got 25 million views. You can't beat that. So my second episode, I was gonna go on Instagram Live. Hey, thank you all for watching. Ask me questions, all answer them live. That was my idea. McConaughey, I wanna have a conversation. Yeah, McConaughey, let's record it in four days. This is gonna be my next episode. Let's do it tomorrow. McConaughey wants to do it tomorrow. I want to do it tomorrow. So episode two, McConaughey, episode three, Chip and Joanna Reach Out. Chip and Joanna Gaines. Episode four, I've now heard from Oprah. And now I move to LA.

Wow. So you were still in Austin then?

I was still in Austin. I was still in Austin, Texas. I was in the middle of a job transition. So I wasn't even supposed to move to LA. My job was supposed to take me to New York. Wow. All of a sudden, job things change, I moved to LA. It was so many God timing things, stars aligning, but I believe in, I'm a man of faith. So so many God things that, bro, that was, that's the weirdest part of it all. Wow. And I mean, dude, I could tell you stories about, rejection and so many obstacles with why this was not supposed to happen. I mean, that's a whole nother video. It's not supposed to happen.

No, bro.

The first, it was supposed to be called Questions White People Have. It was never supposed to be called Uncomfortable Conversations. My first thought was, hey, I'm gonna call it Questions White People Have. I called my homegirl Rachel Lindsay, the first black Bachelorette for all Bachelorette fans. I called my homegirl. I said, hey, Rachel, I'm gonna to do this thing called questions white people have. Three white people at a table, three black people at a table, white people reach into a fishbowl, ask a question, black people answer it. I wanted Lewis to see white and black people in dialogue. That was the goal. Man, middle of COVID couldn't make it happen. So now I have my home girl, she's like, Hey, Achu, I'll drive down, I'll do it with you, this white girl. I'll do it with you myself. She drives down from Dallas to Austin. It was gonna be her and I. We rehearsed for a whole day, all day Saturday we practiced. On Sunday, an hour six minutes before I'm supposed to be in studio, she calls me. Yeah, she called me. She was staying in my house, in my guest room. She called me downstairs like, Hey, I can't do this. It's supposed to be you, not me. They don't want to see me. She has tears in her eyes. I just can't do it. It's not right. I can't do it. It's not right. I'm like, what the hell? It's a white girl, right? White girl. I'm like, what the hell? What the hell? We practice this. We practice this. So now I had to do it myself. Remember, uncomfortable conversations with black man, not uncomfortable monologue with a black man. The first episode I was not supposed to be by myself. Now get this. I open the door to the studio five minutes before I'm supposed to record with my right hand. My left hand vibrates text from my friend. Achó, a different friend, black girl. Achó, I really don't like this idea you're doing. Questions white people have. They didn't educate us as to how to assimilate into their culture. Why do we need to educate them as to how to assimilate into ours. I said, unless you have a better idea, I'm just gonna go where God leads. I hit my literary agents, like three weeks before the first episode, three days before the first episode. Hey, I have this idea. I think I want to do something. I don't know what it is, but I think I want to do something. Hey, the market space is just incredibly crowded. It's not aggressive, probably not gonna go.

Anywhere in this type of space.

The market space is crowded for books like these.

Like racism is hard to cut through.

It's hard to cut through. People aren't really buying a lot. I said, Hey, I'm gonna do this with or without y'all. True story. I sent them the, after we made the New York Times best sellers list, I text my literary agent, Never forget. Wow. I said, I'm gonna do this with or without y'all. And the rest is freaking history. So there were obstacles after obstacles after obstacles telling me to stop. And I was just like, God called me to do something. I had to do it.

Wow.

I couldn't say no. And five months later, you were. Wow, man.

It's crazy. Now, were you talking about this stuff privately or publicly about race and, you know, moving this conversation forward? Or were you just a sports broadcaster?

That's a good question. After George Floyd was murdered, So again, one of the last pages of the book, you'll see me with all my friends. You can see the friend group I have. I have a lot of close white friends, a lot of close black friends. It's the very last page before acknowledgments, so the last page of the actual book. Check it out. You'll see like it's a picture, bro. And it's 17 people at my going away party. And eight are black, eight are white, one's Hispanic. Right? And why do I say this? Because this is my life. Uncomfortable conversations, white and black culture, it is my life. And so my point here is after George Floyd was murdered, I pulled up to my white friend's house. It was four people. And I sat in the car for a second with my black homegirl. Her name is Mo. And I said, I really don't want to go off on these white people. True story. I was like, I really don't want to.

You're friends.

Yeah, they're my people.

They're in the book.

They're in the book. They're at my going away party. My closest friends. I was like, I really don't want to go off on these white people because I was so, I'm like, yo, I'm tired of seeing black people being oppressed or murdered or enslaved or whatever, or mistreated excessively because they're black. I'm tired of that, especially at the hands of white people. We've seen that for years in this country. We've read about it, we've heard it, we felt it. I'm so tired of it. Ah. Caught my breath. I walked inside the house. I said, Hey, listen now. Very sober minded. Very somber.

You've known these white people for how long?

10, 12 years. They're family. They're family. Like at this point, they're family. That's family, bro. Let me put this. The white girl, her name is Brogan. I walked her mom down the aisle at Brogan's wedding. I'll put it like that. Like, they're family. This is family. I said, y'all listen down, we gotta talk. I said, what's up, man? I was like, what is it about white people that make them view black people and such? So we get to talk and we get to talk and Louis, after 45 minutes, my white friends were like, How can we help? What can we do? I said, you'll have to expose yourself to black culture, to black people. You can't live in this white neighborhood, in this white cul-de-sac, go to your white church, go to your kid, send your kids to a white school and expect to understand black culture and black things. You can't do that. I said, Hey, How many black people were at your wedding? Because I know I was there. I said, How many black people were at your wedding? I knew off the top of my head. It was me, my brother. I asked Brogan's husband, She said, There were three. You, your brother, and this other dude. I said, okay, how many knew you? Like how many came for you and how many knew Brogan first? And he thought, and he was like, Dang, you're right. I said, if you don't, it's not that you don't like black people, but if you live your life according to the easiest way you'll live your life, not consciously, you'll just live a very white white life. He said, okay, well, how can I even meet black people? I said, you can go to black church. They said this. Four white people sitting there talking to me and my friend. They said, we thought black church was your thing. I get it now. These incredible white people who love me dearly don't understand jurisdiction or lack thereof.

Of cultural boundaries where they can go.

We got to have conversations. And that's why the book start. That's why the show started, which led to the book. I was sitting at this table with my dearest white friends, and as soon as I'm talking to them, they don't even understand. So the only way you can understand is by talking. Somebody's got to talk. Somebody's got to do this. Because if these people who I love, one woman who my mother, I walked down the aisle at her wedding, if they don't understand, then how can I expect random person to understand who aren't.

Hanging out with black people?

So I said, we got to have conversations. And that's how everything... And when was that? That was on Friday. That was on... What month was that? That was in May. 'Cause remember, George Floyd murdered May 25th or 26th, something along then. That would have maybe been May 29th or 30th.

It was a few days after George Floyd.

You were moving to LA. Moving to LA, June 15th. Didn't know I was moving to LA.

At the time though. Remember that? You were going to New York. New York, exactly.

So you thought you were going to.

New York and within two weeks you moved to LA? Correct.

What? Correct. That's for the job. That was for the job.

That was for five. None of that was based on the video. No.

That was just happened. No.

Happening to be coming to LA.

That's crazy. Crazy. 'Cause if I don't go to LA, now I'm more distant from Oprah and her team and everything is different. And mind you, New York was way more shut down at the time. So, I don't even know what uncomfortable conversations become. So, anyway, that was how it all started.

And that's how I realized uncomfortable conversations need to be had. This is what I love. Whenever I see someone who does something based on their calling or their mission, even if it's not their career, but they feel like it's a duty, it's a responsibility to put something out there, whether it's going to ruin your career, whether it's going to go nowhere, it doesn't matter. I put out a book a few years ago called the Mask of Masculinity, which is about how men can be more vulnerable and open up, how we can tear down our masks. As an athlete, I wore a lot of masks.

Of course.

And it helped me in a lot of ways, but then it also hurt me to being less vulnerable, putting out my ego, all these different things. And I realized that men were doing a lot of the harm in the world because we were wearing masks and we weren't willing to open up and have these loving conversations.

Absolutely.

We weren't willing to share, we weren't willing to heal, we weren't willing to let go of our shame, all these things. And I remember my team at the time, they were like, and my, my agent was like, why are we, why are you putting out a book about masculine vulnerability? And I was just like, I feel like I have to. It wasn't a smart business move. It wasn't helping my business or my career. It could have hurt me in a lot of ways. But I was just like, I don't care if one person reads this. If it helps one person, we got to do it.

Dude, let me speak on this. I said, there's a difference between your career and your calling.

Yeah.

And I've heard, I think Steve Harvey say this. Your career is what you're paid for. Your That's the calling of what you're made for.

That's deep.

It's a bar. It's a bar. I'll put it like this. I'll put it like this. People say, Emmanuel, how do you know you're calling? Remember I told you, I got called from a no caller ID number. First one, it was Matthew McConaughey. I got called from a no caller ID number. The second one, it was Oprah Winfrey. I got called from a no caller ID number. The third one, it was Commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell. Your calling will call you. Pick up. Your calling will call you. Pick up. See, so many times we see no caller ID numbers. I don't want to take that one. Right? I don't know that one. Your calling will call you. People pick up. I was called to this moment. I did not want to do this. I'll be honest with y'all.

I'm telling the world.

Emmanuel Achuo wasn't like, Hey, let's have conversations about race and racial reconciliation. That'll be extremely fun. No, it's not what I wanted to do.

It's what I had to do. Mmm.

Yeah, you were.

I had to do it. Because you were doing sports broadcasting on the weekends, right?

Yes. I was doing college football at the time for another network, doing all these different shows. I was a sports guy, trying to create content about love too. Like that was gonna be what I wanted to do for fun. But I was called to do this. And then when your calling does call you, don't get distracted. What do I mean? After the first video, I get 25 million views. It since has 30 plus million views. Now I'm like, oh, I gotta get views. I gotta get views. I gotta, I don't do it to get views. I did it to change hearts. So now, Acho, don't worry about the views. Just change, like you said, just change one. What if just one person is touched by this? Now, by the grace of God, we're still getting millions of views, which is cool. 'Cause then you just got to see the fruits of your labor. But I don't care about it. It's like, just change one. Just move one. Just cause one to emote. So I had to speak on that 'cause people wonder about the calling. I'm like, you,'re calling it, we'll call you, I promise. You just gotta pick up.

What are three questions every white person should be asking themselves and their black friends or black members of the community?

One, that's a good one. Good one. My guy liked this conversation. Yes. I would say that those are separate questions. I'm just gonna start spitballing. I never really prep for conversations. I like speaking from the heart. The first one, which we'll be asking ourselves, white people. Yeah. The first thing is the gateway to these conversations. Do you understand white privilege? Does white privilege make me feel uncomfortable? What is white privilege? I'm gonna go there. Do I understand that I have white privilege? I would, if I'm white, ask myself all of these questions, all of them. Do I understand white privilege? Does the concept of me being white privilege make me feel uncomfortable? Do I have white privilege? Now let me define it. Three weeks ago, Louis, I'm walking down the streets of Beverly Hills. I walk into a restaurant. Hey, let me get this. Let me get that. Let me get, oh my God, Emmanuel Achuo, I love your show, you, Meal's on Me. Oh, thank you. See, my meal was free not because I'm black. My meal was free not because I'm 6'2. My meal was free because I was famous. so I had famous person privilege. All privilege is is immunity from certain punishment or access to certain things based upon something. Immunity from punishment or access to things based upon something. So what is the adjective or word that precedes privilege? I had famous person privilege. Okay, let's talk white privilege. White privilege is not saying your life hasn't been hard. It's saying your skin skin color hasn't contributed to the difficulty of your life. Oh, it's not saying your life hasn't been hard, saying your skin color hasn't contributed to that. As a white person, your life has probably been hard because for the most part, all of our lives have been hard. But let me tell you, what hasn't contributed to your life's difficulty is your whiteness. You can be white and not be privileged, right? Because just the word privilege is just access and immunity. Typically, just saying privilege means money, but you can't be white and not be white privileged. Every white person has white privilege. Every white person doesn't necessarily have privilege, but every white person has white privilege. That's why when people talk about, oh, well you have black privilege, I quickly dismantle that idea. There was a sports reporter that said these two black players, Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, they're black superstars. They had recruited a white white head coach to coach them. Right. Two black players recruited a white head coach to coach them. The sports reporter said, well, that was black privilege. I said, absolutely not. That was Superstar privilege. Because them being able to dictate who coaches them is not dependent upon their skin color. It was dependent upon their Super Stardom. That's ours. Exactly. Let's not make that mistake. It is a very, very, very, very nearly impossible to have black privilege in America. You can have black black dominated spaces, Nigeria. But it's very, very, very hard, nearly impossible to have that. So we can't throw Louis words around so quickly like privilege without explaining them.

Because they're visceral reactions. Great. Before you go on to the next thing, is there a way in America that you can have black privilege?

That you can? Is there black privilege? I think it would be very hard to define. Let me create a scenario. If you are in a inner city and you go into a school in the inner city that's 90% black and you're one of the 5% white and 5% will be other. Then all of a sudden the people at that school and the school teachers are black and they're showing favoritism within themselves. Then there could be black privilege.

Got it.

But remember, for there to be privilege, there probably has to be an environment in which privilege can be cultivated. And in America, black people typically generally speaking, don't have environments that are like incubated for black people. So it's just very, very hard to have black, like in what space does being black grant you a benefit? Now some people say the lazy out, oh well black people are athletic. That's not a black thing. Read this book called Sports Gene, that's a genetic anatomical thing.

Yeah.

Right, so in what spaces does just your skin skin color, being black grants you an advantage or immunity. That's what then I would challenge all white people if you're like, wait, black privilege doesn't exist. Just think about in what space or situation is being black a benefit? When you find that answer, there's the answer. Yeah. The other questions white people should be asking themselves is, when's the last time you had a conversation with a black person or a group of black people?

That's that.

That, I think, is imperative. Louis, I'm gonna go here, and I'm just gonna give you two answers because I'm going lower. I'm gonna go here. It wasn't enough for us to outlaw segregation. We should have mandated integration. That's a whole conversation that I might make a TED Talk or a book or whatever the heck. I don't know, it might be an episode, but I'm gonna say this again so people can let this sink in. It wasn't enough to outlaw segregation. We should have mandated integration. If we really wanted to change our world. 2013, I'm in the Philadelphia Eagles locker room. Philadelphia Eagles NFL organization. I'm playing for the Eagles at the time. I walk into the cafeteria at One NovaCare Way. That's where the Eagles practice is. And in the cafeteria there are 53 people that are players, 53 people on the NFL roster. I look up. All the white people, true story, are sitting at a table and all the black people are sitting at a table. Really? True story. Minus two people. There's one mixed black offensive lineman sitting with the white people. And there was one white defensive back sitting with the black people. True story. I said, dang, we outlawed segregation years ago, but I sit here and we unintentionally or incidentally still segregate. Think about because we gravitate towards things we are familiar with. My coach would always tell me, Achó, don't be like water. Water takes the easiest route. If I were to pour water on the ground loose, it would just navigate the path of least resistance, and that is what we do. White, I'm in this white neighborhood. Yeah, let me go here. Oh, yeah, this church, I like that. I'll just go here. Oh, only white people? Yeah, that's fine. Oh, this small group, I'll go here. It's only white people, but I mean.

It'S not my fault, I don't see any black people around, so it's fine. We just take the path of least resistance. Let me ask you a question on this. Talk to me. This just came to me, this may be very ignorant, but I've heard the term birds of a feather flock together. What if you had a duck and a pigeon trying to integrate? Would they be able to fly to their destination?

Great question.

As seamlessly... That's a great question. You know, Mighty Ducks, the Mighty V, if you got a parakeet and a...

That's a good question.

Blue Jay and a Robin and a, you know, all flying together, would you be able to achieve the whatever desired route?

As soon as you found your common humanity. If you have these two animals, if they never, or these two objects, whatever the case may be, if they never try to integrate, they won't figure out what they have in common. I say in the book, there's my home girl, Brittany Wheeler, she's a white girl. And if ever I say something to her, and she lives in Austin, Texas, that's my homie. She would be like, oh, bless, right? I would say you trippin', but she says, oh, bless. See, she's white woman, grew up in Austin, Texas. I'm a black dude playing in the NFL, but we figured out our common humanity, so we still rock together. totally different. She speaks different, talks different, walks different, style different. But at the heart, we're very similar. But until you have these conversations, until you get out your box you don't realize wait a second, we actually are more alike than we are different. Not to say we don't have differences, but we actually have a lot in common. So, while the birds of a feather may flock together Imagine what they could do if they really started to speak and talk and understand other people. My life is a beautiful multitude of colors, cultures, etc. So that's what I would submit to that.

And what about white people that are just like, well, I like just hanging out with white people. And I want to live in a neighborhood where I'm not forced to hang out with Black people or Asian people or Hispanic people, I just wanna hang out with my family and friends that are white.

I would say this, that if you were to do that and not expose yourself to other cultures, then you would end up more than likely committing involuntary racism. What do I mean? Let's talk, people. In our judicial system, Louis, we have degrees of murder. First degree murder, what is that? That is premeditated. thought about it beforehand. Second-degree murder, that's a crime of passion. But then you move down the rungs and you get to involuntary manslaughter. While it wasn't intentional, it still led to death. While it wasn't premeditated or a crime of passion, it still led to death. See, if you're only hanging out with your white brothers and sisters and you're white, or your black brothers and sisters and you're black, then you will be unintentionally emotionally killing people when you are in their presence.

Presence, emotionally killing them.

Correct.

What do you mean by that?

You don't even talk like you're black,acho. You're so educated for a black man. Oh my gosh, you dress so well for a black guy. You think you're paying me a compliment, but you're really emotionally killing me, because now I'm questioning my blackness. I'm questioning who I am. So I would submit to those people who are like, well, I just don't want to. For the betterment of our society. For the betterment of your household, for the betterment of your family, for the betterment of your neighborhood, for the betterment of communities at large, push against that. Push, push, push, push, push against that. I want to eat dessert every day. I don't. For the betterment of my health. Yeah.

Right?

Like some days after a hard workout, maybe you don't feel like showering, but you do for the betterment of those around you so you don't freaking smell. We always do things for the betterment of others. So even if in some weird, naive, lazy way, we don't want to, you still do it. Yeah.

Okay, what's another question we should ask ourselves as white people?

I would probably say, and this, I would probably say, how are you using your privilege to benefit those around you? Okay, people say, okay, Achu, I get it, I'm privileged. Now what? Well, as this company sponsors me, I'm this restaurant sponsor, They give me a celebrity card. You may have heard of the company, I've got a store. But for those who haven't, they give me a celebrity card and with the celebrity card, I'm allowed to eat for free whenever I want.

I go to the restaurant, I place.

My order, swipe the card, it's free. That's amazing. Swipe the card, I need to get one of these sponsorships. It's amazing. It's amazing. But also in the back of the card, if you read the fine print, Emmanuel, you are allowed to throw a party for a hundred people every year at this restaurant or have this restaurant cater it. What do I do? I throw it for the homeless. This is not to toot my own horn. This is to say, I have been given privilege because I am famous to eat at this restaurant for free. I'm not only going to use this privilege for myself. I'm going to use this privilege for those who are not privileged in this means. I say that to say, my white brothers and sisters, you have this white privilege. Don't just use it for yourself. Use it for the betterment of other people. America is not a meritocracy. America is based upon nepotism and cronyism, for those of y'all that don't read books. America meritocracy, it's not based on how hard you work, you'll achieve your success. It's based on nepotism, people hire their family, cronyism, people hire their friends. If America was founded by white men and is based upon hiring your family, white men, white women, hiring your friends, white men, white women, then if that privilege, being white, because that was the word that is that's the fixed variable, that's the fixed outcome rather than the variable outcome. If it's based upon being white, then how are you using that privilege to change the matrix? How are you using that privilege to benefit somebody else who may not have that same privilege? So that would be the third question. Now that you've understood that you have privilege, how are you using your privilege for the betterment of those around you?

And what would you say are some questions we should ask black people? people when we're around them without. Because I've seen this in the online space. It's not black people's responsibility to educate white people. It's white people's responsibility to become educated. I've seen that and that's so tough for me. So again, how are we supposed to have a conversation?

That's so tough. I'm a team sport guy, so I don't adhere to that ideology. In team sports, you know this, in football, you might have to pick up the slack of the man to your left or to your right. Not because you want to.

You don't want to.

But the team needs you to.

You're supposed to just do your job.

Do your job, everybody do your job.

Do your job.

But sometimes somebody falls off.

Falls down.

Somebody's and you have to pick them up. I'm a team sports guy. So what does that mean? If a white person is now ready to listen, it will not be because Emmanuel Acho didn't speak that they did not hear. If a white person is ready to listen, it's not going to be for a lack of a manual Achó speech that they did not hear. That's my thing. If somebody's ready to listen, I'm now gonna say something. I've been saying something. Now, I'm not gonna tell my black brothers and sisters, find the strength. I'm not gonna do that. Because people are tired, boss. They're sick and tired of being sick and tired. We say that in the church. I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired. If people are, I'm not gonna, I know what I'm gonna do. Right. I know what I think will behoove those around me, but I'm not gonna project that onto other people. So this is tough. What should their white friends be asking black friends, black people? Probably number one, how are you? Don't ask them for any, nobody cares what you know until they know that you care.

Absolutely.

Nobody cares what you know until they, there's a reason I choose every word, I choose every syllable. I think about everything I say. My very first episode, Dear white brothers and sisters, this is for you. Consider this a safe space. I say that intentionally. White people, I want y'all to know I care. I made this for you. I could have said, Hey, white people, let's talk.

Listen up.

It's totally different. But I use words like brothers and sisters because that implies Mm-. Nobody cares what you know until they know what you care. First thing is just, hey, how are you? Okay.

How are you?

That's the first thing. First thing, second thing, how can I help?

Mm-.

What can I do? Yeah. Don't need it. It's not complicated. After George Ford was murdered, three people called me. Dude named Trent, dude named Russell, dude named Brandon. Russell and Brandon, same two people that I went to their house. Remember, I told you all that story minutes ago. They called me, hey, Acho, I just wanna listen. If you need somebody to cry to, cry, yell at, yell, vent to vent. I just, how are you, man? That was it. That was it. They opened the door for communication. That was it. And then from there, from there we had real conversations.

We need to have conversations.

Correct. But don't, don't, I'm not gonna sit here and encourage white people. We'll start at, no man, 'cause some black people tired. I can't even lie, they tired. And I get it, I get it, I get it. Bro, when you sit there and watch people being murdered and lied on and executed and it's so much of it is racially motivated. I'm not going to say it's all. I've said this before, I don't think George Floyd's murder was exclusively racial. I do not think it was exclusively racial. I do not. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I think so.

I don't think it was exclusively racial.

No. I think that it was power related. Power related and race related.

I think if it was a white person, I do not think George Floyd would have been murdered if it was a white person.

If George Floyd was white, he would.

Not have been do you think he would have put his knee on his neck and maybe asserted power and then taken it off at some point?

I don't even think it would have got there. This is a long conversation, I'll do it in 42 seconds. Here's why. Communication barrier. Because white people and black people don't really know how to communicate. Then white people don't know how to as efficiently defuse a situation with black people. Communication barrier. Communication is everything. If we did a better a better job of disarming vocally, we wouldn't have to discharge with our weapons. Communication barrier. After communication barrier, there is a subconscious thinking of black people are lesser than white people. Generally speaking, there's a subconscious thinking, why is that? That's been for everyone or for society. Okay, y'all pick and choose where you want to fall in society. But in society, that's what society has told us. From slavery to Jim Crow, to television, to segregation, to everything. There is a Concept of, wait, this black person is beneath me. That's just what society has told us. Just think about it. Think about anything in life. Think about whatever movie you watch. Who's the villain? Who's the victim? Who's being victimized? Think about the subliminal cues of that. And then lastly, in my opinion, and I got my master's degree in psychology, so little this is psychological based, when the cop is kneeing on George Floyd's neck, and you have people telling him to stop, he's looking up like, y'all, I'm not gonna listen to you, black people.

If you think of white people telling.

Him to stop, I think it's different. I think there's a different respect.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, I see a bunch of white.

People telling me to stop. Oh, these are my people telling me to stop. Oh, I respect these people. Interesting. Oh, these are my, oh, I respect y'all. Okay, you're right. But I'm like, he's looking at these black people like, y'all hoodlums, y'all thugs, y'all, I'm not gonna be educated. I'm not gonna listen to y'all sitting here in your street clothes telling me I'm the cop. So I think there are a lot of factors at play. Power being one of them, race being one of them.

I feel like we've only gotten started, but we've only got a few minutes left of your time. I wanna go for three more hours, but I wanna ask you a couple final questions before I ask them. Make sure you guys get this book, Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man, Emmanuel Acho. Good looking black man.

My guy.

Get a few copies for your friends. This is a perfect gift for the holidays as well. So your family members can start being educated and having uncomfortable conversations together. What's a conversation a white person can have with a white person who might.

Be.

Unconsciously racist, consciously racist, you know, what is that?

Starter.

Besides the saying, Hey, read this. You need this book. But what's a conversation to open it for someone who might be unconscious or consciously racist?

I would say two things. More than I want or would encourage people to necessarily have the conversation, you need to be anti-racist, not just non-racist. That's where I would really say.

What's the difference between non-racist and anti-racist?

Non-racist is I am not a participant in racism. but I still tolerate racism around me. Anti-racist, I am not only not a participant in racism, but when I hear it, I call it out. I'm at Thanksgiving with my family. I'm white. And my dad says, Man, can you believe all those black people that are in the neighborhood now? Like, what is going on here? Call that out.

Wow.

Don't let that slide. Don't let that slide. I saw this black guy out the street. rocking around in a tank top. Let me look, we should go check that one. Call that out. It's not enough to be non-racist. We must also be anti-racist. Then I think the biggest gateway is, like I said, which is the most common one, privilege. White privilege. Like that's the biggest gateway if you're white, so starting a conversation with other white people.

How can we have a conversation as white people without feeling guilty about white privilege when When a lot of people I talk to are saying, I'm not trying to do something wrong.

Yeah. So I've said this, guilt doesn't cause someone to change. Love does. Guilt doesn't cause someone to change. Don't feel guilty. Like, I don't feel guilty that I'm now a little bit famous. I don't feel guilty. That'd be so dumb. I can't believe people recognize me now.

I get free stuff every day.

It's terrible. Oh my gosh. What have I done? I don't feel guilty. It's not necessarily your fault. Don't feel guilty. That won't cause anybody to change. Love causes people to change. Now, don't feel guilty, but I need you to acknowledge it. I need you to acknowledge it and act accordingly.

How does someone acknowledge it? Who's white?

Is that saying every day, I have white privilege? To everyone they see who's black? I think it's subconscious. I think it's walking up to the restaurant with the black black person and the white hostess is there. And you know the black person got there first, but the white hostess looks at you and says, yes, how many people at your party? No, you didn't get there first.

Saying, oh, they're before me. Little things.

I'm not asking you to save the world, but no, no, they got there first. They got there first. Those are the subtle things. And those are the ones that everybody will probably see in the next week or two, because that's the stuff I see all the time. I'm walking to a restaurant, somebody else is like, and they don't just act like I wasn't there. Like, I get treated second class.

What do, I don't want to say, what do black people feel in general, because you're one human being, but what do your friends or people you know in general who are black who deal with this on a daily basis, what are those conversations like behind the scenes when it's like, man, you know, today this happened again. Well, this happened again to me.

Man, I would say, I would probably say that Several, a lot of black people probably become numb to it. Now black people aren't one monolithic group, so it's hard to speak on behalf, but let me speak, your experience is your expertise, so let me speak from my experience and my friend's experience. You get numb to it. There are degrees, like I said, of racism, right? You have first degree slavery, you have second degree, I'm like the George Floyd and Christian Amy Cooper in New York Central Park, the dogs, y'all go the story if you don't know it. But the bottom degrees of just kind of being followed in a store or not being acknowledged in a store. If I go to the Rolex store, I went to the Rolex store in Santa Monica, I put on my Rolex. I have several watches, but if I'm going to the Rolex store, I'm gonna wear my Rolex, 'cause I'm a black man. And more than likely, black man, can you really afford a Rolex based on what society has told me? I'm conscious of that. Before I hop on Zoom calls, If I'm wearing my chain, I'll put my chain inside my shirt. Because I'm a black man and the world has told me, oh, black man with chain, you should be a rapper, you should be a gangster, you should be a thug. So black people, I think, at least me, I'm just very, oh, it's my life I now have to live.

Yeah, I think you told a story one on your episodes that even when you're in a car getting your mail, you saw white women come out and you waited in your car, just so you weren't getting them out at the same time to not potentially make them feel uncomfortable.

Yeah, because man, I mean think about this bro.

When you go in an elevator, you.

Push the elevator button first and I get off the elevator first. Think about what history has told me, like, -oh. Man, if I go to this mailbox and freaky and I trip and I use a white woman to catch myself, that started the Tulsa race riots back in 1927, Tulsa, Oklahoma, maybe 1921. That started the Tulsa massacre. Black man, elevator trips, uses white woman to catch himself, she screams, he runs off the elevator, next thing you know 300 homes are eviscerated by 1200 businesses. Wait Emmanuel, that was in the 1920s, bro that wouldn't happen now. Christian Cooper, Amy Cooper, black man tells white woman, lease your dog, white woman calls the cops, this black man is threatening my life, please help, come quickly. If not for video cameras, who knows how that situation unfolds. because of that, I as a black man, especially a 620-240 pound black man, I'm just very cognizant of like, man, look, y'all not about to get me. I'm not about to get me.

On something stupid that didn't happen just because.

Just because you're white. And if you call the cops, they will believe you before they believe me.

What is it like with black cops? Are they more believing of a white story versus a black story?

Or how does that scenario play out? It's interesting, man. Again, again, my experience is my expertise. So I will say that, and I said this in my episode with my officers. I didn't say that like this, but I see a black cop as black before I see he is a cop. I see a white cop as a cop first. But I think when black people go to a restaurant, at least the black people I know, you go to a restaurant, you look for like the other black person, and you make eye contact, 'cause like just in case something pops off. Really? Yes, bro. Because think about this, black people, we navigate white spaces.

We see each other like, Hey, I'm gonna be a witness if something happens.

There's a case. There's an unspoken rule of like, Hey, shut up. There's an unspoken rule of like, Hey, I got your back. Shut up. True stories. Bro, I went to a church in Austin, Texas, predominantly white. So when I'm walking in there, I'm looking for other black people.

It's like, I wonder what you're doing here.

Even now in Beverly Hills, when I go to a restaurant, I'm like, oh, good. It's good to see you made it too.

I don't know what you do for.

A living, but I'm glad you're here. 'Cause it's me and you and about a hundred other white people at this fancy steakhouse. So I don't know what you do, but I'm proud, like I'm proud of you.

I'm proud of you, 'cause I know it was harder for you than it was for everybody else.

That's cool. Do other black people think the same thing when you're, is that just you? No, no, no, no, no. This is a, this is a, bro, ask the black people that you know, ask them. Bro, I'm telling you, like when you log on into a restaurant. But it's not that foreign. Let me flip the roles for you now. I go to Nigeria on mission trips every summer and we go with white people. White doctors, nurses, we do medical mission work. And think about if you were to go into a foreign country and you're the only white person there. When you see another white person, you're.

Gonna spark up a conversation. Or someone of a language.

If you're in Mexico, you can speak Spanish. Let me put it good in terms for everybody listening, watching, whatever the case may be. You travel to Mexico, you travel to Italy, and you're standing in the customs line. We've all been there. I know you've been there. And you're standing in the customs line, and you don't see nobody really recognize. But then you see somebody else who looks fair skinned, or say you're from.

Texas, and you see somebody in their backpack has a Texas flag.

What are you gonna do, man? You're gonna connect. You're gonna connect. It's like Jeep owners, motorcyclists, they're like waving at each other when you're driving by.

Like what?

Saying really isn't that foreign. Whenever you are the minority and you see someone else who has something shared with you, you connect over that. White people do it too. White people just don't do it over their whiteness because in America it's white so you're always connected. But in America if you're black you're rarely connected. I'm one of them people who can get motivated very easily. But in a sense of getting motivated very easily you can be down on yourself and have self-doubt very easily. Not thinking you're great great enough, not thinking you're enough, lacking confidence in your shot, you know, and whatever it was, I definitely had a lot of self-doubt self-doubt but I was always able to pull from.