What it Takes to Become a Civilized Savage

Ryan Hanley: Right. How many other 11 year olds were leaving seventh grade and going to work? It's kind of crazy when you think about it.

Guest: When you know what you want, the civilized side says, "Hey, I want to work." That's civilized. The savage side says, "No matter what I had to do." Kids were going off and doing fun things. I was going to work. That's what I chose. My parents didn't force me to do that. That's where the civilized savage comes from.

If you look at guys and gals, if you look at somebody like David Goggins today — civilized savage. Most people, after hearing him, say, "Oh, he's a civilized savage." That's the point where you're pulling that out. He's so civilized every day, but he's willing to put himself through things that everybody else either fears or doesn't want to do. That's the savage side in you.

Any of the greats — I don't care if you take gentlemen like Steve Young. Most people would say, "Oh, football. He's a gentleman of gentlemen." He's a civilized savage. Jerry Rice — you ever see his workouts? One of the players asked him, "Hey, we're running routes 10, 20 yards, and the other 80 yards you sprint down to the end zone. Why do you do that? You're putting on miles and miles and miles. Why?" Mentally, in his head, he saw himself running to that end zone every time he caught the ball, so he fulfilled it. A lot of people on the sideline used to say he's a little crazy. He's putting on like 20 miles in practice that he didn't have to do. That's a civilized savage.

You're taking two concepts and bringing them together. It has nothing to do with being a criminal, a bad person, or a barbarian. That savage side is just somebody knowing exactly what they want and being willing to do whatever it takes, put themselves through discomfort, and face all their fears to become so civilized that they are so good at that. That's where that comes from.

Just think about that mentality that Jerry Rice had: "I am training my body and my mind to score a touchdown on every play. Every play." The wide receiver that tells that story was a rookie. He shows up at rookie ball, which is weeks before the vets show up, and Jerry Rice is there taking passes with the rookies because he knew that quarterbacks were going to be on the field throwing passes. If that was happening, he was going to be there. And then he's scoring touchdowns on every play. That kind of mentality — it makes me sad that it's a rare mindset today.

Ryan Hanley: It's funny. The deeper and more that we get to know each other, the similarities in our stories, while different, just astound me. When I was 10, I used to wake up at 4:30 in the morning every Thursday with two 50-gallon trash bags. I would walk the streets of my town and pull the recyclables out of people's recycling bins that I could get five cents for. I would walk around — if it was winter, in a coat; if it was summer, in a t-shirt — rummaging through at 4:30 in the morning, blue recycling bins out on the street, carrying around sacks of cans. I'd have two full by the end. I'd get 40, 50 bucks in a week just doing that. In my life and where I came from, that was the only way that I could get money. My parents weren't going to give me money.

Guest: I did the same thing. They were getting by. But think about this, Ryan. Do you do that for your kids? Do your kids get up and do that? They don't, right? It's one of those things that you either have it or you don't have it. That's not something your parents told you to do.

Ryan Hanley: My parents didn't tell me.

Guest: I did the same thing. We had a beach house — a lot of people... my dad... we never went on vacation. First time we ever left Connecticut, we went to Rhode Island. We had a beach house. The only time we ever went on vacation, I think I was 17. I was when I first got on a plane. We went to Florida. Because what do we do Saturday? My dad worked till one o'clock. We would head down to the beach. We would stay at the beach. What did I do Saturday and Sunday? I said, "Dad, can we stay until six?" Because when the beach closed, I would go through the garbage and pick the cans, just as you did. Nobody told me to do that. Nobody told you to do that.

It's different today. If you look at your kids, are your kids willing to do what you were willing to do? A lot of people today would look at that and say, "I would never go and pick garbage out of a garbage can. What would people think? What are they going to say about us? What are they going to say about me if they see me doing that? Are they going to think I'm poor? Are they going to judge me? Are they going to say things?"

Here's the best part. One of the neighbors caught me rummaging through the bins, saw what I was doing. He came out of his house one time and asked me. I said, "I'm just picking cans." Didn't say a word to me back, turned around, and went in his house. A week later, that son of a bitch was driving in his car around the neighborhood, picking cans in front of me. He became a competitor. An adult, right?

I remember the feeling. Neighbors would be up sometimes because it took me like an hour, hour and a half. I'd have to be home by six to get dressed and get ready for school to get to the bus — it was a half-hour bus ride into school from where my house was. I would see the neighbors rummaging or ruffling their curtains or their blinds, looking out, and they'd feel it. I remember the first couple of times I was like, "Oh no, am I going to get in trouble?" And then I just said, "What's the worst that could happen?"

Ryan Hanley: Right. I think we don't ask ourselves that question enough. We immediately want to jump into the future and start projecting: "What's this person going to say? Is someone going to yell at me? Am I going to be allowed to do this?" Obviously operating inside the frame of general legality, most of the stuff we're afraid of — the consequences are so small, yet we create these enormous what-ifs in our head, and it keeps us from moving forward.

I have been pounding into my children's head every day. I have this piece of wood. One of my listeners to the show made this for me — he's just a woodworker — and it's just the letters G-N-F. It stands for "Give No Fucks." I say that to my kids all the time. I'm like, "If you want to be great at anything, if you want to make any kind of dent, any kind of mark on this world, you cannot give a fuck what people think." It doesn't mean you don't want people to like you. I want you to like me. I do. But if you didn't, my life would be exactly the same. It doesn't change. I can't control how you feel about something I say or do. I have to build the life that I'm going to be proud of. If I care what you think, that's only going to limit my ability to get there.

Guest: Why do you think today in particular? I've been reading a lot of history, and I do think this is a particular concept to the modern world — maybe the last 40, 50 years or so. We care so much about what other people think, and it drives so many of our decisions. Why do you think that is?

Ryan Hanley: Easy to answer if you look at the last 10, 15 years. I think social media. What is social media? In itself, you're posting things to get a response, probably because you're not confident enough yourself. "How many likes did I get? How many shares did I get?" That's vitally important to who we are, but it shouldn't be.

It's kind of like you were at the last mastermind, right? What did Angus Reid say? "The worst thing you can tell your kids is 'I'm proud of you.'" You know why? Because now you're telling your kids that someone else is telling you you did a good job, and you should accept what other people say. So Angus says you need to change that. You ask your son, "Hey, Gianni, how'd you play today?" "I played well." "Are you proud of yourself?" And my son says, "Well, are you proud of how I played?" "I'm always proud. You're my son. Are you proud of yourself?" You make your kids answer that because the outside world shouldn't be telling my son or my daughter whether they should be proud of themselves. Your kids should be proud. If they're not proud of themselves, "What could you have changed that you would have been proud of yourself?"

A couple weeks ago, my son said, "I shouldn't have said anything to the ref. You always tell me, keep my mouth closed." I said, "What happened when you got mouthy with the ref?" "I didn't get any calls." "You're not going to get calls. That's why I said to you, nothing good comes out of telling the ref that he stinks. He or she missed a call. He's a human being just like you. Hey, ref, good job. Leave it at that." So don't let the outside world tell you or tell your kids if they're doing a good job.

Guest: Going back 50, 60 years ago, that's a different question, I think. Social media has been around for hundreds of years, if you think about it. When the Indians used to send smoke signals to others, some people could call that social media. It's media and you're communicating. It's a different form of communication. But I really think social media has damaged society tremendously. You don't get to see both sides of the coin. There are so few people that are putting out everything that happens. I don't even think that's healthy. You see the beautiful car or the house. Even with a lot of the accounts and individuals that are out there, most of the time those are rented. They're not telling you that beautiful beach house that they're at — they rented for four hours so they could take pictures at it. There are literally homes, facilities, and operations in different major cities in this country whose entire business model is renting these things to influencers so they can take these pictures and build this fantasy life that doesn't actually exist.

Ryan Hanley: This year, or last year actually, my son who had played on the A baseball team — the top level baseball team for his age in his town for three years — didn't get asked back to the team. He had to play for the B team. It was very, very difficult, mostly because his friends were there. He's younger, so it wasn't as big a thing for him that the team, but he felt that disconnect from his friends. He cried. It was emotional. I was probably crying a little bit too just because I felt bad for him that he had to go through this.

Now a year later, it's the best thing that's ever happened to him. That pain, that frustration — he started working on the parts of his game that allowed that coach not to ask him back. There were certain aspects of him that he was light on. He's also nine years old. He hadn't grown into his body. He's still figuring things out. There were some things he was good at, some he wasn't. He started working. I saw a new determination in him, a new drive.

Not that we, especially as parents, want our children to experience these negative things. No one wants them to experience negative things. However, negative experiences early in life in particular — if we can reframe them from "Oh, this happened to you, you're a victim, everyone's out to get you, the system is rigged" — if you can reframe that as "Well, how did you participate in that? You had the lowest batting average on the team. You might have been the second best pitcher. You might have been the starting second baseman, but you had the lowest batting average on the team. Unfortunately, until you're a professional baseball player, you can't only pitch. You have to hit. That's what it is. If you want to play this sport, this is a skill you have to develop."

He turned that part of his game around and he worked on it. That negative experience — the pain, the frustration, the sadness of losing his friend team — that will be something that sticks with him. The next bad thing that happens, he'll know what to do, hopefully.

It's almost like we protect... I hate this idea of safe space. What part of fucking life is safe? Driving down here from my house is not safe. This building, while beautiful, is in a part of town that is not safe. There is no part of life that is safe, yet we try to create these little bubbles for them that just do not relate to reality that they're going to face when they get out in the real world.

I think that's the problem with the generation below me — I'm 43 — the 25 to 35 year olds that are struggling so much today with the marketplace: "We can't afford this." It's like, "Yeah, no duh." All of us had that thing in a different way when we were coming up. The only difference is you were never taught that this was coming. You were everything safe. Everything's great. You're perfect. You're amazing. All of a sudden, reality smacks you in the face. I think previous generations were just shown what reality was, particularly in America. They were shown what reality was really like so that when they got to the real world and shitty things did happen or things were hard or you couldn't afford something, you were like, "Oh, I just have to work harder. I have to figure this out."

How do you, with your children in particular, show them the world that they're going to have to fight against when they're outside of your home?

Guest: It's a great question. Just a step back. I would challenge you. You're at 43. I'm at 51. I would say eight, ten years ago, roughly your age, I would have thought the same thing. "I can't stand seeing my kid fail — not make this team or not do well." Today, with the mindset I have, I believe it's a blessing that he fails, that he has his mom and dad with him to explain from failure what you learn. Your son had you at nine years old. He had you.

Now, I would challenge you. You got to stay present when your kid fails. You got to stay focused. There is so much to learn from him not making it. "Hey, maybe we need to work on this. Maybe we weren't in the best shape. Maybe this, maybe that." Let's surround him with why he failed. One of the questions we were talking about is the difference between losing and failing. Failing — I have no problem with my kids failing. I have a problem if they lose. Losing means they didn't learn anything. They blame other people. "We got beat. They were better than us. They've been practicing three years together." That's baloney. They beat you. Why? They beat you. Maybe you weren't disciplined enough. Maybe you didn't practice enough. You didn't shoot enough free throws. You weren't in good enough shape. There are reasons why they beat you. Failure is learning from that. Losing is just blaming: "I got beat because of this." No, you got beat because you and your team — maybe you're out-coached, maybe you're out-played, maybe you're out-worked. You lost. If you don't learn anything, that's a loser's mentality.

I always tell my kids, "I have no problem if you fail. I have no problem if you're beaten. You're going to be beaten. People were better basketball players than me. They were taller than me. They could jump higher than me. But you know what they didn't do? They weren't going to outwork me." So what do I teach my kids? I teach my kids, "Don't be outworked." I'll take the person who works the hardest over the most talented person all day long.

My son was told after freshman year he should never go out for basketball. He'll never make a basketball team. That was the greatest thing that that coach ever gave my son. You know why? Because he chose his enemies wisely. We were just talking about that, right, Ryan? If you choose your enemies wisely — it's a book by Patrick Bet-David. I recommend everybody reading it. I look back in my life after reading it, I'm like, "I chose a lot of enemies. I still choose enemies." It's amazing when I stay focused after reading that.

My son chose an enemy. That coach looked at him and said, "You're a loser and I don't believe in you." That's not him being cruel. That was the state of where my son was, who picked up a basketball only a year prior. He didn't like the game, and I didn't push him. My dad kept saying, "Don't push him. If you push him, he's going to run from it." Then a year prior to getting cut from his freshman team, he picked up a basketball and he lived basketball. When he tried out, he wasn't good enough for the team. He got cut. But what drove him every single day — morning, noon, and night, not going to dances — was the coach's voice in the back of his head telling him he's never going to make it.

We're going into our senior year. As a junior, he started one varsity basketball game. He played in almost all the varsity games. They go into the state tournaments. They win round one. He plays well. They win round two. He plays well again. Round three comes in. He's not playing that much. Big guy fouls out. Who comes in? My son. Minute and 21 seconds left. They go down two points with 10 seconds left. The star shoots, misses. Gianni gets a rebound, gets fouled. He has two free throws. Down two points. He's only played a couple minutes that game. He hasn't started but one game his whole junior year. He gets up, makes both of them. Now all of a sudden they go into double overtime. They win. Gianni played well, hit a nice three, made the free throws to carry the game on. They go on to the quarterfinals. They end up getting beat.

The moral of the story is you have to be prepared. I was talking to the coach a couple nights ago, and he says, "I was so thankful that Gianni got fouled." I said, "Coach, why were you thankful? He hadn't played." He's like, "Because I knew he shot more free throws than anybody else in that gym." It's discipline. It's believing. It's taking that enemy, that person who said you couldn't do it, and driving you — that nail or that voice in the back of your head that just drives you every single day.

That's what I teach my kids. I teach my kids failing is okay as long as we learn. Regret is okay. "Leave no regrets" is a bunch of baloney. I have friends that say that, and I challenge them. I say, "Hey, I respectfully disagree. Leave no regrets? No." Regrets is a superpower if we learn from them. Have you ever done something that you regretted? When you ponder about it, you're like, "Wow, that's something you're never going to do again." Or you're going to alter your actions because of what you did. You had a regret. It had a profound impact on your life. These are teachable lessons.

I would encourage you as a parent, as I encourage parents and coaches: if your kids aren't failing, they're not trying hard enough. They should be failing — not losing, failing. Mom and Dad — and I know what type of guy you are, a guy like you needs to be there to teach him, not pick him up. Be there to teach him a lesson, teach him why he failed and how we're going to not fail next time. That's more valuable than praying for him not to fail or always seeing your son win.

Ryan Hanley: Yeah, I agree. There's a bunch in there that I want to respond to. My older son, who I coach his travel team, had a game in the middle of the season. Pitching is his thing. He loves pitching. He's actually figured out ways to make the ball move that I could never, in my entire career, make the ball move the way that he can. He just has a natural ability, and it's wonderful, and he works at it.

We had a game in the middle of the year, and he's getting hit. He's our number one pitcher. In a double header, he'll start the second game. He's one of our top pitchers on the team. Middle of the season, season's been going well from a pitching perspective, and he's just getting lit up. Every ball is finding a hole. He's all over the strike zone. I know what he's doing wrong. I can see it, but I'm just watching him. He wasn't striding far enough, so his timing and rhythm were off. All these things. It doesn't matter.

Unlike me — I'm a highly emotion-driven person. It's taken me a lot of work to pull that in, but in general I run very hot. Not always negative, I just run on that level. He's not that way. He's a thinker. He's usually calm, cool. He can come in with bases loaded — he did this season multiple times — bases loaded, no outs, come in, and any other kid is throwing the ball off the top of the backstop, and he's boom, boom, boom. But I could tell he was getting rattled because he couldn't. He looks over at me, and I go, "Figure it the fuck out. What are you looking at me for?" We have a relationship that I can say that. I didn't say it to him in a mean way. Some people are going to say, "Why would you say that to your kid?" Yeah, that's the real world.

The point is he looked to me for help, and it's like, "No, I can't come out there and throw the ball for you. You're the one throwing the ball. You know what to do. If I come out and I tell you you're not striding long enough or whatever he was doing, then you're not going to be able to correct it when I'm not on the sideline. Right now I'm in the dugout. I can see everything. I'm right there. But there is going to come a time in the not too distant future where I'm not going to be in the dugout. I'm not going to be able to yell down to him what he's doing wrong. So you gotta use this moment."

Guest: Absolutely.

Ryan Hanley: I could tell he didn't like that response from me. But then he pulled his shit together and he got himself out of the inning. When he came off — I'm getting a little teary even saying it because it was such a proud moment for me — I grabbed him and I gave him a big ass hug. I just looked at him and I was like, "Dude, I do not give a fuck that you got lit up out there. What matters is the last three batters where you pulled your shit together, you figured out what you were doing wrong, and you got those guys out of the inning." He's looking at me and I'm a little teary-eyed, and he gives me that 10-year-old look like, "What the fuck?" But in my head, it was such a moment for me because of the tumult that he had had in his career. I knew how hard he would work. For him to realize, "I'm not always going to be there" — and that played out the rest of the season.

We got into the playoffs. One of our pitchers got hurt. Our number three pitcher just absolutely blew up. He had to pitch two games in two days to try to win this tournament. We ended up losing, whatever. But he goes seven innings with two earned runs and like 12 K's, one walk. Absolutely lights out. Didn't look at me once. Not just because he was doing well — he knew it was him.

You see those little things, those moments when we force them into the fire. We don't push our kids into the fire. You force them into the fire. That's a little thing. Some people are going to go, "Oh, it's not a little thing." You got your son, without even knowing, to believe in himself.

Guest: Yes. That's the part that I love about this work we're doing with Civilized Savage and this book, and why I feel this is so important. We had originally talked about putting it out in the fall, and I said no, I want to do the spring because I want to do this right. This lesson of walking into the fire intentionally — intentionally — that's the difference. The universe doesn't give a shit about us. The universe is going to mow us down and not think twice about it. You can be reactive and just react to the fires that come, or you can pick the fires you want to walk in and go in intentionally and come out a stronger, more confident, more put together person. Then when those moments do happen, they're like, "Whatever."

The up and down story of my career, different things that have happened. I had someone recently say to me, "How do you keep coming back?" I said, "Do you know how many times in my life I've been knocked down, had my dick kicked? Do you know how many times I've been knocked in the dirt and had to dust myself off with no one grabbing my hand? This isn't the first time this has happened." This is everything from when I was young with my parents and all the craziness in my personal life. My dad went to jail when I was 16. He went to jail before when I was 12. He's a great guy. I don't want to disparage him in any way. He's amazing. He made his decisions and turned all those problems around as an incredible grandfather. But this is not the first time.

So what are you going to do? You're going to baby the shit out of your kids. You're going to let them live in this safe little bubble where they're perfect. Everything they say is wonderful. Everything they do is amazing. Then you're going to push them out into the world, and that's going to be the first fire they have to experience — when they're 18 or 19 or 20 years old. They're in trouble. No wonder these kids turn to drugs, video games, all the different things they've now grabbed onto. They've isolated themselves. The millennials are the loneliest generation in history. The loneliest generation in American history is the millennials. How is that possible? With all the connectivity, all the programs, the community things, the sports, all the different things they have at their disposal to meet and mix with people, they're the loneliest. I think it's because they have no idea how to deal with even the smallest struggle in their life. So they turtle up and they don't want anyone to know because, God forbid, someone knows I'm going through something hard or I failed. They become these little isolated versions of themselves with no skills to actually deal with that feeling.

Ryan Hanley: But remember, it's not the millennials. It's the parents of the millennials.

Guest: Yes, agreed.

Ryan Hanley: I think society, including us sometimes, we blame the millennials. But remember, that's parenting.

Guest: Yeah. That's something that's not talked nearly enough. Parents are protecting their kids, even with school teachers. It's amazing. Do you really believe your kid came home from high school or came home from 8th grade and little Johnny did nothing wrong and just got a detention, and the teacher just had it out for that person? Come on. Do you really think that? But there are parents that really think that, rather than sitting little Johnny down and saying, "I want to know the truth. This is what the teacher says. I want to know, did it really happen like that?" And when they tell you a fib, "Are you sure? Because we're going to go sit down with the teacher and you." It's amazing when you get the truth. Rather than just taking the side and saying the teacher's out targeting little Johnny and my kid would never do that. Hey, my kids made mistakes. Your kids are going to make mistakes. Let's teach them how to own their mistakes rather than protecting them from them and blaming it on the teacher or on the coach.

I thank the coach every time I see him when we're traveling at AAU. My son is where he is today because you basically told him he has no shot at ever playing high school basketball. Boy, were you wrong. But I was grateful that you put that in his head. I can't protect him. I did tell him, "You're not good enough to make the team." That was hard to tell him the truth, but that's true love. If you love your kids, just like if you love your friends, you're going to be truthful with them. Why do we live in a society where we're afraid to offend everybody? You really don't love people if you're not going to tell them. If somebody hurts you, what are you going to do? Run from it?

Guest: That's what we do today. That's what society says. "Oh, I'm offended by that." We're offended by everything. I want people, and as I always told you, Ryan, we're friends. If you love me, you'll tell me the truth, even if it hurts. That's love.

Ryan Hanley: Jordan Peterson, one of his—it was the Utah event that you invited me to. So at the Utah event that we went to for Sean Whalen's Lions Den event, Jordan Peterson was a keynote speaker. And I'd say the vast majority of that talk was about one topic: tell the truth. And his point was the only way for us to live in reality is if we tell the truth. That's it.

Guest: Think about your relationship with your spouse or your partner or loved one. The challenges that you face, the disagreements are most often because you have not told the truth about what you really want.

Ryan Hanley: True.

Guest: And then friction creates regret and resentment and bitterness because you didn't tell that person, "Look, for my mental health, I need to go fishing once a week and you got to deal with it" or whatever. So you don't go do the thing you want to do or you don't say the things you want to say. And then all this tension builds up because you haven't been living in reality with this person. And that person is only responding to what you say to them.

Ryan Hanley: Right.

Guest: If I lie to you about something and then you respond per what I told you and I don't like that response, that's not your fault. That's my fault.

Ryan Hanley: It is.

Guest: Because you can only respond. You can't read my mind. You can only respond to what I say to you and the things that I do. So if I am false in my actions and in my words, your response is not your fault. Your response is my fault. And that idea—we think we're doing favors for people by not telling the truth. We're not doing them any favors. Not at all.

Ryan Hanley: And it's one of the biggest lessons that I learned in my marriage and now in the relationship that I have with the woman that I was talking to you about before. I'm a hundred percent—you know, in my marriage, I thought the right thing to do was get along, say what needed to be said, do what needed to be done to get along for the betterment of the family. And a lot of bitterness and resentment was created because of that. And remember, your kids see through that. They see it even if they're young. While I don't necessarily know that she and I were meant to be together long term, she's a good mother and we co-parent very well together. But in my real relationship that I have now, I'm a hundred percent upfront and honest with her with the things going on—the good and the bad.

Guest: So you learn from failure. You failed that marriage—maybe both of you failed that—but you learned something so valuable that you're doing something very different in the relationship you are in today because of that failure.

Ryan Hanley: And the truth is, between when I've been divorced and today, I had two other relationships in the middle. But by telling the truth very quickly, it was obvious that those were not relationships that would last. Instead of trying to be the person I was during my marriage and just getting along to get along—they were perfectly fine humans and we could have had a nice time—but I wanted to be with someone who wanted to be with me, as I believe we all should. And I wanted to live in reality. Those weren't failed relationships; they just weren't the person I was supposed to be with.

Guest: It's the definition of insanity: doing the same thing and expecting a different result. You can't do the same thing, and you chose not to.

Ryan Hanley: This idea of telling the truth is something that as a people pleaser, I've had to come to grips with. Being a people pleaser can have very negative connotations. It can be a positive—it allows me to be a good salesperson, it allows me to be a good leader at times because I am empathetic in that way. But there's a toxic side of that. And I believe—and this is going to lead into my next question—I want to transition out of some of the parenting stuff and talk more about the individuals who are watching and how we can live our own lives better. There's this concept I was exposed to called toxic empathy. I think this is the case for most liberals—how they're willing to accept autocratic and authoritarian ideas in the name of doing what's right by people. We do want every man, woman, and child to have equal rights. We don't want discrimination, racism, and sexism. I think you and I both agree these are horrible things. And honestly, the answer to me is always capitalism, because if you're a true, pure capitalist, you're only going to want to work with the best. What color their skin is or who they have sex with is meaningless—it's just who is the best fit for your company. I find the people that see ideas like racism to be so insane are athletes. When you're on a sports team, you don't care what that other person is. If they got your back and they're pushing in the same direction as you, you don't even see it. So coming back to what I believe here is that we've developed this idea of toxic empathy. We're willing to do things that long-term have very negative ramifications for both us as individuals and our society in the name of trying to be empathetic to certain humans. So with that table set, you wrote, "Modern culture normalizes mediocrity." My take on that line when I first read it was that it's possible our desire to be empathetic and to equalize our world is the catalyst of that. One, do you agree with that? And two, build upon it as to your case for why our society has normalized mediocrity, because I 100% agree.

Guest: I wish I knew the reason why. I think humans—and I'll go back to a really simple philosophy that I believe in. Have you and I asked people all the time? It's a really stupid example, but my kids laugh at me because their friends laugh at me. When you go to the grocery store, where do you try to park? Closest to the entry. Why? Because our mind's purpose is to keep us comfortable. And keeping us comfortable is a form of laziness. So if you're in my car going to the grocery store, we're going to park the farthest away from the grocery store. I put that example in the book. Why? Because it says a lot. How many people do you see at a grocery store—even acquaintances I know—park in handicapped spots and they're not handicapped? That's how close they want to get. That's their mind telling them we got to stay comfortable. We can't walk more than 10 feet to get to that front door. Why do we do that? And why is it okay? I tell my kids all the time, "I pray for a hard life, and I pray for a hard life for you, because an easy life isn't worth living." But our mind wants to keep us easy. So I challenge not only my kids but people to do something out of the ordinary. Next time you go to a grocery store, your mind's going to tell you to park close. It's instinctive. You're doing it automatically. Go to the mall, park the farthest away. At Christmas when people have to park far, but there's nobody in the parking lot—park the farthest away. See what your kids, your wife, your friends, see what your own mind says. "Why am I doing this?" It's the opposite way of thinking.

Ryan Hanley: So I think a lot of it has to do with our mindset, number one. And I think a lot of it has to do with education. I think teachers—and not just teachers, but coaches are a form of teachers—we're teaching the wrong mentality to kids. We lose a game, we blame the ref. We didn't lose the game because the ref made a bad call. He or she is a human. They missed the call. We lost the game. Why? Let's look at the real reason we lost the game. You ever see somebody miss a free throw and we lost the game because we didn't shoot free throws well? Well, we could have played better defense. We could have got more rebounds. What's the real reason? Why is our mindset really the way it is? Is it modern society teaching us? Is it coaches? Is it teachers teaching us? Or is it our mindset? I would challenge that it's a combination of both. And why I said what I said in that book is I challenge my kids. What's the easy way? What's the hardest way? Choose the hardest way. My son is adamant that he loves to study an hour or two hours before the exam because it's easy for him. I challenge him. "Hey, you got a test on Monday. When you come home, I'm going to work out with you in basketball. When you come home at seven o'clock, we're going to study." He doesn't like doing that. That's against the way he is. My daughter is opposite. So I then challenge her. "Hey, I'm going to take those books away from you. You're going to study Sunday night." She panics because she's rigged differently. We do what we're comfortable with. We're all rigged a little differently. But at the end of the day, we all have a piece of lazy in us. That's why we do what we do when we go to the grocery store.

Guest: When's the last time you took an elevator? Don't you have a rule about walking upstairs versus elevators?

Ryan Hanley: So we were in Switzerland with my wife and with other insurance people. It was interesting seeing—they're like, "You're leaving your wife?" She's getting in the elevator. I'm taking the stairs. I tell the story because people look at me a little crazy. I said, "That's the easy road. I want to take the hard road." What's your mindset set? "Oh, I'm going to get in the elevator." How many people—the next time you go anywhere, don't take the elevator. Take the stairs. I've done this for a long time. I was in Hawaii with my best friend on a company trip with an insurance company, and my wife couldn't come. I said to my buddy, who's still one of my closest friends, "We're going to take the stairs all day, every day." We were on the 18th floor. It was amazing how it changed our mindset because you're going to double check what you have—your cell phone, your ID, money, credit card. You always double check. It changed the way our patterns were for one reason: because if we came down and we forgot something, we're going up 18 flights. We averaged 34,000 steps a day. It's a hell of a lot of steps. But it changed our mentality from day one to the end where we didn't forget anything because we knew it was tough coming back up. So taking the stairs is the hard road. It's just the opposite way of thinking. Have I taken elevators? I have. I still have weak moments. But I can't tell you the last time I took an elevator. It's been a long while. Even in the airport, I take the stairs. If there are stairs, we're going to take the stairs.

Guest: Recently at Yankee Stadium, there was an escalator to stairs. My daughter said—we were with another agent friend, and he's a bigger guy. He's like, "Oh, I'm going to take the elevator." My daughter looked at him and said, "Shouldn't take the elevator. That's the easy road." He took the elevator. We sat down, we were eating ice cream, and my daughter said to him, "If you took the stairs and you ate the ice cream, it's a little easier on the conscience than taking the escalator and then eating." It was funny. The next day he texted me, "Yeah, she really got to me on that one."

Ryan Hanley: Good. That means I got to her, and she's going to get to people. "Hey, let's think about before we take the escalator. Let's think about why we should take the stairs." A little easier eating that ice cream, right? Discipline. It's all about discipline. Take the hard road. The hard road teaches us very valuable lessons about appreciation of whatever it might be. One common thing that I do—and it'll be six years in January—is I fast. People think I'm a little weird when I fast. "Why do you fast?" Everybody fasts 18 hours. No, I fast long term—a minimum of 48 hours, a minimum of two days. Why do I do that? Six years ago, I pick a topic for the year with my accountability coach. I wanted to put gratitude on the top every day. I wanted to become a more grateful human being. So I said, of all the things I can take from me to be grateful, I figured food. We take food for granted. When you remove food—every single week for almost six years, I only eat five days a week. It's amazing how grateful I am for the food that's in front of me. Come Saturday, when I know Sunday I'm going to stop eating, I'm so grateful for the food. Friday, on the other hand, it becomes distance. But come Saturday, I know I only have a few more hours that I'm eating before I'm not eating for a minimum of 48 hours. That's changed how grateful I am—not only appreciation of food, but how grateful I am and staying focused on the little things: my eyesight, being able to afford a car, all the little things we all take for granted. It all started with removing the most important thing that we do every single day besides breathe: eat.

Guest: I think a lot of people would hear the example with the stairs and they would pass that off as trite. "That doesn't really matter. I'm a hard-working person." And I think what I've taken from you over the years is the impact of those small activities, small hardships like taking the stairs to Yankee Stadium instead of the escalator.

Ryan Hanley: It all depends on how high. We were in a box, so it was quite a few flights. And then we actually took an elevator because there was no more stairs to get to that special area, so I did take an elevator.

Guest: We'll give you a pass on that one. But this type of activity leaks into other areas of your life. When you make the mental decision—you're staring at the escalator and the stairs, and you say, "Easy way, hard way. Hard way." Boom, you walk up. Then later that day, someone pushes a basket full of cookies in front of you. You're like, "Mmm, grapes, cookies. I'm going to go with grapes. Easy way, hard way." Grapes. Then a big decision hits. What many people don't realize is psychologically, those two hard decisions that you made—stairs to the meeting, grapes instead of cookies—now all of a sudden you have to decide between a hard business decision or an easy business decision. It's going to be easier to make the hard decision.

Ryan Hanley: Absolutely.

Guest: Despite this being a life-changing business decision, the decision to take the stairs, the decision to choose the healthy option over the sugar-filled option—those two hard decisions, your brain doesn't know the difference. Your brain doesn't go, "This is a low-level hard decision, and this is a high-level hard decision." Your brain is binary: do you do what's difficult but necessary, or do you take the easy option? When that big decision comes, you have prepared your brain to make the tough decision that's necessary, not because you've made 100 decisions of that magnitude, but because you made 100 micro decisions throughout your day, week, month, life that led you to the ability to make that hard decision.

Guest: No question. If you're eating cookies and cakes and not working out and not telling the truth, and then some incredibly difficult, hard decision gets placed in front of you, your brain doesn't know how to process it because you've always chosen the easy way. We do not give these micro actions enough credit. When you look at someone like a David Goggins—you know what David Goggins says, "You got a heart in that shell." The one piece I should have stated when it comes to the elevator versus the stairs: I am only training my mind to think abnormally. If we asked 100 people right now that came in through the main entrance—there's an elevator for five flights or they see the five flights of stairs—all 100 are going to take the elevator. Would you agree?

Ryan Hanley: Yeah.

Guest: Arguably, there might be one. And if I'm in that group, I'm going to be that one because I'm training the mind to think opposite of what it wants. It's trying to keep us comfortable. That's the real reason why I do it. I don't want my mind to make the decisions for me. It's making easy decisions, which are bad decisions for me. All the time, you see a nice bowl of ice cream—it's only one bowl of ice cream, some hot fudge, this and that. "It's only one bowl." Isn't that what our mind tells us? No big deal. But discipline is going to tell you—like I tell my son. I'll never forget our college coach. When you make the decision to go out and drink during the season, he says, "The average kid in this room is going to go drink eight beers." He says, "Do you realize you just lost your last five workouts? You just threw away the last five workouts." You just worked your tail off for five days prepping for a game. You had one night of partying, of enjoyment. You just ruined the last five workouts. I still think of those comments because he used to pound that into us. Yes, it's great to go out. Why not leave the alcohol out? You want to go to the club and dance and meet girls? That's great. But you know what? You leave the alcohol out. That's discipline.

Ryan Hanley: The funny part about alcohol and its impact on our decision making—in September of last year, just about a year ago, I did 75 Hard for the first time. For anyone who doesn't understand the program, it's a mental toughness program: work out twice a day, 45 minutes a piece minimum. One of them has to be outside. No alcohol. Read 10 pages of a book. You have to stick to a diet—they don't specify the diet, but you have to pick one that's healthy and productive. And you have to take a picture of yourself every day to track your progress. That's it. But you got to do it for 75 days in a row. When I went in, I thought the alcohol was going to be the hardest part because I enjoy having drinks. I don't drink a lot, but in moderation. I thought that was going to be the hardest part. Oh, a gallon of water too, I forgot. What I found was—I'm going to speaking gigs, work functions, personal functions where alcohol would normally be part of what I would do. Instead, I'd go get a bubble water or seltzer or cranberry seltzer and stand there drinking it. I tried a non-alcoholic beer, but I didn't really like the taste. Guess what? People don't give a shit. They don't. People don't give a shit whether you drink or not at a party.

Guest: Agreed.

Ryan Hanley: And frankly, if someone honestly does care—like really cares and doesn't just bust your balls—a lot of people bust my balls, but they didn't really care. After they got their little ribbing in, we just moved on. The ones that do care, those aren't your friends.

Guest: No question. Those aren't your friends.

Ryan Hanley: And how better did you feel?

Guest: Oh, I felt amazing.

Ryan Hanley: I felt amazing. I'm probably going to do it again. I want to do it with a friend this time. I've been talking to my girlfriend about it. She has done it in the past as well. What was the hardest part for you?

Guest: The gallon of water. The gallon of water was the hardest part. Mostly because I didn't drink a ton of water. I drank water, but it wasn't part of my routine. A gallon's a lot. I'll tell you what broke me: I was traveling and I wasn't drinking water on the plane, which I should have been doing. I got home at 11:15 and I only had about a quarter of a gallon. So for the next 45 minutes—because this all has to be done by midnight—I had to pound three quarters of a gallon of water. That was such a terrible night. I was up all night. I got up five times to go to the bathroom. I was like, "That's never going to happen again." Now the flip side is I now drink almost a gallon of water before 10 AM every day. I feel like the water changed my life.

Ryan Hanley: Sure.

Guest: I've learned from it. I now put Element in the water and get my sodium and minerals.

Ryan Hanley: What was the easiest part?

Guest: Easiest part was alcohol. Even easier than reading.

Ryan Hanley: Reading. I guess I read every day.

Guest: That was my point. That one was super easy. But if you look at society—and I'm just going to group society as a whole—I bet you reading will be one of those things that would torment most people.

Ryan Hanley: Yeah. And the other thing is working out twice a day, one inside, one outside, especially in New England if you're in the cold. That focus—there was a rainstorm in November. It's mid-50s at best, pouring rain, freezing cold. I'm out there doing laps around my building for 45 minutes. My kids were in the apartment that I was living in at the time, so I didn't want to go too far. I'm literally just walking loops around my building. I did it with a ruck vest—40 pounds. My outdoor workout every day was a 40-pound ruck vest walk. I usually walk for an hour. I'm just walking. Neighbors are coming in, giving me weird looks. One guy's like, "What the hell are you doing?" I'm like, "75 Hard." I don't even know if he knew what it meant. He just went inside. I think what I took from 75 Hard as a tangential lesson was how little people give a fuck about what you do. It's weird doing that program. It also, because of the guy that created it and a lot of misrepresentations of him, has this bro culture kind of idea—a lot of young guys and more masculine workout guys tend to do the program. And it is tough. Two workouts a day is tough. But I hit my all-time deadlift record: 465 pounds. I only lost like five pounds of weight, but I felt amazing. I read three full books—four books in that time period. Skin was better. Brain was like—you get about to day 20 and you're like, "Oh my God, I'm smarter than I thought I was."

Guest: Yeah.

Ryan Hanley: All of a sudden that fog from the sugar—because my diet was basically just no sugar. I ate pretty good in general, but I do have ice cream or something once in a while. I was like, "My diet is going to be relatively the same, but no fucking sugar. I'm getting the sugar out." Without the sugar and without the alcohol, it was like this veil that I didn't know existed lifted from in front of my face. I was seeing the world so clearly, and my mind was so snappy—just bam, just pop. I haven't felt that way in a long time. I actually went 79 days. The last four days I called "fuck you days" because I didn't want to be the guy that just ended at 75.

Guest: I think that's key in anything. Even on your workout, if it calls for 40 minutes, always do one extra. Even if it's one minute, five minutes. If you're doing a set of 20 push-ups, do 21. If you're doing a set of 20 sit-ups, do 21. Always try to do a little bit more. Ed Milet has a phenomenal book on it—trains the brain. Called *The Power of One More*. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend. Ed Milet is an awesome guy, very popular podcast business guy. While you can basically get the gist of the book off the title, there's so much good stuff inside around what it takes and why it's so important to do one more. It's like the micro lessons we talked about—the micro hard decisions. When you do one more, then one more isn't enough. Then you do two more, then three more. Instead of running an extra half mile, you run an extra mile. Now all of a sudden you run two extra miles. The reason this is important goes back to the original question of why modern culture and society has normalized mediocrity. All of a sudden, your mediocre is so much higher than everyone else's. When you have a mediocre day—which we all do—that bar is so much higher than the average person we have to compete against. If you're not making the hard micro decisions and you're not doing one more in every instance that you possibly can, then your bar is the same as everyone else's. Then you look around and wonder why you don't have the life you want, and there's no joy, passion, meaning, fulfillment—these things that actually matter. I hate the idea of happiness. Happiness to me is like sugar. It's a drug we've been sold that is not good for us. Searching for happiness is insane because it's so fleeting and so trivial when what we really want is joy. If you've ever felt real joy, compare that to when you were happy. I watched a funny show last night on TV before I went to bed. I was happy. I was laughing. But a week ago when I was on vacation in Turks and Caicos with a woman that I really care about, sharing a moment on the beach with each other in perfect silence, staring at this beautiful place—I was in joy. How do you compare those two? Are you searching for a laugh on the couch, or are you searching for a moment that you will remember for the rest of your life with someone that you care about? Happiness is like sugar in our food and all these different things. If you're listening to this and you're not happy with where you are—I see people reading this book and taking on this mentality who know there's more inside them, who want to be something and they're not there yet—there are actions that you can take. Make the hard micro decisions. Tell the truth. Do one more in every instance that you can. I want to finish our conversation with a topic that you mentioned earlier. We were talking a lot before we went live, and it's this idea of being present. I've read *The Untethered Soul* by Michael Singer. I just finished *The Power of Now* by Eckhart Tolle about two weeks ago. I have another book on presence on my shelf right now as well. Talk about regret. I feel an immense amount of regret that I didn't learn the power of presence and being present in the moment earlier in my life. I wish I did. I feel like there are vast swaths of my life in which I was constantly living in the future or the past. Now I try to cultivate every moment as present as I can possibly be, and it's changed who I am as a person. It's allowed me to feel real, true gratitude in moments because I'm here right now. If you're living in the future, you can't be grateful for what you're in right now. I am so grateful that I get to spend time with one of my best friends, someone who I respect the hell out of, who's been both a mentor and an investor in a company of mine, and someone who I've learned so much from. I get to be here and spend three hours. I know how busy a person you are. I'm so grateful I get to spend this moment with you because I'm here. I could be thinking, "Well, shit, I have work I got to do when I get back to the office, and my kids are going to be home, I got to go to a baseball practice." I could be thinking about all these other things, but instead I'm choosing to be right here with you right now. Talk to me about what presence means for you and how you cultivate being present in your own life.

Guest: I think not only me—and you just said it—I wish I became more present and learned more about it at an earlier age. I think that's all of us. Unfortunately, that's one of those things. As we age, we get wiser. I would agree with you. I only wish I was. I think what hit me was my kids. When my kids were younger, I was on the road speaking a tremendous amount. But what it taught me was when I was home, I was very present with them. I put the phone down. TV wasn't on. That time was invaluable. I think what my kids have done is brought that presence and staying present into my life that maybe I wouldn't have learned until 10 years later. Kids are 17. I can tell you they taught me a very valuable lesson just by arriving into my life. I knew what true love was. It changed my life.

Guest: I mean, we talk about love, right? It's kind of like happiness and joy. You say, "I love you forever" when you get married. That's a different love than when those kids were born. I remember 9:43, 9:46, July 8th—I'm sorry, July 8th was when I got married, July 24th. I'll never forget. I was so present. I remember that feeling. It was the most incredible feeling ever.

But staying present allows us so much more. I actually think staying present is a huge part of knowing that we're free. We talk about freedom—"Oh, we can move around through the country. Some countries you can't move. That's freedom." That's not really freedom, right? I've read books about prisoners of war. Even though they were prisoners, they got themselves to a mindset that they were free because they did not want their captors to strip everything away from them.

I think staying present is when you can really come in touch with being so focused that you're present—that's when you're truly free. It's a tough topic because people say, "I'm present." But are you really present? You'll have a feeling of that freedom knowing that tonight, like last night, I'm meeting my son. We're gonna train, we're gonna work, we're gonna shoot hoops. Every single pass, it's almost like it's in slow motion because I am so present with him that he wants to spend that time with me.

Just as you said, "Hey, we're spending time together." I agree. Being able to be present, I know that I'm appreciative to spend time with you because we're going to get into topics, and when we get off, we dig deeper and deeper and deeper. I leave knowing that there's a spur of growth in my mind because I'm going to drive home for two hours, and I'm going to think about some of your answers to your questions or some of the answers to the questions that I then follow back up with you.

So I would assure you that reading books is an enormous opportunity for you to figure out earlier in life. That was a huge mistake I made. I allowed teachers who used to say to me that I was terrible at reading and comprehension. If I told you how many times I was told I was terrible at it, why did it take when I hit 40 to say, "I have freedom from what I was told"? I was told by people—in my opinion, of authority at that time—that I was no good at something. I will assure you, nobody will ever take a book away from me. Every single day, I'm presently and have been in the last year and a half, two hours a day. Yes, there are audiobooks while I work out, but I refuse to allow anybody to tell me I'm terrible at anything. And reading has changed my life. That's why I do Bikes for Reading for the schools, because I want kids to know that you can do anything and become anything you want to be through reading.

If you think about all the secrets—people say, "What's your secret sauce of success?" Just read a book. Inside of somebody's book is the secret sauce. And there's a lot of secret sauces. That's why I'm a constant reader. And it once again makes me feel free because my mind is always learning. You work out all the time. I work out all the time. But the most important muscle in our body is our brain, and we're not taught that. I challenged my son, who challenged his PE teacher. I said, "Okay, you get in a bad accident and your brain dead—that's number one. This person over here got in a bad accident, they're paralyzed. Who's still living?" My son says, "Both." I said, "Yeah, you're right. But who's truly still living?" He or she has a mind that they can still work. They don't have the physical ability because they're paralyzed. This one that's brain dead—the most important muscle in our head, in our body, is our head, is our brain. We should be working that out every single day.

Ryan Hanley: Yeah. The interesting part about reading as much as you and I do is what you start to see are patterns. There are universal truths to meaning, purpose, joy, satisfaction, fulfillment. There are universal truths. A lot of people who discount books say, "It's all just the same stuff." I've heard that argument. I'm okay reading that being present is important over and over and over again.

Guest: Me too.

Ryan Hanley: I'm okay reading that because what it does every time—it builds, it makes the neuron in my brain that says "be present" thicker and thicker and thicker. So that absolutely being present is easier and easier. Because I can go, "This guy that I respect and admire was present. This gal that I respect and admire, she was present. Present, present, be present, be present in the moment." Now all of a sudden, what am I? I'm going to be an asshole and these ten people who've been highly successful and achieved all these great things and wonderful people, they were all present in their lives, but I'm not going to cultivate that? Who am I? Right? I can't expect to make a dent in the world if I can't live at least by the baseline things that these incredible people are telling me over and over and over again are the universal truths of success and fulfillment.

And if you're not reading, how do you gauge where you are in the world? How do you improve yourself? Now, I do think there's something to isolation as well. Something that I started doing is when I go for my ruck walks now, I started leaving my earbuds at home. Amazing what comes out of your brain. But if you're not putting anything in, you ain't getting anything out. That's the part that I found so incredible. All of a sudden, these quotes from a book or a thought or something that I underlined in a book because I read—for some reason, my comprehension on audiobooks is next to zero, but I have to read. When I read, I terrorize the books. If anyone who is a book purist came to my house, they would barf because my books are dog-eared and bent and damaged and underlined. I have crazy notes written in them.

What I'll find is when I give myself moments of isolation, especially after reading—I usually read first thing in the morning, try to get half hour, 45 minutes in a day at a minimum, and then try to work out. If I don't work out in the morning, it's too hectic. I'll get in the afternoon. But whenever I get that ruck walk in and I don't have my earbuds in, all of a sudden these ideas that I didn't even know were in there—I'll be like, "Oh wait, Eckhart Tolle said this about being present. And Michael Singer mentioned this part about being present. And Jordan Peterson, I saw this clip the other day, he talked about it." And now all of a sudden, I have this idea woven together that I wouldn't have made that connection if I didn't give myself that isolation. And in that isolation, if I wasn't present in the moment—if I'm on that walk just marinating on all the shit that's going on in my life, or this project is behind schedule, or this person's giving me crap, and I'm not happy with this relationship—if that's where my brain is at and I'm way out in the future, way out in the past, my mind is not there. But if I can go on that walk and be present on that walk, listening to my footsteps, looking at the scenery, watching what's going on, then all of a sudden it's like your brain goes, "Oh, you actually give a shit about me here. Here's some—I'm gonna leak some stuff out on you." And the ideas that come in are crazy.

I started walking with a notebook now. I got a little pocket notebook. I bring my cell phone, I just don't bring my AirPods. I have my cell phone on this side of the ruck vest, and I put a little notebook in the other side of the ruck vest with a pen, because all these things hit my brain and I'll be like, "Got to write them down, got to write it down. Oh, that's a good one. I want to do a video about that, or I want to tell this to my kids, or I just want to think and marinate on this thought a little bit." But it always comes back to being present.

And the last thing I just want to mention that you said about freedom—I don't know where I got this from, but it's what I honestly believe. We are all free all the time if we choose to be. Because to me, freedom is actually freedom from an automatic response to something. When you are present, when you've done hard things, when you've crafted this life that you're proud of that has meaning and purpose, when something happens, you are completely free in your response to that thing. You are not responding out of fear. You're not responding out of some passion or emotional drive or regret or trying to just make someone happy because you feel like it's what you're supposed to do. When you've done this work, when you've become a civilized savage, you are free to respond to every situation exactly the way you want to—your soul, the way your soul wants to respond to that thing. That type of freedom is what you read about in *Man's Search for Meaning*. It's the type of freedom that can get you through anything. It's the type of freedom which allows you to act in a give-no-fucks mentality. I think it's the type of freedom that you and I are constantly searching for, and I think it's one of the many bonds that we share together.

Guest: I would agree wholeheartedly. And everybody should read *Man's Search for Meaning*. I mean, he's hit a lot of people. He's helped a lot of people come present. He's helped a lot of people move them forward. It's a must-read for everybody.

Chris, I'm excited we did this. I'm sure we will do it again as we get closer to the launch of the book. For everyone who's listening at home, if you want to get on the waitlist and get some free resources—we put together a historical list of people we view as civilized savages, quotes from them, breakdowns of those quotes. We also have ten kind of rules for life that your father instilled in you and his father instilled in him, some of these generational ideas that have been passed to you that have guided you. Those free resources are there. Go to civilizedsavagebook.com.

Ryan Hanley: Civilizedsavagebook.com. Again, we're looking for probably a spring, late spring release of the book. Almost done with the full draft, but we'll get that out to editors pretty soon. We'll have tons more updates and free resources coming. But dude, I appreciate the hell out of you. I haven't been as excited. Some of the delay recently has been on me, and I said this to Chris before we went live, because I keep digging into these sections, and then I get kind of enamored with them. It's been incredible. We had 21 questions I was supposed to ask you. I think I asked you two. But I want to be respectful of your time and of the audience. And like I said, I'm sure we'll do this again. So thank you, my friend.

Guest: Awesome.

Ryan Hanley: Hey guys, I hope that you enjoyed that conversation with Chris. I know I thoroughly enjoyed the time that I spent with him when I was actually having the conversation. If you want to learn more about the book, if you want to sign up for the waitlist, again, go to civilizedsavagebook.com. I'll have a link in the show notes, whether you're watching on YouTube or listening wherever you listen to podcasts. There'll be a link there as well. Go to civilizedsavagebook.com, sign up. You'll be the first to know about the book when it goes live. Free bonuses that we're going to do, as well as free resources that we have available for you right now—excerpts of the book, as well as resources that we put together that support the content and the material.

As always, I love you for listening to this show. I appreciate the hell out of you. And go out there and be a civilized savage. Let's go.

Guest: Yeah. Make it look easy.

[End of conversation. Podcast outro begins.]

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