On this episode of the Joe Rogan Experience, I catch up with my good friend Rick Ross. We talk about how he went from being homeless to being a drug dealer and how he became a multi-millionaire. He also talks about the story of how he got his start as a t-shirt maker and eventually became one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the history of t-shirts. I hope you enjoy this episode and that it gives you some insight into how to become a better version of yourself. Thank you so much to Rick Ross for being on the show and for sharing his story with us. I know it was a lot of fun to talk to him and I hope it inspires you to do the same! I hope this episode inspires you and helps you to be the best version of you! If you like what you hear, please HIT SUBSCRIBE on Apple Podcasts and leave us a review and tell a friend about this episode! I'll be looking out for you in the next episode. Timestamps: 3:00 - How to be a Drug Dealer 4:30 - How I Became a Drug Dealer 6:20 - What it takes to be an Entrepreneur 8:15 - How Rick Ross Became a Dealer 9:40 - How He Became a Multi-Millionaire 11:00 How to Become a DrugDealer 16:40 17:20 What it Takes to Be a Good Person? 18: How to Get Out of Prison 19:30 21:10 22: How I Got My Start a Good Life 23:00 How to Deal Drugs 26: How To Become a Good Dealer? 27: What Would You Do It? 28:00 | How I Learned to Deal With Money? 29:00 Can I Talk About My Life After Being Homeless? 30:00 What's My Deal? 31:00 My Story? 32:00 I Can I Help You Help Me Out Of A Bad Situation? 35:00 Is It Better Than My Life? 36:00 Do You Have A Good Idea? 37:00 Are You Ready To Help Me Talk About It? 40:00 Thoughts On My Story 39:00 Should I Get a Job? 45:00 Don t Let Me Help Me Help You Out? 47:00 Or Do You Need A Friend Help Me?
00:04:30.000And for people who don't know, just because, you know, we did a couple podcasts in the past, but just for people that don't know, you unknowingly...
00:04:40.000During the whole Contras versus the Sandinistas War, the United States government, or some people inside the United States government, were selling crack in the hood, and probably other places too.
00:04:58.000And they were using that to fund this war.
00:05:01.000They're using the money to fund this war.
00:05:03.000And you were the one who was moving the drugs.
00:05:55.000You know, it's funny because I said my judge and my lawyer and the prosecutor couldn't read.
00:06:04.000I mean, because it was really plain and simple in the law, the way they explained it.
00:06:10.000The most important thing was an intervening arrest.
00:06:13.000Not that you get convicted three times, but was an intervening arrest.
00:06:18.000Because they're saying that, you know, if you get a kid and he does three different things and you whoop him one time, that's for all three.
00:06:28.000You know, now if he does something and you whoop him one time, And that whooping is over, and then he goes and does it again, and you whoop him for the same thing again, now you're whooping twice.
00:06:42.000So the third time, that would be a three strike.
00:06:45.000And that's what the law meant, and they just couldn't understand that.
00:06:48.000Like, oh no, that don't apply to you because you had a conviction in Texas, and you had a conviction in Cincinnati, and you had a conviction here, but they were all the same time.
00:09:49.000And then John Singleton, you know, he was working with me on the movie.
00:09:54.000He'd take all the stuff that we did from the movie and do this show called Snowfall, which was one of the biggest TV shows on TV. And I got zero dollars out of that.
00:11:32.000You know, you're a great story because a lot of people write people off, man.
00:11:38.000You know, and there's a lot of people out there in the world that want to think that because someone did something that's illegal or someone did something that's bad, that makes them a bad person.
00:13:17.000So when you break through and you're selling millions of records and people come to see you in arenas and everybody's singing along to your shit...
00:15:25.000And I just figured I made some bad terms.
00:15:28.000You know, I listened to some people that, for the most part, loved me to death, you know, would have died with me, and they gave me what they had to give me.
00:15:38.000You know, and what they had to give me was the drug game.
00:15:42.000It's just so crazy that you were connected to this enormous story with Oliver North and Ronald Reagan.
00:15:48.000You know, Ronald Reagan had to testify about it, you know.
00:15:52.000I mean, the whole thing was really insane.
00:15:54.000It was an insane cultural moment because I remember, I was young at the time, I remember watching it all play out on TV and seeing how this insane story was playing out that, you They were selling drugs?
00:16:51.000It's just like, for me, it was unbelievable.
00:16:54.000But even when I first went to jail before all of the stuff hit the fan, you know, one of the guys that went to elementary school with me, he came up and he said, man, I heard the stories, but I couldn't believe it was you.
00:17:07.000You was the poorest kid in the school.
00:17:09.000Like, you and your brothers used to change pants and you had holes in your tennis shoes and you used to put tennis balls on your shoes so your feet wouldn't be on the ground.
00:17:38.000Michael testified on C-SPAN. He was at one of those C-SPAN hearings and testified that he witnessed the CIA selling drugs in South Central Los Angeles.
00:18:11.000Him sitting there chain-smoking, sitting in a chair, explaining how the whole system was going to fall apart.
00:18:21.000It wound up not being correct, but it was mostly about oil.
00:18:26.000And mostly about the way the economy is run and the way our government is, the way everything's structured, that we are on the verge of collapse.
00:18:37.000And he was telling people back then, like, you better get ready.
00:18:40.000You better get ready for everything to fall apart.
00:18:42.000Well, I mean, if you go on the streets right now and you see...
00:18:46.000The homeless problem that we're having around the country.
00:18:48.000You know, because I travel the whole country now.
00:19:35.000I watched a video about it the other day where these people were driving.
00:19:38.000They were documenting it and driving down Oakland, down the worst areas where these people have these shanty towns set up, these tent towns set up, and it's just open-air drugs and violence and no police presence and no help and no nothing.
00:20:14.000Who knows how many of those people, if they had a little bit of help, if they got the right counseling, they got the right this, the right that, they started to get a path towards a good life, they could turn it around.
00:20:27.000You know, I was one of those people eight, nine years ago, just out of prison.
00:20:33.000And Joe, you know, when I was in prison, I educated myself.
00:20:36.000I read over 300 books while I was in prison.
00:20:38.000Because I didn't want to come out and get into the same thing that put me in jail.
00:20:42.000So what I wanted to do, I never had a job.
00:20:45.000You know, I never had a job right now today.
00:20:47.000I've never had, I mean, you know, I get paid for doing speaking engagements and stuff, but I'm saying I've never had a job where I punch a clock or I had to fill out an application, none of that stuff, because I couldn't fill out an application before I went to prison.
00:21:00.000And now, you know, I'm not going to fill out an application, but I had all this potential, but I had nobody to give me a boost, you know, to say...
00:21:13.000And that's one of the things that I was saying about Lulu House that they're doing is they got...
00:22:02.000So me getting that money coming in was like heaven sent.
00:22:07.000You know, like, yes, you know, I got a way to get me some traction now.
00:22:12.000But without that kind of traction, you know, and most of those people, they're not going to have the opportunity to do a t-shirt for themselves.
00:22:20.000So, you know, we need to set up programs where...
00:23:06.000And one of the things would be re-energizing communities and helping, taking places like these shanty towns in Oakland, set up community centers, police presence, Do something to stop the crime.
00:23:17.000Do something to try to educate people.
00:24:21.000There's a lot of creative, interesting people that just don't know what to do or where to turn, and they've been doing drugs their whole life.
00:24:27.000They're all fucked up, and they're homeless, and they've got records, and they don't know what to do.
00:24:32.000And he's helping them, and he's helping them in a really beautiful way.
00:25:10.000It's just us with different circumstances and different things went wrong and different people around you giving you bad advice, different bad influences, different everything.
00:25:23.000One of the things that drives me crazy Is the pull yourself up by your bootstrap shit.
00:27:33.000I know people that have went back to jail on purpose because the outside world was too confusing and scary for them and they'd rather have the structure of being inside.
00:33:06.00040 years later and nothing's changed in terms of drug dealing.
00:33:11.000Nothing's changed in terms of drugs being legalized.
00:33:14.000They're still giving money to criminals and particularly criminals in Mexico.
00:33:19.000I mean that's literally what funds the cartels and the fact that there's a demand in America and the supply is all brought over or for the most part a lot of it is brought over by the Mexican cartels.
00:34:08.000I got lucky when I was in high school, my friend's cousin got hooked on coke and I watched his life fall apart and I was like, oh, I don't want nothing to do with that.
00:34:17.000I was always terrified that I was going to do something that was going to turn me into a loser.
00:34:22.000You know, I grew up poor and we moved around a lot and I always felt out of place.
00:34:28.000I never felt like I had anything going on in my life until I started doing martial arts when I was a kid, when I was like 15. That's when I really got into it.
00:34:38.000And then from then on, I said, this is the key to life.
00:34:41.000The key to life is discipline and focus.
00:34:44.000And I don't want nothing that's going to take away my focus.
00:34:47.000Nothing's going to take away my drive.
00:34:48.000And I saw my friend's cousin I was like, God damn, he was a good dude.
00:35:50.000And if you're living in Mexico, shit, you think South Central is poor.
00:35:54.000Try being born in these places where you live in these houses with no windows and dirt floors and you see some dude driving by in a fucking beautiful car with a gold-plated gun and that's El Jefe.
00:36:50.000Because if it wasn't illegal, people would just let it sit there, or they would traffic it, and then it wouldn't be worth, you know, it wouldn't be worth hauling because everybody would have it.
00:37:00.000And the way I see it, that if it loses its value, most people that I saw get started with Coke start off selling.
00:38:15.000He's a professor at Columbia, and he was a clinical researcher, and he was a very straight-laced guy, never did any drugs, no nothing.
00:38:25.000And when he started doing clinical research on different drugs and different things, he realized that all the things that we're being told about drugs are incorrect.
00:38:39.000And he talks openly about responsible drug use.
00:38:44.000I mean, this guy's a professor, a legitimate academic, an intellectual, and he talks openly about his own personal drug use, about how, you know, that these things can be used responsibly, but that thought is never out there, that nobody says that.
00:39:00.000Everybody tells you, if you do drugs, you're going to be an addict.
00:39:03.000If you do drugs, you're going to be a loser.
00:39:04.000Well, you know, so many people are making money off of the illegal drug market.
00:41:33.000He's like, man, they're having a high-time event coming.
00:41:35.000I was like, oh, no, I don't want to get with that drug stuff, man.
00:41:42.000Because, you know, I'm still, even though I've been through all I've been through, I'm still under this impression that they've been instilling in us, oh, well, marijuana is a gateway drug.
00:43:10.000And after that day, you know, I've been chasing the marijuana business.
00:43:15.000And in 19, in 2016, when the federal, when they changed the law, I went there and they, you know, first they didn't want convicted felons to work in the industry.
00:43:42.000So I got to argue the issue and they broke down and now everybody around the country adopted that philosophy and they're putting convicted felons in the front of the line.
00:47:19.000I mean, the problem can be solved, you know, but it got to be somebody who said, you know what, we're going to throw a few, maybe 50 million, 100 million into building some low-income houses that we're also going to have some treatments, you know, where people get treated, where they get job training.
00:47:45.000I would look at this problem and I would solve it totally different.
00:47:51.000Because even though I like making money, I'm not like typical people.
00:47:55.000They get the money and they want to harness it and they just want it for themselves so that they can look down on everybody else.
00:48:00.000I don't think money is supposed to be used like that.
00:48:02.000I think money is supposed to be put back into the community where the community can rejuvenate and the money circulates into the community.
00:48:11.000And that makes everything better for everybody.
00:50:20.000And we've been led the wrong way by people, like what we were just talking about before, that use their power to subjugate others, to keep everybody else down.
00:50:29.000And then we got all these old motherfuckers who've been running things for too long.
00:50:34.000Why do you stay in the Senate and Congress for 30 years?
00:50:39.000Did you ever look at the founding fathers, how young they were?
00:53:13.000And those people also, what they do is they elevate everyone around them because they make you realize like, wow, my watermark was here, now it's here.
00:53:23.000Those are the people that I consider special.
00:53:25.000If you can make other people, if you can lift up other people, then you're special.
00:53:29.000Yeah, I mean, there's so many people just by virtue of their success and the example that they set.
00:53:34.000They change the course of so many people's lives because they look to those people for inspiration and it gives them the energy to go out and do things.
00:54:04.000But, you know, that could be, in your case, it turned out to not be good, but in other people's cases, in different things, with different examples of people that are succeeding.
00:54:17.000Like, you could have done what you did in the drug game, if you had better opportunities, in fucking anything.
00:57:20.000To now see the world to where I should be trying to save lives You know, is a total different mentality than when I was 12 years old, 11 years old, you know, and I'm saying guys fight over color and stuff.
00:57:49.000What was it like once you got into jail and learned how to read and then started reading and recognizing that the world was just a much different place than you thought it was?
00:58:23.000How to think, you know, how to think successfully, how to have faith in yourself, how to believe in you, you know, because when you don't believe in yourself, it's hard to believe in anything.
00:58:45.000Having these experiences in these books, you know, Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, like, just blew my mind, you know, like, fuck, people actually think like this here, you know, like, you can think and grow rich, you can use your mind to create,
00:59:00.000and you only really need one idea that could make you a fortune, you know, that you shouldn't be allowing other people to Feed your mind, their ideas, you know, what they think you should be, you know, because when I was coming up,
00:59:19.000other people affected the way I thought, you know, like, man, you play tennis?
01:00:05.000So as soon as those things happen, you got to get rid of them.
01:00:08.000You know, because when Blandon approached me about selling drugs again, I wasn't planning on selling drugs no more.
01:00:17.000But when he kept offering it, and when I listened to the tape in court, man, you know, I'm in court, we're going to trial, and they're playing the tapes of our recorded phone calls, and he says, Rick, I got 700 kilos.
01:00:33.000The first thing popped out of my mind, my mouth, and I don't even know I said this, how much?
01:02:47.000So it's easy, you know, when I go out and I talk to these young guys, I don't criticize them because I understand what they're going through.
01:02:54.000And I understand that if we don't replace the drug with something else, don't even ask them to quit.
01:03:04.000Why would you ask somebody not to feed their kids, you know, not to be able to buy their girlfriends the shoes she wants and, you know, we have to come up with things Because, you know, most of the manufacturing jobs overseas.
01:04:10.000You know, you might have to go through a little something.
01:04:13.000You might have to miss a couple meals, you know, but this is what it's going to take.
01:04:18.000Yeah, it's just hard if someone's already making a lot of money doing something illegal.
01:04:23.000It's very hard to tell them you're going to make way less money and you're going to work way harder and you're not going to enjoy it, but it's going to be legal.
01:05:21.000You know I'm deep in the marijuana industry now and I'm watching these guys and these guys are making millions of dollars but I'm watching them cut their own throat.
01:05:33.000I'm sitting here and I'm literally watching them take razor blades to their necks.
01:07:47.000Why don't you just, like, make as much money as you can and then encourage all these other people to make as much money as they can and hang out together?
01:09:18.000But at the end, I wanted to say he made the world a better place because he lived.
01:09:22.000You know, when I go out like that there, I'll be a happy man.
01:09:26.000Well, sometimes you have to do the wrong thing in order to be an example of someone who can do the wrong thing and course correct and then become a better person.
01:09:35.000Like, if you're just a good person from the beginning, that's kind of boring.
01:09:39.000I like a guy who fucks up a few times and then figures it out.
01:09:43.000And then that can inspire people who have already fucked up their life.
01:09:47.000Because people want to think that once they fucked up their life, oh my god, I'm a fuck up.
01:12:23.000I mean, he was fat just a little while ago.
01:12:25.000Gervonta Davis took him in, and he started training with Gervonta, and he documented it.
01:12:29.000So he showed photos of, like, he had this big belly, he looked fat and out of shape, and then leaned himself down to where he had a six-pack again, but...
01:13:07.000You may be able to hit pads and everybody's like, oh, he's back.
01:13:10.000The difference between success and failure in the boxing game is fractions of a second.
01:13:17.000Fractions of a second, the ability to maintain a pace for as many rounds as the fight is, the understanding of how to pace yourself, the ability to handle the pressure, the pressure of knowing that you've fucked up for so long and this is a big opportunity, the nerves, the anxiety,
01:13:33.000the sleepless nights before the fight, all that's gonna weigh on you.
01:15:54.000He talked about how he knew that he was gonna eat a punch in order to counter, so he had to put himself in range so he knew Errol could hit him, so that he could crack him.
01:16:06.000He's like, I knew I had to gamble on this.
01:16:09.000And this is like levels to the way that guy fight, the game he plays.
01:18:27.000No one becomes like a Sugary Leonard or a Floyd Mayweather or Tommy Hearns without discipline they don't it doesn't happen you have to stay focused always and if you don't Then worse then you left with a life of regret.
01:18:43.000We said that's what we were saying about the drug business I mean it applies to really anything anything and that's why I believe that I can Can play major roles in so many different businesses because, you know, and I'm at the point in my life that I know that all I got to do is sacrifice for a couple months and you're in the game,
01:19:50.000I think when you're trying to knock the most valuable thing that a human being has, which is their brain, you're trying to knock their brain out, I think it's kind of...
01:20:21.000When you see someone succeed and someone who lives a disciplined life, especially if you're a fan of a boxer, it'll make you want to live like that.
01:20:29.000Yeah, so I just felt that I could step in and really help these guys with their money as well as help them become the mentors that they should be.
01:21:11.000But is there any video of anybody, like, hey, why are you running around with this dude's name when this dude's out of jail now?
01:21:17.000Well, you know, these guys, they're kind of like, like we talked about, when you got some money, They don't care if you beating women or making them lick tampons.
01:22:02.000And, you know, just stuff that normal officers just don't, you know, officers...
01:22:07.000I mean, everybody in jail got extra soups.
01:22:09.000You know, you say your soups because it might come a time and you ain't got them, so you stack your stuff up, but most officers don't even care.
01:22:15.000You know, ah, who cares about extra soup?
01:22:17.000We trying to get the dope dealers and, you know, the guys with the knives, but...
01:22:22.000Then you got those ones, and they're like, oh, well, you got an extra pair of underwear.
01:22:39.000What is it like having a dude running around out there with your name?
01:22:43.000Like, if there was a rapper out there named Joe Rogan, I'd be like, what the fuck?
01:22:49.000I mean, it's crazy, you know, like, how would you take my name and not have the decency to ask me first of all, you should have asked, but then never pay homage?
01:23:06.000You know, he won't even admit that he stole the name.
01:23:08.000He tells people that he invented the name, like...
01:23:20.000When the case came out and when the connection to the Iran Contra affair came out, when everybody found out what was going on, you were a legend.
01:23:31.000Yeah, you threw a few million dollars toward Instagram and Facebook and Instagram.
01:26:08.000I didn't care about the name like that.
01:26:10.000I just felt that it was so disrespectful that he didn't come and ask me or he didn't show any consideration or pay any homage to the fact that he actually took my name.
01:26:27.000So, but yeah, I probably would have took $250,000.
01:26:30.000If they would have said $300,000, I would have been tickled pink.
01:26:33.000Because I felt that I didn't need much money to get started.
01:27:48.000About 12 people in the room and he walks in and he walks around the table, shakes everybody, including my lawyer, shakes my lawyer's hands and everybody.
01:27:57.000And I stood up to shake his hand because I don't have no hard feelings, you know, just give me my money.
01:31:14.000You know, I'm an illiterate, you know, 28, 30-year-old guy from South Central who never watched the news and, you know, had heard about the Iran-Contra stuff, but that shit didn't mean nothing to me.
01:31:28.000It had no effect on South Central LA. You know what I'm saying?
01:31:47.000So when all that stuff was coming about, they wanted to know how much money I was making, you know, who I bought drugs from, what years I bought drugs, you know, just a whole, basically like an interview.
01:35:35.000Our southern hemisphere, you know, being in Nicaragua.
01:35:37.000They felt that that was the greatest threat at that time to our democracy.
01:35:42.000And they felt that they would do anything to stop that.
01:35:45.000What a crazy thing to do, though, to think about the sacrifices it's going to, what it's going to do to American citizens, including the people that, like you, went to jail for helping them.
01:36:16.000And, you know, we're just saying, I think that's a lot of the Afghanistan war, too.
01:36:21.000There was one of the best videos out of the Afghanistan war that's so ridiculous is watching Geraldo Rivera interview soldiers that are guarding poppy fields.
01:36:31.000They have to guard the poppy fields because if they don't, then these poppy farmers won't side with them and then they'll side with the Taliban.
01:36:40.000So they're interviewing American soldiers who are guarding heroin being grown.
01:36:47.000And then during the United States occupation of Afghanistan, heroin production went up, I think at the peak, like 96%.
01:37:32.000Well, I mean, and just think that if we didn't have situations like what you got here with your podcast, the people wouldn't even know about this stuff.
01:38:28.000Nobody came and heard me talk to young people about how they're going to get started selling drugs, how you're going to get introduced to drugs, who's going to introduce you to drugs.
01:38:38.000Like, most people don't even know how people get introduced to drugs.
01:38:41.000They're thinking that it's some boogeyman that comes with a dark jacket on and...
01:39:02.000Those are the ones that can get your confidence to make you accept something that, you know, some strange guy come around, you know, most girls going to take off, you know.
01:39:12.000But your friends, the people that you care about, that you trust, you're going to believe in them.
01:39:41.000You know, why they're not trying to get funding for him?
01:39:44.000You know, why they're not saying, man, if this guy had a couple hundred million dollars or, you know, I mean, in California, taxpayers agreed to give up extra taxes.
01:39:55.000I think they raised like a billion and some change for the homeless problem.
01:40:28.000Probably shouldn't be allowed to be advertised.
01:40:31.000They shouldn't be allowed to have advertisers.
01:40:33.000Because as soon as you have advertisers, especially like pharmaceutical drug companies and big corporations, then you can't criticize those people.
01:40:41.000Those people are the people that pay your bills.
01:40:44.000And even if it's not written down anywhere, you're not going to go do an investigative journalism on...
01:45:36.000The plan has been approved by Attorney General Merrick Garland and heads next to the DEA, which will take public comment on the proposal after a 60-day comment period.
01:45:45.000There'll be a review by an administrative judge.
01:45:48.000The move started with a recommendation from the Federal Health and Human Services Department, which launched to review the drug status and the urging of President Biden in 2022. This is a long-ass process.
01:45:58.000But the DEA has not yet formed its own determination as to where marijuana should be scheduled and expects to learn more during the rulemaking process.
01:46:27.000And that is something that is just wrong.
01:46:29.000That is wrong in this world that we have private prisons and that we have people that are benefiting and profiting off of people being in jail.
01:46:38.000Because as soon as you make a profit off of something, you're going to want to keep making that profit.
01:47:32.000Yeah, and this country sells it better than anybody.
01:47:35.000If you don't lock them up, they're going to come into your house and rob you and kill you.
01:47:39.000Here's a big thing that's a hang-up for Schedule III drugs.
01:47:42.000Okay, for example, the proposal does not specify whether state-licensed dispensaries would need to be licensed pharmacies because only a pharmacy can dispense Schedule III drugs.
01:47:52.000Other questions surround the coordination of federal regulations related to drug approval, manufacturing, supply chain monitoring, storage, and prescribing.
01:48:00.000So prescribing, we go back to prescribing it?
01:49:27.000And then adult and medical use regulated program is all over the place now.
01:49:33.000New Mexico, Nevada, California, Colorado, Missouri, Illinois, Minnesota, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Michigan, Ohio, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, even fucking New York, which is like New York used to be a bad place to get weed.
01:49:51.000If you got weed in New York, if you smoke weed outside, they'd arrest you.
01:49:55.000You'd get caught outside, try to buy weed.
01:50:05.000During the 70s, when Hunter S. Thompson's day, you would get fucking thrown in jail for your life, for your whole life for having weed on you.
01:54:00.000Or we take the amount of time that you locked all those people up for, and then you have to wait that amount of time before you can sell weed.
01:54:10.000So you can sell weed in three more lives.
01:57:54.000They had some sort of an involvement in the rock and roll movement of the 1960s in Laurel Canyon.
01:58:00.000And there's been books written about this.
01:58:03.000That they have some sort of involvement in promoting these kind of activities, both with rock and roll in the 60s and then gangster rap in the 80s.
01:58:17.000I think the idea is they do it to try to make sure that society is always in a state of unrest.
01:58:24.000And that they wanted to keep people in a state of unrest and promote criminal behavior and criminal activity and gang activity and to do it in popular music and that that would make more crime and make more things happen and that they can get away with more levers of control because of that.
01:59:03.000It talked about the big meeting where all the record labels got together because they knew they weren't selling music anymore, so they invested in prisons.
01:59:14.000But that doesn't say, no one knows who wrote it.
02:00:32.000How many people do you think actually know the story, the whole story, the real story, your story of you and this guy who calls himself Rick Ross?
02:00:40.000I think older people know, but younger people don't.
02:01:32.000Because when you help him come up, you come up.
02:01:35.000Say, for instance, if I find a guy, he's down on his luck, and I give him a kilo, he starts to sell his kilo, I benefit every time he sells that kilo because I get a percentage of what he does.
02:06:31.000Yeah, I mean, I look at my case, right?
02:06:34.000If you go on the internet, I got millions and millions of views where I've done interviews with different people and talked to different people.
02:06:43.000But then you go on my Instagram, I got 300,000 followers.
02:06:55.000And then my friends be like, man, all the people looking at you, they want to talk to you, but you know, so when I experienced that, I understand that they haven't let me...
02:08:10.000If you come on this podcast and 11 million people or 15 million people, whatever the fuck it is, see you, What is the odds that you stay at one million?
02:13:23.000Because some of the people with the platforms don't use them to benefit the people.
02:13:28.000Well, also, we need platforms from a person like yourself that has gone through this arc of life, this interesting arc of life, that finds yourself a completely different person now than who you were when you were 28 years old selling drugs.
02:14:06.000How much money do you think you earned over the entire course of selling drugs?
02:14:12.000Well, you figure, just my two best years, so you say 360 days in a year, just those two years was like, what, 600 million, something like that?
02:17:04.000And even when we went to jail, I was a black box.
02:17:08.000You know, they put a black box on you.
02:17:10.000They put handcuffs on you, and then they got this little black box that they slide over the handcuffs so that your hands are, like, stiff, and then they cuff you to your waist, and you can't even use the bathroom.
02:17:24.000And then when you go to prison, you go to the worst part of the prison because they classify you with the guys who do murders and the bombers, and so now they got drug dealers who...
02:17:36.000I consider myself almost like a white-collar crime.
02:21:19.000But, man, he told us about me when I started.
02:21:25.000And it was just, like, so fascinating to hear him talk about me to me you know and he's laughing about how green I was how he used to Take dope out of the bag, and I didn't know he took it out the bag.
02:21:41.000He said, man, I wouldn't sell him a kilo because I could get four extra ounces out of the kilo, and I could sell him a pound.
02:21:49.000It was just so much stuff, and it was amazing for me to understand that at one time I knew absolutely nothing about cocaine.
02:21:59.000I'd never seen cocaine before, and they taught me.
02:22:06.000What's really crazy is that even though that sounds like, oh my god, that's illegal activity, that's drug dealing, but it's really a system and you figured out how to excel inside this system.
02:22:25.000I mean, I understood it was illegal, but I understand now, like you're saying, that it was the mentality of of being able to be taught to be able to listen to be able to follow instructions was the part that I feel was The most valuable lessons in this whole thing is that I learned to follow instructions.
02:22:52.000I'm doing the same thing with the weed business.
02:22:54.000When I first got into the weed business, you know, when I was out of jail and we were smoking weed and stuff, it was like two kinds of weed.
02:26:14.000It's so perplexing, the problems of our world today.
02:26:19.000It really is, because it's such a complicated series of issues, and it doesn't seem like any progress is being made.
02:26:28.000Even the minimal progress that's being made with marijuana, the good progress is states making it illegal for recreational use, making it legal.
02:26:38.000But if the federal government still doesn't have it legal, what the fuck are they doing?
02:28:18.000Especially if you're addicted to the thrill of the game.
02:28:21.000If it's an exciting thing and then you're not doing that exciting thing anymore and you miss it.
02:28:27.000Because everything that you're not supposed to be doing is exciting, at least in some way, especially something that's massively profitable.
02:29:47.000Everybody else has been telling me, and I've been like, ah, ah, ah, yeah, but I did so well the last time you told me to do something, and I would be going against my own principles.
02:30:09.000You know, we grow and learn from other people's perspectives of the world when you get to hear a person who's gone through the life that you've gone through, which is very unusual.
02:30:18.000When you hear that person talks, it educates you and informs you and it changes your perspective.
02:30:25.000You get to add to your perspective of the world from another person's life experiences.