00:05:52.820Yeah, because you're promoting your program.
00:05:55.040We've talked about it before, and we will talk about it today, too, Mind Up, which I love and I think is needed now more than ever for all sorts of reasons.
00:06:02.320It's only gotten more necessary since the last time I interviewed you on camera.
00:06:06.640But let's start with – let's start broader.
00:11:06.320And one of the reasons is, is that, you know, at number one, a Kurt like me, I mean, we just we're just family people and nothing will take to take that away.
00:11:18.440OK, so if we have an opportunity to be together, we are.
00:11:22.120In fact, why it just finally moved right in the neighborhood.
00:15:57.300So I was in New York. I just got to New York. It was in May. I remember. And I got to New York because I was dancing at the World's Fair. So I went for an audition in Washington, D.C., which is where I'm from. And I made it. You know, I made the audition. Oh, my God. I went home. Mom, Daddy, I, you know, I got the audition. I'm going to be dancing at the World's Fair.
00:16:19.800so all this was like you know really really exciting and I went to New York and in May
00:16:26.860I was only there a month and I walked across the street and this guy stopped me
00:16:32.720and he said to me I'm not trying to put the make on you I'm not trying to do this please believe
00:16:39.260me he showed me his watch it was kind of I guess gold and he said I go with Tuesday Weld and Tuesday
00:16:47.480Weld was an actress back in that day in the 60s and and I went oh wow okay so I started you know
00:16:54.760to trust him I didn't look at him as a bad guy or anything and he said to me I just I just got
00:17:02.720to tell you you look just like a character that Al Cap created and he was a cartoonist he was also
00:17:09.080you know sort of a you know a guy who represented a certain consciousness and and so anyway I said
00:17:15.040oh wow El Cap Little Abner oh I did Little Abner in high school I mean we did a lot of shows there
00:17:20.780and you know oh I know all about that and he said oh great he said well listen let me I'm going to
00:17:26.900talk to you he said because I think you'd be really great for Little Abner we're doing it on NBC
00:17:31.080and you look like a character that he created and it's a new character and she's Tenderly Ferrickson
00:17:37.660well there was you know I don't know for those who don't know what Little Abner was but it was
00:17:42.380you know it was kind of political in a way um but it was it was a cartoon and it was a very famous
00:17:48.200cartoon and the show little abner had songs you know i mean what is it something jake uh trying
00:17:55.700to think of the name of the song but little abner anyway was very famous i said great so i believed
00:18:01.160him so i got into his car and we're driving and he's dropped me off at an audition that i was
00:18:06.420going to and he dropped me off and as he was driving he said you know what i think you're
00:18:11.840going to be a really big star. And I looked at him and I said, why? He said, because you have
00:18:17.960an unusual face. And I thought, hmm, well, he didn't tell me I was creepy and he didn't tell
00:18:23.920me I was beautiful. He said I had an interesting face, which actually, I mean, I think I did,
00:18:29.260right? My eyes are too big. I had all kinds of things. I was not, you know, but I was pretty
00:18:34.320scrutinizing about my face. Although my mother didn't like that I was. She said, don't mess
00:18:39.620of my work my mom but you know I got my you know nose was everything I was a thing so I believed in
00:18:48.220but the one thing that scared me and it's a long story to get around to my perception I didn't want
00:18:56.120to be a star it actually scared me I thought I you know I don't want to be that person I just
00:19:04.320want to be normal. I just want to, you know, I was a dancer. I had a craft. I had something I did
00:19:10.720well. And I also had a job. So for me, that they were going to make me into a star. And then I
00:19:18.900eventually the story goes on, which I won't go into, but no, no, we have to talk about that jerk
00:19:23.420Al Cap. This is the Al Cap is an asshole portion of our interview. Oh, God bless him. May he rest
00:19:36.340in peace. Yeah, he was the one that, you know, OK, so we'll go on. So now we get to the time
00:19:43.560where I'm supposed to meet Al Cap. And I had a script and I was reading of this script and I,
00:19:50.000you know and I thought I read it at home and I thought okay this is cool it's real it's a script
00:19:55.700you know nothing's fake about it so I go to Park Avenue on the time I was supposed to meet with him
00:20:01.120and um they and the door opens Eric the butler oh Miss Hahn you know we're waiting for you I went
00:20:08.660oh that's great oh and I was like on Fifth Avenue and I mean I was like what the hell happening to
00:20:15.080me i mean next thing i know i'm like in this like rich guy's apartment and he's famous and his name
00:20:21.740is out cap and i know him and i did this show i mean it was the whole thing and so he said so i
00:20:26.060sit down and he said mr cap isn't here right now um but he'll be back in a moment he said but um
00:20:32.660i'm bringing this tea and he walks in with the tea set when i tell you it was pure silver and it was
00:20:37.720so heavy that it was kind of like weird when he said to me you need to pour his tea he likes all
00:20:46.160his women to pour his tea and now I'm practicing and I picked up the tea and I'm looking at the tea
00:20:55.740and I'm like trying to pour it and it was so heavy I was sitting too deep in a sofa it was too
00:21:02.420the fulcrum point was not acceptable and so anyway and he walks with his you know i i didn't know he
00:21:09.860had a wooden leg um but he did yeah such a detail don't try yeah he picks well he walked like he had
00:21:20.480a wooden leg and and then he said to me oh and he had to like slip lascivious like grin kind of
00:21:27.480is really ugly. And he said, I'll be back in a minute. I'm just going to slip into something.
00:21:32.780And he came back in a robe. So now I am like freaking out because, you know, I, I'm recognizing
00:21:40.400something's going wrong. So I'm there. I was 19 years old and he comes in and he talks to me.
00:21:46.860And I said, Oh, we sat down and we talked. Now I'm thinking to myself, I better let him know
00:21:51.540I'm a good girl. I better let him know whatever he's thinking is not, it's not going to happen.
00:21:56.120so I told him that I my mom and my dad and the fact that you know I they wanted me to marry a
00:22:03.200Jewish dentist and I wanted to know that I was religious I wanted to know that I had you know
00:22:11.200scruples and I had you know the whole thing I just wanted him to know I was a good girl
00:22:16.300and so now he said well let's do the reading so I started to do the reading with him
00:22:20.920and I was stood up and I'm doing the reading off of the script and he says to me now you don't have
00:22:27.220to speak so loud this isn't theater this is now going to be um you know it's film so you need to
00:22:34.860just speak regularly and I went oh what a good note so now um I got you know into the idea that
00:22:41.180it wasn't staged because that's really all I'd done and and then he said um now walk away uh over
00:22:49.080there in the room and now when you walk toward me uh i want you to just kind of look at me like
00:22:55.020on the camera and and you know just kind of look stupid look look look like an imbecile or you know
00:23:02.880like that you know that look you know and i thought okay so you know i did my dance walk and i walked
00:23:10.160there and i remember i tried to look stupid and i was looking at him and all this stuff
00:23:14.700and then he said well now this is good he said he said you know what he said i'm going to get
00:23:20.380you with david merrick's coaches he's one of the greatest david merrick's one of the great
00:23:25.080people you know on broadway back then and i went oh really yeah yeah he said i'm gonna have him
00:23:31.120work with you you you got something he said by the way could you got walk over there and lift up
00:23:35.900because your legs you could be daisy may your legs are good can i see your legs and so i had
00:23:42.940this i remember exactly what i was wearing it was a pink knit dress it wasn't totally mini at that
00:23:49.540point but i picked it up over my knees and i showed him power short and then he went higher
00:23:54.840and i i think i lifted up for just another like inch and he said no no higher and i went oh and
00:24:03.600i put them down i put my my skirt down and he said to me now come on over here and give me a kiss
00:24:10.720and i was i was shocked but i but i expected something like that and so i sat i went over
00:24:22.440to the couch because i wanted him i wanted him to know that i wasn't going to run out of the room
00:24:27.540i was going to stay calm and and whatever and he pulled over his you know it was like his
00:24:34.020knight whatever that you know that robe was and his he was his whole apparatus if you know what
00:24:41.280i'm talking about his whole wiener was literally like lying there oh and i looked at it i looked
00:24:49.620at it and i said oh oh mr cap i'll never get a job like this he said well i've had them all
00:24:59.180and nothing will become of you and i said that's okay i said i'm a dancer anyway
00:25:06.920but i'll never get a job like this he said well you know you just just go back and marry a jewish
00:25:14.740dentist oh wow and i said oh i might so i walked out and then i realized that i couldn't take the
00:25:24.080L because I didn't have the time and I wasn't near it. And I had to get to my, to the world's
00:25:28.580fair. So the world's fair was going on. I said, Mr. Cap, I'm so sorry. It's late. I can't get the
00:25:36.180L and I just don't have any money to get a taxi. And he threw $20 at me. So I got in the taxi and
00:25:44.420I go to the Texas pavilion, which is where I was dancing. And I was so upset. And I had been seeing
00:25:51.600this guy that was under the bar he was a bartender and we were dancing above the bar as can can girls
00:25:58.780did and we danced and i was so sad i felt so bad and that night i did the show it was three shows
00:26:09.460and it was a heavy duty can can and also go go and all this stuff and he said come on i'll take
00:26:16.720you out for a drink and i'm like okay so i go out get in his car and we go into the bar at the
00:26:26.820andine which is just under the 59th street bridge and i had a scotch and then i had another scotch
00:26:35.380rocks and his friend was there that we met and then that was over so i'd had two cocktails
00:26:42.360and he backed up got the car around first avenue and he starts accelerating
00:26:49.400and i'm in the middle and there are no there's no seats there's no no seat belts and i thought
00:26:57.140do you have to go so fast you know in between stoplights and he said no no no no no it's okay
00:27:02.980meanwhile everybody in the car had had a cocktail or two i don't i wouldn't say we were drunk and
00:27:09.760whatever but definitely you know under some level of influence and then he went down west side
00:27:16.900highway and we were on west side highway going much too fast and it was quite different than
00:27:22.180the potholes and it had windy roads and it was a single road and it was really not a great road
00:27:29.380to speed on and i looked over my right shoulder sitting in the middle of an oldsmobile with
00:27:34.060you know about no bucket seats right and i looked over to this cab and this taxi cab
00:27:40.660either he ran he fell asleep or he just ran us off the road but we went into a light pole at
00:27:48.320about 45 miles an hour my goodness coming and i went underneath the dashboard to hide from the
00:27:58.500crash. And I woke up. But I really was not in my body. And I looked down. And it was paramedics
00:28:11.040that were pulling me out from underneath the dashboard and asking, is she alive? And they
00:28:19.960were touching my heart and ripping my clothes so they could get to me. But I saw it. And then I
00:28:28.000woke up in the hospital and that's when i was there and they basically did an x-ray on my
00:28:36.820head i had a concussion and i had one little nick on my leg and i now the two guys and one of them
00:28:47.260the boyfriend that i'd had walked into my room and he had a broken nose and a few little scratches
00:28:55.740they sent me home which i don't remember i lived alone in a roach infested one room
00:29:02.660place on 70th and between broadway and amsterdam and i didn't have my mom i didn't have anybody
00:29:11.960and i got a phone call and he said you fucked things up didn't you you really
00:29:17.860fucked me up i told you to be nice to him i told you to be nice to him and i said peter please go
00:29:24.560back to Tuesday well and leave me alone and I went into the bathroom I threw up again I came
00:29:30.060back and I realized I needed my mother but for some how I don't know I remembered this guy's
00:29:37.980number and I called him up and I said I'm alone in New York I know you know you're not happy with
00:29:46.580me but I was in a very bad automobile accident last night he hung up he ran to my apartment
00:29:54.140he lived near me he came to me with roses that he got and he was crying and he said i'm so sorry
00:30:02.180you're such a nice girl and i i'm just a pimp for our cat that's all i am oh my goodness i'm really
00:30:10.600sorry and he got the ambulance he took me back to the hospital he made sure i had everything i
00:30:16.540needed a tetanus shot whatever they didn't give me and you know he took care of me
00:42:07.240You know, why pay someone else, basically, a big producer to take over?
00:42:11.580Because, you know, this was a financial, practical decision.
00:42:15.520In the meantime, big hit, cover of whatever, everything's saying.
00:42:20.140and then next thing I know I it was so such a hit I guess that I had you know directors really didn't
00:42:28.420want to work with me because they felt that I would only do my own things and that I took over
00:42:35.280and that I was it was sort of had to be my way there was some fear around a woman being successful
00:42:42.100and and being a bitch and and I wasn't at all not even close I mean there were many of us that
00:42:49.540made that movie great not just me and i'm just looking at you know at that time you know there
00:42:56.680was a serious glass ceiling and and when i broke a record or whatever you call it i mean i don't
00:43:03.180know i made a movie that was successful and i was happened to be a person in it that you know
00:43:08.620made made it more successful like she was funny um and whatever but point is is that i remember
00:43:15.300even one of my dear friends who I was who was a dancer a friend of my mom's Herb Ross um he
00:43:22.060heard that I you know took over and I wanted to do everything my own way thinking oh my god
00:43:27.300who made that up I mean you know trying to save a movie yeah Private Benjamin had like you know
00:43:33.920three laughs in on the first edit I mean it was we had issues but we have the most amazing writers
00:43:39.880And they, I sat down and they did 135, I think notes, editing notes, and they were followed because we were producing and, and, and they changed the whole movie around to make it as funny as it was written.
00:43:52.180So I think there's a whole viewpoint of women at that point in power.
00:43:58.840And it was, you know, extremely male dominated, extremely.
00:44:01.980me so it's so crazy that somebody like you who is obviously warm friendly kind that no one would
00:44:08.200ever look at you and suspect bitch you know that that if they can do that to you they could do to
00:44:12.600anybody yeah it wasn't about me really it was about the you know the culture and uh you know
00:44:20.540i was part of the color of that culture uh and slowly it changed which it has to a point but i
00:44:26.440remember uh with my daughter we we went katie and i she was just starting and the two of us were
00:44:32.340at women's lunch what was it women's film for women for film or something um and uh it was a
00:44:38.980thing that they created you know and like the powerful women and now we had certain women and
00:44:43.280in positions of power and you know it was great and it was like the women in film women in film
00:44:48.300and um i got the giggles it was just so crazy katie and i are you know in the podium and we're
00:44:56.120looking around and i'm looking around at all these women and i got the giggles because
00:45:01.520it didn't matter these women were working for men and there were still no women's movies being made
00:45:10.680including first wives club we all took a less money certain amount of money because they were
00:45:17.380scared that women a certain age and we weren't even that old then but a woman of a certain age
00:45:22.560couldn't bring in you know box office dollars and we went out and made this movie and it was
00:45:29.760a huge hit cover of time magazine oh wow then you go to make it another one a sequel and they
00:45:37.300don't want to pay you any more money oh wow shocking and that was first wives come now it
00:45:43.080was 25 so whatever years ago 30 but i mean the reality is is that the fighting of this you know
00:45:50.400idea that a woman cannot really carry a movie or that they can't make money, you know, in the
00:45:58.800industry is because the money that they make are all these other big tentpole movies, which aren't
00:46:06.240really about a star. You know, they're about special effects. They're about, you know, all
00:46:11.120these big movies and they're most of them, at least back and then were very male oriented.
00:46:15.500so young boys would go to the theater they would go to see them so you know but my point is
00:46:21.760as we're getting to is that women have had a an interesting hill to climb sometimes well i mean
00:46:29.660and and in a lot of industries but especially hollywood which is one of the crazy pieces of
00:46:35.800i think it's why it drives people crazy when hollywood tries to act holier than now and start
00:46:42.560lecturing middle america about morality and so on and you know these people sitting in iowa who
00:46:47.480have never done any they've never tried to put something at a casting couch or do what you know
00:46:52.080al did or any of this they're like i you could save your lectures for somebody else
00:46:56.220that's right exactly and the idea that you know well i i do have a feeling about keep your
00:47:05.020keep up I've never known okay how do I say this Hollywood and a lot of Hollywood has a lot of
00:47:13.760mission right and you know you want to put your name onto something you believe in but it doesn't
00:47:20.260make a difference and that's the one the reality is that if you are someone in the industry and
00:47:27.500you want to go into politics or you want to talk about these things you know I stay in my lane
00:47:33.100and and i think that the idea if if you know maybe segwaying into what i'm doing now
00:47:39.160but the reality is is that if we'd want to do anything we want to do it for all people
00:47:45.140not just for a group or whatever what makes polarity even more is creating teams on either
00:47:52.280side of the of the aisle and i don't think that's what we do i think we entertain i think we bring
00:47:59.440awareness to people just of their ability to laugh to have joy to experience it to cry
00:48:06.300we we are emotional beings and create emotion and and in others and and it's an escape i think we're
00:48:15.560in service i really do i think people get paid really well to be in service but i don't think
00:48:21.560We should forget that our first job is to help people laugh, feel something, escape a little bit from there.
00:48:31.860All right. Now, that's a great note on which to leave it.
00:48:33.780And when we come back, Goldie's latest effort to bring that kind of messaging to your kids, my kids and the world in a really creative way.
00:54:23.000It's important on how it's delivered. Right. So what we did was when when COVID happened, part of what happened to me, we talked about earlier, basically sitting down is that I had the dream and I was able to dream in quiet.
00:54:40.420I was able to quiet my mind, my stress level, my body, my movement places, take my distracting my brain.
00:54:48.100And I figured out how to redo and reimagine what MindUp is.
00:54:54.820And so that's what COVID helped me do.
00:54:59.480So now we have created for various amazing people online accessibility on our learning platform.
00:55:08.040so any teacher of any school can go ahead and get that program just as it's taught and it's
00:55:15.160beautiful to look at we I didn't want the program to look at like pedagogy or anything a teacher
00:55:21.780would have to do again it's all written it's there but it's beautiful it has sound it's
00:55:27.140pretty to look at it feels good to be in that space is what I wanted it to look like in the
00:55:33.160meantime, you can take that program, become an accredited trainer, and go in there and teach
00:55:39.820your children. Schools have already bought the program, along with other teachers similarly.
00:55:46.700But then I decided, we've got to put a parent program in here. This isn't just rituals. So now
00:55:51.940we're building, we built part of it, of a really in-depth parent program, of learning how their
00:55:58.080brains work and knowing that until they are a little more mindful themselves that they will
00:56:04.980be able to be a better parent you know we're hijacked by our anger and our fear and lack
00:56:10.760of knowledge of what's happening in the future our money look we're in a you know in basically
00:56:15.700a recession right or in no not recession in a um help me out well we're in a massive inflationary
00:56:24.580period. And while we've filled a lot of jobs, a lot of people have left the workforce altogether.
00:56:29.700Exactly. So the inflation. So that was the first thing. So the reality is, is that we've got a lot
00:56:35.880to worry about, right? But in what we teach and what we're helping them with is to actually stay
00:56:41.700right here, right now, and understand that this moment right now is the most important moment.
00:56:47.440And they understand now about their children, their children's brains, their brains,
00:56:51.140they have discussions around it they're able to work with families we have mind up family
00:56:55.860so what happened is is megan is that i have taken this and now it's grown into a library
00:57:03.300of of people talking about these various things um we've got you know happiness experts we've
00:57:08.820got researchers we've got neuroscientists talking about what is mindfulness what happens to the
00:57:14.880brain what's going on when you quiet your mind it's powerful we're going to have doctors who
00:57:20.960food food the best food for your mind the best food for your children and we have a cardiologist
00:57:27.980now speaking about the brain and breath and the heart and that connection and how it heals your
00:57:33.860heart physically so we we i've just opened up a world that literally i believe that we need to
00:57:40.860all understand about the potential of who we are and how we can change our mindset how we can be
00:57:47.760a better partner how we can literally have more tolerance and more love and more listening
00:57:53.340capability so well just to pick up on what you're saying that i there's a line of sweatshirts and
00:58:00.160t-shirts and so on and it reads um choose happiness and to me that's never spoken to me
00:58:05.440because if if it were that easy everyone would do it it's it's not that easy so i like what you said
00:58:12.180about brain fitness. If you have somebody who's trained their brain to be negative, to see the
00:58:19.840darkness, to stay mired in anxiety and worries about the future and depression, and they don't
00:58:24.040know how to sort of reset that, they can't choose anything other. You're talking about training the
00:58:29.520brain the same way you train a muscle to do something different that would be better for it,
00:58:34.820to understand how to process some of those feelings, get a handle on them, maybe table them,
00:58:41.620right? So stay in the moment, as you're saying, so that happiness is just more frequent in your
00:58:46.880life. It's not about having to choose it. It's just, you've set your brain up to put yourself
00:58:50.740there. Perfect. Perfectly put because it is you, do we choose happiness? Of course, everyone wants
00:58:58.020to be happy. What do you want for your children? I want them mostly to be happy, right? We get it,
00:59:02.880but we have to set our brain up. We have to have foundational material to understand that we can't
00:59:09.140just be happy because we say we want to be happy we have to understand how to we look at the causes
00:59:15.620of happiness one of the causes of happiness is a very together bound together loving family that
00:59:23.800is one of the big causes of happiness that other thing is a cause of happiness is giving caring
00:59:30.680about someone else the idea of doing something which is acts of kindness sounds crazy but that
00:59:37.060actually makes you feel better hang out with happy people why because there is a thing called
00:59:43.680emotional contagion and emotional contagion is real whether i mean we're experiencing it today
00:59:50.220you know people are angry hang out with them you're going to be angry it's what happens we're
00:59:55.920just humans our brain has this mirror neurons and it starts to process in the brain and we get it
01:00:01.780you hang out with happy people you'll be happier you hang out with people who aren't watching their
01:00:06.620weight as well and not take it sometimes you'll actually put on a few pounds it's weird but we
01:00:12.280actually if you want to be happy there are actions to take there's things to learn about the causes
01:00:19.420of happiness one of them is movement movement real movement you know go out there be with a friend
01:00:26.320hike take a walk breath breath is another one so when we learn all these causes to have a more
01:00:33.800i would say a more generous life a feeling that you there's more abundance in your life than
01:00:40.800deficit that's the way to do it we have a brain that we can train but just by wanting to be
01:00:47.900something does not mean you're going to get there you've got to work and i think that's ultimately
01:00:53.120what you said and that's what we train so in a child's classroom which we are we'll be preschool
01:00:58.440through eighth grade right now. And I'm doing it because that's a developing brain. And they learn
01:01:04.06085% of our kids said reportedly, they now felt they could make themselves feel happier.
01:01:09.980Well, I have to tell you, that was huge for me, but I just made it really did. It made me emotional
01:01:16.720because if those kids today could figure out that if you could do this in every grade till you're
01:01:24.340in eighth grade you'll ride that bike for the rest of your life that will never ever go away
01:01:29.900you will always on the website you have tips for parents that i was like this is actually quite
01:01:35.300clever it seems simple but it's quite clever one of them that stood out to me was every night at
01:01:40.020the dinner table ask your child uh what was something good that happened today as opposed
01:01:45.980to what what most of us do which is just you know what happened today tell me about your day
01:01:49.920like what was interesting usually i've come at it from sort of a neutral standpoint or just an
01:01:55.520information seeking standpoint but the point is you're helping them train to go to something
01:02:02.020positive something for which they might have gratitude right so it's like a it's a practice
01:02:07.420that you can get your child into night after night exactly right you know my dad used to call me and
01:02:14.380he'd say, what good happened today? And daddy, I'd call daddy when I was like dancing in New York
01:02:19.720or whatever. And he'd say, and then he'd say to me, okay, go. What is the one thing you learned
01:02:25.620today? Did you just tell me what you learned today? Just one thing. And you know, it's lived
01:02:30.040with me. I mean, I'm an older person now, but it still lives with me. I mean, I remember what did
01:02:37.440I learn new today? And I can remember myself all through the days I could say, well, I learned
01:02:42.620something new today. That was great. These are positive experiences. Here's the deal. The brain
01:02:49.300is negative bias, no matter what. And it's negative bias because it's there. The brain is
01:02:56.060there. It's a very primitive part of our brain, but it's there to look for trouble. You know,
01:03:00.760that's the original, that's the center brain, right? That's the area where we are. Our smell,
01:03:05.680oh, I smell gas. Oh, I do this. Oh, you know, one of the little kids was seven years old and her
01:03:10.760aunt pulled her away from the curb. And she said, auntie, do you know what saved our lives? And she
01:03:16.880said, no. And she said, the amygdala. Her aunt said, what? She said, no, because that saves our
01:03:29.740life because that was an alert. We knew. And I'm thinking, oh my God, this was a seven-year-old
01:03:34.780telling, okay, this is me hearing this story from in Vancouver. So the reality is, is that
01:03:41.460learning what we naturally go to, which is the negative story. And you find yourself doing that
01:03:48.680negative story, you wake up in the morning, you're lying in bed, you're thinking about what happened
01:03:53.720a year ago, or 10 years ago, or whatever. Why is that happening? That's what the brain's doing.
01:03:59.100it's shifting it's bringing stuff up don't even think about it just get out of bed you change the
01:04:06.500subject you don't have to you know sort of go over and over and over this thing that your husband did
01:04:12.280or your boyfriend or back in the day or you know you're holding grudges your brain won't let you
01:04:17.140forget it you have to talk to your brain and say stop it i'm getting out of bed i am not thinking
01:04:23.500about this anymore because it's gone. It's over. Today is today. It's now. And dammit, if we don't
01:04:31.660live for where we are right now, if this pandemic didn't teach us that we can't depend on a lot of
01:04:39.300things, including this frigging virus that's running around here, but we can find the things
01:04:45.420that we depend upon and we can have a nurtured heart. We can go in and sit quietly and think
01:04:52.900of the beautiful things that have happened to you and look at your children every day so you can't
01:04:58.120so you can't right so we you can't just say okay be happy right you can't do that but you can
01:05:02.180practice mindfulness you can practice it's basically cognitive behavioral therapy you're
01:05:05.860talking about when you you got the thing the bad thought in your head over and over and over and
01:05:09.360you just choose to just redirect for the moment i've always i said i used to this moment i use my
01:05:15.200my old puppy's face little bosh's face it was so sweet for me it's just a good it's like a
01:05:21.020rejiggering, you know, like Bosh's face. It'll just stop the thinking of whatever I need to
01:05:25.980stop. It works. But, but I wanted to ask you, this is a, this is a sensitive subject, so forgive me,
01:05:32.060but I do, I do think it's helpful. Something bad happened to you when you were a child
01:05:38.320with respect to an attempted sexual assault. And you told me this over dinner one time,
01:05:45.240it's never left me, but the way your mom handled it with you, I thought was brilliant. And I'm sure
01:05:53.100some people would find it controversial. I thought it was brilliant because in a way, Goldie,
01:05:57.280she was training you this, you know, from a very early age. Right. That's exactly right. You're
01:06:04.400a hundred percent right. Is that I had a, uh, one of my sister's friends and they were like 18
01:06:09.580in that age. And I went, it was Christmas time and we were having a party and he came up
01:06:15.780stairs and I knew him, you know, I was 11. And the next thing I know, I wake up and he has his
01:06:21.760hands on my breasts. And then he puts his hand on my vagina area. And, and I said, Ted, what are
01:06:29.760you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing? Trying to push his hands away. And I said, stop
01:06:36.540it and then I just stopped as I called my mom I called mommy and I called her from I didn't get
01:06:41.300up because I was in bed you know a little bit because then he left and my mother ran upstairs
01:06:49.960and they you know somebody went to get him they ran out the door I said my here's what he did
01:06:55.620and he touched me here and he did this and my mom looked at me and she said okay look at me are you
01:07:01.400okay are you okay and i said i am she's wow all right so just so you know i want you to know
01:07:08.180something all right he's very sick it's a very sick boy honey so if you're okay and whatever
01:07:16.640and you're not hurt and everything's fine don't don't worry i'm right here but i didn't know she
01:07:23.060didn't go oh what happened to my daughter what what you know how are you how are you i mean no
01:07:30.320she just said you know how are you doing are you okay and suddenly again contagion okay mom didn't
01:07:39.760wasn't upset i wasn't upset i learned that he wasn't well i had owens ralph went and ralph went
01:07:47.020and chased him out he left the house she said so he's very sick boy honey so you know but so i
01:07:54.220didn't have this like woman who lost her shit you know yeah she gave you the file to put this in
01:08:01.800yeah exactly you know and it's very interesting when you talk about the outcaps of the world
01:08:09.320uh and by the way he wasn't the only one um you really you know i danced in vegas so you know it's
01:08:15.100a whole other story um but you know in a way i had more empathy for them i i felt like they there's a
01:08:23.980weakness there. And, and, and I, I felt bad. There's a, you know, whether they're addicted
01:08:28.620to sex, terrible thing to have that hormone running through your, your body and not being
01:08:34.780able to handle it, not deal with it, not know what to do. Um, so I, you know, I know it sounds
01:08:41.000crazy, but I forgive them. And, and, you know, I, I kind of, I care about, about them.
01:08:50.620but that that may be a bridge too far for for many people but i but i think people can get
01:08:58.340into the habit of not catastrophizing every bad thing that happens and this was by any measure
01:09:05.980a bad thing that happened and your mother absolutely could have said oh my god and held
01:09:13.260you and started rocking and saying you'll never be the same your relationship with men will not
01:09:18.260be the same you know we're gonna have to get you in a media with therapy and it and that could have
01:09:22.500created further scarring i do think the way she chose to handle it and and already the child she
01:09:28.820built till 11 years you know who she was dealing with thanks to all those years of input she was
01:09:34.560able to sort of say this is the file it goes in it's about him not about you you're fine and i
01:09:40.980know you've said it did not negatively impact your view of or relationship or sexual relationship
01:09:48.240with men at any point thereafter? No, not at all. I mean, as you say, you're not
01:09:55.580whatever. That was an early experience. And I remember back when I was also at a bar with my
01:10:02.700girlfriend and it was over and he locked the door and my girlfriend was in the other place next
01:10:08.440door. She wasn't there. And this guy who was a really nice guy and he threw me down on the
01:10:13.820banquette in this place. And, and it was, they served food and everything. So it wasn't,
01:10:18.640and, and he, he started to, you know, pound on me, not hurt me, but he wanted to, you know,
01:10:23.660make sense with me or something. And, and, and I was lying there now, but mind you, I was a ballet
01:10:30.020dancer. So I was, I was strong. I had very strong legs. I, you know, I wasn't wimpy. Right. In the
01:10:36.000meantime, a cop came from Washington, DC. I looked at the window. He looked down because he heard me
01:10:41.960yelling and he, and the guy put his hand over my mouth. I got out from under him and I ripped out
01:10:50.040from under him, my leg, I pushed him. I got out and I ran into the kitchen and I got a knife
01:10:55.640and I held it up and I said, don't touch me. Wow. And he started to cry and he said, I'm so sorry.
01:11:05.500I don't know what happened to me. I'm so sorry. Now I look at that experience and I still feel
01:11:12.360bad for you. Wow. Because, because I, I wasn't hurt. I knew, I knew it was wrong with him.
01:11:20.900He, he redeemed himself, obviously. So I didn't have one of those horrible experiences. Okay.
01:11:27.340So I'm not saying, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. I could, could it, it's gone a different
01:11:32.360way for too many people it's gone a different way for too many people you bet i mean so but
01:11:38.360it's an experience and and i i think that it's an element of if we can't have a deeper understanding
01:11:47.760of human behavior forget killing forget full-on rape forget all these things but with your
01:11:53.740your husbands your children your loved ones the people that are in your life people strangers
01:11:59.240that aren't nice, things that you can see out of it. If we don't feel empathy, a sense of empathy
01:12:05.960for someone else, I don't know if life is worth living. I really don't. I think caring for
01:12:14.340something, caring about something is really, really what you have in life. And it brings
01:12:21.300great happiness and great joy. And this thing that I'm doing with Mind Up, Mind Up for Life
01:12:28.040brings me so much joy because I'm ultimately doing something at this time in my life
01:12:34.300that I care about, building human capacity, human capital, to be able to say one day,
01:12:42.100maybe this will be in every school in the world. 27 countries have already come to our site.
01:12:50.400You said it. It's around the world, this problem. We've got to build a healthier world,
01:12:56.820a world where people actually experience what it is all the joys of being human not just being
01:13:03.920angry not having to win not be somebody who has to you know weigh this against that understand
01:13:10.580that try and understand that and when you do you realize there's actually more congeniality
01:13:18.060where we actually understand we don't always think the same way and we talk about this in
01:13:22.380the classroom. So I just think we have to build better capital. We are there. I'm sappy to do it.
01:13:30.200I may sound like a Pollyanna sweetheart. I'm very scrutinizing, but I'm resilient and,
01:13:38.540you know, people aren't going to push me over that easily.
01:13:41.240And I think it's a good reminder that there is a soft, safe, loving place that everyone can go to
01:13:49.000on their own within their own head you don't need a room called a safe room you don't need speech
01:13:54.660labeled safe you are in charge of the safety of your own body your own mind and whether you are
01:14:01.220okay whether you can handle the anxiety or the stress brought on by anybody's words or behavior
01:14:06.240what whatever it is you are in charge of how you're going to react to that and if you don't
01:14:11.580have the tools they are gettable they're gettable they're learnable they definitely are i love i
01:16:15.040First Wives Club, Everyone Says I Love You. That was the Woody Allen film, 1996. Same year. Protocol, Wildcats, Bird on a Wire, House Sitter, Death Becomes Her, The Out-of-Towners, Town and Country. I could go on. First Wives Club is, I hear, possibly making a sequel. So we'll see about that. But let's get to the main event. Okay, let's talk. Let's talk Turkey overboard. 1987. I just learned in preparing for this interview, it was based on a real story.
01:16:39.720There was an actual woman who fell off a boat or showed up on a Florida shore with amnesia.
01:16:45.700And in the movie, which was apparently written with you and Kurt in mind, the premise is
01:16:50.540that the woman, your character, falls off of her yacht after being a real jerk to Kurt
01:32:20.240He lived a life of luxury with money, yachts, women and drugs, but it could not last forever.
01:32:28.800And soon the FBI would catch up and catch on to a multimillion dollar pump and dump stock manipulation scheme that would land Jordan in federal prison for 22 months.
01:32:41.260He would later write a New York Times bestselling book, The Wolf of Wall Street, and soon Hollywood would come knocking.
01:32:47.520And A-list actors would launch a bidding war for the movie rights.
01:32:52.180Leonardo DiCaprio would go on to portray Jordan in the now very famous and high-grossing film.
01:32:58.660It's incredible life and incredible life lessons that Jordan has gotten along the way.
01:33:03.180And today, he is my guest and we'll discuss it all.
01:33:06.820Jordan, thank you so much for being here.
01:37:00.800Part of it, I think, is a God-given gift.
01:37:03.200Seriously, I mean, I think that all of us, each person possesses certain gifts and certain deficits, right?
01:37:10.360I think in my personal genetic makeup and a combination of nature and nurture, I ended up naturally being very, very talented at sales.
01:37:18.380But then I trained myself and honed that skill over years and years of hard work and selling to a razor's edge.
01:37:25.540And then I found myself in a position very young when I started my firm where I was teaching a methodology of sales that was intuitive to me.
01:37:33.540It didn't have a name back then. And it didn't. It was working real well until I tried to get to a much more difficult type of sale.
01:37:39.780And when I was faced with this difficult sale, I could do it.
01:37:43.560Yet the people that worked for me couldn't. And it forced me to come up with a new way of training salespeople,
01:37:48.500which is really what allowed me to understand my own sales process much better.
01:37:53.520So, you know, by almost by becoming a teacher, it made me a far better actual student.
01:40:12.100if you're here to make money you're probably in the wrong place like what the hell i'm in the
01:40:16.940wrong place and i got up and i literally walked out my first day and i dropped out yeah that that
01:40:22.300too is such a moment it tells us a lot about you because i would think i mean honestly having been
01:40:26.720to law school and practice law you at that point your ego's into it you've told everybody you're
01:40:31.000going to dental school you have some sort of you know skin in the game so the the fact that you got
01:40:35.920up and walked out does say something about you like you know it doesn't take you long to make
01:40:40.680a decision about your life and your future and where you're going to do what you're going to do
01:40:43.780next important thing that you're hitting on here because one of the biggest mistakes that i think
01:40:49.520people make and we all make you know i still make it but i try to stop myself from making it is
01:40:54.000is that it's not just ego it's it's part ego it's part it's just part when you get caught up in
01:41:01.560something you're in like you can't see the forest or the trees like you know anyone on the outside
01:41:05.460say what are you doing no it's not working you know it's time to make a move get out go do
01:41:09.540something else so many people will stay with something to a point where it's obvious it's
01:41:14.600not working for them it's obvious it's not going to get them the outcome they want but they sit
01:41:18.260they feel like they put time into their invested in it they've done things they've told people
01:41:23.580they're doing things so they feel they have to be consistent with that yet to their own detriment
01:41:27.800they stay and they that other opportunities pass them by and i think that's a very very powerful
01:41:33.400thing that you know for all entrepreneurs actually success oriented people is to always be looking at
01:41:39.140your surroundings and what's going on and just being honest, you know, is this work or is this
01:41:43.460not? I don't believe you just keep trying and quitting. I'm not like that at all. But at a
01:41:47.340certain point, you have to get realistic with yourself and say, you know what, I should be
01:41:51.460making a pivot here and trying something else. What I'm doing is simply not work.
01:41:55.840And you had your eyes on the prize. You knew your overall goal was to get rich. It was not to be a
01:42:01.800dentist. That was just a means to an ends. And when you found out it wasn't the means, you were
01:42:05.620like, peace out. So you, you not knowing exactly what's next, you leave. And then the way I hear
01:42:13.300it, you heard about a kid from your neighborhood who was making a million bucks on wall street
01:42:18.140and the light bulb went off and you were like, I too am going to wall street, but it's not that
01:42:24.020easy. One step in this one step. What? Oh, the meat. Is it the meat salesman? Yes. Yes. I actually,
01:42:31.660So this is a very important part of the story is that, you know, when I dropped out of dental school, I answered a blind ad in the newspapers, newspapers back then with ads, right?
01:42:41.400And it was for a sales job and it said company vehicle, make a thousand a week company vehicle.
01:42:46.580I was like, wow, that sounds pretty good, right?
01:42:48.180And I went down, I didn't realize that the company vehicle was a meat truck and it turned out it was selling meat and seafood door to door.
01:43:10.320I was the kid with the lemonade stand.
01:43:11.940But this was a magic show even I did when I was younger.
01:43:15.000But this was the first real, you know, job and sales job was like that influence and persuasion.
01:43:20.180And my first day on that job, I broke the company record.
01:43:23.800I just I had a natural ability to sell.
01:43:25.640And that was really how it got started is like, you know, me knowing that I could really close at a high level.
01:43:32.000And after about two weeks of breaking the records, I said, let me just try to open up a business myself.
01:43:37.000I always had had that entrepreneurial edge and I started my own meat business.
01:43:41.040And over the next year, I built it up to 26 trucks and, you know, and I trained all those employees how to sell door to door and was selling door to door.
01:43:49.880So that was really the proving ground for everything else that came after.
01:43:54.180And then ultimately, I made every mistake that a young entrepreneur could make.
01:47:02.180The fear, the greed, the cursing, the screaming.
01:47:05.020I mean, it was unbelievable, just the energy in this room.
01:47:08.440And I and for six months, I watched all these other brokers selling.
01:47:13.820I wasn't licensed yet. I had to go through a licensing process.
01:47:16.420And and the messaging was, you know, let's just say it was very much like Matthew McConaughey said, even at a big firm.
01:47:22.580I think one of the worst, one of the worst kept secrets and the dirty little secret of Wall Street is that most of it's really not in the best interest of the client when it comes to because, you know, the fact is, is that most of this whole machine is not necessary of stockbrokers.
01:47:35.760Is it an analyst because you better just buying the S&P and holding it?
02:01:16.760So it's like, he's like a larger than life character.
02:01:20.580You know, he's always very good friend of mine and I respect him. And, you know, he just did he did a lot of good stuff. He personally had people, you know, like, you know, security guards and he did a good job for me.
02:01:31.720Yeah. So he tried to help you, but he he was quick to tell you, please do not try to bug the FBI agents. Do not try to tape them. Do not try to bug offices or briefcases or anything like that.
02:01:41.520Okay. So you go from the penny stock place. How does Stratton Oakmont, it's got a great name and
02:01:46.780that's by design, but how does Stratton Oakmont, which was officially born in 1989, come about?
02:01:53.740So, so Stratton was actually started, Stratton Securities was started in 1979, I think. And
02:02:01.140it was a trading firm that just, you know, did a lot of interbank trading, insurance companies,
02:02:08.340traders, right? And then when the crash came, the firm basically lost all its equity and it was
02:02:14.520teetering, you know, by a thread. And right around the time I decided to open up my own brokerage
02:02:21.820firm, you know, Stratton became available that you could like use their licenses with what was
02:02:27.540called an OSJ, Office of Supervisory Jurisdiction. So I jumped on that bandwagon and that's how it
02:02:35.280started with stratton uh after a short time another firm named oakmont became available and
02:02:41.900i wanted to there were some things with that about that firm i like had a good clearing arrangement
02:02:46.240the trader was uh more professional than what i had so i bought oakmont and that's how i came to
02:02:52.560stratton oakmont okay so you wind up going around and hiring a bunch of guys and they're these are
02:02:59.140I don't know how you want to describe them, but salt of the earth.
02:03:04.360Barely post-adolescent new computes, but in a loving, fun way.
02:03:08.900And you were their fearless leader who is up there like, let me show you how it's done.
02:03:12.680There's a famous scene in the movie in which you're talking to them about selling and how
02:16:02.180OK, so you'll need to go on your average and average, like, you know, average plus average plus average times average equals average.
02:16:08.480It's like somehow that all coagulates to be great. It's like, you know, the mortgage crisis where they said, let's take a bunch of piece of shit, deadbeat borrowers, deadbeat loans.
02:16:18.440OK, and I'd be borrowers on piece of shit. OK, but deadbeat loans. Right. And they're all terrible.
02:16:23.420But we put them all together. They're suddenly good. No, you have a giant lump of terrible.
02:16:27.640Like it doesn't change the makeup, like by putting a lot of bad together, suddenly becomes
02:17:25.400after all the drugs I know you've taken.
02:17:27.640what amazing i look pretty good considering like that right i really want to talk about that because
02:17:34.060i've i've told my audience this before um i do drink alcohol but i i've literally never tried
02:17:39.640a drug i've never tried an illicit drug of any kind um and i i don't know if i'm in the minority
02:17:44.420the majority but yeah having lived in new york for almost 20 years and having practiced law and
02:17:49.840been in media i think that's unusual but i'm kind of curious about all the drugs you took and like
02:17:55.380how they felt and how you feel about them now I know you're sober now but it was a lot and you
02:18:01.600lived a life of big big debauchery while you were while you were running that firm and I I'm just
02:18:08.620curious about the whole thing so uh let me start with this had you grown up we'll squeeze it in a
02:18:13.620break in a minute but had you grown up doing drugs drinking alcohol like were you that kind of person
02:18:18.560before all this? I use drugs occasionally in high school and the college, but no, I was not a drug.
02:18:27.120I was never addicted to drugs. And it was never something that was like an integral part of my
02:18:32.320life growing up. But I tried, I tried drugs and use them. Like, you know, most kids, you know,
02:18:37.260I think back then it smoked pot and I tried cocaine once or twice, but that wasn't something
02:18:42.780that was really part of my life. And so when you were at the penny stock firm and Rothschild before
02:18:48.060that this is prior to you know the formation of stratton had it yet blown up in your life or you
02:18:53.280were like addicted yet when you started that firm the big firm that was another part of the movie
02:18:58.400that was a bit i thought was kind of you know i to me it could have been done a bit more elegantly
02:19:04.380again i loved the movie but if there were things that could change it they they had me going to
02:19:09.480the dark side really fast and like it almost like you know i go day one i'm like this really wet
02:19:14.660behind the ears honest kid that can't we make our clients money too and he's like no and i'm like
02:19:19.500okay and then the next scene i'm in a strip club starting coke right that's okay wait that's a
02:19:23.760great place to leave it we've got a clip uh to sort of bring that to life for you uh right after
02:19:30.300this quick break when we have more with jordan belford the wolf of wall street sex drugs and
02:19:36.800Leonardo DiCaprio. What more could you ask for? Stay tuned. So Jordan, so you how many years were
02:19:47.160you? I don't know if we can say on the straight and narrow, but like, how long did it take before
02:19:52.360full debauchery and drug addiction set in? So I would say it took from the time of I walked
02:20:03.560probably two years um to start using drugs and maybe two and a half to be really deep into it
02:20:10.960um and you know drug addiction is a very strange thing it's very insidious it starts
02:20:17.080slowly and it creeps in a little bit at a time and before you know it you know one drug
02:20:23.820makes you want to do another drug to counterbalance the negative effects of the first one
02:20:28.820And then the third one, I mean, it happens really slowly.
02:20:32.680And but I would say by 1991, 1991, I was full in very much into drugs.
02:20:42.700OK, and the you know, I think I understand that just because anybody who drinks alcohol
02:20:48.080can understand the alcohol at night and coffee in the morning.
02:20:50.980This is just a much more extreme version of it.
02:20:53.140And when you when the firm was killing it and you were killing it, there's that's portrayed
02:20:58.420in the movie and you're pretty open about the drugs and here's a clip of uh leonardo as you
02:21:02.640on the drug cocktail that you'd been using on a daily basis i consume enough drugs to sedate
02:21:08.860manhattan long island and queens for a month okay mr jordan i take quaaludes 10 to 15 times a day
02:21:18.160for my back pain adderall to stay focused xanax to take the edge off pot to mellow me out cocaine
02:21:24.860to wake me back up again and morphine well because it's awesome all the drugs under god's
02:21:30.580blue heaven there is one that is my absolute favorite see enough of this shit'll make you
02:21:38.000invincible able to conquer the world and eviscerate your enemies
02:21:43.940oh and i'm not talking about this i'm talking about this
02:21:51.620at the end there for our listeners he was the the character was snorting cocaine and said i'm not
02:21:58.100talking about this the coke he's talking about this and he holds up a hundred dollar bill
02:22:01.200money money was the number one drug i have to say that um i wish i could take credit for writing
02:22:08.580that line that was terence winter who came up with that brilliant statement which is so true but
02:22:14.380yeah it's a real i i thought that was so clever of him um because you know the other things i
02:22:19.740I said, but he sort of pivoted back to this ultimate truth that the money itself was the
02:22:25.700most powerful drug of all. And I read that like, wow, this guy is good.
02:22:30.360How much money were you making at your peak?
02:22:34.080Oh, it's a lot of money, man. I, you know, let's go back to the time wall. So this is a time before
02:22:40.480hedge funds, before you heard about people making hundreds of millions of dollars. I was making,
02:22:47.460you know, a million a week in the cash side, plus I was taking stakes in all these different
02:22:55.740companies. So I had a net worth much, much higher. I had shares and, you know, there was a time I
02:23:01.160owned 85% of Steve Madden shoes and 20 other companies that were all going public or more
02:23:07.760public. And then I was making the cash portion as well. So I was making phenomenal amount of money.
02:23:13.340Wow. You had a yacht, you had a helicopter, you had estates, mansions and so on, jewels for your wives and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What did it feel like? Did it, did it make you happy? You know, the goal of being rich, were you feeling like nailed it?
02:23:26.460i think the thing about money is that you know and i've said this many times that you know i've
02:23:35.060been rich and been really really really happy i've also been rich and really really really
02:23:43.140miserable i've been poor and really really really miserable but never once i've been poor happy like
02:23:50.840And so it's like I think money doesn't buy happiness, but a lack of money can really be a passport to misery and discomfort.
02:23:59.200And I've seen a lack of money cause so many problems in marriages with families.
02:24:05.660And I believe my belief is money is an incredibly important thing.
02:24:10.620It's a tool. It's certainly not everything and it won't buy happiness.
02:24:14.200But without it, you could really be making your life much more complicated and your relationships much more tenuous without money.
02:24:21.940So I think that's the best definition I give you.
02:24:24.260Did it feel great to make all that money?
02:25:11.140He was a great pilot and he'd fly 10 feet off the water and, you know, like gunship in Vietnam sort of stuff.
02:25:17.560And and we just, you know, have that boat in places that, you know, that you would normally not go to, like, you know, the Virgin Islands or the Caribbean and then take the helicopter and just see amazing things land in live volcanoes that weren't currently erupting.
02:25:31.120So we did all these really cool things.
02:25:33.140I think that was probably the most my most favorite toy, even more so than the yacht.
02:25:37.480Mm hmm. And is it true that the yacht, the Nadine, named after your second wife, was taken down by a rogue wave?
02:39:12.400But I'm in control, but you rationalize, never underestimate the power of rationalization.
02:39:17.040And also, you know, what we do as human beings is we surround ourselves with a peer group that shares our values so we don't think we're crazy.
02:39:27.580So, you know, what defines what's normal and not in a society is what's happening in society every day.
02:39:33.480So we almost form this self-contained society where rules that might seem abnormal or completely out of control in the real world seem quite normal in the four walls of the boardroom or when we were partying in a hotel or a casino.
02:39:47.040it does it makes sense and it's scary it's it's i i see it and i read it nice it's like you almost
02:39:56.320have to look at the people around you for the reflection of what you are good or bad um but
02:40:02.740eventually it would all come crashing down uh legally the marriage uh the money all of it and
02:40:10.680that's where we're going to pick it up next uh with jordan belford so happy to be speaking with
02:40:15.800the Wolf of Wall Street, and we'll be right back with more.
02:40:45.800Must be 19 plus. Ontario only. Please play responsibly.
02:40:51.560I can't skip by before we get to the downfall about before asking you about the animals that were allowed on the floor of your office.
02:47:02.640And I was talking to him about these college students
02:47:05.140who were yelling at their school dean saying,
02:47:07.220these were college students who happened to be black saying,
02:47:09.760You don't understand anything. We come, you know, we come from slaves that are, you don't have the same ancestors. Our ancestors were slaves and yours weren't. And, you know, you basically can't explain anything to us because of that. And I said, well, you know, how's this guy supposed to respond to this? And Douglas Murray said, we can all do that. We can all do that. Right. Everybody's got some sort of a painful history. It may not equal slavery, but bad. You know, it's bad.
02:47:34.420Listen, my people, the Irish Americans, didn't have it so good when we first came over to America.
02:47:40.760But you tweeted out something on July 22nd where I was like, well, I haven't seen a shorter, more succinct version of the way I feel, which is sad story.
02:56:07.360and he's a friend of mine today by the way we became friends he's been on my podcast i really
02:56:12.580like him i have just nothing but the highest regard for him yeah he's a great guy he thinks
02:56:17.340exactly like you just you know you should have him on your show he shares you know he's he's a very
02:56:22.200very intelligent guy um and he i deserve to go to jail i mean i broke the law i mean like you know
02:56:28.580he was like it wasn't like i was i was framed i wasn't like they made this stuff up oh i mean i
02:56:33.840broke the law and I got caught. Listen, I wasn't the first guy, you know, Wall Street, you know,
02:56:38.040you can go to any firm and find terrible things happening in any day. So I'm not saying I was,
02:56:43.400I certainly wasn't any worse, but I broke the law. It doesn't make it right. Okay. So like,
02:56:47.540you know, you could say it was happening everywhere, which it was. I didn't, I did it
02:56:51.280with more panache, I guess. But the things I was doing were happening all over Wall Street.
02:56:55.620They're still happening today. I got indicted for it. I deserved to get indicted for it.
02:56:58.760He earned the indictment, the old factory, knocking on doors and doing the work.
02:57:02.800Can I ask you about the, you write about how he came to you and said, I went to 100 people, you call them Strattonites, guys who work for you at Stratton, and nobody would talk. They were totally loyal. And you said something like, that's what happens when you're the cash cow.
02:57:20.560um but so they didn't want to turn you in the guys who worked for you but then i know you you
02:57:27.200wore a wire for the fbi you and the guy who also got indicted with you your partner um did you have
02:57:33.240to go against those guys the guys who didn't turn on you or was it different fish so this is really
02:57:40.200this is this is probably the most difficult part of my life i would think and i ended up i ended up
02:57:46.200getting in trouble by the way i almost thanks to coleman i didn't do 30 years in jail because
02:57:52.600i refused so i agreed to cooperate um as did pretty much everybody in my case so and and
02:57:59.980you know when i was considering whether or not to cooperate um i was like everyone is going to
02:58:05.040cooperate so you're not gonna have to testify against your friends you're gonna have to give
02:58:08.720all the information up tell them where your money is and you know maybe you'll testify against
02:58:12.900someone you don't know but it's not most everyone in the federal system that it's so rare that someone
02:58:17.420goes to trial in these cases because the the sentencing garlands is so onerous and that unless
02:58:23.220you cooperate it's like it's like go to trial you'll lose it's 30 years so most people will end
02:58:28.400up cooperating right and then they were threatened to indict my wife even though she hadn't done
02:58:34.040anything wrong once they threatened to indict my wife i had no choice but to plead guilty and
02:58:37.980cooperate so I started cooperating giving information on on what was going on and then
02:58:42.780they asked me to wear a wire against a very very close friend of mine and um and it was a terrible
02:58:49.580terrible thing to do because it for me that was sort of my moral line was like I'm okay you know
02:58:55.560cooperate with a rat out a close friend of mine it just it just seemed like it was just a bridge
02:58:59.960too far at the time and so when I went to meet with him they wired me up I passed him a note
02:59:05.160saying i'm a liar don't incriminate yourself and it was this moment i was like i'm a good guy i'm a
02:59:11.940i'm a what a good guy i am like for doing i'm a i'm a stand-up guy i you know and i passed him
02:59:17.520this note and sure enough he didn't incriminate himself and then three months later he got in
02:59:21.860trouble and turned me in and gave and and i mean and that was the point when i think i lost all
02:59:27.860faith in humanity he's like that was my ultimate low point where i was like i can't like what do
02:59:33.620do i have any beliefs that are right or correct here like you know like i broke the law i justified
02:59:39.160that i justified not cooperating because it's my friend i shouldn't wrap my friend out and he turns
02:59:43.240around and wraps me out like it was the ultimate blow to seriously it was an emotional blow you
02:59:47.620can't imagine and the government was gonna break my agreement and give me the full sentence of like
02:59:54.82028 years and it was agent coleman that stopped that from happening wow he stopped he stood up
03:00:01.820for me and said listen you know he wasn't even doing it to benefit himself you know it was a
03:00:06.480moment of stupidity and also trying thought he was trying to be a good person and like you know
03:00:10.740it wasn't like a selfless it was it was like a selfless thing i did it was like i was benefiting
03:00:14.640myself i just didn't want to hurt someone that i love the friend saying so coleman stepped in and
03:00:19.180saved me and then i did cooperate and there was a couple of people that went to trial and um but
03:00:24.900most people um really i think 90 anyone was really close to me they cooperated yeah and and they all
03:00:31.740cut deals and you and your partner went to prison you for or yeah it's terrible really terrible
03:00:38.100so jordan did uh plead guilty he went he was sentenced to four years he served 22 months up
03:00:43.640next i'm going to ask him about the very famous guy he met in prison who encouraged him to write
03:00:48.620this all down into a book and about the hundreds of hours he spent with leonardo dicaprio and what
03:00:56.640that was like our closing chapter with jordan belford right after this quick break
03:01:01.740so jordan you go to prison and is it true that you met tommy chong there who had some
03:01:11.180advice for you of cheech and chong we do not it's actually true that when i get to prison who is my
03:01:18.080bunk mate not just in the same place my bunk mate is tommy chong from cheech and chong and they put
03:01:24.760us together the same cube i guess they were both high profile so they want to like kind of put us
03:01:30.480together told me to watch us or just like they thought it was smart thing to do and and um you
03:01:35.680know he's just a we're really good guys a very smart guy too very very uh very highly educated
03:01:42.440profound speaker and nuggets of wisdom and he was writing a book and there's not a lot to do in jail
03:01:48.560so you know you you sit there at night you tell stories to each other and i was telling him stories
03:01:52.940about my life and he's just laughing and rolling on the floor because i'm you know some really
03:01:56.480funny stories and i'm a pretty good storyteller he's doing the same to me in like the third night
03:02:00.640he says you know i honestly thought you were full of shit but my wife googled you and like
03:02:05.600all of this stuff is online it's true you actually did all this goes you have to write a book and i
03:02:11.560was like really i'm like you think my life was crazy i didn't think my life was that crazy because
03:02:16.660it was my life i it happened to me and i sort of just whatever you get used to all the inside he's
03:02:21.980like I'm Tommy Chong and I think your life is crazy. So that's right. So you do it. You write
03:02:28.300you write the book when you leave with the Wolf of Wall Street, which is what you were called in
03:02:31.480a newspaper article. And then everybody's clamoring for the movie rights. Leonardo DiCaprio gets
03:02:36.340involved. He wants to play you. This seemed to be a mission for him. And I read that you spend
03:02:40.800perhaps as many as hundreds of hours with him, getting him ready, showing him
03:02:44.560what it was like to be on that many drugs and so on. So what were your impressions of him
03:02:49.880in that whole process. I think what people don't realize maybe about Leo is he's, of course,
03:02:57.400he's naturally talented, but like the amount of preparation and the care he put into the role,
03:03:04.360like he really, like, he was just so determined to make it perfect. And he, he worked really hard.
03:03:11.640It wasn't like, oh, let me just wing it. It's going to come out. But he really put in mass
03:03:15.720amount of hours just you know we went through every single line of the script you know just
03:03:20.940again and again making sure every word sounds authentic and every scene was authentic and
03:03:26.040uh he just you know he's very talented and a very hard worker and there's a lot of integrity he's a
03:03:31.540great guy wow um you now are doing like entrepreneurship lessons uh sort of guidance
03:03:41.320mentorship and it almost in a way it's kind of self-helpy to me in a good way um so like how are
03:03:48.340you channeling this whole experience into a new version of you professionally so it's it's been
03:03:55.780many years now that i've been doing this um i started in about 2009 going out there and teaching
03:04:03.400people first about you know the sort of the mindset of success using the lessons i've learned then
03:04:08.260very quickly pivoting to teaching sales the straight line system which is really what
03:04:12.740you know made my career take off is that the system that i i had taught the strategist was
03:04:18.340very it's very ethical you know especially when i reinvented the system and and and made it you
03:04:23.740know five and better than it was it's a very powerful system and that's really what i was
03:04:28.320starting to get hired around the world to teach this to sales forces and by individuals all over
03:04:32.900um and then you know also teaching general you know entrepreneurship so i do a lot of consulting
03:04:39.400with companies and and yeah my message is is very you know it's very um i would say
03:04:44.620it's very honest i i think there's a lot of people that are out there teaching things like sales and
03:04:50.880and entrepreneurship they don't know the first thing about it really they just
03:04:54.300what they what they read either in my for my stuff or someone like a tony robbins stuff who i
03:05:00.320have a great respect for is a legitimate really you know brought things that were new and fresh
03:05:05.320and then there are just so many just charlatans out there that are regurgitating the same nonsense
03:05:10.640just trying to separate people from their money and i i really was very very you know early on
03:05:15.840made this sort of you know my my internal compass was very very clear it was pointing north
03:05:20.580meaning towards ethics and integrity like i you know i was very careful that i never took a penny
03:05:26.780from anyone without trying to give at least 10 times more value back doesn't mean you always
03:05:30.840succeeded like you know you always succeeded that you're my my mindset is always i'm looking to give
03:05:35.500more value than i i ever would get with every transaction i enter into every mentorship i do
03:05:41.400so um i've had tremendous success with people all over the world and it's great because now it's you
03:05:45.740know the movie became this incredible cult it so it uh people come up to me all day every day i get
03:05:50.700you know whenever i go out you know people just say you know you you're such an inspiration to
03:05:54.640me you inspire me your life your teachings your comeback uh it's just amazing and because you
03:05:59.840easily could have skulked away you could have skulked away and said i've been disgraced and
03:06:04.900you didn't you found a new way to reinvent and you came clean with all of it too to your credit
03:06:09.000which is how we're all learning now but i i have i have to ask you about um the blowback because i
03:06:16.040one of my questions in watching was how do you have any money because they ordered you to pay
03:06:20.200110 million in restitution so don't do they garnish your wages like what because i know
03:06:25.860some of the victims some of the people who got burned uh this is what i read left 1500 clients
03:06:31.240with 200 million in losses i don't know if those numbers are right but did i know they sort of pop
03:06:36.320up when you make money and say this is not right that that's that's not true that's not i don't
03:06:42.660you're trying to be lying but it's just not that's not true um clients don't pop up which
03:06:49.000is odd by the way because the number was wildly inflated okay it was it was there was losses no
03:06:54.380doubt okay but like when Bernie Madoff um they said what was it 50 billion that turned to be 10
03:06:59.740billion they when you're when they're coming up with losses and people they double and triple
03:07:03.780count and it ends up always being far less that was an estimate so it knows it I only was fine
03:07:10.100for 100 million 110 so what so and then it was Danny was 200 was a moving target that no one
03:07:14.980really knew what was actually lost. But there was certainly a loss there. And I discouraged a lot
03:07:19.360of money. Danny discouraged some money. I discouraged a lot more. I continue to pay money.
03:07:23.720And I pay some money each month. I pay some money and I pay a percentage of what I make. And I said
03:07:28.520to myself, what's my solution? You know what? I'm going to make so much money that I can afford to
03:07:33.940pay a percentage and still be rich. And that's what I always aspired to do. And I said, I'm just
03:07:38.620going to work hard on everybody else. I'm going to make so much money that I can afford to pay
03:07:43.040what i gotta pay and still live an amazing life with luxuries and that's exactly what i did
03:07:47.500and i just went and it's to their advantage too to have you get back on your feet you've
03:07:52.160you found sobriety you found love you found a way of making an honest living and so i only have
03:07:58.900about a minute left but i want to ask you because i know you've said your life serves serves as a
03:08:03.080cautionary tale and but others do find it more than cautionary they find it downright inspirational
03:08:08.200So what do you want people to know about the Wolf of Wall Street and the takeaway on Jordan