- On this episode I have a guest!
(bouncy music)
You ask questions, and I answer them.
This is The #AskGaryVee Show.
Hey everybody, this is Gary Vay-ner-chuk,
and this is episode 72 of The #AskGaryVee Show.
Or should I say, The Ask Gary and Casey Show.
That's right, for the first time ever,
you know 72 is such a symbolic number
that I figured we would use that to break out
the multiple person #AskGaryVee Show.
So, Case, thanks for you being the first person ever.
- Happy to be here, happy to be here,
ready for some questions.
- Why don't you tell the VaynerNation a little bit,
you know, let's call it a 72 second version
of who you are for the few who don't know,
and then we'll just get right into the questions.
- Okay, who I am for those who don't know.
I live in New York City, I work in New York City,
this is one of my offices, one of my companies.
I'm mostly known as a film maker,
I love making movies on the internet,
but I also do a lot of advertising work
for companies like J.Crew, and Nike, and Mercedes Benz,
and I also work with other companies
like The New York Times, making films for them.
How was that, was that good?
- That's great.
- I'm the father of two, I like to skateboard,
and yeah, that's...
- I mean the bottom line is, let's put it this way,
DRock is so excited right now that I can barely
deal with the tension in the room.
- Just try to hold the camera still.
- And so, you know, please go down the rabbit hole
that is Casey, he's an incredible storyteller,
and for me a lot of you know that I love talking
about market in the year that you actually live in,
this is a filmmaker, storyteller
in the year that we actually live in,
while a lot of his contemporaries,
and people of his talent have not recognized
the world we actually live in.
You've been one of the few that has in my opinion,
and for whatever that's worth, so that's how I see it.
- I'll take it Gary.
- Cool, let's get into the show.
- [Voiceover] Joe asks, "What advice would you give
"a high school senior in America
"trying to decide whether to go to college,
"and if so, which one?"
- Joe I'm gonna let Casey answer this first,
just cause I think it'd be fun to have
you start off the show.
- Yeah no, I've got a strong feeling
about further education, which is that
I think in life you should only be doing two things ever,
and one is like discovering what your passion is,
and then two is realizing it.
So Joe, if you know what you want to do,
and you're convicted that's where you want to be in life,
and that trajectory does not necessitate
a college education, then skip it.
Chances are you don't know what you want to do,
otherwise you wouldn't be asking us this question,
and if you don't know what you want to do
your responsibility is to figure that out,
and college is one of the best places,
one of the best atmospheres, environments
you can be in to figure out what your calling is in life,
to figure out what your passion is, what your purpose is.
- Joe, I'm gonna jump in here,
as the cars are racing outside,
and say this, I agree with a ton of what Casey said,
I'll also add that if you're taking $200,000 in debt
to find your passion, that might be a practical kind of,
by the way, debt that you can't even
declare bankruptcy against, which complete,
I mean, I can't even, I'm suffocated
by the game, the AK racket that is student loans,
and today in today's environment,
things that you and I didn't have.
There are other places where young people congregate,
and pound into each other in the serendipity
of finding those mentors, or contemporaries
that allow people to discover.
So look, I think one thing for sure,
it's fun, entrepreneur, I look at you
as an entrepreneurial artist, but I look at you
way more artistic than I me.
So, call it entrepreneur, artist,
boy there's a lot of rationale in the 2015 world
where college is not the right answer,
and I think, you know what's really been unique to me, Joe,
is I'm gonna give you a weird answer.
I acctually find that there's an enormous amount of kids,
and I'm spending a lot of time on this topic
since I was a shit student, and have made
something of myself, that a lot of kids
are still just going to college,
just making that decision on not wanting
to disappoint their parents, and that to me
is maybe the most fascinating thing goin' on
is that father of five and a two year old
living on the Upper East Side with elite private schools
where I'm paying college tuition for kindergarten already,
it's been funny to me, cause I'm really poking
and prodding the parents that are
my new contemporaries to see how much pressure,
and they have not switched yet.
The reason I keep talking about college
in a world where a lot of my friends talk about its demise
as more of a 20 year thing than a 10 year thing
is cause I still think parents of my generation
still value it too much for their own self esteem.
They want to say their kids went to Stanford,
and Harvard, and things of that nature.
So look, you've got to make your own decision,
but I'm with you, like discovering it,
and then I'd be curious, now I'm like mixing up the show,
what do you think about this based on your answer.
Because your answer is my answer,
and there's one other part that I'm trying to figure out.
I'm a big fan of practicality.
I think you and I got lucky that not only
were we able to figure out our passion,
but we actually had some level of talent within it.
There's a lot of people, a lot of the people
that go and try out for American Idol,
or the wannabe NBA players.
What's your point of view on Joe
figuring out his passion is to paint,
but he sucks shit at it?
- Well, you know, I think that
anyone's life, your world always shrinks
and expands in proportion to your willingness
to take risk, or try new things.
And that's why I think that like an academic environment
is a great place for trying new things
and experimenting with new things.
So, if your passion is painting,
and you're a terrible painter,
then maybe being in an environment like college
will open your eyes to something like graphic design
which doesn't involve a paint brush,
but you can make a great living at it,
and you're realizing an artistic passion
that is certainly inline with painting.
- Do you think that then one needs
to be challenged to make sure they go
into the funnel of college to recognize
they're not there to check those boxes?
Because the way you play the game
actually has as much to do with the game, right.
If you hack college in the way that you're talking about it,
you know, now you're starting to think about,
you know, course selection, you're talking about
the kind of group of friends that you're spending time with.
- Yeah, but I think college is,
can be a total waste of time and money
if not approached carefully, and I think a lot of kids today
go there for a lot of the wrong reasons
like what you're suggesting, and certainly if there
are better, other opportunities
that feel better to you than college,
I think now today, those opportunities are...
- Way more practical.
- Are as practical as an academic education.
I can tell you that a big falsehood
is that by going to college, you will get something else.
You will find success.
And one thing that's becoming more and more true,
especially as technology is opening up
all new means of transmission of information,
is that if there were a defined path to success,
especially in any sort of creative endeavor,
everyone would just follow that defined path.
There is no defined path.
And college can be a great way
to help you find one of those paths,
but it is certainly not the only way,
and it's certainly not a guarantee
that you'll find that trajectory.
- Yep, let's move on.
- [Voiceover] Andrzej asks, "How do you keep aim
"on your goals, and separate yourself from
"the demands of the external world?"
- Andrzej, I'll take this one first.
You know, I don't know what to tell you
other than it's unbelievable for me
how much the external world has not factored
into my decision making, I've talked about,
if you've been watching this show long enough
that first F on a test in fourth grade
and literally making that transition
to I'm gonna fight the market,
and I've been fighting the market my whole life.
I think for me, it was the level of self esteem
that my mom instilled in me, plus some level
of my own DNA, I think that's the friction at hand.
Heck, a lot of the themes of our last question were on this,
right, like what does the market want you to do,
whether that's your parents or society,
versus what you want to do.
For me, it has a lot to do with intestinal fortitude.
A Gorilla Monsoon WWF reference.
You know, I think it's surrounding yourself with people
that give you permission to take that risk.
That to me is the most practical version
of what I'm giving you,
other than you've got to be born with it.
It's finding those like minded people
who are taking those similar risks,
and give you, through their own actions,
a little more umph, or if you're amazingly lucky
to have that parental, or mentor infrastructure above you
that created that context.
Case.
- I think focus is everything.
I think that you can do 10 things poorly,
or one thing well, and saying, "No,"
is something that I only learned late in my career.
- I still suck at it.
I still suck at it right now.
- Saying, "No," is so hard, but the truth is
like we're surrounded by leeches,
blood suckers, and vampires, and those are people
that want to take, take, take, and they don't give back,
and learning to say, "No," to those people,
learning to say, "No," to all those distractions
is the only way to get anywhere.
Cause time is finite, life is short.
Quickly you find things in life that are really incredible,
like family, things that you love,
things that you're passionate about
that might distract you in a positive way
from your career focus.
So, you have to learn to shed everything else.
- I'm gonna throw a little bit of a curve ball.
I get so much happiness out of doing things for people
who would be, you know, categorized
as the way you just broke it down
because I have a weird gear inside of me
that has zero expectation for the return
on someone's selfishness.
I know that's a little bit of a mouthful,
but it's just, it's probably why
I'm so ridiculously happy.
I have such little expectation for the return,
it makes me happy to do the give,
I sit in front of you knowing I will accomplish
less in my career, and amass less wealth,
and a lot of other things, less time with my family,
which is my number one because I get so much happiness
out of some of those actions.
So, I would tell you if you're in a rare group like myself,
make sure you recognize, in a world where people
will tell you that you're a sucker for doing it,
or things of that nature, you still got
to make yourself happy, but I will tell you,
I'm way happier than I was five years ago
because I have grown in my no meter moving a ton.
It hasn't gone to zero, and I think a lot of people
close themselves out of serendipity
by saying no too much, right, and I think we've probably
both benefited through our years of the yes
when it didn't make sense on paper.
But I'm with you man, I mean I made a video
a long time ago that, The Yes Virus.
It's like the sickness of just saying, "Yes," all the time,
and it's a tough one.
- Yeah, I mean, I've made movies,
I made a movie that's Just Say Yes,
like I believe in saying, "Yes,"
I believe in embracing risk, and embracing chance,
and all the things that...
- Do you think you need to say, "No,"
more as you get older?
- I just think it's a learning curve,
a very steep learning curve to understand
when no is appropriate and when yes is appropriate,
and until you learn that, you default to yes.
- It's a really, really, or no,
my dad defaults to no.
I think you and I, like we have some similarities
that makes, like I think there's a lot of people there
that default to no, I think there's
a lot of people that default.
My dad's opening words are, "Hey dad."
"No."
Like I can't, "I was gonna say how was your day?"
You know, like no is not a proper.
Like, I know a lot of people that default into no.
I think we happen to be surrounded
by a lot of people that default into yes.
- Yeah, lucky us.
- But I think, you know it'll be interesting,
you know what actually,
quick little side question of the day,
give me are you a default yes or no person?
I'm just curious for my own kind of like polling.
India, move it along.
- [Voiceover] CJ asks, "How has having a family
"changed your long term view of work?
"And what does retirement mean to you?"
- CJ asked a good question.
I'll let you go, cause I know you're
a new father of a second.
- Yeah, so what does family have to do with work?
I think family is the ultimate cheat,
and what I mean by that is I had a kid
when I was 16, I've always had a family
since I was an adult,
my entire adult life I've had a family,
and it gives you a reason to do all this work,
and that downtrodden feeling you can have,
which is like, "Why am I doing this?
"Why am working another night til three in the morning?"
When you have family, for me, it gives me my purpose,
my reason for doing everything I do is my family.
Part two retirement, retirement's my biggest fear.
Retirement is what people do when they wait to die.
My grandmother was a tap dancer,
and she had a tap dance school,
and she taught tap everyday of her life,
and she taught tap on a Friday,
and she died on a Monday when she was 92.
That's my fantasy.
I want to work until the last minute,
I want to be working in my hospital bed as I'm dying.
So, that's how I feel about retirement.
- I'll start with retirement, I'm you know,
in the complete same camp.
You know, that is my nightmare.
I want to die on Monday, on the Monday that I'm working.
I didn't need those two days in between.
You know, I'm with you I think, you know look,
I will say this, there's one weird
retirement fantasy I have,
which is to be an old man sitting
at the racetrack, having some nickname
like one eyed Gary, and like betting on the ponies.
I do like the notion of the ponies as an old man,
so there's a little bit of that.
You know, the family, work life balance whole thing
I think is completely counter punching.
Meaning, I hate giving an answer to this
because I think it really is predicated on your partner,
and then the evolution of your kids.
My partner part I really kind of took care of.
I mean, I was looking for Lizzie,
when I found her, I locked her up,
married her immediately, we were married
within the year of meeting.
I told her on our first date that we were getting married.
I knew that she was independent enough
and could, I intuitively felt that she could
handle the insanity that is me.
It's crazy, I feel like we're still dating.
Because you know I travel so much,
and like I'm busy, but like it's just over communication.
When I see a little strain, I'll cancel a trip,
I won't say yes, you know, I try to hack,
the kids are a whole new variable.
You know, now that Misha's five and a half,
I've got to get ready for:
They may not be like Lizzie.
You know, my little Xander might want me
at every single thing at every moment.
So, I'm starting to get mentally prepared
to counter punch their reality.
Kids are always going to want their parents around,
but what's the hack, right.
Like, do I, like it's funny, I've been traveling,
and where I speak now, I spoke in Anaheim
and I noticed that Disneyland was right next door,
so I'm like, "Maybe I'll do these speaking engagements
"cause I'll take the kids, let them see what dad does,
"and then a full day of..."
So, it's interesting how my brain
is starting to adjust to:
What's their reality gonna be like?
So, my answer to your question
is counter punching, what I mean by that
is gross over communicating.
Having those conversations with your spouse
or with your partner, having those conversations
maybe even at an early age with your children.
- [Voiceover] Shay asks, "Think back to a time
"when you pissed someone off.
"How badly did you piss them off,
"and what did you do to make up for it?"
- This is a really interesting question.
- I work so hard not to piss people off.
- Oh man, me too.
I'm like suffocated by pissing someone off.
I'll take this, pissing someone off.
So look, I mean the only time I'm truly ever affected,
ever, by pissing someone off is when I piss myself off.
So, it's a little bit of a wrinkle, meaning
I am so aggressive to try not to piss off anyone,
that the second I taste in the water that I did
I start hedging like a hog.
You know, like I start like really,
did you get that Sonic Hedgehog, good alright,
you got it (mumbles).
I'm in full apology mode immediately.
The only time I even am comfortable
pissing people off is on stage
when I'm challenging the audience
to the quid pro quo, so I'm,
on a one to one basis, I'm crippled
by hurting someone's feelings, and the second
that I sense it, I start backtracking.
So, the way I answer, the way I fix it
is by immediately taking the gas off the pedal,
cause I don't like that feeling.
I think there's other ways to manipulate my point.
That's the truth, I truly think that I can
drive home my point through honey, not vinegar.
- Yeah, I agree, I mean there's no worse feeling
than upsetting someone else.
And that said, because I have a very specific image
in my mind when I think of pissing someone off.
But I can tell you that living life
where you pander to other people
to make sure you never have enemies
or never have anyone dislike you
is a very dangerous game to play,
and I've always said with my work
that I'd rather, if 100 people see
a movie I make, I would rather have
50 people love and 50 people hate it
than have 100 people go, "Eh."
So, it's a fine line in that idea of pissing someone off
can mean so many different things.
The last time somebody walked away from me angry
I honestly can't remember, but the last time
I read the YouTube comments on any one of my videos
and they were 100% positive,
well there was never that last time,
cause I don't think that's ever happened.
- Yeah, I mean, that just made me think of Linkedin.
Boy, does the conservative business world hate
where I'm coming from.
You know, it's funny, I'm sure a lot of people
are watching right now and saying,
"What?"
My living is being in the minority
on my points of view, on the current state
of marketing and all that stuff,
but I'm with you, like on a one to one basis, never.
As little as possible, to the masses, no problem.
And I think that's an interesting insight.
- Yeah, I think so, cause as a human being
the ambition is to never piss someone else off,
or to leave someone else upset,
but as far as a belief system. - For sure.
- The belief system has to be uniquely yours,
even if that's a divisive...
- I will also say I'm in the sport sense,
like in competition, I'm very interested
in pissing people off.
I'm, you know, it matters to me a lot,
like nothing excites me more than if I know
somebody's upset because I did something positive
for my team versus theirs.
It's extremely interesting to me to piss people off
during the heat of battle because I want to get
them emotional and off their game.
- Yeah.
- Yeah, alright, let's move on.
- [Voiceover] Hamms asks, "If you could have
"a bionic body part, which body part would it be,
"and what powers would it have?"
- The truth is I do have a bionic body part.
My right leg from the knee to the hip,
and then the hip all the way in
is made out of titanium.
- I didn't know that.
- Yeah, most people don't.
And the super power that it gives me
I think I can make this, but when I was in the hospital,
my leg broken in like, literally, 27 places,
and they were hammering it back together
made out of metal, the doctor said to me,
"You know, you'll never run again.
"You'll be able to like catch up with a taxi cab,
"but you will never run again."
And I was 26 years old, and that is a tough thing
for a 26 year old to hear, especially someone
as physical as I am.
So, the superpower that it gave me
was prior to that,
prior to getting my bionic limb,
I wasn't much of an athlete or a runner,
but since getting my metal leg,
I've run 22 marathons, and four IRONMAN Triathlons,
and countless other races, and I'm a much fitter,
faster person since getting my bionic leg.
So it has, I do have a bionic limb,
and I do have a superpower.
- I also have a bionic limb that no,
no I don't, I really wanted one though, I'm pissed.
- I was excited to hear what limb,
what you were gonna go with.
- You know what, I would go with ears.
I'm not joking, I'm very intrigued
by the notion of like, I love picking up senses right,
and for some reason, so one of the things
that I think I do extremely well is I,
that I really enjoy being able to do,
and I'd love to do more of, which is why
I'm going with ears, is I am often
at a dinner table, or at a conference,
having a conversation fully in it,
and capable of listening to the two or three
other side conversations, as a matter of fact,
often when I talk to a small group
of 40 or 50 people, I will use side whispering
of what I just said to incorporate into my talk,
and then look at the person, and they're always freaked out,
because I was so focusing going here,
but I heard them, and so I think people
don't listen enough. That's a big thesis of mine.
It's my overall social media thesis,
and so I'm gonna go with ears.
- I'm just picturing Gary with gigantic, titanium
- It's like metal ears.
- ears that turn and respond to people.
- Case, one of the things we do on this show,
I didn't tell you, but I'm sure you're busy doing your thing
is we get to ask a question of the day
of the VaynerNation, I know you're not prepped,
and so that makes it even more fun for me,
but I'm just trying to talk a little longer
to give you a couple seconds.
- I appreciate it.
- You get to ask them any question you like.
We're gonna end this show with you asking
the VaynerNation, VaynerNation please,
our first ever guest, so get in.
Lurkers, this is a good time to come out.
Please ask your question of the day.
- Sure, I have like a two part question,
if it's already been asked, forgive me,
but it's something I'm always curious about,
but what is your greatest fear and why?
Is that too generic? That's a good question right?
- No, thats good. I've never asked that.
- Yeah, great. - And so we're excited.
Thank you my friend. - This was great.
- This was a lot of fun. - I hope I get invited back.
- We'll see, I don't know what the rule is on two...
- Write in the comments, "Invite Casey back."
- That's a good point.
- I'll be back on 144 right.
- Yeah, I could, I like the doubling up.
What about 720?
I don't think we're gonna go that long.
I'm leaving that for them to say,
"Please do it that long."
That's me like fishing for compliments.
You keep asking questions,
we'll keep answering them.
I'm such a perv.
- The question was.
- I went to such a dark place.
Go ahead Case.
- If you have a bionic body part.
The truth is I do have a binoic body part.
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