Gary Vaynerchuk on Creating VeeFriends to Find the Middle EP 481
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Yes, I do think we need to talk to kids about emotions, but I actually think the place we need to go with them is to make them more accountable, is to let them lose a little bit more. I think we've over coddled a generation of individuals. And I think that the emotional intelligence we need to talk to kids about, believe it or not, is less about kindness and compassion. And it's more about tenacity, accountability.

competitiveness. Welcome to Passion Struck. Hi, I'm your host, John R. Miles. And on the show, we decipher the secrets, tips, and guidance of the world's most inspiring people and turn their wisdom into practical advice for you and those around you. Our mission is to help you unlock the

power of intentionality so that you can become the best version of yourself. If you're new to the show, I offer advice and answer listener questions on Fridays. We have long form interviews the rest of the week with guests ranging from astronauts to authors, CEOs, creators, innovators, scientists, military leaders, visionaries and athletes. Now let's go out there and become

PassionStruck. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to episode 481 of PassionStruck, consistently ranked one of the top five most inspirational podcasts worldwide. A heartfelt thank you to each and every one of you who return to the show every week, eager to listen, learn, and discover.

new ways to live better, to be better, and to make a meaningful impact in the world. If you're new to the show, thank you so much for being here. Or you simply want to introduce us to a friend or a family member, and we so appreciate it when you do that. We have episode starter packs, which are collections of our fans' favorite episodes that we organize into playlists that give any new listener a great way to get acclimated to

everything we do here on the show. Either go to Spotify or passionstruck.com slash starter packs to get started. I am thrilled to announce that my new book Passionstruck was selected as a winner of the 2024 Reader's Choice Contest by Connections eMagazine. It also won the Best Nonfiction Book at the International Book Awards, the Eric Hoffer Book Awards, the Best Business Minds Book Awards, and won a gold medal at the Nonfiction Book Awards. It was also a must read for the next Big Idea Club. You can purchase it on Amazon,

or go to passionstruck.com to learn more about it. In case you missed my interviews from last week, they featured Finian Kelly and Dr. Mary Murphy. Finian is a speaker and executive coach who reveals the transformative power of intentionality, a feelings-first approach to living in leadership.

In our episode, you will learn how prioritizing feelings over outcomes can help you reconnect with yourself, reclaim your power, and unlock infinite possibilities in both your personal and professional life. Mary is a Stanford-trained psychologist, CEO of the Equity Accelerator, and a distinguished protege of Carol Dweck. In our interview, Mary shared groundbreaking insights on how to identify your triggers, how to challenge your genius worship, embrace failures, and cultivate purposeful effort

to promote the growth of neural brain cells. Please check them both out. And I also wanted to say thank you for your ratings and reviews. And if you love today's episode or either of those others, we would so appreciate you giving it a five-star review and sharing it with your friends and families. I know we and our guests love to see comments from our listeners, and it helps so many people join, find out, and learn about our community. In today's episode of Passion Struck,

I am absolutely thrilled to have an extraordinary guest I have wanted to have on the show for years who needs little introduction. Joining us is Gary Vaynerchuk, also known as Gary Vee, a serial entrepreneur, chairman of VaynerX, CEO of VeeFriends, and a six-time New York Times bestselling author. Gary is a leading global mind on the future of culture, relevance,

and the internet, known for his uncanny ability to identify trends and patterns early, helping others understand the impact of these shifts on consumer behavior. His approach uniquely blends business and culture, consistently bringing brand relevance to the forefront. In today's episode, we're diving into Gary's exciting role

is the CEO of VeeFriends, a contemporary entertainment company with a unique character universe that's designed to foster stronger connections and emotional intelligence. We'll also explore his first children's book, Meet Me in the Middle, which sets to release today when the episode airs. This all-original picture book featuring beloved VeeFriends characters Patient Pig and Eager Eagle aims to teach young readers about empathy,

problem solving, and compromise through its innovative two-in-one flipbook format. VFriends, founded in 2021 by Gary, introduces the world to over 250 characters through collectibles, comics, events, games, and technology. The mission is to scale these characters and their qualities to create a happy world.

Thank you for choosing PassionStruck and choosing me to be your host and guide on your journey to living an intentional life. Now, let that journey begin.

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Terms apply. Learn how to get more out of your experiences at AmericanExpress.com slash with Amex. I am incredibly honored and humbled to have Gary Vaynerchuk on Passion Struck today. Welcome, Gary. Thanks for having me, Jim. Gary, today we're going to be discussing a couple new things in your universe. One is a brand new book, which I have right here, Meet Me in the Middle, which is a flip book, so I'll show both sides of it, which premieres the day this episode goes live.

And we're also going to be talking about VeeFriends. And before we get into them, though, I always like to start with an origin question. And something that I talk about a lot on the show is the importance of values. I wanted to understand, because my parents were really influential in shaping mine, how did your parents shape yours?

Oh, I mean, in an exceptionally deep way. I was born in the former Soviet Union. So we had a very immigrant story. I came to the U.S. when I was three and we grew up very poor. I lived in a studio apartment with multiple family members. And so we lived very humbly and in Queens. And I have a all world mother. She instilled very good attributes into me, very much of what Be Friends is about.

has a lot to do with her parenting style. And I would argue that keeping your word and work ethic and being competitive comes from my father, being kind and empathetic and selfless and compassionate and really just a good human being and a leader comes from my mom. Hard work ethic and accountability comes from both of them.

So I would say besides growing up in New Jersey, my parents, both from a DNA standpoint and being very parented, is the foundation of my life. Yes. And I know with VFriends, part of the origin of this is that you're trying to teach the next generation of kids who are coming up values and other things like that. Can you give the origin story?

Yeah, I think there was a concept I had back in 2017 called workplace warriors. I wanted to make these little toys and put them on people's tables to remind them that patience and kindness and empathy mattered in the workplace. And even if your boss is being a jerk, maybe she or he is dealing with something at home that you don't know about. Or there's these different things I really believe in. Compassion, curiosity, competitiveness, accountability, empathy.

And so it's been hovering for a while that I wanted to do something for all the people that were emailing me and DMing me that they were struggling at work or they didn't like their job. It felt like a real issue in the world that I wanted to attack. And that kind of dragged along as a project. I didn't get around to it because I was busy and then COVID hit. During COVID, digital collectibles became a big thing and I wanted to get involved and I resurfaced this concept of Workplace Warriors, this time rebranded as VFriends.

And I started drawing these characters and making them alliterations and alert ape and gratitude gorilla and the heart trooper and all these different kind of passionate parrot and gracious grizzly and dialed in dog and perfect Persian cat and

all these different characters I drew out and I launched them as digital collectibles. And now they come in stuffed animal trading card. I mean, I think a lot of people listening here, if they went to eBay right now on their laptop or phone and typed in VE friends, they'd be shocked on how much of the Pokemon aspect of this IP is growing very collectible. And now the Sesame street part is a big focus of mine. And what I mean by that is really teaching parents and kids

of all ages, that positivity and kindness and warmth and good attribute has not been a lost art. Even in this complicated world we live in with technology and politics and all the things that I'm sure everyone who's listening thinks about, staying true to

historically wonderful principles of humanity is a great way, but also a contemporary way. I think, for example, a big reason I made competition a big part of this universe is I do think modern parenting demonized competition a little bit and focused on eighth place trophies too much and

I would say veered too far to one side. And so finding the middle has been a big part of this. And so I'm excited about growing these characters. And so the kids book comes out today, Meet Me in the Middle. You can find that anywhere, but predominantly probably on Amazon for people listening. And then this fall, we have a bunch of cartoons coming out with Candle Media, Moonbug, the people who made Cocomelon.

And I'm excited about these cartoons hitting YouTube kids and that putting out content in book form and audio form and video form and cartoon form and podcast form. This is the next chapter to expand this intellectual property. And I'm excited about building this for the rest of my life, similar to a Marvel or a Pokemon or a Disney or Sesame Street. And I'm looking forward to it.

Thanks for sharing that background. And a couple of things jumped out for me while you were talking. The first was, I'm not sure if you know who Dacher Keltner is. He's a professor at UC Berkeley, but he wrote this great book on awe, A-W-E. And what he discovered is that we typically think of awe

when we see things like the Grand Canyon or a masterpiece or the birth of our children, etc. But he said that we find it the most in our lives when we see others perform acts of kindness onto another or we ourselves perform acts of kindness. And I think this whole area of kindness is underrated and you've highlighted it now two or three times. Why is this such a focus area for you?

I think this concept of awe that you're describing intuitively comes natural to me. I think this goes back to the earlier question of parenting. I think I've always been a sweet person. I always viewed kindness as a strength. As a matter of fact, I remember...

having a visceral reaction the first time it settled on me why this saying nice guys finish last was so accepted felt so wrong to me. I've been able to navigate my life. I'm 48 years old turned 49 in November where I've been in the competitive field of business my whole life where sharp elbows and stepping on other people and is commonplace and I've watched myself and others that I admire

have successful careers and be kind people, be menches, be wonderful. And I think it's a misunderstanding. I think the answer to your question is it's just come so natural to me. In fact, I struggle in the reverse.

Some things that I've had to worry, work on, excuse me, I'm worried about is not running away from negativity or being comfortable in those situations because I have a visceral reaction to darkness and negativity and anger. And just, I cherish warmth and kindness. And now when I'm hearing awe and

And I put pressure on the people around me, my father, my grandmother, may she rest in peace, and many others around me that I feel look for negativity, deploy negativity, comes from a place of fear. I really struggle with fear. I think fear has been weaponized at scale in our society. It's in me. It's in my soul to be a champion for the alternative.

Well, let's discuss this alternative path a little bit because you mentioned VeeFriends being the next iteration of a company like Disney. And when I think of Disney's core mission statement, it is to create the happiest place on earth through the different mediums that they use. If you had a tagline for VeeFriends similar to that, what would it be? To help the world find the middle. I think the thing that I'm really struggling with is humans and parenting

have become incredibly left to right, blue or red. And I think all the magic is in the middle. I think all the magic is purple. And I think having the capacity to having different thoughts and pulling from opposite directions is healthy. And so I'm trying to help the world find the middle because I think balance leads to peace of mind and eliminates anxiety. And I think I wish more content on the world.

Yeah, I love that answer. When I get asked the question, who are your favorite guests on Passionstruck? Obviously, I love having people like you. But what I try to aim to do is to have everyday heroes on the show or people that I look at as everyday heroes, because I think we live in a society where we're trying to emulate people that are almost impossible to emulate or show a false projection of themselves that the world sees instead of these true, authentic,

people who are doing amazing things in the world, even if they're only touching one or two people, but they're making a huge difference. And to me, I saw a lot of parallels between what you're trying to do with VFriends and

and trying to make people emulate the everyday hero aspect of the characters that you're trying to bring to life. Is that a good way to think about it? It's an incredible articulation, John. And I would argue that as my internet fame started to grow as an entrepreneur, my beat drum of kindness and accountability and compassion, sympathy and...

Being the bigger person and the capacity to see other people's opinions, even if it's at your own expense, it grew and it continues to grow. I could tell that 15 to 25 year old men wanted to emulate me because of my professional business entrepreneur success.

And it became more important for me to show them about my emotional intelligence and humanity and management style. That really is a big part of where Gary Vee is. That being said, I'm also very self-aware, meaning I curse a lot on stage and in my videos. I'm a Jersey boy, so I'm hyper. I'm competitive. There's definitely an edge to my communication style. It's aggressive.

And I knew that meant that I wasn't going to be everyone's cup of tea. And I also knew that getting people when they were 16, 17, and 18 into thinking about some of these things that I was looking to champion, similar to what you just talked about, might be even too late or later than I would like. And so the youth space became more and more attractive. A, I knew that patient panda and accountable aunt

and competitive clown kind could do and compassionate catfish might be able to reach certain people in a way that I couldn't because they were more lovable and softer, calmer potentially. And that I was going to get to people a little bit younger. This kid's book is going to teach the balance of being patience is great, but overly patient to be indecisive and non-action oriented. And eagerness is amazing, but not if it's sloppy.

And so I think you nailed it on the head. And not only do I see it that way, I also became passionate about reaching as many people as possible, which has really became the seed of why VFriends exists.

I completely get it because as I was going down my own strategy for creating PassionStruck, I could either go down the path of reaching one individual, which there's only so many people I could touch, or I could try to start reaching people at scale to really show them that their lives matter and that you were put here for a reason if you exploit

the unique gifts that you've been given. So I completely hear where you're coming from. Yeah, I think for both you and I, and this probably resonates with thousands that are listening right now, you can't even help it. You just feel, when I hear people want to serve, whether they're religious leader or a politician with good intent or...

even ones that just want to be apparent to three people. You can't even really articulate it. Like I always use this analogy, John, this might make sense to you. I feel like I'm a bug that's just going directly into that light that's going to zap me, but I can't help it. Like I'm too attracted to the light. Even though I even might know that I'm about to get zapped, I can't stop it. I don't know how to live without communicating positivity. I think negativity is very good at being loud.

And I feel a sense of responsibility and a deep yearning to go towards the light of being an aggressively loud and scaled communicator of positivity. Practical positivity. I'm not delusional. I don't know if this one resonates with you, John. A lot of people say, Gary, I'm just keeping it real. I'm like, yeah, you're keeping it real negative. Cynicism, I think, is lazy and dangerous. And I choose practical optimism.

Practically. I'm not delusional out here. I don't think you could just wish for a rainbow and it shows up. You've got to work. That's where work ethic, hardworking wombat is probably one of my favorite V friends. I think hard work matters. I think accountable aunt, I've mentioned him now four times in this interview, he might be my favorite character. I actually think, John, for the majority of the people that are listening right now that are not

as happy as they wish they were, they would be shocked how happiness is a road paved with accountability. Employers are on the lookout for defined skills, and a University of Phoenix business degree is built on them, giving you the skills to stand out. Plus, eligible transfer credits could cover up to 75% of your bachelor's. Get started at phoenix.edu.

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I love that. And I think what people don't realize, and you were talking about self-sabotage earlier and getting in our own ways, is one of my favorite phrases that I heard is this concept of we become our own visionary arsonist. We arson the very things in our lives.

that we want to attain because we do these things that get in our way. It's the same thing that happens in work when projects go wrong. We do the same thing in our personal lives. And a lot of it goes down the rabbit hole that you're talking about of being unaccountable or being constantly negative and not seeing the positives that we have in life because we tend to gravitate towards the negative things.

I was walking out of a supermarket this weekend. I was very busy because it was 4th of July weekend in a busy little town. And this woman was saying to herself, as I was walking out, she was walking in and she goes, this is just terrible. And she delivered it with like real passion because it was chaotic. And I was just like, man, I don't know why it struck me. And there's no judgment. I'm sure she wasn't delivering it as the worst thing in her life. But it's funny you say that. I really do believe in life. You find what you're looking for. And

By the way, this is a very bougie high net worth town on a 4th of July weekend. She's living a blessed life that she can go in and to the supermarket and pay three times the price for a common good that others can.

And yet she chooses to be upset about how busy it is. And again, I don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill, but it is interesting that it struck me and I took note and it just goes to this point. I genuinely believe humans find what they're looking for. If you're looking for positivity, social media is filled with it. My feed is filled with it. And if you're looking for negativity, and I'm sure this will resonate with everyone because this is how most people see it, well, social media and mainstream media is 100% allocated on negativity.

And so, yeah, we report murders and burglaries and it's pretty sad that we live in a world that doesn't report kind gestures and charitable donations and good warmth. Yeah, people might actually tune into the news instead of so many of us being disengaged by... I think to the news' credit, they sell negativity because people tune into it. It's rubberneck. We do tune in, unfortunately.

But I do believe that there, whether it was Oprah during her prime, I can tell you right now, I'm pretty sure most of my, half my audience tunes into me because it's a burst of optimism. I mean, there's a lot of business advice going on with my channel. So I have to be aware of that part of it. But yeah, I think people would tune in to positivity, but we definitely tune into negativity. And that is something I'd like to come back to.

So speaking of your business world, I wanted to ask you a question in that realm and then jump back into VFriends because it deals with emotional intelligence. As you're aware,

I had one of your right-hand people on the show a while back, Claude Silver, and I was really intrigued because myself being a Fortune 50 senior executive, I always thought that at the core of the disengagement that we're seeing around so many companies is really that we don't treat the employees as individuals. We treat them in the microcosm of the job that we see them doing, not what they've done in the past, not the life that they have outside of

work, not their long-term aspirations. And so it really intrigued me. And that's the reason I wanted to interview Claude. She was the first person I'd ever heard called a chief art officer. How did that role in emotional intelligence come together?

I needed to scale how I was operating as a CEO. Claude is an extension of how I built all my companies. It was very HR driven, but I'm the CEO. I have a lot of duties and I got lucky. Claude worked on the client partnership side of the agency. She was an account person, but I just saw the light inside of her, that humanity, who she is. And it really became obvious to me that there was a bigger purpose and a bigger role, but I knew that it wasn't HR.

I learned enough about corporate and knew that marketing and positioning and communications mattered. And I just knew that I couldn't make her the head of HR. I came up with a different title. And I thought that we needed a separate role that was a partner and the boss of HR that came from a humanity lens.

not a financial PMLN. And it worked because gentlemen like yourself being captivated by that title, what does that mean? It makes people think. And I think that's an important thing to do. Curiosity, thinking, processing. The world moves in positive and negative directions based on people processing and looking at things from different angles and then communicating it at scale. I wanted to leave my mark on the business world and

I thought there'd be a lot of ways I could do that. And I feel like the chief heart officer role, which now I've seen pop up in other places, is going to be a little footnote in my career that I'm extremely proud of. And it's really more importantly, forget about the external validation or the fun of looking back at your career, feeling good about your deposit externally, internally. For our 2000 plus employees, it's been remarkable because they understand that there's a different energy to that human being versus others.

what they would accustomly look at from ahead of HR, which I came to learn, which you learned at your, the Dells and the Lowe's. Like I didn't know that HR was viewed by employees as a negative. When I was growing up in my dad's liquor store, I thought HR was there for the employees. That was the good division. So yeah, I needed to make my point. And I felt one of the ways I could do that was with a different title and it's been very effective.

Gary, my experience is I've really found that there are two different types of HR professionals, and I hate to boil it down to this, but it's been the track record that I've seen. They're those who are really tuned in to the company, to the employees, and have a vested interest in trying to do what's best. And then I see another set.

that are really just following textbooks and using this guidance that has no emotional feel for what is actually going on in the organization. And when I meet someone who's in that latter group, it was always a complete

disconnect between what we were trying to do in the organization and the guidance that they were trying to give compared to the other person who was just trying to make the culture the best that possibly could be. Thank you, brother. I think what really struck me was like, oh my God, HR is just a weapon of the CFO. That broke my heart, John, when I had that aha in my late thirties, when I started getting bigger and my company felt more corporate than anything I've been involved in before.

That's it brother. I'm with you on that. I never saw HR as like the KGB for the CFO. I had no idea. That was a cold shower when I had that epiphany, that aha. That was something I was not in awe of. It was the reverse. That was a gut punch of like, oh man. So for me, HR is the weapon of me, the CEO, who is willing to leave a lot of profit on the table year in and year out

to have a culture that feel better. I completely agree with you. And I hate when HR gets weaponized, but it's one of the easiest things to do if you want to cut your EBITDA. So I understand why it happens. It is. I understand too. And look, I'll be honest with you. Let me share with everybody here on the other side of the pillow. My issue has not been a negative workplace. My issue has been overcorrect. This is back to why I care about the middle.

I've had to also realize that one of the issues in the companies that I've run is I create entitlement because we don't hold people accountable enough to the work sometimes. We go a little bit too...

fantasy land and businesses, unlike corporations, unlike universities, unlike parenting, unlike government. Like if you don't make payroll, I was on a board meeting the other day and someone said, nobody's going to care about our HR and our DE&I if we're out of business. And it was well said. She was making a very valid point.

And I definitely had to adjust towards the middle a little bit because there was a little bit of a fantasy land that I was creating, which led to entitlement and delusion. And what that really did was it really hurt the A and B players that were putting in the efforts and the works because we were letting D and F players get by and

That creates resentment and unhappiness for the people that are lugging that quote unquote, not as good weight around. I would say to people that are really passionate about the good, the one unfortunate thing about business is it's based on merit much more than other things. It's the best thing, but it's also not as fun if you want to live in a little bit of a Nirvana fantasy world. And when I think that chapter in my forties really helped me reconcile, I think has a lot to do with this meet me in the middle.

I love patience. I'm obsessed with it, John. But a lot of people hide behind... Actually, I'm curious if this... I'm sorry to go on a tangent. Everybody's listening, but I'm jamming now here. Perfectionism always fascinated me. I feel like people weaponize the word perfect. I'm a perfectionist. No, you're not. You're insecure. And you're using a fancy title.

of perfectionism to not do, to not put out into the world, to not be judged or based on merit. So these are the things I think about when trying to figure out the middle. I want to talk a little bit about patience because I remember when I first started listening to you maybe eight, nine years ago, it's been a long time. At first, you weren't really using the word patient.

And then something switched maybe five or six years ago, and all of a sudden you were doubling down on it. What caused the change? I talked about it earlier. Once I realized that I was getting quote unquote famous, I was like, wait a minute. I need to really show all these kids the good stuff. I'm showing everyone the tack. So John, if you've been following for nine years, there was two things that I focused on, especially given...

post the 2009, 2008 financial crisis. One was work ethic was a viable energy that could help you if you were in a pickle. And two was tactics like social media, do this, do that. And I realized a lot of people weren't doing it. And as I dug deeper and spoke to many more people and read a lot more emails, I realized it was emotional energy.

It was insecurity. This was a game of self-esteem versus insecurity. This was accountability versus blame. This was patience versus fear.

was easy for me because I wasn't worried about judgment of the outside. It was hard for others because they wanted to get rich quickly to be able to flex in front of others to get outside validation. So it was a reaction to sense of responsibility and understanding of the ingredients that were missing in my message that actually allowed me to achieve not only the financial success, but the success of peace of mind. And so it

captivated me and it really encouraged me and I got excited about and invigorated about communicating soft skills and emotional intelligence as much as I was talking about tactical marketing and business intelligence.

I want to jump on this point and I'll just tell a little bit of a short story of me. It's a moment here. When I was at Lowe's, Lord knows why they did this, but they brought in Korn Ferry to analyze our executive team so that Korn Ferry could do executive searches and redo our org charts. All that aside, they brought in this team who were psychologists. And I remember I had been picked as one of these people in the high achiever must promote type of section.

So I go into my final meeting with the person who's the lead evaluator. And she said, John, you've had this brilliant career, but in the words of Marshall Goldsmith, what got you here isn't going to get you to where you need to go. I have to tell you, Gary, I was like totally ticked off at her because I'm like, what the hell are you talking about? But what she was really talking about was the more senior I was getting, the more emotional intelligence was going to be a superpower that I needed to grow into that I didn't have.

And I look back at my life and when I think about the Naval Academy and my time in the service, I was taught a lot of things about leadership, but I wasn't really groomed in emotional intelligence. I think that there is a growing gap, especially for kids right now with learning emotional intelligence. Yes, but I think you'll agree with me on this, John.

We talk more about emotions with kids than we ever had before. I would argue that much of what was a challenge to me through the first 40 years of my life is the current challenge with children, which is it's crazy. I was raised in a way to be incredibly accountable. I almost went too far in the other direction and I had to find the middle. I think we talk to children more about emotions than ever.

But we've lost our way. And obviously there's a million different parents out there, billions of different parents out there. So everyone does it different. I don't like generalizing, but...

Yes, I do think we need to talk to kids about emotions, but I actually think the place we need to go with them is to make them more accountable, is to let them lose a little bit more. I think we've over coddled a generation of individuals. And I think that the emotional intelligence we need to talk to kids about, believe it or not, is less about kindness and compassion. And it's more about tenacity, accountability,

competitiveness. I think we've actually gone weirdly in reverse of where corporations need to do a better job of talking about compassion and caring and things of that nature. I think youth needs a little bit more tough love. We've gone away from grounding. We're a million years away from spanking. Youth sports parents are trying to manipulate outcomes

We're just overprotecting. We've created bubble babies. And I think the emotional intelligence we need to talk to kids about is thick skinned, self-esteem, tenacity. And I think that comes through really letting them live life versus cracking them on their phone. I mean, it's unbelievable what we've done with children. And we need to look at

I wholeheartedly agree with you there. I mean, you and I, the way we grew up is so far different than the unfortunate way our kids are being forced to grow up. We had so much more freedom to make so much more. And it's on us as adults. And we have to. And it's about conversations like, John, why are we giving kids eighth place trophies? There's no rationale. They came in eighth place. It's OK. Like, I think a lot of stuff creating celebratory for effort is lovely. Like effort matters.

but to manipulate it as an outcome of success has really confused people. And it leads to so much of what everyone's struggling with. People want to blame social media for a million things, but in reality, that's just a mirror of our actual society. Social media is an empty vessel. Humans fill all the content that goes into social.

We've really got to have this conversation in a real way. And what I'm sad about is that people think it's or. I think that people think you've got to be competitive or hardworking or it's winner takes all. It's not. It's not an or thing. You can have merit and kindness sit at the same dinner table.

And speaking of the dinner table, how do you hope VeeFriends will impact families and the way parents and children interact going forward? Well, John, you're going to like this. The cartoons, because I've been very involved in those right now, which will come out in the fall. Every episode has a moment where I'm really poking at the parent more than the kid. It's a little disguised to the kid in the comedy and the entertainment, but...

My hope is that when a parent reads this new book, which comes out today, that while they're reading it, they have a little bit of an aha themselves, either for their own life or in how they think about having conversations with kids. I'm just trying to contribute. Now, I think it's very dangerous to tell an individual person how to parent their kids because there's so many things you don't know. But I think there's room to have overall macro conversations. And that's a contribution I want people to have.

Gary, I have actually written a children's book. It hasn't been published because my team keeps on telling me the timing isn't right. But it was so much harder to write than I ever expected it to be. What was your thoughts when you wrote this book? Was it harder for you to do than you expected? I don't want to fib. I wouldn't say harder, John. I would say that I feel like I've been thinking about this stuff every day for 50 years.

that that explode. I'll tell you what was hard. I really wanted the story to be about optimistic otter and cynical cat, two characters can be friends. And Harper Collins, my publisher said that for the five to eight year old demo that the book is written for, that the concept of cynicism was too complicated. And so it was a little heartbroken that I couldn't go with the first two meet me in the middle characters I wanted. But once I settled into being content and excited about patience versus eagerness,

as a meet me in the middle framework. The story flew pretty easily. I was very fortunate. And maybe this is what your challenge was. I already have this world so envisioned in my mind. We have these three friends who need each other to help each other, to help kids and parents around the world find the middle. And they do it through

that competition can create the change, that the challenge of competition, pure merit. So as you can imagine, because I had that all very thought out,

Once I had Patient Pig and Eager Eagle figured out, it wasn't hard for me to think about basketball as being the framework of where they played. And then it just flew. Once you have the setting and the concept, I think I was fortunate that I've put in a lot of time and effort to thinking about the framework and the pillars of this universe. And then to your credit, I may say all this and as

As I start doing the next one, the story might not flow as easy. And I've been there. I mean, I've been writing a book called Perfectly Parented in my head, which is how I write my books, probably for seven years now. I know what it's like when it doesn't flow. But this one's long. Well, that's great. And the technique that you use to develop this is really unique. It's a two-in-one flip book. So here's Patient Pig, and then I'll flip it over, and then you have...

Eager Eagle. Can you discuss the thought process behind that innovative design? Manny Galana, creative director that has worked with me in the past, was with us for a while, worked for me at VaynerMedia. I don't recall if it was his wife or someone in his world had mentioned this concept when he was talking about what I was trying to accomplish. And the second he showed it to me, I was like, yes, this is it. And so

The publisher is on board. It's a format that has been infrequently used over the last 15, 20 years, but fits perfectly for what I'm trying to say, which is find balance, find the middle, and let your friends and your circles help you. And you can help them round out or find the middle on their shortcomings.

We all have strengths, we all have weaknesses and together as a community, whether a family, whether an office, whether a neighborhood with a cul-de-sac, we can lean on each other to extract the strengths and the balance. And yeah, the story being told from two opposite directions and finding the middle, I think parents are gonna have a lot of fun. We've been able to send out the book to some people

The kids seem to love it, especially when a parent reads one side one night, the other side another night, and the third night for both sides. So I'm excited about it. I'm really curious to see how it lands.

Well, I thought it was really interesting. My kids are now 20 and 26, but I was trying to go back myself and think about all the books that I've read to them and how this one, because it has the two different perspectives, it really does make it unique. In fact, you could have one parent read one section, the other do the other and then have them swap. That's cool. Yeah. I hadn't thought about that. That's really neat. Thank you. I will definitely put that into the

From the education standpoint, how do you see educators using the book? Do you see it being the same way as parents? Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great question. I mean, obviously, I've thought a lot about first kindergarten, first grade preschoolers reading it in classroom environments. Yeah, I think so. I think

A teacher has the advantage of not being the actual parent of that child, which in some instances, especially as people get older, gives them the latitude to actually land a message that maybe a parent otherwise couldn't. So I think a different voice. I've thought a lot about grandparents reading this and it really landing. And I think teachers fall into that territory of someone that has care for a child, but that isn't their child. And sometimes that's the voice needed in a certain circumstance.

Gary, I just had two questions outside of the book for you. This whole podcast is really focused on the concept of the importance of being intentional in the way we live our lives. Because I think so many people today live their life almost like they're a pinball and they just bounce off of things instead of learning how to play the game, instead of letting it play them. What's a great life lesson that you could give to listeners about the importance of living intentionally? The fear of regret.

That's a life lesson. Boy, can I give you all a tangible thing to do. Go donate a couple hours of your time to a senior citizen home, retirement home. Donate your time. Literally Google right now retirement home near me and drive up to it and be like, hey, I'm Johnny, I'm Susan. I'd like to donate some hours. Is that something that's possible here? Many don't. Find one. And when you do that, you're going to be amongst people who've lived full lives.

people in their 80s and 90s. And I think if you're in the right environment, if you get a little time to be able to speak with some of those individuals, you will find out what I know to be true, which is regret is the great poison of humanity and that you must mitigate it at all costs. And one of the ways to mitigate, if you fear regret the way I do, you will become intentional immediately. It will reshape the way you think about things, your relationship, your career,

And it really will get you into a place where you'll say things like, for me, if I didn't do WeFriends, I would have regretted it. I've always would have wondered what if. And eliminating what if from your vocabulary is incredibly powerful and achievable. And so donating time to a retirement home to be a proxy to recalibrate your relationship with regret, I think will make you the most intentional.

I've got a great segue to that. There's this study that Tom Gilovich did, who's a professor at Cornell, and he's been studying regret for decades. And he did this survey where he looked at people who were in their third trimester of life, the people that you're describing, and he asked them, what was the biggest regret?

in their life. 76% of them gave the same answer. And what was interesting to me is it wasn't the mistakes that they had made. It was the what-ifs, the should-haves they didn't pursue, which goes directly to what you're saying. To me, I'd rather die on my own sword than someone else's. This is why I brought up eighth place trophies nine times. We must teach children that losing is... John, this is a very big conversation. It's a great thing to have done. Losing is good.

Once you realize losing is good, when you just said that, I'm like, yeah, the reason I'm always doing things is if it's a complete and utter failure, I am so happy that I went for it, that it grumped the fact that I lost a lot of money, time, reputation. It could be literally anything. All of that is better than me not doing it and always wondering why.

Yeah. I mean, it really ties into Bronnie Ware's work on the top five regrets of the dying, where that's the number one regret out of all the palliative care she did. But I was going to say the other one that I have found, and I'm no researcher or scientist, but it comes intuitive to me. What's been really fun to listen to 78-year-olds, especially some of the ladies. I've spoken to a lot of people in their 80s and 90s that are strangers to me before the conversation I have with them. The amount of

individuals that wish they married someone else is really fascinating. I don't know if that came up in either of the things you just talked about, but besides not being what they wish they were professionally or as a father or mother to their children, which comes up a lot, which has really shook me straight because I am a workaholic and I'm passionate about my career, but I fear answering the questions the way so many have answered to me, which is I wish I spent more time with my kids. The other big one was I wish I married Johnny Thompson.

Or I wish I married Susan Smith. Over the weekend, I happened to catch this video on Instagram where they had this women's retreat for people who were deeply disappointed in their spouse. And these people were hitting trees and screaming and getting out all this angst, funny. It's one of the biggest decisions for everyone who's listening, give them a little extra credit here. It's one of the great decisions of your life, right? Who you decide to spend your life with. And I think we demonize divorce and other things. And I think there's

There's a lot of truth to it, but on the flip side, fighting for love and happiness is really what a human should be doing. I encourage everyone who's listening right now as a final moment of this podcast, do not allow the judgment of your parents or your spouse or even your children and definitely not your siblings or closest friends and definitely not strangers. There's people who don't do things because they're worried about someone saying something on a social media post.

Please don't live your life for anybody but yourself. Be compassionate. Don't be selfish. Be thoughtful. But mitigating regret is a great way to end this episode. And on that note, Gary, it has been such an honor to have you. Thank you so much for joining us and congratulations on your brand new book.

Thanks, John. Thanks for having me. What an incredible honor that was to interview Gary Vaynerchuk, an interview that I've wanted to do for so long. And I wanted to thank the folks at HarperCollins and Gary for coming and joining us on today's show. It was such an honor to have him. Links to all things Gary will be in the show notes at passionstruck.com. Please use our website links if you purchase any of the books from the guests that we feature here on the show. And additionally, if you're interested in books that I recommend, you can go to the Passion Struck website under Passion Struck Podcast, where I have read and

and recommend over 200 different books. Videos are on YouTube at both our main channel at John R. Miles and our Clips channel at Passion Struck Clips. Please go subscribe and join over a quarter million other subscribers. Advertiser deals and discount codes are in one convenient place at passionstruck.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.

You can find me on all the social platforms at John R. Miles, where I post daily. And you can also find me on LinkedIn. Are you curious to find out where you stand on your journey to becoming passion struck? Then head over to passionstruck.com and take our new passion struck quiz, where you can find out if you're an imitator or a vanquisher in the grand scheme of life. It consists of 20 questions and will take about 10 minutes of your time. Head to passionstruck.com and take the quiz today. If you want to know how I book amazing guests like Gary Vaynerchuk on my podcast, you can

It's because of my network. Go out there and build your network today before you need it. Most of the guests that you hear on the show actually subscribe to the podcast and contribute ideas for topics and guests. Come join us. You will be in smart company. You're about to hear a preview of the PassionStruck podcast that I did with Dr. Chidi Parikh.

a leading integrative medicine physician and the founder of Integrative Health and Wellbeing at Weill Cornell Medicine, New York Presbyterian Hospital. Dr. Parikh shares her insights from her latest groundbreaking book, Intentional Health, Detoxify, Nourish, and Rejuvenate Your Body into Balance with a foreword from Deepak Chopra. Discover how Dr. Parikh's global experiences and her frontline battle with COVID-19 inspired her to create a comprehensive roadmap

that balances ancient wisdom with cutting edge science. The mind is the source of all dis-ease and also the source of healing. So that's why anytime we talk about health and wellness, we have to start the conversation of what our thoughts are doing because they're determining our destiny. Everything takes root in our thought, our intentions. So that's why we have to be so mindful of that.

And for my patients, a lot of times we get focused on outwards things that need to be fixed in the body. So we're saying, I'm going to change my diet. I'm going to take this supplement, this medication. So we're trying to bring in outside things to fix what's wrong here until

And to be honest, John, from years of medical training and by seeing thousands of patients, one thing that I've learned, our body is incredibly intelligent. Everything we need to live a long, healthy life is right in here. The problem is we just get in the way.

The fee for this show is that you share it with family or friends when you find something useful or interesting. If you know someone who could use Gary V's inspiration, then definitely share today's episode with them. The greatest compliment that you can give us is to share the show with those that you love and care about. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so that you can live what you listen. Until next time, go out there and become passion-struck.

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