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A
Which weight should I use? They're all the fucking same. They're 15 fucking pounds. I don't care what fucking company you use the £15. It's fucking having the discipline to go to the fucking gym and fucking. I don't give a fuck if you use mango or schmanger or fucking goalie pro or pro this or fucking weight this or Muscle Yuckin Inc. I don't give a fuck what your company's called. If it's 15 fucking pounds, it's 15 fucking pounds. It's the discipline to get the fuck up in the morning when it's raining out in New York, go to the gym and fucking lift the 15 pounds. This is the Garyvee Audio Experience.
B
How do you fight negative self talk and limiting beliefs like I'm not good enough or why should people buy stuff from me due to not feeling ready because I myself am still on the way to learning what I want to?
A
I really struggle with this because the reality is it's a self esteem versus insecurity game. And I just don't understand how people don't understand that. No one gives a shit and it's not high school. And like, I get that people have voices in their mind. My voice says I'm good and I have good intent. Other people say I'm bad. Like I get that parenting circumstance DNA. The reality is it's all fake. Me being overly confident and other people being deeply insecure is actually fake. And I think once you get to that Zen place of understanding that truth, it gets a lot better. And so I just, you know, honestly, I just, I really believe this is like the boogeyman and being scared of the dark and like, like all that stuff. And I just need people out of it.
B
I'm 18 years old and I have these amazing music making skills. But my dad wants me to go to uni first and later do my music. My inner voice says, focus on music. What should I do?
A
Focus on music. Living your life for your dad is wrong. Like, I do not understand how people understand this. Like, living your life for other people is wrong. Look, uni's good if it doesn't collect debt because it's a lot of fun. And I highly recommend people going to that world if they want to. But at the end of the day, living your life for anyone, your dad, your mom, your cousin. It's always wrong if it's not for you. It's always wrong if it's not for you.
B
How do I transition from short form to long form? Content is There any specific equipment I need to be able to do that?
A
Nope. I mean, that's, that's just, you know, go to ChatGPT and ask that question like, there's no tools. It's, it's understanding. Like, there's a million tools. You could do it by hand. You could do it in Adobe. You could do it on Opus Clip. You could do it on like there's just a million. It's, there's a million tools literally, you know, ready like that. These questions don't excite me because we have Chat GPT now, right? Like, hey, I want to go from long form to short form content. What are the best five tools out there? Absolutely. Shifting from long form to short form content can be really fun and impactful. A few cool approaches include focusing on punchy attention grabbing hooks right at the beginning. No, I mean I actually need the tools. I know the punchy hooks. I know the 3 seconds. I know the thumbnails. What are the best 4 tools to use to take long form to short form content? Opus Clip, Viddy V D Y O AI Chopcast, Pictory, AI P I C T O R Y AI friends. That's it. And they're going to change. They're going to constantly change. There's going to be unlimited tools with AI now. There's going to be unlimited tools. Tools are not the game. The discipline to use the tools are game. The weights, which weight should I use? They're all the fucking same. They're £15. I don't care what fucking company you use the £15. It's fucking having the discipline to go to the fucking gym and fucking you like this. Braden and Zach both like this answer. I don't give a fuck if you use mango or schmanger or fucking goalie pro or pro this or weight this or Muscle Yuckin Inc. I don't give a what your company's called. If it's £15, it's £15. It's the discipline to get the up in the morning when it's raining out in New York, go to the gym and lift the 15 pounds. It's not the tool, it's the mindset. It's the discipline.
B
What do you mean when you say pop culture is currency?
A
What I mean when I say pop culture is currency? I am saying that popular culture, like what people are into. Laboo Boos, Kiff Charlie xl. New restaurants, private clubs in New York. Baggy clothes instead of tight clothes seven years ago. Hats. Hats when I was in high school. Major hats for after Friends came out and everybody had that haircut. Nobody wore hats, came back. Like, what? Food, music, Netflix, what shows are people watching? Love Island. Like, what the fuck is happening? LeBron, second decision. Hennessy, like, what's happening day to day in the culture? What's happening day to day in the culture? In every culture, right? What's happening in bull riding culture, UFC culture, the UFC event at the White House. Like, every brand, every person, every entity on earth needs to know what's happening in popular culture. Do you not? Do you know what ishowspeed is doing? Do you know what ishowspeed and Kevin Gates's thing at the LSU sidelines, Do you know that happened or don't you know that happened? Do you know what's happening on the runways on fashion week, or don't you? Do you know what's happening with Penn State, you know, and Texas shitting the bed after being 1 and 2 in the top 25, don't you? Do you know that the New York jets are destroying my fucking heart or don't you? Like, what do you know that's happening in music, sports, travel? Like, do you? What do you know? Like, all of that matters to the content you make, to the products you sell. I believe comic books are about to get hot next year. That's why I make them. I believe the card collectors, the sneaker collectors, the watch collectors are going to collect more and more comics. And then Rips, you might have been in this meeting. Miraculously. This is a thing I believed for 15 months. Miraculously, yesterday we're in a meeting or the other day, I don't think rips was in this. It was Andy, me, Jim and dj, and I was like, what's going on in the world? And both Jim and dj, who are deep in comic culture, said they spoke to multiple comic book stores who said August or September was their best month in business in 20 years. Go ahead, Aaron. Next question.
B
Okay, we actually had a question in the chat asking about what you were just talking about. They wanted to know how can 40 year olds keep up with that pop culture. You were talking about work.
A
It's fucking discipline. I'm fucking 49. The fuck does this have to do with 40? I didn't say teeny bop 13 year old culture. I don't need you to know what 6, 7 is, but I prefer you know what 6, 7 is. You don't have to be fucking 15 to know what 6, 7 is. It's fucking work. Like, it's. Watch this. Do you know what chat GPT Is good.
B
Yes.
A
Hey, chatgpt, I'd like to know the 10 things that are happening in popular culture that have popped off in the last month to anyone. Like urban culture, hispanic culture, youth culture, women in the midwest culture. What's happening in popular culture that is new and exciting and a new potential trend in a year Because I want to be ahead of it. I just asked that again. It's not about the tools. Every fucking person watching this knows what chat GPT is. It's do you have the mindset, the strategy to put in the work? Here are two trends.
B
Right?
A
Soft modern goth revival. Great. Soft goth is back. Good. A cowboy western revival, reclaiming the look. AI co creator music artists. A artist recession. Pop dance pop with emotional weight. Wonderful. I'm pumped that we have emotional weight dance pop. I can't wait to dig the in, you know, like, it's just there's some post instagram fashion Runway that doesn't translate to the feed Cultural hibernation. Like fucking. It's all there, everyone. We can all be brilliant at what's going on if we put in the work. All of this is about the work. How do I get more fit? Work and discipline. How do I build a business? Work and discipline. How do I have a great relationship? Work and discipline. Work and discipline. Work and discipline. Work and discipline. Right. Con Ben, how'd you guys have your career? Work and discipline. Right. Thank you, Connor. Fuck.
B
What are the two most important traits you look for in an employee? This is from the chat as well.
A
I don't know if there's two most important. You try to like. It's hard when you, you know, I assume when you're hiring or after they are here. I mean, I think. I think buy in, you know, I think buy in is a huge part of the game. Meaning I have a vision of the things I'm building. Whether it's vee friends, Vayner sports wine library, Vayner X team Gary. I'm very empathetic that I have like a strategy. I don't think I'm right or wrong or brilliant or lost.
B
You okay?
A
Yeah. Good. I just have a vision and so what I'm really looking for is do people really buy in and understand buy in and understanding matters because no matter how talented trane will be, if I don't feel like he's bought in, he can only be so good. And that's why so many people move around in the company. Like some people go to vayner to be friends or team Gary to VaynerMedia or VaynerMedia to Team Gary. I'm agnostic if someone's bought into anything I do in any company, but it is the first requirement and then after that you're looking for, you know, I really care about someone's humanity. Like how we all interact with each other. You're looking, you know this, like with our team, we're so, you know, entrepreneurial. Like how do people deal with adversity? How do people deal with feedback? How do people deal with stress? I think mindset matters and then I start caring about skill. So it's buy in and humanity and then I care about skill. Skill is a commodity and it's about to become a huge fucking commodity. In fact, everybody who's been listening to me for 15 years about soft skills and emotional intelligence, you better get your therapy up because with AI, your fucking skills mean dick to me. It got real quiet in the office. Like, I'm serious though. I need everyone to buy in. EQ is about to eat up the oxygen of the world. Like so much of my team, editing, filming, like, okay, cool, I'm going to do that for 9 cents. But if I feel like you're about that life, there's so much else to do. There's so much else to do. Check this out. This is actually powerful humans. What are humans going to do in this AI scaled world? More human shit. We're not called processities. We're not processities. Rips, you're not a processity, you're a human. I'm going to need more human shit from you. I don't know. You're not an informationalist. Are you considered an informationalist? Risks? No, you're considered a human being. I don't need information from you. I don't need processity from you. I need humanity from you. Humanity is at the tippy top of my list, Aaron, and it's about to really fucking matter. Teamwork, self esteem versus insecurity, which always leads to less politics, all that stuff, and then self awareness. The other thing I'm obsessed with is self awareness. What are you good at? What are you not good at? What do you like? What you don't? And then that leads to communication. A flaw of mine for a long time was I had all that, but communicating when it was tough was tough for me. And I now value that more and more and more in my older age. All right, let's go to the next question.
B
Next question is from Sally. If I'm a brand manager at a Fortune 500 company, how do I make the shift to becoming a pop culture strategist, AKA a modern version of what a brand manager should be.
A
Smart. The spending time. I mean, spending an hour, two or three on research every day. This is research, friends. Researching, researching, reading, listening, watching scrolling feeds, Reddit chatgpt, podcast charts. Like consuming information as a human being. All right, let's go to the next question.
B
Next question is from Louise. How do I set goals when we have an autistic child that consumes our life, when we want to move forward?
A
That's an incredibly challenging question. I mean, look, there's many families, many that I know that have autistic children who have set goals. But first you have to calibrate your emotions. I don't know how recent this is or not. You know, there's so much to this. And so it's tough for me to sit here and tell parents how to deal with such a real adversity. I would just tell her or him, please, just give yourself some grace. Give yourself some time. Like, you don't have to set goals. I don't know when this diagnosis happens, they could be three years into this. They could be three weeks into this. Just anybody who's dealing with adversity, the loss of a loved one, a diagnosis that's scary, dealing with a challenge like autism. Just give yourself grace. We need way more grace. So many people, so many people judge themselves for how they handle adversity. And I ask people to give themselves more grace, especially people who are grieving a loss. The amount of people who think they can take, like a couple days off at work after their dad died and everything should be back to normal. Look, for some people, they can, like they put on a shelf, they'll deal with it later. Some people are just so grateful the time they had, and that's their perspective. But other people, like, it's just too tough. So I just, I ask all of you, in every aspect of life, financial mistakes. There's some people right now devastated. They bought a home because they ate up all their liquid and their cash flow is a problem and they're living to pay their mortgage and they're upset. Just give yourself grace. Life is long. Life is long. Grace. Graceful goldfish. Graceful goldfish is a very sneaky v friend reps. And I think we need to give ourselves more grace. More grace. Aaron, next one.
B
Okay, question from Johnny. Collecting has always been a thing, but how has social media changed its trajectory in the recent years?
A
Social media has changed every trajectory of everything. It's given it more awareness, more Shelf life. There weren't that many comic book. Excuse me. There weren't that many magazines, radio shows and television shows that were giving collectibles a lot of attention in the 80s, 90s, 2000s. I think collectibles has been given a lot more awareness. So has so many other things, unfortunately, including, like crazy conspiracy theories. Like, other things. Other things have been given a lot of awareness, too, and some good, some bad. But that's just life. That's the. That's the movement of the world we live in. All right, Aaron, go ahead. They'll just be watching.
B
Okay, this question is from Lori. How do you start a new business after 60 years old and challenged with technology?
A
Very easily. You start a business like 60 has nothing to do with anything. And technically challenged is the work discipline and work using. What's her name?
B
Lori.
A
Lori, download ChatGPT and ask every question that you're challenged by in technology. To ChatGPT. No worries. Another giveaway, everybody. About $100 worth of value on this signed comic, in my opinion, on ebay. So even if you don't collect, just get it in the mail and make a hundred bucks. Next question, Aaron.
B
Okay, we're a B2B SaaS for car dealerships. We're trying everything right now. When it comes to social. Should we keep doing that or dial into a theme?
A
No, I think. I think both work. I think you could be thematic for a while. You can be broad. But I think they're B2B SaaS for dealerships, Aaron.
B
Yes, dealerships. Car dealerships.
A
B2B SaaS.
B
Yeah, that's what they said.
A
Oh, this is a piece of cake. This is all about LinkedIn. Anybody who's selling SaaS products, please go to LinkedIn. Anybody who's selling SaaS products, please go to LinkedIn and treat LinkedIn the way you treat TikTok and Instagram and make content there. And then when you have some content that gets some views. Let's say you normally get eight views. I said eight, Aaron. Eight. But you get 400. Then run some ads against employees of car dealerships. You know, Babo. 323 on Twitch. Welcome from France. All right, everybody, I'm going to reset the stage again. I don't know if it's Chris or Courtney that's moving me to the screen share, but I'm going to reset the stage again. Who in here, because I know hundreds of you in here are veefriends, collectors. Who in here is looking to buy their first veefriends? Nft. But it's been too hard with all the crypto. And you want to buy your first one right now? This is the moment. You want to buy one? Please say me, because I have a way to do it. Let's go, Uribe. I know Uribe is pumped. Who's ready? Who's ready to buy their first one? Who's ready? Okay, that's a lot of you. Follow me here. We're going to rarible.com/be friends. Don't worry, Stella J. This is your chance right now. It's happening right now. Let's go. Drew, can we show rarible.com vfriends on my screen? We've got a pinned at the bottom. I need all of you to go to rarible.com vfriends. This is huge. We've taken away the friction. We've taken away the friction. Okay, there it is. Everybody, you're looking at Rarible. Back to the top. Back to the top. Chris, not on that unit. We're going back to the top. You can click rarible. Just click the rarible or it's fine too. There we go. All right, so this is rarible.com vfriends. When you land on it, it is linked on here. It's that easy. You rebate collectibles. You literally close that out. Chris, follow my lead here, brother. Close that out. All right, you land on this. Now, this is the be friends page. All four of our major collections are here. Series one, as you can see at the top, these are about $6,000. I don't think that's gonna be for everybody, but if somebody buys a series one, let me know the next one, the one that I'm going to recommend the most to all of you. Series two, you can see it right there. Series two collectors. That's about a couple under 300. Scroll down. Iconics, a very rare series that I love quite a bit. I can't see exactly what that number is, but it looks like 6, 700 bucks. How much is how much? 930. About a thousand dollars for the iconics. They're very rare. And scroll down. These are little side projects. This is probably the least important to mini drops, but I would scroll up to series two. Scroll up to series two. Click that. When you click into series two, everybody, this is how simple this is. Now you're going to scroll what's here? I can't believe that Inchworm is still there, but scroll down, Chris. Let's show a bunch. Scroll down. Let's just show A bunch of them. You can find the trusting tarantula. That's a rookie nft right there. You got the OG ox. Look at that prudent polar bear. Click into that polar bear, Chris, at 0.06. Click into that. Somebody's going to snag this one right here. Look at that. That little polar bear they're running through the field. Scroll down a little bit, Chris. Scroll down a little bit for me so I can see the price. 270 bucks. You click buy it now. This is like buying on the Internet. You click buy it now. And literally right there, if you put in your email, your email that you're going to use for your veefriends account and owning your NFTs, you put that in, you hit enter. The next screen is a checkout screen. Just like being on Amazon or winelibrary.com you can literally use Apple pay. Click, click and you are done. You now own a Veefriends NFT. All the crypto blockchain web3 stuff is down behind the scenes for you. This is complete insanity. You can finally buy your first friend. Everybody, everybody can. And then go to veefriends.com and sign in and see your vee friend Aaron, ask the next question.
B
Okay, question from Jack. When a business is creating collectible items, how do they choose a partner to develop the collectible with?
A
One more time.
B
When a business is creating collectible items, how do they choose a partner to develop the collectible with?
A
I mean, it depends on which collectible you do. Research. If you use chat GPT I want to make a comic book. What are the five companies I should work with? Friends. ChatGPT is the answer. Perplexity is the answer. Gemini is the answer. Grok is the answer. Like literally type in. Like literally type it in. Aaron, next.
B
Okay, this question has been asked a couple of times in the chat from the Don started my Christmas light install business yesterday. Waiting on a product to arrive. Any advice to help make this an awesome season of installs?
A
Literally. Literally. Facebook content, Instagram content pound meta Meta is the alpha. Facebook and Instagram at Facebook and Instagram Organic content. Content, content, content, content, content, content, content, content, content, content. Garyvee.com attention. If you want to be good at it, Adrian, put it up. We can put the rarible thing down. Garyvee.com Attention. Get rid of that little swiggy at the end. Edit that. Adrian, thank you so much. If you want to learn how to be good at it, keep it going. Let's keep it going.
B
Okay? When trying to build my own software business, how should I go about understanding pain points of my customer's business? I've tried cold emailing and surveying, but I'm wondering if there are better options.
A
Go live on platforms. Email, like just, you got to keep emailing. You got to email better questions. Just because you're cold emailing doesn't mean you're doing it well. Making content that asks people, like a video that says, what are your three pain points? And posting that on LinkedIn again. I had seven views when I did Wine Library TV, 12 views. Like, we've all seen the Mr. Beast video. That is only, you know, like Kai said that like, everyone starts at the same place. People are just not Aaron. People are just not willing to put in the work and be patient. They know the answers. Like, it's just fucking consistency and trying different tactics if you've done something for months and like, I don't know, people just not willing to put in the work. It's like Pierre, right? Good athlete. He could have put in more work to his basketball game. He brings so much of his soccer skills. He's just so athletic. But I know because I played with him, if you put in more basketball practice, he'd be even better. He's just going on pure athleticism. That's life. Like, we have natural talents. And then there's work. It's fucking work. It's fucking work. Podcast nation, big announcement. As you probably heard at this point, because I had Jon from Stan on the show. I am an investor advisor to an incredible startup called Stan. Stan Store. I'm sending you right now to GaryVee.com GaryVee.com Stan go check this out. We've done a GaryVee Stan store challenge, which actually has a weekly call with me. This is built for everyone who's been affected honestly by my overall content. The tech stack, all these features, and the minimal costs per month that Stan Store has built is really the tool that was needed for this world that I envisioned when I wrote Crush It. When I wrote Crushing It. And this overall thing I'm thinking a lot about lately, which is the individual empire, right, this creator entrepreneur slash entrepreneur creator economy that I think is gonna eat up the oxygen very honestly. The thing that so many of you want in your life and the reason so many of you are not there yet, is you've got the strategy for me. You've got the ambition within yourself, but you don't have the tools for you to fully maximize it. And I believe you can find that at Stan Store. Stan Store. But specifically, I want you to sign up for it through my challenge because I want to get access with you. And plus, there's a bunch of cool things. So if you want to go see those cool things, go to garyvee.com Stan S T A N.
Host: Gary Vaynerchuk
Date: October 29, 2025
In this high-energy Q&A episode, Gary Vaynerchuk takes live questions from the audience on business, content creation, self-discipline, trendspotting, and overcoming personal obstacles. With his characteristic candor, Gary emphasizes the importance of discipline over tools, work over wishful thinking, and embracing the realities of the fast-changing business and cultural landscape. He delivers practical, unfiltered advice and underscores key concepts: grace in adversity, the supremacy of soft skills in the AI era, and the ongoing need to stay in touch with—and work within—current pop culture.
"It's fucking having the discipline to go to the fucking gym and fucking lift the 15 pounds. The weights... they're all the fucking same." (00:00 & 02:24)
"Tools are not the game. The discipline to use the tools is the game." (03:29)
"No one gives a shit and it's not high school... The reality is it's all fake. Me being overly confident and other people being deeply insecure is actually fake." (00:42)
"Focusing your life for your dad is wrong... It's always wrong if it's not for you." (01:34)
"Every brand, every person, every entity on earth needs to know what's happening in popular culture." (04:03)
"It's fucking discipline. I'm fucking 49. The fuck does this have to do with 40? ... It's fucking work." (06:24)
"Work and discipline." (07:24)
"Humanity is at the tippy top of my list, Aaron, and it's about to really fucking matter." (10:53)
"...spending an hour, two or three on research every day. This is research, friends. Researching, reading, listening, watching scrolling feeds, Reddit, ChatGPT, podcast charts." (11:53)
"Give yourself some grace. Give yourself some time..." (12:23)
"Life is long. Grace. Graceful goldfish. Graceful goldfish is a very sneaky v friend..." (13:30)
"You start a business like 60 has nothing to do with anything. And technically challenged is the work discipline and work using ChatGPT..." (15:09)
"Research. If you use ChatGPT... 'I want to make a comic book. What are the five companies I should work with?' Friends, ChatGPT is the answer." (20:07)
"Facebook content, Instagram content. Pound Meta. Meta is the alpha... Content, content, content..." (20:41)
"People are just not willing to put in the work and be patient. They know the answers. Like, it's just fucking consistency." (21:24)
"The reality is it's all fake. Me being overly confident and other people being deeply insecure is actually fake." (00:42)
"It's not the tool, it's the mindset. It's the discipline." (03:53)
"Pop culture is currency... Every brand, every person, every entity on earth needs to know what's happening in popular culture." (04:03)
"It's fucking discipline. I'm fucking 49. The fuck does this have to do with 40?... It's fucking work." (06:24)
"Give yourself grace. Life is long. Graceful goldfish." (13:30)
"Humanity is at the tippy top of my list, Aaron, and it's about to really fucking matter." (10:53)
Unfiltered, honest, relentlessly pragmatic, and often explicit, GaryVee’s responses cut through excuse-making and overthinking, reverting again and again to discipline, action, self-honesty, and the ability to leverage evolving culture and technology without getting bogged down in tools or perceived limitations. The episode serves as an energetic call to action for entrepreneurs, creators, and anyone seeking breakthrough in business or life.