← The GaryVee Audio Experience
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- [00:00]
Gary Vaynerchuk
Hey everybody, you're about to listen to a talk I gave to a bunch of teenagers in Queens, right new town. Hope you enjoy. This is a fun keynote. Especially good to turn up loud if you got some kids in the back seats right now or if you want to send to a 15, 16 year old, especially one that's maybe in a, you know, environment that is a little bit more challenging financially and literally what's going on around their house and the hood. And so yeah, I was really proud of this. I was really looking forward to doing it and I hope, I hope you get some value out of it in any age that you are. Also, if you're listening to this early in the morning, I'm on 9 to 11am live right now on T with Gary Vee. See you there. Bye. When I thought about what I wanted to talk about this morning, probably the biggest thing I thought about is how do I get these kids to realize that success that is being pushed on them, what success is, is incredibly twisted. I know that so many people view success from a money place, from a fame place, from a follower's place. All the shit that's being put into your head from the outside world is confusing. And I say that because the only mark of success as you get older is just sheer happiness, simplicity, Joy. When you're 17, when you're 15, when you're sitting in this room listening to me talk, you don't believe that shit as much. I get that. Even when you're 20 and 25 and 30 every day I get thousands of DMs that talk about not believing that money isn't the unlock to happiness. 40, 50, 60 year olds are confused and twisted on how to win life. For the kids in here that are overstressed about some fucking test this week, let me promise you, and this may not go over super well and I apologize, but I need this for the kids. Bad grades is not going to end your life. How you do at school academically is not an indicator to your joy when you get older. Of course, learning how to be disciplined and doing shit that matters, right? But we worry about stuff that ends up not mattering, especially at this age. Of course, for many of you in this room, getting, getting good grades is your way out, is your way to build. And if it comes natural to you, that's remarkable. But I had the luxury of chopping it up with your principal and when he told me about his passion of converting the school to a CT school and just the way he sees the world, I just really really feel happy in my heart right now that so many of you are going to be affected by that, Especially the freshman in the room that. That are gonna eventually get impacted by this. But for everybody in this room, please understand a couple things. Life is very different than school, very different than school. Again, I don't want kids to. I don't wanna leave here and all of a sudden B students become F students, and they blame me for that shit. I'm not trying to get that heat. But what I do want is for everybody here to understand what you need to extract out of school to prep you for real life, extracting out of school. Things like being comfortable with being uncomfortable. Like, I'm aware that not everybody wants to go to this class or that class. It's Monday morning. I'm aware that for a lot of people, last night was a tough night because you didn't want to come in the next day. You live for Friday. Real talk. That was me when I sat where you're sitting right now. I hated school. I was a bad student. But what I learned in school really mattered to what makes me happy today. One of the biggest issues in the world, not just for kids, but for the grownups in the back, is that we've lost our way with dealing with adversity. The world has lost its way with dealing with adversity. We've become soft. We've become incapable of dealing with things that don't come easy. One of the great things to learn during your four years here is getting through the things that are not as easy. If one kid in this room leaves this talk excited about eating shit, meaning literally being comfortable with getting through stuff that doesn't come easy. My mission will be accomplished here. Life has challenges. It gets complicated. I'm sure it's not lost on a crew like this. There's a lot of high schools that I could visit where the kids have not faced anywhere close to the level adversity that this room has. That is ultimately, for most of you, your strength. Me growing up in a family that had little and me having to work when I was in high school, after school every weekend, every summer vacation. That became the foundation of my happiness. In a world where I'm sure a lot of you can look at others and see how they have it easier or how they have it better. I'm excited for y'all to get older eventually and recognize how this chapter was the foundation, how this was the moment. Couple things I want to talk to you guys about before we go into Q and A. One thing that I get a lot of questions from this crew, call it 14 to 18, every day, probably the DM, I get the most of it, says Gary Vee. How do I make money? So I'm going to tap that a little bit here on a practical kick. And this is fun to talk to y'all, because what I'm about to talk about, I talk to companies and executives and big companies all the time, and they're confused by it. None of you are going to be confused by what I'm about to talk about, because you live in this world. You live this world. So couple things. Number one, I'm sure most of you have noticed that on TikTok, they've been pushing a lot more live shopping. How many of you are familiar with on TikTok? Tuning in? When you go through your. For your page, you see somebody doing like a QVC thing, selling shit on TikTok, raise your hand. I'm just trying to get a sense. Raise it high. I want to get a sense. All right, good. The middle really fucks with it. What's the matter with y'all? You don't see it? So for all of you, one of the biggest opportunities right now is TikTok shop. Literally. Literally. Going to the dollar store or grabbing stuff that's laying around in your house. Going live on TikTok and selling is stunning. To see what's going on with this right now. For many of you, another move would be, you got 20 bucks, you go to TJ Maxx, you buy three things for 20 bucks, you go on TikTok shop, you sell those things for 50 bucks, you take that 50 bucks, you do it again and again and again and again for the next year or two. Anybody that goes live on TikTok, in a TikTok shop, even if you have no followers, will start to reach people on TikTok. And that is a big arbitrage. That's a huge opportunity. And for this crew, obviously, some people are going to feel scared to go on camera or things of that nature. But anybody who is about that life, I could not recommend this more to you. It's a huge opportunity. And what you're gonna learn on it, what you're gonna learn on it, is really gonna impact you, really gonna impact you. Couple other things, content on social media. So the other thing that's going on on social media right now, from a business standpoint, is you don't have to have any followers. Any followers to have a post go viral. So the social media that I grew up on when you were little, little kids, you had to amass followers for anyone to see your stuff. I think that comes very natural to all of you. You understand that what's happened in the last 12 months is the game is completely flipped. Now, even if you have no followers in here, your first post can get 10,000 views if it's good. I was just talking to principal, I was talking to my team. This book right here that I just wrote, Day Trading Attention just came out and really breaks it down. I just decided in the back room that I'm going to send hundreds of books here of this book so some of you can grab that shit. Don't clap. No clapping on that because if you don't read it, nothing's going to happen. You can clap after you read it or you use it because another thing I'd love to talk to you about that I'm obsessed with and again isn't just a 15, 16, 17 year old thing, it's a 20, 30 year old thing. It's a 40, 50 year old thing. For the back is we talk too much. People always talk about what you're gonna do. I need you to look at the people you're sitting with. Your homies always talking about what they're gonna do and not doing it. We need to shut our fucking mouths. Uh huh. And we need to start doing instead of talking. I promise you nothing you want in your head right now, nothing you're hoping and dreaming to do for you and your family will ever happen if you just talk about it. People talk about things and think they're doing it. We talk too much. So I appreciate the clapping. I know it came from a good place. But what would make me much happier is when I send them here and they're free and however the school's gonna do it, that you actually read it. But actually reading it is also not the game. Actually posting. You know this. Teachers, parents, the media, they're all demonizing social media to y'all. And you know, you sit there and you watch it aimlessly all day, I get it. But guess what? Your parents, the teachers, we did the same shit. We just did it on television and magazines. The world's always the same. What's not the same is how you're gonna actually attack it. You can use social media just to waste your day or you could use it as the biggest weapon in the world. If I had social media when I was your age, I promise you one thing. My mom and I laugh about this all the time. I would have never graduated high school not because I was bad or that was good or bad, but because if I had social media, I just would have built business after business after business, and I just wouldn't have been able to get there. I was doing it without the Internet and social media in the analog world, so I would have definitely done it. My friends, kids, this is crazy. You understand the computer you have in your pocket, the phone, is a more powerful computer than Ronald Reagan had in the White House when he was the President of the United States. The world's changed, and you live in a time and era where everyone's trying to tell you what's wrong and what's not good. And meanwhile, you've never had more opportunity in your life. If you harness this stuff for good, for you, it will change your life. And so please do not buy into the negative and choose optimism, no matter how deep the adversity is. I promise you, you're capable and I get it. Listen, I'm sitting here giving the talk, and I'm literally thinking about kids sitting in the audience right now listening to me, and they're like, whatever. Can't. No, I don't see it. Maybe for you, bro, but not for me. All the that shit. And what really motivates me to be here this morning is with the desperate hope that just one of you in this audience hears me. Just one. I can't get all of you to believe what I'm saying. I just know the math of how this shit works. But if I can get one person in here to understand that everything you hear that tells you that you can't is fake. If one person realizes they can, whether they decide to go down TikTok shop, whether they decide to just post content about whatever you're interested in, no matter how chill or whatever you are in this room, all of you give a shit about something. Something. And if you make content about that on social media that's free, that can be the gateway to a whole new world for you. You will learn, you will build community. It will be real. But you just can't talk about it. You got to start being about it. I mean that honestly. I want to go into Q and.
- [13:57]
Student
A. Gary starts off this Q and A by answering a question from a student who asks, what's your advice to someone who believes they suck and can't do it?
- [14:06]
Gary Vaynerchuk
I think it's fake. I don't know what else to tell you. Like, I promise you, people have had it way worse than you. I got one. I am on the board of A nonprofit called Charity Water. What we do for a living is we build wells in Africa and parts of Asia so that people can get clean water. As we sit in this auditorium this morning, there are 800 million people on Earth, almost 10% of Earth, 800 million people on earth that can't drink a glass of clean water within 24 hours because the water's that far away from them. What do I do to give someone advice here that's at wit's end and think they can? For them to realize how good they have it, for you to realize how good you have it. The world has so much adversity, and I think that people have to choose optimism versus negativity no matter how. Somebody in this room has the most fucked up situation. Somebody. Somebody in this room. If we asked 50 people to analyze everybody's life in here, somebody has it worse with their parents, their financial situation could be something. Alcoholic parent. It could have been fucked up. Somebody has it worse. But for that person in this room, there's billions of people that have it worse. You live in America, and to me, that should make people happy, not sad, and make you realize you can. How many people have a phone? Raise your hand. Real talk. How many people have a phone? Every one of those people can. The whole fucking world's in here. That's it.
- [16:04]
Student
The next student asked, what can schools do to support kids with these new opportunities?
- [16:10]
Gary Vaynerchuk
What can schools do? They can stop being ideological and political and like, thinking about yesterday and they could start focusing on tomorrow. When I hear that we're going to teach kids practical skills that they can live their life, that excites me. Listen, for a couple kids in here that are deeply into science and are going to work for SpaceX, like knowing what's going on with Saturn and Mars right now matters for 99% of us in this room. It does not. And so I think schools need to do a better job to be practical, because being practical actually is putting the kids in this room into a position to make something happen. And so I'm very motivated and very inspired by what this school is trying to do. For example, all these schools are now demonizing ChatGPT, right? They should be teaching prompt engineering in class. What do you want these kids to do? You don't want them to write their papers in ChatGPT. I get it. The problem is ChatGPT is real. I gave this same talk 20 years ago about search engines. They didn't want kids to use search engines. I did this shit about calculators. Remember when they didn't want kids to fucking use calculators. What do you want? You want these kids to memorize shit that doesn't matter for a week for a test and then forget it for the rest of their lives? We need more fucking practicality. That's what we need.
- [17:34]
Student
What advice would you give to someone who wants to start a business right out of high school?
- [17:39]
Gary Vaynerchuk
One, work a job for someone that's already in that business because they're gonna pay you to learn, even if it's a shitty job, even if you're getting very little. If you go work for somebody for a year. That's in the general idea. Do you have your business idea? Not yet. So I think first to start a business without an idea is crazy. That's like driving with your eyes closed. So first try to figure out. But if a lot of you are trying to think about starting a business, I would highly recommend starting with something you like. So if you like sneakers, sneaker business, if you like music. Music business. If you like cooking. Cooking, like business is hard as shit. Like, don't let entrepreneurs on Instagram confuse you. It's hard. So if you're gonna do something hard, you might as well like it. If you like it, you might actually do it for 12 hours a day. If you're doing it just for the money, you will quit. So first, do something around something you like, and then consider working for somebody for a year while you're building your business at night. Because you need to learn because you're so young and you don't have experience yet. Got you, my man.
- [18:56]
Student
This next student asked, how do you combat procrastination?
- [18:59]
Gary Vaynerchuk
I got a good one for you, bro. Procrastination, just an indication that you don't like it. Procrastination, I procrastinate everything I don't like, and I go hard at everything I do. Like. This goes back to the beginning of the talk. What you're going to learn in this time in your life, at school and at home, is getting through shit that you don't like. You're not going to fix procrastination on your home. If you don't want to fucking do homework, what you need to do is just learn how to get through it. That grind like procrastination, is just an indicator to what's in your soul. I promise you're not procrastinating on stuff you like. You understand? My girl said to me the other day, she's like, you can't get up for this stuff, but you get up at 5am to play basketball, because I fucking love basketball. Procrastination is showing you the truth of what's in you. You're not going to fix procrastination. There's no fixing procrastination. What you can work on is discipline and getting into a mental place where, you know, you just have to do shit to get to the next place. And that's how you have to just address it. You got to start practicing being comfortable with not liking shit. It's a mindset thing. Gotcha.
- [20:27]
Student
What would you do if you had to start from zero?
- [20:29]
Gary Vaynerchuk
What would I do if I had to start from zero? What would be my first step? My first step would be what I just told you all before. The number one thing if I had to start at zero, that I would do is make content on social media, my friends. It's great again, it's so fun because I don't do this with high school kids that often. I do it in business environments. I know how much people are telling you social's bad. Social is the best if you know how to use it. Everything is good and bad. Everything is good and bad. So what I would do is I would make content on social media because it's free, and I would be starting at zero, and one piece of content could change my whole game. What would be a plan to start? I'm gonna send you a free book called Day Trading Attention. You're gonna read that shit and you're gonna be off to the fucking races.
- [21:22]
Student
What are your thoughts on Ivy League schools?
- [21:24]
Gary Vaynerchuk
So Ivy League school wasn't for me, but Ivy League school is one of the best brands in the world. Let there be no confusion, my friends. If you go to Harvard or Yale or Princeton, when you get out, it creates real opportunity. To me, Ivy League school is. You know how earlier I said practical, Learn H Vac, be a plumber, do stuff. I like practical. To me, bro, Ivy League schools are practical. If you can get into one of those motherfuckers, go there. Because if you go there, when you come out on the other side, the business world, the world looks at you different, and you've got leverage. The problem with college right now is the schools that are not Ivy League schools are losing leverage. It matters less than it did when we were growing up. But for Ivy League schools, if you can get there now, by the way, I need you to hear this very carefully. Other schools not named Ivy still will work for so many of you. It's just, you got to understand how it is one of the things I worry about, for example, is debt. College debt is scary to me. A lot of kids choose to go to a slightly better school and take on the debt versus going with a school slightly lower where you get a full ride. I always tell kids, take the second one because that debt is too scary to me. And I think the education is negligible in comparison to the debt. But. But bro, Ivy League schools. If anyone here can get into one of those things, go.
- [23:03]
Student
Is marketing the most important side of business?
- [23:06]
Gary Vaynerchuk
It's one of the two most important things. Let me explain. I'm really good at marketing. I've done it my whole life. I have one of the biggest marketing companies in the world. Three weeks ago we met with a company. They wanted to give us millions of dollars to do the marketing. We had a great meeting. When the meeting was over, I called the CEO and I said, bro, you need to wait a year or two before you hire us because your product sucks. The most important thing in business is marketing is only true if your product is good. If your product is ass, all that marketing does is speed up the process of all of us knowing that it's shit and then you go out of business quicker. You understand it's one of the two most important things. Product quality is number one, then getting people to know about it. Marketing is number two. So how are you going to reach the audience of your product? The way you reach audience today in my opinion is social media. It's the lowest cost way to reach people. Obviously there's a lot of ways. If you've got paper, then do a Super bowl commercial. You'll reach 120 million Americans in one day. But for the people that have smaller budgets here or starting their own little things, I could not recommend social media more. Especially organic. You don't even have to pay for ads, my man.
- [24:32]
Student
This student asks, what is your opinion on AI? Is it going to change our future?
- [24:37]
Gary Vaynerchuk
It's going to be the biggest technology that impacts every kid in this room. AI is massive. It's such a big deal. But we shouldn't treat it negatively or overly positive. It will be in the middle like everything else. My man. You know one thing right now, a lot of people are scared of AI. As you probably are aware, I was in a meeting the other day and I educated somebody by the way, back to my high school career. I don't know who the history teacher is in here, but that was the one class that I was really good at and I was always interested in it and I use it A lot in business. Now let me give you all a history lesson. Right now, everyone's scared of AI and saying how bad it is and how it's going to ruin the world. When electricity was invented, electricity, almost 80% of the people's opinion on electricity was that it had demons inside of it. And they did not bring electricity into their home. They continued to use candles because they thought it was bad. Let me give you a lesson that I want you to take with your whole life. Remember this. This will help you. Humans. Humans always pick the negative. When new shit comes up, that is where the actual opportunity is. You understand humans, and for the rest of your life, all of you, good news. You were born at the right time. Y'all are going to live to like 120. So you're going to live for a while, God willing. Remember this for the next hundred years of your life, especially if you're an entrepreneur or business person. Humans, when new big technologies come, will always look at the negative. That is where the opportunity is. I think AI is going to change the world in a significant way. You know how they talk about AI taking people's jobs away. The tractor, the farm tractor. When it was invented, 80% of the people on Earth worked on farms. It didn't put everybody out of business. It allowed humans to do bigger and more important things. AI is going to allow. There are kids in this room, my guy, who are gonna change the world because of AI because they were born at the right time, as AI was building. AI is gonna allow us to be better, to be bigger, to do more things. And I'm excited about it. But it's got a long way to go. And there's gonna be a lot of confusion along the way. But keep digging into it. There's a lot of opportunity there.
- [27:11]
Student
How do you deal with burnout?
- [27:13]
Gary Vaynerchuk
You know, it's really funny you asked me that. Besides health. Besides health, do you know what the number one thing I wished for every kid in this room right now? The ability to not give a shit about what anybody else in the room thinks of them. So the way I deal with burnout is by realizing that whatever I'm struggling with, that anybody else's opinion on it doesn't matter. I think a lot of you would be very surprised how much of your anxiety or burnout comes because it's grounded in you worrying about what other people are going to think about the thing. Whether that's your teacher, whether that's your parents, or worst of all, whether it's your classmates judgment on You. So the way I deal with burnout or when I'm struggling is to take a step back and recalibrate my perspective on the situation, right? I'll give you an example of something I really struggle with. I struggle when my company has to fire someone. To me, it's out of all the things I do for a living. The idea that I have to fire someone crushes me because I'm sad. I know that they're gonna have to deal with it, right? And sometimes that can overwhelm me when it's at scale. But I have to take a step back and realize that it's my ego talking, because the person on the other side is capable of getting another job. Maybe they're gonna get a way better job. Maybe they're gonna get paid more. And so I think just taking a moment, and I'm not worried about what people think about my firing. That's what makes it palpable for me. So the way I deal with burnout is perspective and understanding. I play a trick in my mind, it might work for you, which is I'm the only person that lives on Earth, and thus nobody else can say anything about it. And I just gotta keep moving forward. And so I keep things very simple. I think gratitude really helps me a lot. When I'm really struggling, I just think about the fact that my family is okay and that whatever I'm dealing with right now, if that was okay, but my family was sick or hurt or worst of all died, what would that mean? And then all of a sudden, the thing I'm worried about gets really small. And so I use gratitude and perspective, which is why I don't sit in burnout or negativity or anxiety very long. I'm a human. It pops up. But I have coping mechanisms to attack it, and it's based on gratitude and perspective.
- [29:47]
Student
If you had a business that failed, what would you do to keep your motivation alive?
- [29:52]
Gary Vaynerchuk
Business is sports. Business is ufc. I've had so many businesses fail, brother, my man. I've had so many businesses fail. Do you know that 90, 95% of businesses fail. So to me, it's like I'm a little bit of a sicko when it comes to this. Like, I enjoy the loss. Like, you've got to get to a place where you enjoy the losing. Like, it's okay. And again, notice what I just told her earlier. If you don't worry about what your homies think about your loss, but then all of a sudden, you're moving, right? So it's Just part of the game, brother. It's the way it is. There's no choice. There's. There's no undefeated entrepreneur, brother. And honestly, this is gonna make you happy. The more you lose early on, the more you learn the shit that fucked it up so that you don't do it. So losing now is a lot better than losing in your 40s and 50s. So look at them as battle scars that are good.
- [30:57]
Student
What is more important in business, finances and logistics or psychology and marketing?
- [31:03]
Gary Vaynerchuk
Similar to that young dude right there. When we talked about the product and the marketing, the answer is both. But if I had to answer you and you said, no, you've got to pick one. I literally think the psychology. Anybody in this room that is interested in psychology and all that stuff, I could not. I get a sense that that's where you're at. I could not push you more to go into that field. It is very valuable as technology. Back to my man talking about AI. As technology keeps getting bigger, the emotional intelligence and psychology will become more valuable. And so if that comes natural to you or you're interested in it, I would highly recommend pursuing it.
- [31:44]
Student
If you were a female interested in sports, what would you say to someone who is trying to get into sports departments, even though there aren't many spots for females?
- [31:52]
Gary Vaynerchuk
So that's a great question. So the young lady that you just handed the mic to, her, she is the single reason that we're having this happen. Her. She is the single reason. One of the things. So I have a very big marketing company called Vaynermedia. I hope some of you intern and work there one day. My biggest strength is that I have an open door policy as CEO. It's been the biggest reason. We have a big company that anybody, first day, 10 years, senior, junior, intern, can come and see me. You kids are all very blessed that you have a principal that does the same thing. I hope you understand how rare that is. She went to him and said, I want to make this happen. He said, great, go make it happen. She went and made it happen. Now I'm going to say the same thing to you. You don't control how many teams this school has that's bigger than you. But that doesn't stop you from emailing every sports organization in New York City, including the big ones like the Brooklyn Nets or another high school's team. If you want it, you can go and grab it. Kids, I need you to listen to this one because this is right here, the whole fucking thing about life. She asked such a great Question. She's like, look, here's all I can do. She can choose and say, oh, shit, I got unlucky. There's not enough sports teams here, and I can't get it. And she could give up and decide to come up with an excuse of why she can't, or. And I believe she will, or she can hear me and understand. Everything is in your control, My friends, you want a good life. You want to be happy. Forget about Ivy League schools, Forget about being an entrepreneur. Forget about everything. If you want to be happy, actually happy, let me promise you one thing. The second you realize in your beautiful heads that you are in control of everything, regardless of what you look like, where you came from, and what's going on in the world, the second you actually believe that shit is the second your whole life changes. And so what do I say to you? Go out and get it. If they don't have it, you can find someone who does. That's an email away in 2024. When I was a kid, we didn't have this shit. You have nothing but technology to get you to anywhere you want. And your tenacity, your push, your lack of complaining and excuses will get you everything you want in your life.
- [34:35]
Student
Should we spend our youth on hustle mindset to be happy?
- [34:38]
Gary Vaynerchuk
Sam, first of all, it's a remarkable question. Thank you. Number two, I think it depends on the person's circumstance. To your point, do I think hustle mindset? First of all, I think the word has been weaponized. Let me retweak it. Do I believe that hard work is an important variable? I do. But for someone here who decides to. What? I said go to TJ Maxx, sell stuff, flip if they enjoy it the way I enjoy it. So for me, I'm 49 years old, in 10 days, Sam, you would be blown away if we were homies and knew each other a long time. You'd be like, you're sick. I cannot believe how much you like going to garage sales. I like going to a garage sale and buying something and flipping it on ebay, the way most people like skiing or going to a movie or going to a concert. So do I think that will work for 12 to 28% of this audience? I do. I also think for another 50%, making that extra 100 or $200 might actually really help their financial circumstance for their family or them. To your point, the thing that is always lost in the hustle mindset conversation is some people actually enjoy the game of it. Right. So to your point, I'll give you an example. I have unlimited people that I'm aware of that work 40 hours a week who are desperately burnt out because they hate their job. To me, would I rather them work 70 hours a week on something they love? Yes, I would rather have that because I think you have to fight for joy. But to your point, which is why it was such a great question, I think for everyone here it needs to be about self awareness. If they wake up and dread going out and flipping. Well, that was not the point of that idea. And so I think you've articulated it right. And then back to spending on your youth. To your point, I think people should do whatever makes them happy. And if you're in a luxurious position where you can enjoy the youth and not have to do that, then I would take it no different than when I answered the Ivy League question. For a lot of kids, they should really not go to College. Getting up $80,000 in debt for a piece of paper that does nothing for them when they're older is a bad move. On the flip side, for many kids it is the starting point to what is remarkable. Remarkable. So what's really challenging is self awareness is a challenging game for anyone at any age. But to your point, no, I think. I don't think anything is one size fits all. But I think for a lot of people in here, it will really work. And for other people, I think they should try. I think it's worth trying. But to your point, if they feel like, oh, this is not for me, this feels icky, I hate this, then they should not do that.
- [37:22]
Student
What if the fact that other people have it worse doesn't motivate me?
- [37:26]
Gary Vaynerchuk
It's a great call out, just like Sam. I think what's so important about what I'm talking about here, and this is probably gonna be. Let's bring this up to the macro. When I think about things that I've observed or I've lived or I watched in others, to your point and to Sam's point, which is why this is becoming such. This is why I wanna do predominantly Q and A. We're getting to some real fruitful stuff here. To your point, brother, just because for me and many other people perspective of how the world is and being grateful for what you have versus being upset for what you don't have, just because that works for some of us. To your point, brother, it does not work for everyone. And so I don't view that as bottling up my emotions or what I'm upset about. I view that as perspective. I view that as quantifying the reality of the journey of life. For many people, therapy is exactly the answer for other people. Eating right and exercising is the answer for other people. Meditating is the answer for a lot of people. And this is gonna be a big one for all of you. To hear who they surround themselves with from their friends and family is a huge answer to get into a better place. To your point, there's not one way to get there. It just happened to be the one that I chose to speak about earlier.
- [38:46]
Student
This next question is asked by a student who has tried TikTok shop but it didn't work for them. They want to know what else they can try.
- [38:52]
Gary Vaynerchuk
Yeah, I mean, I think, look, like anything in life, not anything is going to work right away, right? Just like I'm sure the first time you, like, think about the things that you do well, the first time, time that you did them, you might have not done them well. Right? So just because what you sold the first couple times you did it didn't do well, doesn't mean that the next thing you won't sell as well. What TikTok will tell you, what we see is finding something unique. One of the reasons I like people selling stuff around the house is it's unique. It's not something they bought at a flea market or things of that nature. The other thing you could start and I don't know how much money you would have to do this, but over, over time, buying unique things in China and shipping it in is a real play. But the number one thing that they say works is under $30 and you can't find it on Amazon. Under $30 and not easily found on Amazon. Tend to over index on TikTok shop.
- [39:52]
Student
This person asks Gary, how did he make his first $100,000?
- [39:57]
Gary Vaynerchuk
How did I make my first hundred thousand? Nothing too clever. I just worked at a liquor store and saved money and saved money and saved money. Like I worked in a liquor store until I was 34 years old. You know, this is why I'm sure, for the people here that have consumed my content, I'm always saying, patience, patience, patience. At this age, people want to be successful. At 18, at 22, at 25, at 27, life is long. And so mine, there's no real cool way I made mine. I stocked shelves and helped people pick out wine and saved my money.
- [40:29]
Student
This person says to Gary, there's a lot of options nowadays. They want to know what Gary would suggest to do with someone who's Just graduating high school.
- [40:37]
Gary Vaynerchuk
This is a game, brother of self awareness. You know what I really, and I talked about it earlier, what I really hope is that you can tap into what you actually like, especially with options and especially being young. The biggest advantage you have over your teachers, over me, is time. In the beginning, this is when you should take the highest risk. So if you love soccer, football, something in that, if you love running marathons or rock climbing, that if you love hip hop, move to Atlanta and try to get into the hip hop world. I think what I would do with all these options is only pick things from 18 to 30 that were things that I'm genuinely interested in, because being interested in it will give you the energy to get it done. You all know this. A lot of you in this room have parents that are trying to push you towards a specific job because they think it's safe and you're going to make money, but you hate that shit. You don't want to be a doctor, you don't want to be a lawyer, you don't want to work in the family business. And 18 to 30 is when you should be taking risks around shit you want to do. That's the thing the world never tells you. The thing the world tells you at 22 is have your shit figured out. My friends, nobody has their shit figured out at 44, let alone 22. 18 to 30, take risk around shit you love. That's what I would do with your options.
- [42:09]
Student
This person asks, what did you do right after high school?
- [42:12]
Gary Vaynerchuk
I was a really bad student. I had 257 kids in my high school class, and my class rank was 243 out of 257. But my parents were Russian immigrants and they wanted me to go to college. So I tried to trick my parents and not go to college because I knew they were immigrants and didn't know how it worked. So I didn't even take my SATs. I had it all figured out. I was gonna trick them. February of my senior year, my mom rolled up on me and she's like, what are we doing about college? I'm like, mom, it's over. I was supposed to have college figured out. Sophomore and junior year, it's over. I'm not going to college. My mom smacked me in the face and said, you're going to college. Figure it out. A week later, I got a postcard in the mail from Mount Ida College in Newton, Massachusetts. It was a postcard. I filled out the postcard at the mailbox in my car. I flipped back you know how the mailbox got that flip shit for the. I literally put it back in my. In my post box and flipped it. Two weeks later, my guidance counselor in high school called me down. I hadn't seen her since freshman year because I wasn't going to go to college. She said, gary, you're going to college. And I said, Mount Ida accepted me. And she said, Mount Ida would accept this stapler. I then went to Mount Ida College in Newton, MA. For four years. I barely went to class. All I did was play spades and CeeLo and Madden. CeeLo, dice and. But this where you need to hear me, kids, because you might get twisted with my story. Instead, what I did, my man, was I read about wine every day, for 10 hours a day, about wine vino. I wanted to build the biggest wine store in America. I read about wine for 10 hours a day, five hours a day, two hours a day. And in 1996, remember what I said earlier? I want you to remember this. When new shit happens, the world will say no. But if you say yes, there's opportunity. In 1996, in 1995, I saw the Internet. The Internet. For you kids, you don't understand this, but for some of our teachers, we know. I went to high school, all of my high school, and I'd never been on the Internet. It wasn't invented yet. I saw the Internet and I thought there could be some something. And I launched the first E commerce wine business in America, one of the first five, and built a humongous company for my family. And that's how my career got built. So what did I do after high school? I went to a crappy college where I barely did any school. But I did put in work every day. Besides the fun I was having playing spades and CeeLo and Madden, and I got an education on what my future was going to be about. And that's what I focused on. Newtown.
- [45:09]
Student
Thank you.