From Prison to Purpose: Peter Meyerhoff's Journey of Redemption

Summary

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The Home Service Expert Podcast

Episode: From Prison to Purpose: Peter Meyerhoff’s Journey of Redemption

Host: Tommy Mello
Guest: Peter Meyerhoff, Author of Against All Odds, Motivational Speaker & Podcaster
Date: October 6, 2025

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Overview

In this gripping episode, Tommy Mello sits down with Peter Meyerhoff, a former inmate turned bestselling author, motivational speaker, and entrepreneur. Together, they explore Meyerhoff’s early descent into crime and addiction, his hard lessons from over a decade in the Arizona prison system (including a year in solitary), and his extraordinary transformation into a leading voice for redemption and second chances. The conversation intertwines personal storytelling, raw truths about incarceration, and actionable advice on mindset, purpose, and overcoming failure—serving as a powerful message of hope for both former inmates and ambitious entrepreneurs.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Peter’s Upbringing and Descent Into Crime (00:41–08:30)

• Early Family Life: Grew up in a cul-de-sac; father was a drug addict and alcoholic; after parents separated at age 10, started struggling at home and school.
  • “I realize now that I have kids that I just blocked all the bad stuff out of my childhood.” (Peter, 02:41)
• School Drop-Out & Juvenile Trouble: Rarely attended school; began petty theft and drug use.
• Escalation of Crime: Stole a brand-new Mercedes and received only three months in jail, losing his fear of incarceration.
  • “Now, like, the fear of jail is gone for me.” (Peter, 04:20)
• Burglary & Betrayal: Involved in a high-profile burglary with friends; betrayal by close friends and brother led to harsh sentencing.

2. Harsh Justice System & Prison Experience (08:47–22:29)

• Legal Battles & Sentencing: Despite plea bargains and a recommendation for the minimum, Peter was given an aggravated 12-year sentence—the result of a notoriously tough judge. The plea deal he thought protected his family yielded a much harsher reality.
  • “I told my lawyer...you just gotta make sure I don’t get the six years. I cannot do six years. Like I cannot do. I’m claustrophobic.” (Peter, 09:59)
• Prison Shock & Survival: Entered prison as a skinny, naive 18-year-old; forced to quickly adapt by fighting and joining prison gangs.
  • “The weirdest thing about going to prison, especially when you’re a popular kid, is like, you’re a nobody, bro.” (Peter, 16:40)
• Aryan Brotherhood Involvement & Prison Politics: Peter explains the pressures and realities of gang dynamics in high-security yards; loyalty and violence were daily survival mechanisms.
  • “I only have one choice: I can either run with the Aryan Brotherhood or I can be a lame.” (Peter, 17:48)
• Solitary Confinement: Spent nearly a year in a 5'x7' cell—no reading, just pacing. Describes the psychological toll and how the physical routine saved his life.
  • “I would pace one and a half steps this way, one and a half steps this way… twelve hours a day.” (Peter, 22:00)

3. Transformation after Release: Rock Bottom & Redemption (23:07–26:17)

• Reentry Struggles: Left prison totally unprepared for normal society; initially slipped into drinking and partying, culminating in a fentanyl overdose.
• Near-Death & Faith: Overdose (receiving seven doses of Narcan); interpreted survival as a sign from God and the catalyst to seek sobriety.
  • “By the time they got me to the hospital, my heart was only beating six beats a minute. They gave me seven shots of Narcan…” (Peter, 24:21)
• Starting Over—Zero to Success: No job history or education; got a car sales job through a contact and excelled, earning $350K/year in just over a year.
  • “I just turned a drug addiction to a money addiction and got sober and just changed everything, bro.” (Peter, 26:17)

4. Building a New Life: Purpose, Family & Advocacy (26:45–32:20)

• Finding Fulfillment Beyond Money: After financial success, realized money wasn’t enough; driven to share his story and help others, not just accumulate wealth.
• Networking & Podcasting: Proactively built a network, launched his podcast, and leveraged his story to reach bigger stages.
• Family & Healing: Married a Black woman (despite prior white power tattoos); described the difficult but freeing journey of removing old prejudices and forging a new, loving family.
  • “This woman changed my life beyond belief. Changed it in ways I didn’t even know has changed.” (Peter, 29:56)
• Curriculum and Prison Reform: Developed an inmate rehabilitation curriculum, recognized as one of the most downloaded influences on prison tablets nationwide, second only to Eckhart Tolle and God Behind Bars.
  • “I get to teach to prisons all over, and prisons and states pay me to come teach inmates what to do.” (Peter, 32:10)

5. Lessons on Mindset, Purpose & Redemption (32:20–41:16)

• Mindset as the Foundation: Emphasizes routine and an expansive mindset as keys for ex-inmates and anyone seeking transformation.
  • “Routine and mindset is everything, because people...just have to get them to open up their mindset to show them what’s possible.” (Peter, 32:22)
• Advantage Through Adversity: Encourages leveraging hard experiences as assets, not handicaps.
  • “When you can use your screw-ups to help you, you have an advantage on failure over the normal society.” (Peter, 41:16)
• Never Too Late for Change: Hammers home that it’s never too late to find purpose, regardless of your past or age.

6. Philosophy, Faith & Impact (41:16–48:49)

• Faith and New Goals: Now strives to know the Bible inside and out, prioritizes internal growth and giving back over material achievements.
  • “Now, you know, it’s crazy. My number one goals...aside from like raising my family great, is like, I want to be able to just know the Bible like the back of my hand.” (Peter, 43:02)
• Impact Over Income: Tommy and Peter both agree the real measure of success is the impact left on others.
• Practical Life Balance: New routines include “no phone” days and more intentional family time.
• Advice for Business & Hiring: Hire those with battle-tested resilience over degrees; war in life often translates to business grit.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “If you believe in yourself, you can literally achieve anything. The fact that I’m sitting here today should show you that.” — Peter Meyerhoff (48:28)
• “You have to get them to open up their mindset to show them what’s possible.” — Peter Meyerhoff (32:22)
• “Prison will teach you real quick about loyalty, man, and how important it is to have someone that’s loyal to you. Like really loyal, to the core.” — Peter Meyerhoff (14:29)
• “I just wanted to die. And then I went from that moment to thinking, maybe I was saved. And this is, like, God.” — Peter Meyerhoff (24:21)
• “You embrace the failure, and you remember where you came from.” — Tommy Mello (42:03)
• “Don’t ever stop finding your true purpose. It’s never too late to restart.” — Peter Meyerhoff (41:16)
• “You could put me in the middle of mountain Afghan, and in about six months, you’re gonna be running that mountain.” — Peter Meyerhoff (34:30)
• “Life is hard. It’s hard for everybody. The only time that you’re never going to progress is when you actually give up.” — Peter Meyerhoff (48:28)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Peter’s Early Life & Crime: 00:41–08:30
• Legal System & Harsh Sentence: 08:47–12:53
• First Days in Prison & Gangs: 14:45–18:30
• Solitary Confinement Insights: 21:00–22:29
• Overdose & Spiritual Awakening: 23:07–24:21
• Career Success Post-Prison: 26:10–27:24
• Building Network/Podcast: 27:24–29:51
• Family, Redemption, and Faith: 29:51–32:20
• Mindset and Prison Reform Work: 32:20–34:30
• Hiring & Business Wisdom: 42:03–43:38
• Peter’s Closing Advice: 48:28–48:49

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Final Takeaways

Peter Meyerhoff’s journey underscores the core belief that no setback—however crushing—defines your future. His life, transformed from crime and addiction to entrepreneurship and advocacy, exemplifies resilience, personal responsibility, and the power of believing in the possibility of change. Whether you’re an ex-inmate, entrepreneur, or simply striving to overcome your own past mistakes, this episode delivers unvarnished wisdom, strategies, and hope.

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Connect with Peter: Instagram: peter_meyerhoff, petermeyerhoff.com, Podcast: "Roll Call with Chappie"

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Transcript

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I just turned a drug addiction to a money addiction and got sober and just changed everything, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

Welcome to the Home Service Expert, where each week Tommy chats with world class entrepreneurs and experts in various fields like marketing, sales, hiring and leadership to find out what's really behind their success in business. Now, your host, the home service millionaire, Tommy Mello. Before we get started, I wanted to share two important things with you. First, I want you to implement what you learned today. To do that, you'll have to take a lot of notes. But I also want you to fully concentrate on the interview. So I asked the team to take notes for you. Just text notes N O t e s to 888-526-1299. That's 888-526-1299. And you'll receive a link to download the notes from today's episode. Also, if you haven't got your copy of my newest book, Elevate, please go check it out. I'll share with you how I attracted and developed a winning team that helped me build a $200 million company in 22 states. Just go to elevate and win.com podcast to get your copy. Now let's go back into the interview. All right, guys, welcome back to the Home Service Expert. Today's going to be awesome. I got my boy Peter Meyerhoff here. He wrote the book Against All Odds. He's an expert in motivational speaking, podcasting and resilience. He's based out of LA Here the podcaster is called Rock Roll Call with Chappie and he's, like I said, the author of Against All Odds. He's got an incredible story and we're going to be going over it. At 15 years old, Peter became involved in a life crime and drugs. At 18 years old, he was sentenced to 12 years in prison and ultimately spent nearly a year in solitary confinement. But since his release, Peter turned his life around. He's become a best selling author, motivational speaker, podcaster and entrepreneur. He currently runs a sober clothing line and has also created a PR curriculum app that helps inmates transform their futures. Peter's story is about resilience, redemption, and refusing to make excuses. Today, he's not just an advocate for change, he's living proof. Proof of what's possible when you can turn pain into purpose. Hey, it's a pleasure to have you my brother.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Appreciate that. The only mix up is I'm based out of Arizona, not la.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, you're. You are in Arizona.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

People think that because I do so much stuff out in la. And I'm always like, I'm going out there next week. I'm out there every month.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah. Cause you're at Queen Creek, right?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yep, Queen Creek. Just built a house out there last month with my beautiful black wife. And that's crazy. From an ex. Dude that used to run yards for the Aryan Brotherhood.

[Tommy Mello]

Wow. We got a lot to talk about, man. Tell us. Tell us, you know, about your story, where you're at today, where you're looking forward to going.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. If you want to get in the backstory of, like, how I got there, you know, I was a. I said I had a good as a kid, but I just. I realize now that I have kids that I just like, blocked all the bad stuff out of my childhood. So I don't have too many memories. But, like, my parents, I lived in a cul de sac, so it was cool. Till they were 10 years. Until I was about 10. My dad was a drug addict, alcoholic. My mom left him when we were 10. And that's when the trouble started. I went to go live with a single mother who was a flight attendant. So four or five nights a week, I was home alone. And, you know, when you're in middle school, if. If your mom's not there to wake up, make you go to school. Are you gonna go to school? No, usually not. You know, so I usually would have attendance about one or two days a week at school and started going down the bad path. So anyways, I go to prison at 12 years old. Want to know how I went to prison at 12? I mean, 18 years old for 12 years. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

So that's what I want to know.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I end up. So what, did you drop out your freshman year? Oh, so you're like, I never made it to a Semester High School.

[Tommy Mello]

15.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. Never made it to a semester of high school. I got probably two or three months.

[Tommy Mello]

So you got four years of your life just chilling, doing drugs, off doing.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Drugs and off, like, getting arrested. And the thing is, I would always get arrested for stupid. Dumb, though. When you're a kid, you could do anything. Like, literally, like, there's been multiple times, like, they were. The cops were on there telling my mom, like, come pick your kid up. She's like, I'm not picking him up. He needs to go to jail. And, like, we can't. He's a juvenile, man. You know, that's what they tell my mom. So I still kind of have that mindset. I steal a Mercedes Benz from the Mercedes Benz, a dealership right here. Brand New, like, still had plastic on the seats. This is back when Garner 60 seconds came out. So they were like, yeah, they're like those, they're unstable. They have the red laser cut keys. And I'm just like, that's all we did. We guard all night. And like, I've. I've been the first to believe. I was not no big time dude on the streets. I was a little petty thief. Like, literally, that's all I did. We'd go around and it's embarrassing and saying the I did now, you know, like, we go on just stealing all night long, you know, like with bolt cutters and stuff. So that's what I did. I stole Mercedes Benz there. I. I get arrested. LoJack had just came out. Didn't know nothing about LoJack, you know. So I get surrounded two hours later, and I get three months jail and probation. Now, right? Even then I'm like thinking, damn, I just robbed a Mercedes. I only got three months jail, you know what I'm saying? Like, and now, like, the fear of jail is gone for me. You know what I'm saying? Cause I always had that fear in the back of my head. Like, we don't know what jail or prison's really like, you know what I'm saying? Now I've been to jail, it sucks, but it's not that scary, you know what I'm saying? And I only got three months.

[Tommy Mello]

It's not like the deep prison.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. No. And it's. Yeah. And I was on minimum security shit, so it was nothing gangster. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? So it's like. And then I'm like. And now that's all gone for me. And I only got three months for stealing a Mercedes Benz, you know, I'll just be a little more careful this time or whatever, you know? And spring break, which should have been my senior year of high school, my brother and his friends come back. What's crazy is I went to prison for burglarizing a house that was already burglarized and whose house it was, it was my best friend that didn't stand up for me, which is why we did it. So coming full circle, right? So four years later, now it's spring break, and they're the most spoiled, rotten rich kids in all of altogether. They have like a 15,000 square foot house out there, and they're in Hawaii. My brother and his friends come back and just had a bunch of shit. And they're like, we just burglized at Nelson's house. We're like, where are they at? Like, they're in Hawaii. And I'm like, oh, they do go to Hawaii every spring break. So nobody's there. Like, yeah, no one's there. We're like. So, like, I'm just keeping on the low. And like, when my brother's friends leave because they drink, so they're going to pass out at 2 or 3 in the morning, Me and my buddies, we don't sleep. We're on drugs, you know? So when they go to sleep, then we go back to the house. Because that was the only deal. Like, do not go back to the house. We're like, no, we won't. You know, so go back there. I know where the house is. The back door's open. I don't even make it out of the garage, bro. Like, I was gonna take just stupid stuff. And coming full circle now. It's just crazy how you can see, like, I just wanted shit that I couldn't afford, you know? I took Jordan basketball shorts, Jordan sandals, and a snowboard and a drill, you know what I'm saying? Like, and now it's like, it's such a. Like, my kid wears Jordan shit every single day now. You know what I'm saying? Because I can never wear that shit as a kid. And it feels so good. Just little shit. Just seeing my kid come up to me, you're wearing Jordans, And I'm like, dude, it's. It's now. It's cool seeing the life I get to raise my kids, because how many kids I got? Two little babies now. So anyways, we do that. I don't make it out of the garage. My buddies come and they take all the jewelry upstairs. And we get home, and he pulls out this bag of jewelry, man. And it's like, a bag of jewelry, $330,000 worth of jewelry. And I'm like, keep in mind, I'm out. No, big time, dude. Like, this is bigger than my drug dealer that I know. We go steal and give it to him and give us drugs and money. Like, he can't even buy this shit, you know? He lives in a trailer on the south, right up the street from here. South Phoenix, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Like, literally, I was having flashbacks. Anytime I turn on Broadway, I have flashbacks.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And of course, 10 kids involved. My friend that took the jewelry, of course, tells the cops that he was sleeping at my mom's house. I burglarized the house. I even told them where the jewelry is hidden because I'm on probation. So now I'm this Hard ass. So I ain't saying shit to the cops. The other five kids that went to the house first, every single one of them said that I had did it. I told them I did it. They don't know nothing about this except that I told them I'd done it. And they say they're going to make an example out of me. And I'm just like, bring it, you know, Like, I think I'm this little bad tough ass dude, you know. And worst case scenario, I thought I'd get like two, three, four years. And at this point, like, did you.

[Tommy Mello]

Have a court appointed attorney?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No, I actually had a. So I had a court appointed attorney at first and then when they, when they were still trying to give me the same plea, four to six to nine years my dad had got me. I had the attorney that ran for the attorney general for the state of Arizona and he lost the election, right? During my case, I had the worst judge in Arizona's history. They end up banning him because he was too harsh on his sentences afterwards. But they didn't re sentence me and they sentenced me. And I never forget his words. He goes, I find it mitigated for the fact that you're only 18 years at the time you committed this crime. He goes, I also find it mitigated for the fact that I think you have a drug problem rather than a thieving problem. He also, and his next words are, but I think this also calls for an aggravated sentence of 12 years. And I was like. And I remember before my sentencing, I told my lawyer, because we were looking at 4.25 to 6 or 6 and a half.

[Tommy Mello]

And I was like, didn't they give you. Then the prosecutor give you a plea bargain?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, yeah. So this is how dirty this is. I got a plea. So all the kids that did it, all they had on me was everybody's, all these kids telling on me, right? I know they'd already did it. And then by the time I got my police report, the five kids had all got seen. They went to this house in the daytime. So there it was, a maroon Malibu had got seen and spotted by the neighbors. So I'm knowing if it goes to trial, like I was the only one I knew. I wore gloves, my fingerprints were nowhere. These all kids that got spotted and my brothers, and they're all kids. I'm like thinking, worst case scenario, my brother gets probation, I take this shit to trial. I skate on this, right? So I fought my case for almost two years in the county jail. Nobody's in there for like non dangerous crimes for that long, right? Like literally nobody.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And I was in there for 20 or 21 months, so. But they won't budge on this. So then what do they do? A year into my case, they charge my mom, my dad and my grandma all with my crimes because my grandma lived in my mom's house. And they said that my mom and my dad knowingly possessed the stolen stuff and didn't do anything about it.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh my God.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Right? So now I'm fighting.

[Tommy Mello]

That's crazy.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And they don't budge on anything still. So then finally we go to the settlement conference and everything's recorded in court hearings, right? Except a settlement conference. Because a settlement conference is your final mediation before you go to trial. Okay? So it's the last step. So for your settlement conference you're going to go in front of. I don't remember the name, but I went in front of a different judge and it's like a mediation. So it's not recording. It's just like they put you guys in a room, like, figure this out before you want to go to trial because they're saying you don't really want to go to trial.

[Tommy Mello]

Plus it's expensive, plus they throw the book at you.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Please figure this shit out. You know what I'm saying? That's like telling you to tell me, like you really don't know what you're looking looking at if you lose in trial and telling the prosecutor like, yo, you don't really want to go to trial, this and all that. And then so I tell them to give me a different plea. She says no. I said, okay, how about this? Drop the charges against my family and then recommend the minimum. I said, you do that, I'll sign your plea bargain today. Minimum is 4.25. She says, if you sign this plea, I'll drop the charge against your family and recommend the minimum. Cool, Done. Whatever it is what it is. So I signed the plea bargain. So now I know I'm going to get 4.25 to 6 or 6 and a half. I remember telling my, my lawyer like it was yesterday. You just gotta make sure I don't get the six years. I cannot do six years. Like I cannot do. I'm claustrophobic. I'm everything. Which is why I say, like, you can do anything you want to as long as you train your mind to do it. You know what I'm saying?

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Like I lived in a five by seven and I'm claustrophobic, you know, for years too like, not only a year in solitary and I go to my sentencing. At this point, I'm just ready to go to prison. I've been in county jail forever. Right. So I go there, and you're, like, all shackled up together. Your lawyer usually comes and talks to you. Right. When you get to wait.

[Tommy Mello]

You said, I can't do six years. They gave you 12.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

And then they count the two that was in the county.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. So I went to prison in May of 2005, got locked up in April of 03, and I got released in February of 2015.

[Tommy Mello]

Dude, don't you get to get out earlier for good behavior or anything? Or, like, a pill?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I got out of supermax on an investigation for attempted murder. Like, I didn't behave good in there.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, you didn't behave?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, my God.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Exact opposite. I didn't change my life until, like, I overdosed on fennel after I got out and found God.

[Tommy Mello]

And what year was that?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

A year after I got out.

[Tommy Mello]

So 2018.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No, 2016.

[Tommy Mello]

20. So. So that you got out in 2015, 2016. You almost died and then.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, that's nine years ago. Just over 10, because I have 10 years sober now, too. Yeah. And then made 2 million bucks in the next five years with zero education, no help, nothing.

[Tommy Mello]

2 million. Wow. And so keep going. I want to hear these details because I don't get a whole lot of stuff.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I was gonna say people don't ask these details. It's pretty cool, even me talking about this now. And it brings it up for me, too, because sometimes, you know, I tell dudes, the worst thing I can do is forget how shitty my life used to be. You know what I'm saying? Because then I'll get complacent. I don't have perspective. I don't have as much gratitude as I should have.

[Tommy Mello]

Yep. So you have these shackles.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. So it comes down. My lawyer won't even look at me. I knew I have goosebumps. I just knew it was a bad day. I just had a right. Then when he wouldn't look at me, I knew there was something was wrong, you know? And what I should have done going back is I should have had her cap the plea. Because if I would have told her, cap the plea, which means she said she'd recommend recommendation. But if I tell her to put no, it can be in the plea bar, and they can say, and I'm recommending the minimum for this.

[Tommy Mello]

I didn't get the best lawyer.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I didn't do that. Because she's a lawyer. She's telling me to my face, how am I thinking a lawyer's going to spread a lot of my face in front of a judge? You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So then she goes, and my lawyer hands me this pre sentence report, which they do before you get sentence every time, which is they do, like, separate people go through the whole case, and they kind of give the recommendations to the judge on what they should do, Right? He gives this whole thing and he's like, here's this. And I'm like, what the f is this? What do you expect me to do with this? What am I looking at? You know? And he points right here. He goes, that's her recommendation. She recommends 13 years. I'm like. But she said to me, he's. I know, I know, man. But it was from in front of a different judge. We don't have anything recorded. And I'm just like. I'm like, oh, my God. And then we do the talking thing. And I still was like. I was like, what? There's no chance the judge is gonna give me this much time, you know? Like, keep in mind, I've been in there for two years now, so I've seen dudes, you know, murders and manslaughters, five, 10 years. Like, I've seen all this shit. There's no way they're gonna give a kid like me 12 years for charge. Like, not to mention I didn't even think 12 was even on the table. I thought the worst case scenario would be six to nine, you know?

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And then he says that. And I go from, like, bawling my eyes out when he says that 12 years to like, just flat out shock. And then the next thing I know is I. You can hear, like, just the court erupt, man. And I turn around behind me, you know, and like, my grandma's there and she's like, flipping out, like, please let me hug my grandson, because he's gonna be dead by the time I get out now. Like, barely holding himself up like you've seen in the movies, bro, you know? And you know, I have a big family. You know what's crazy now, I made it through all this When I don't talk to any of them.

[Tommy Mello]

You don't touch your grandma.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I'm sorry. My grandma, my mom are the only two people in my entire family. I talked to both.

[Tommy Mello]

You don't talk to your dad?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Nope. No.

[Tommy Mello]

What about your uncle?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No. My dad's 27 years sober. So you don't talk I don't talk to my. The last talk I got into my uncle was like, I will whoop your ass. I'm that dude now.

[Tommy Mello]

You said that to him.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

So my uncle, the one that taught me how to box.

[Tommy Mello]

So you don't. You talk to your mom and grandma only?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

That's it. I don't even talk to my own brother that, like, we're like, this your younger brother. Yeah. And you know, what's.

[Tommy Mello]

What's the deal with that?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I had a hard time being this because I don't ever want to bad bout with my family like that. But like, I'm. Here's the thing. Like, I'm a servant for God, bro. You know what I'm saying? And like, my message is supposed to help people. So, like, if the truth hurts, then my brother needs to change, you know? And like, I won't have negative bad stuff around my family, you know?

[Tommy Mello]

And whether your uncle, your dad, your brother, you just don't feel like they're living.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

They don't pass every one of them. I don't associate with bad people now, bro, like blood or not, Like, I don't. I'm a firm believer. Like, just because you have the same blood does not mean your family. Like, I have dudes that have not even a trace the same blood as me, and like, I would die for them and they would do the same for me.

[Tommy Mello]

Wow. Yeah. That's crazy, man.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Prison will teach you real quick, like, about loyalty, man, and how. How important it is to have someone that's like, loyal to you. Like really loyal to the core, not just saying they're loyal to you.

[Tommy Mello]

Well, loyalty. So you go in and there's a few. So talk to me about.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

It's hard to even picture because I was a model. I used to. I was in a movie as a kid too. Like, I was a stud athlete. Like, I was 6 foot 144 pounds with long blonde hair, like a little pretty boy.

[Tommy Mello]

And this was. What did you weigh when you went in?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

6 foot 144.

[Tommy Mello]

That's when you went in prison?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No. Okay. So I put on like 20 pounds in jail. So I think I was like 160, 170. And then I got released. I was six four. 264.

[Tommy Mello]

What do you weigh now?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

222, 25. But I got. Yeah, I got. I put on shit. What did. I can do the math. 120 pounds in there and grew 3 inches. I barely had armpit hair. Yeah, I was the last person to hit, like, puberty out of my friends. Like, I was like, literally just like a little kid when I went away, bro. Like. And, you know, that's it. Honestly, it made it easier for me, though, because it'd be so hard, bro, if I knew that life was this good out here. Seriously. I didn't even know what I was missing, so it kind of made it easier for me, you know. That was after two years in the county jail right there, too.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, boy. Wow. So tell me about the gangs. I just want to hear a little more. I want to jump into what the future looks like, for sure. So you walk in and you, what, did you get in a bunk with someone else?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, a little cubicle. Like, you're an absolute nobody. They run the rules down to you. Like, yo, here's what it is. Like, you got 12 years. Like, you better pay attention and put your head down, you know? And like, they. You know why they call it a sucker punch? Do you?

[Tommy Mello]

No.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Because you're the sucker if you could punch. I was like, what does that mean? He's like, if someone raised their voice at you, you even think you're going to get into someone, you just take off on them. And I was like, you.

[Tommy Mello]

You take off you on them?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I was like, really? I was like, we can do that? He's like, yes, this is prison. He goes, you don't ever let someone get the better hand on you if you even think you're gonna go there. He goes, it's always better to say sorry afterwards.

[Tommy Mello]

So you hit him?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, that's what they tell me to. So I ended up using this on the same guy like, a couple of weeks later. And my first fight in prison was the guy that ran the rules down to me and was running the building and was built like me and you now. And I was built like 160, 170 pound kid back then, so.

[Tommy Mello]

And you had already learned a little bit about boxing.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I used to box. I already know. And I have a cheat code, you know, if you actually know how to fight and have, like, a trained person, like, no one on the streets knows how to fight, you know, and that goes for prison, the same thing, you know. So, like, out of the streets, 1 out of 100 knows how to fight. In prison, 10 out of 100 know how to fight, you know? So he says some smart shit about his playing cards in his little cubicle area. And I already made up my mind. After counting, I was going to, like, take it there, like, say something. We had to fight. And I'm just good on reading vibes. I knew no one respected me or looked at me and I was like, I'm going to at least show these guys I can fight, you know? So he does it and then says, I'm going to teach you little young punks how to respect your elders. And goes to take the chew out of his mouth and turns his back to me while he does this. I'm like, dude, you told me the rules here, you know? So like, I'm on top of him within 5 seconds. Doesn't even get a hand on me. They end up ripping me off him and beat the brakes off this dude the next morning. Like, the. The weirdest thing about going to prison effort, especially when you're popular kid, is like, you're a nobody, bro. No one cares about you. Like, no one even talks to you. They're gonna see if you're gonna last a week or two, you know what I'm saying? Like, literally no one even messed with you because they think especially a kid like me, little, pretty. Like, they're like, this dude's gonna check in in two seconds to request protective custody, you know?

[Tommy Mello]

And. But yeah, but you. Was it like the. The what are. There's gangs you either got to go with or not. Right? Like you. So there's.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I only have one choice. I can either run with the Aryan Brotherhood or I can be a lame. Those are the only two.

[Tommy Mello]

And then the other ones are.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, you got the Mexican mafia, you have Sudanos, which is the Cali guys. Glendale's so big. Glendale has their own race and gang in prisons now too. And then you got the Paisas and the Border Brothers for the. For them, which we're at complete war with in. In the prison before I left, like literally flowing war.

[Tommy Mello]

And that's when like they had a separate yard.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Oh, murder each other. Like dudes. Yeah. The head dude of my to the Aryan Brotherhood was like stabbed the head through the Mexicans and killed him and his in his right hand man. Right in the yard in front of everybody.

[Tommy Mello]

These guys are doing what were their sent?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Like, a lot of them are not even like. So the my were they like less.

[Tommy Mello]

Than 10 years and they still did that. Now they're down. Now they're doing life.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

The main guy that was the top dude for the Aryan Brotherhood that I'll show you afterwards. And he's like a man of God. He's the most remarkable dude I met now. Came down for a three year burglary charge back in the 90s and murdered a black dude in the child home picked up 30 years, came down for three years.

[Tommy Mello]

And when you get out, some, some of these guys, they, they do you know Andre Norman? Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

He was just on my show last week.

[Tommy Mello]

I know Andre really well.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Okay. He was just down here.

[Tommy Mello]

He was like the one.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

He.

[Tommy Mello]

Well, he says he's one of the bosses. Yeah, he's like, look, he'd walk in and be like, make me a sandwich.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I made him say that story on my show too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Andrew's coolest.

[Tommy Mello]

So like that. That's one of the guys.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Same kind of stuff. Yeah, it's. And that's the same thing. So he was. You can tell by dude's verbiages and stuff like that. Yeah. How it is. And that's like. And you know what that says is that Andre. Not only that, but he did time in a real yard. Because those real yards. Those cops just want to go home, bro. They're not trying to start. No, they don't want none. They to don't want no problems or any of that stuff.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, there we go. That's my man. We'll hit him up later.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

So world.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Right.

[Tommy Mello]

So now you're. You go through all this and you go through the struggles and who's visiting you?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

So then. And then my mom, my brother and my dad. I always had visits. I always had chicks too. Like, it was just kind of easy for me, you know, like, like I would say like I had. I had the toughest time possible. I had it as good as possible with all that stuff, you know, I always had visits and stuff like that and always had comments especially you're running yards, you have to have that stuff. But so that was addicting for the attention. Like the next morning when I come out, like all these OGs that I used to like look at on the yard, you know, like. Or now want to shake my hand, you know, because they heard this little kid whoop way that was running the building, you know. So now they wait out there to shake my hand. And now it's. It's as addicting as anything possible. It's like making your first money when you're trying to become an entrepreneur, you know what I'm saying? And I just jump head first into the politics and I'm like, oh yeah, if you guys want anybody smash, please let me know. Like, I don't like, God, if he's real, he don't like me.

[Tommy Mello]

Wait, this is right when you get out?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No, when I get in. Right. So I'm Getting into politics now and then. By the time I was 23 years old, I ran my first yard, which is a forward I was on, no joke, like pulled a corrections officer. I had that yard so crazy. I was in a relationship with the co. I had the lieutenant on the team that was helping us make sure we could go certain places. We're drinking promethazine with codeine on the yard, smoking blunts. Enough on a four yard in the morning, just. It was like U of A to me, bro. That's why I said that was my taste of college. But then you get your first predator packet, which means they say, like literally the state and staff says that you're a predator on the yard and it's automatic maximum security. So that's my first one. I got four of those done on me.

[Tommy Mello]

Maximum security is hell.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Five by seven. Five by seven. You're. You can touch this. You can't even do a push up beside yourself. And you're in there 24 hours a day. 24 hours a day. The only time you get to get out is you get to go to a wreck cage that's the same, exact, smaller than this, but dirty ass concrete. And you get to go out there, they shackle you, walk you out there like that, and then unshackle you. Once you're in the cage, you're never out of your cell without full on cuffs on. And so you never even do that. And like bird bass, you take a bird bath in your cell. Because showers is like when you go to the shower, it's. You get a shower either Monday, Wednesday and Friday or Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday. Not to mention that by the time they put you in the shower, say you're up on Henry Run, they put you up in the shower in Henry Run. Then they go down, Ida run, whatever, all the way down to Abel Baker Charlie on the other side. So by the time they come back to you, it's almost an hour. Like you're full on drenched in sweat in this little hot ass, you know, shower that you just went in. So, like I don't even shower, bro. Like, when I was in Max, usually I'd spend a year not even leaving that cell, bro. Oh, you spent a year in the same freaking.

[Tommy Mello]

What do you do?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And I'm claustrophobic.

[Tommy Mello]

You just, you read, you get like, are you.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Do you want to know how crazy it is and how hard my time was? I'm so ADD and adhd. I never even read in there. I was in VCU where all you get is a Bible and didn't even open it. I would just pace. And I still know my thing. I would pace one and a half steps this way, one and a half steps this way. And you know I would do it like that. Why I still lean like this is because it's always freezing cold in there. So every time you're in there, all you do is like this. You have your hands in there because they don't give you anything. You go like this, one and a half steps this way. And then my shoulder bounce on the door like this. And I turn on like this. Go one and a half steps that way. And then my, my shoulder hit the other wall.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh my gosh.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And you just pace for 12 hours. It saved my life. I was 170 pounds on the yard, strung out, shooting dope. I go to the hole for 11 months. I get out 263 pounds. Finally I was able to get 11 months of like not even positive, but at least not just doing drugs on the yard and this prison politics, you know what I mean? And I'm actually able to like every week I get a phone call. So I'm calling my brother, my mom, and I'm actually talking like normal stuff now, not yard politics, which I'm hearing every day for 12 years straight. But I got out of prison. I didn't know what to do, bro. Like, I didn't have a plan. Like I thought that like somehow get a construction job, like try and figure out how to get sober, but like have no fun, but at least you're not in prison. Like that was like, if I can find success, that's what it looks like. And I didn't know how I was going to do that.

[Tommy Mello]

And so you get out, get out.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And I'm entitled to party. Never been to. Never been on a date, never worked a day in my life. Never been to a bar, never done any of this stuff, right? Like I was a little kid when I went out. So like any normal good person place would be to spend time would be sambar. So I went to that sandbar over there and I would. Took you six days a week.

[Tommy Mello]

I used to, I opened that sandbar.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. Pulled chicks there. We were probably ones that close it down, but pulled chicks there, like every day. Just hook up with chicks every day. Did nothing positive. Get an assault case on parole, blacked out. And then overdose on fentanyl. Blacked out. Wasn't even doing drugs, but I was blacked out drunk. And I had to go through my phone afterwards and I ended up leaving the bar blacked out drunk, and one of my youngsters from the joint literally hit me up in Guadalupe. I drove my truck from Hobnob right there in Chandler to Guadalupe, blacked out drunk, don't remember driving it. And wake up in an ambulance nine months out of prison, and I'm like, it was fentanyl. And I wake up in an ambulance and I'm like, I've never still. I've been out of prison nine months. All I've done is drink and party. I'm not. Nothing bad, but nothing positive either, you know? Like, nothing. Like, I'm not.

[Tommy Mello]

Did you have a job?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No. No. I have this mindset. Who the hell wants to hire me? You know what I mean?

[Tommy Mello]

What did you, like, just Mom's helping you.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

My dad would give me 1500 bucks a month at first. That's it. Just to live off of, you know? And he's like. And that was the deal. I'd have to, like, act like I was putting in job applications every day.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And I wake up in ambulance and I tell the paramedic what the hell happened? And he's like, you overdose? I was like, I don't even use drugs anymore. He's like, you did today. By the time they got me to the hospital, my heart was only beating six beats a minute. They gave me seven shots of Narcan. Had to resuscitate me. When they found me, I was dead. No heartbeat, completely dead. This is another reason that I really believe in God. I didn't find this out till after is my ex girlfriend's sister found me, right? She went home after work to go tanning. Said she pulled in the parking lot, parked her car, got out of her car, walked up to the door, put her hand on the door to open the door. She said the second she put on her hand on the door, some told her to go home for some reason. So she said she took her hand off the door, got back in her car to go home and take a nap, finds me dead in the bathtub. If she even walks in there and then decides to go home, like, another few seconds, I'm probably not here today, you know? And, like, instantly I went from. I remember in that hospital bed, I was thinking, like, why did I survive this? Why can't I just died and been done with this life, man. Like, I was done, bro. Like, I still hadn't even worked. So I didn't know, like, if I was going to make something of myself. Like, I felt like I've been fighting my whole life. I was just done. Like I just. But I always wanted to kill myself, but I never would because of my mom, you know, And I just wanted to die. And then I went from that moment to like thinking maybe I was saved. And this is like, God. And maybe this is my chance to like try and get sober. And so my last, my little talk, I have myself in that hustle bed is like, how much do you want to like prove that you're entitled to go drink and party and pull chicks and have fun? Or do you want to at least try and get sober and figure life out at least once, like, and told myself, give yourself a shot. You've never even tried to live life, you know? Went out to South Dakota State with my dad. Went to like two or three a meetings a week. Had no idea what to do. But luckily my co defendant was the finance director at a marquee up in Scottsdale. So he's going to give me a job to go sell cars. And I got out and my dad sent me back here with five pairs of khakis. Buy one, get one free at Kohl's. Five dress shirts. Buy one, get one free. And I had to pay him back my first paycheck and made 10 grand my first month ever working or selling cars. And 13 months I was in finance manager making 350 grand a year with my own office and just murdered. Shit. I just turned a drug addiction to a money addiction and got sober and just changed everything, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

So you go into cars? My dad used to run Amco on Scottsdale and Thomas. He owned a transmission shop before that. I grew up at auto shops, so I love car. I bought and sold over a thousand cars.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Really? Wow.

[Tommy Mello]

I bought them on craigslist. I used to buy G20 infinities, Honda Civics and just clean them all up, put new tires on them, change the oil and my dad would fix them if they need anything.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, that's dope.

[Tommy Mello]

But that, that's, that's great. So you got 350 grand coming in and then what's the next calling after this?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

So then, yeah, I do that for four or five years and like, you know as well as anybody, like money doesn't make you happy. It's cool when you first get it, but after a while all does it open your eyes up to more expensive stuff and then you realize you don't really have as much money as you think you have, you know, and then it's like. So I did that and like, you know, worked forever.

[Tommy Mello]

A lot of hours, 70 hours.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Working all these hours, I'm just like, I have this nine, you know, million dollar house. But it's like, what. What is am I doing this for? You know, Like, I'm not meant to do this. I know for a fact I'm not meant to do this. Had no idea what I was gonna do, except a Vice TV producer had reached out to me and. You ever seen that show? I was a teenage fella.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

So season two, episode five is my whole life story. It's the Shot Caller episode. So Vice producer reaches out to me and I was like, I had 400 followers on Instagram. I was like, man, I'm trying to make a run at this shit. Like, I'm dumb and naive enough as it is, you know, I have.

[Tommy Mello]

You got a great story.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, I got a few hundred grand saved up. And I'm like, if this Joe Schmoes can get Instagram rich, I can get Instagram rich too. You know, that was my mindset back then, you know? But I knew I wanted to help you. I knew my story. Wasn't meant to sit in that office all day long, you know, And I was right. I was on the free rents at Indian school right there. So my. The finance office is like the glass window one in marquee. If you ever see, if you're driving out, you'll see now, like, that was my office right there. So, like Saturday, I would just look at cars driving on the free, and I'd be like, dude, I used to spend Saturdays locked in a cell and I'm like, now I'm just locked in another cell out here, you know, it just felt like this was not what I was meant to do. But I had no idea or no experience. I hadn't done anything positive. Like, I'm not one of those guys that did schooling or programming or anything, you know, like, so I don't know anything. I just know how to sell shit, you know, and. But I saved up a few hundred grand. I was like, I'm just going to go meet with whoever the hell I can. Don't even know who. But I had a rule with myself. I went to a different gym every day and I would at bare minimum at least get one new dude's phone number every single day and go up to the dude that looked like, you know, I had a nice on at the gym or something like that and just go spark up a conversation, you know. And I used to get roasted by my brother and his friends back then. Because they say I would go to the gym to pull dudes, but I'm like, look at the network I built by myself, though. Literally two years, you know, I'm saying, like, you asked. I met Snow. Like, just the same idea, just networking. I don't know, but I know everybody just like, you know, and so I did all that. And then luckily, you know, if someone tells you I get interviewed on a couple shows and they're like, this dude needs his own show. So I try and launch this podcast and launch the first episode of that one gets 20,000 views. And I was like, holy shit, we might be on something here. And started the podcasting for a few years and, you know, wrote the book. Yeah. Start playing some crypto, end up writing a book, and then meet my just amazing wife. And then to come full circle, you know, like, I get. I. You know, I had white pride tattooed across my stomach. Got it. Seven sessions, the most painful ever. Got that completely removed. And I had to tell my wife at first, like, you know, like, I had one session left, but I told her, like, the second day I met her, I was like. I was like, yo, I gotta tell you something. Because I had a bad experience with that, not telling a woman before I flipped out him in the middle of the night when I first got out. So I tell her and she's like, oh, I don't care about that. I'm like, are you serious? For real? Another cool thing about my wife is I don't know stuff except for what I see. So I'm like thinking, this gorgeous black woman, I'm like, my only rule is don't talk politics with her before, you know. I'm saying, before you see what kind of woman she is, you know?

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Her second day over my house, she's like, I just gotta ask you one question. I was like, what? She's like, what's your political beliefs? I was like. I was like, I don't really do politics, you know? She's like, but come on. She's like, well, who do you believe? Would you be like, conservative or Republican if you could say? I was like, All I could say is this. I don't like Joe Biden. She's like, oh, my God, thank God. I was like. I was like, all right, we got something on here, you know? And she grew up Mormon. Like, complete polar opposite. She was an all American volleyball player.

[Tommy Mello]

She's Mormon?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. Grew up Queen Creek.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, she was in Queen Creek.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. So she has the kills record at Colorado State. Then went to Grand Canyon got her master's degree, full rides everywhere. Was gonna go play professionally overseas, but tore her Achilles. And she knows she's a chick I just want to hook up with. And I would have never even tried to have a relationship with her because I was like, I'd have to do way too much fixing internally to have to date a woman like that, you know? And not to say it's the greatest thing that's ever happened. It's just such a far understatement. Like, this woman changed my life beyond belief. Like, change it in ways I didn't even know has changed and, like, made me believe that, like, I can do so much. At first, I just thought I had to get sober, you know? Like, that's such a. It's a low bar, the barometer. Like, that's what these old guys. Hey, they've been sitting on it for 30 years. Going to Amy, it's like, cool, Congrats, bro. You got sober 30 years ago. Who do you help? What have you done? Or what have you fixed on top of that? You know what I'm saying?

[Tommy Mello]

Like, well, their dream is too small.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

You know, most people that I meet, they're like, I want to do this. I'm like, yeah, that's money. What else?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Literally. Then what do you do after you do that, right?

[Tommy Mello]

I do this all for my wife and kids. I'm like, what about you? Yeah, you can't love yourself.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. Yeah. And then my. The thing I'm most proud of now is like, so I was kicked out of prison, right? Like, I'm. I'll tell you this. When I. When I was at the. When I was in a solitary confinement the last year, right? Ssu who's like the gang detectives in there, if you get booked on anything in prison is from the SSU staff, right? So once we find out this guy survived and everything, now I'm like, now I'm like, all right, this investigation's up. Investigation is supposed to be for 30 days. It's called a 2A investigation, right? They can extend them every 30 days, but whatever, it's usually a month. Sometimes they extend it twice, right? So they come in. I've been here, like, three or four months now, and I'm telling ssl, I was like, yo, what's up? You guys got to let me out of this hole. Like, let me go to the yard. I'm like, you can't expect me to go home after 12 years and solitary confinement and then make something of myself. That was back. I'm Thinking they. They want you to succeed. And he's like, no, we, no. He's like, you're done. Literally. Told me he's like, you're done. He's like, meyerhoff, we are done with you. Verbatim, he says, we're done with you in hero. In prison, we're gonna let the streets have their luck with you. You're gonna sit in the cell until you go home. And my release, dude, I was released in five point shackles walking to my release cage. Like, with all the release guys walking with their own thing. I was separate with five point shackles completely walking in there. And you got to see the video after this, but I had no idea what to do. And now I have one of the biggest podcasts, so they all have tablets now. So I have this. I'm the second most downloaded dude in all the prison tablets across the entire country. The only dude that's bigger is that Eckhart Tolle and God behind bars because they do their stuff together. And I develop prison curriculum now that I get to teach to prisons all over, and prisons and states pay me to come teach inmates what to do.

[Tommy Mello]

Now what are your number one lessons?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Well, give me, give me mindset's number one anything. Like, routine. And mindset is anything, because people, you just. Like you said a second ago, people are like, too small minded. Like, you just, you just have to get them to open up their mindset to show them what's possible. Like, here's the deal. Like, I thought I had a cheat code, and I thought I was doing a disservice to everybody that had been locked up before. When I made tenure in that first month, and I was like, I got that first check and it was like 4400 bucks after taxes for my bonus check. And I was like, oh, my God. All it did was show me holy shit, it's possible. And I remember thinking, like, what the f. Didn't they tell me that we could do this in prison? You know, I mean, you know how much, how much harder I would have tried to do something productive if I knew that. If we had known that we could do cool shit, we get out of here, people are going to try a lot harder in prison. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And which is why my curriculum so different. Because, like, anybody you see watching go to these prison yards, they're going to minimum security yards, these low security yards, and they're talking these dudes that are in and out of prison their whole lives. Like, I go to the high High security yards like Soledad, that place I went, that's a for it. It's called a direct out from the shoe. So anybody that comes from security housing, which is supermax, goes directly there. It's your first yard ever out of the shoe. And if you don't there you go right back to the shoe. And then when I got done with that program there, and I get these killers on the yard, bro, to like, cry, bro, and like, literally act like. I've never even seen dudes in prison act in my entire life. And not only that, when I get done with there, you know what the warden tells? He goes, dude, where do you want to go next? I was like, what's a higher security prison than this? He's like, selenus. But he's like, we can't go to Salinas. I'm like, why? He's like. He's like, they're killing each other right now. They're killing cops and everything like that. He's like, no one can go to that yard right now. And I'm like, all right, if they cleared up, can I go there? That's what I want to do. Because when you get the shot callers to pass it down, you can change a hundred lives with one person. If you're just changing those little kids that are in and out of prison every two, three years, you're not changing nobody. You're barely changing one out of a thousand of them. If you can get the shot callers to, to, to preach this on the yard.

[Tommy Mello]

Well, the other thing is change it in the streets.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yes, absolutely.

[Tommy Mello]

Which is because they can make a big impact going. Look, you guys, you listen to me, which is we're big.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Which is why I finally do coaching out here too. I didn't want to forever. Like, no joke for Sal is one of the guys that talked me into it too. And I didn't realize how many people are just like, just don't know how to live life, bro. You know, like. And that's what I'm just. I feel like I'm a pro. I. Bro, just. You could throw me anywhere. But I'm gonna figure it out. You know what I'm saying? I always said like this, like, you could put me in the. In the middle of mountain Afghan of Afghanistan, and in about six months, you're gonna be running that mountain.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah. I don't know how, but I will fire.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know what I'm saying? You know, you got the same trait.

[Tommy Mello]

I never went through, dude. You know what's interesting is somebody's cat could die when they're nine, and that will traumatize them for life. And somebody else could watch their mother overdose, and it doesn't mean anything of the way they were live. So you don't. People go through. And what's a lot diverse people, 100. You've been through a lot more, Dude, I. I've had a lot of impactful things, but I look back and I'm like, man, everything happened for a reason. I had great parents. They went through their own trials, but at the end of the day, like, one of the most important things is, look, I got a lot of people that don't believe the same way I do. Not. Not in God, but just. I just had to have a big heart and just say, you know what? You know, look, I'm not going to coach you on this, but, you know, your uncle, your dad, your brother, I don't know, maybe if they've seen you. And plus, you got kids, and obviously you don't want them to leave a bad influence, but if you met with them every once in a while, for sure. Yeah, I. I don't know, man.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Let's hear it. No, I want to be real.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah. The deal is, for me, if a.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Guy like me, like, dude, I didn't get to where I did not listen to dudes like you, well, it's just.

[Tommy Mello]

You know, I would never want regrets. And I tell you, dude, there's a lot of regrets. I have is like, my dad almost died through Covid. And I prayed hard. I'm crying, going to visit him. And he's like, I'm not ready to go. And I said, if you let my dad live, not only will it be a better son, but I'll. I'll tell everybody on every stage. And this guy calls me a year later and goes, did you make a deal with God?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Shut.

[Tommy Mello]

No, I'm not kidding. And I got goosebumps, man. I'm walking around. And he goes. He goes, I don't know what you did, but I imagine you on your knees praying. And I was like, who are you? He's like, I'm not any crazy, you know? He goes, this is the first time I've ever done this. He goes, but whatever deal you made, make sure you keep it, because just as quick as he gave it to you, you could take it away. And I was like, oh, boy. I redid my PowerPoint. Yeah. And so the first thing I do in my orientation is show one. I got baptized. And, like, I believe In Jesus Christ. But listen, I'm not going to tell you guys, whatever religion you are. I'm not. I'm just telling you who I am. But, yeah, it's important.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And wow, man.

[Tommy Mello]

You know, I started hanging out with Travis Hearn. If you get a chance, you need to go meet him at impact church.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I would love to. I've been. I've only been to two churches. Been an impact, and then I go to echoes with Daniel Golding out there now, too.

[Tommy Mello]

But, yeah, and, dude, I'm gonna start, like, I feel like it's my obligation. Like, if you are, you know, four out of five people will go to church if you invite them, but nobody invites them, really. So I'm gonna go blow that church up, dude. I'm gonna bring our A1 trucks out. We're gonna get there 45 minutes early. I just want to go once a month and just show up and be dressed like this and just say, listen, guys, if you want this life, I don't care if you come or not. It's. I'm just inviting you. And then you decide. And I'm gonna go meet with Travis.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Have him talk to us. I'll tell you this, like, now, like, all the cool. I've done everything. Like, even though, like, I'm most proud of the parent time out of my kids and stuff. But, like, because what's crazy is, like, the household I get to I raised right now is one I've never even seen except in the movies, which is crazy to me. Like, think about that. I get to, like, raise my kids and have, like, a standard in my household, and they get to, like, see love in my household. I've never even in my entire life, you know what I'm saying? Like, me and my wife are like this, bro, like five times a day. I'm like, babe, do. Anytime I get up, do you need anything? Can I do anything for you? You know, like, checking on each other, like, putting the other person first and making sure the kids go first over anything. Like, out of all anything I was going to say, I'm rambling there. But out of anything that I was most proud about, it was, damn, I just lost my train. Thought I was saying with that.

[Tommy Mello]

It's all good, man. We added this. So you teach mindset, you know, where are you going from here? I mean, what is your big hairy. This is goal. What's your dream?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

My dream is I want to be the biggest speaker and I just want to travel to prisons across the entire world, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

I got so many People I'm going to introduce to you three that come to mind. And all of these guys came from prison. One of my buddies trafficking a lot, a lot, a lot of cocaine spent a long time. He's worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Today, another buddy changing people's lives, getting them in shape. Sean, I got, I want to introduce you to these guys because, you know, I don't know if you enjoy kicking it with guys that know the, like, the serve time like you. Keegan came out, his dad had a small business, electric business. Well, Keegan learned how to do H Vac in prison and he stayed in the hole because they transferred him to Atlanta. And he's like, I can't go out there. Like he just, he's got stories and he gets teary. Yeah, teary eyed. And so he just spent it locked up and he gets out. And you know what's crazy about prison? If these guys come out, if they want to make it, they can make as much money. They could have any relationship. They could live the best life ever if they choose to. Because they've already seen they've been to rock bottom. It's straight up.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

That's what I teach.

[Tommy Mello]

And it's like this, this if they find their brother. And I don't even want to call it a brotherhood, I like to call it a wolf pack because wolves will attack. If an animal attacks one wolf, they all come. And Navy seals, all wolf packs. I spent some time with Jocko. Extreme ownership. And dude, he's soft. When you're with him, he lives this David Goggins kind of hard face. I'm not going to say he's a soft dude, but he's been through this the ringer. And he gave me some of the best compliments ever. And he's like, look, if you ever want to get into business, you know, I'm an investor, just call me. He's like, I'm in. And like, you know, I get access to these people, but I don't go in there going, hey, dude, here's what I want to do. Wait till you see me. I'm just like, hey, man, we'll be friends. I want to learn from you.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

And I'm going to take notes and I'm going to actually do the work.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

And so, dude, I like your story. I love your story. And the fact that you're going back to the prisons and the, the impact that it could have externally, I mean, that's real and that's impacting. That's massive. Massive impact.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Not Only that. But like I said, dude, it makes your mom safer at home.

[Tommy Mello]

No, it's that says, you know, we got a rule here is treat people like mom. And if you didn't raise by a great mom, maybe it was a grandma, maybe it was an uncle, maybe it was a, a coach. But just do the right thing. And I don't need to teach my guy sales. I'm like, smile more, play with the dog, make friends and do what you would do for your mom's house. If we do that, we're winning.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Absolutely.

[Tommy Mello]

But they can't believe. Here's the hard part. A lot of people believe that's a lot of money. My buddy that lives in Fresno, his Average ticket in HVAC is 38,000. Average ticket. And I go, what's a lot of money? If we all wrote down our what's a lot of money? Somebody would put 10,000, another person would put 10 million. It's not like when you own a house, you want things done right. And if you got two little kids at home like you do, you want to make sure they're trustworthy with your wife when she's alone in the H vac or the, whatever goes out. What other, what other things do you want the audience to know about?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Don't ever stop finding your true purpose, you know, like I can't tell you how many guys that I know that I work with now, their 30s, 40s, 50s, and like just still feel lost and feel like they don't know where to go. It's never too late to restart. Like I didn't start working until I was 30 years old. I never worked a day in my life like you could, whether you're 40 years old. And I did that stuff and I, I mean I semi retired within five years, you know what I'm saying? Like you could legit restart anything. And another thing I like to do is I try to get dudes from prison like ready to attack the world. Just like you said, they've had their backs against the wall. Like when they get done, like going through my program in prison, the number one thing is their mindset should be that they have an advantage on regular people out here because of what we've been through. So when you can like literally use your screw ups to help you better off, like you have an advantage on failure. The normal society, you know, you embrace.

[Tommy Mello]

The failure and you remember where you came from. Dude, it's, it's hard. Like, listen, would you rather hire a PhD or somebody that's been 10 years of literally war and business. And they've been through all the mistakes.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Absolutely.

[Tommy Mello]

I'll tell you, there's a great book you need to throw on the top of your list. It's called A Man's Search for Meaning.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Okay.

[Tommy Mello]

And the dude went through holocaust and he made it out. And when you could find meaning in a place like that, I mean, I would imagine that the Germans. That was worse than prison. When you're watching your families getting murdered, every Jewish person just treated like bones. Their arms are smaller than my wrists. And that's the ultimate to go through that and, you know, more. Read more of the Bible. I want to. I got a book that every day it's a new scripture that I just read. And then there's the, the Bible app.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I know, I just got that Bible apps. That's. That's how I read. I'll do that. And I've been reading like, I think the, I don't even know like the book of John or James, one of the two. But yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

Well, my dad could quote every scripture.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

And by the way, that's how I strive to be. I used to strive to make a lot of money and all stuff. Now, you know, it's crazy. Like, my number one goals, aside from like raised my family great, is like, I want to be able to just like know the Bible like the back of my hand, you know? And like, I want to be one of those guys that like, I always say to my wife now, like, I want to be one of those guys I would have made fun of when I was in prison, called him a Bible thumper and stuff like that. Because like, why not? Like all this stuff that we do, like, look at our lives, bro. You know what I'm saying?

[Tommy Mello]

Like, seriously, I wake up every day and here's the cool thing, like, I don't have any pain.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

I live in the United States of America. Like some days you're like, man, I just want to do more. And you're like, what? Dude, I am drinking out of a fire hose. 24. It's self inflicted.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

Like, my mom goes last week, she goes, hey, honey, you seemed really quiet the other night at dinner. Are you okay? I was like, well, a one's got 920 employees. I got the family office launching three softwares, not to mention 20 other investments. I've got my, my event with 1500 people and that's growing. We're building two houses. I'm engaged. We want to have children.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No. I'm like, dude, that's the. Oh, My God, I can't even tell you.

[Tommy Mello]

It's like, I'm good, but just know.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I'm in my own head a lot.

[Tommy Mello]

I'm in my head.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

But I. You know, there's one day a month where I kind of like. Like, man, why do I do all this? And then the rest of the time, I'm like, dude, let's go.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

You know, I just started doing two weeks old. Me and my wife, too, is like, one day on the weekend taking. No phones.

[Tommy Mello]

No phones.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah. It's a big thing. And it's. You don't realize how much because even I'm pretty good, bro. Like, I'm trying to be. I'm really. Like, I change all the diapers. Like, I wake up with them every morning and night. Like, I'm a very, very.

[Tommy Mello]

No phones on Saturdays.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

But we're doing this Sunday, this week. So we just pick a day, like, whatever. We have something going on, you know, Like. But we're doing this Sunday, no phones of me and the wife, you know? And it does make a difference because even. Even if you're not bad with it, like, you realize all your attention is there. Like, you don't realize how much. You're just flicking it on commercials, you know? And it's like, instead you're playing with your son or something the whole time or giving your wife more attention. It makes a huge difference.

[Tommy Mello]

No phones, maybe. No phones, no tv. That'd be crazy.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Wow. And you really get to know. The weather's nice now, so you could do that.

[Tommy Mello]

Yeah. You know, I was with a buddy yesterday in this room, and he sold his house in Paradise Valley or in Arcadia, and he sold his house in Canada. And he just lives. He's been to 70 countries.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No, they do.

[Tommy Mello]

He's got two. Two duffel bags he brings, and he works three months in each, different countries. I'm like, dude, I don't know if I could do that. But he's like, dude, I live the best freaking life.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Imagine that.

[Tommy Mello]

And he's on major stages. He gets paid 100 grand per stage. You know what I mean? And. But by the way, I love stages. I love my time. But every time I leave here to do a stage, I'm losing a ton.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Of money for sure.

[Tommy Mello]

But I'm impacting lives. So what's it about? Is it about money or impact?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

So I can't believe you have that many employees, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

No, they're. They're my co workers. We're the. We're a good team. You know, the thing Is. Is they've changed my life just much, if not more than I've changed theirs. So how do people get a hold of you?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Peter on the gram is Peter Underscore Meyerhoff. My website, Peter Meyerhoff.com. i'm on every platform, though. TikTok podcast. Don't forget that Roll Call with Chappie on Every platform, too. YouTube, all that stuff. I'm. I'm everywhere, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

What's your favorite podcast you've done?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

No offense, Josh Snow, bro. Really? And I'm not just saying that because he's coming up here. I tell people all the time, bro.

[Tommy Mello]

Like, what did you like about his podcast?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

You know, when, you know the whole circle of all the big dudes around everywhere, like, 90 of them dudes are fake. Even the ones that aren't fake, 80 of those aren't genuine. Like, he's just real genuine. And, like, to be honest, he gave me a shot when my show wasn't even really big. Like, I was kind of shocked he would do my show. And, like. Like, this is the kind of guy Josh knows. He showed up to do my show. Remember? I'm, like, just starting. I think it was, like, my 20th episode. Like, no, nothing. Nothing big. And someone just vouched, and he came and did it and then showed up, like, 10 minutes late because he forgot to bring me presents. So he went to Best Buy and dropped a thousand dollars getting me all his products from Best Buy and then gave me a whole bag of all his snow products he just bought from Best Buy so I could try all his products. And, like, just the greatest conversation. And, like, me, you always get it wrong. Like, you always think, me, I'd always think of a guy. When you see someone like him, you're like, dude, whatever. What? How much money did his parents give him? Or how much. You know I'm saying? Or how many, you know? I mean, what?

[Tommy Mello]

His parents house partners with him when.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

He was 17 and grew up. Oh, and I heard what you did. That's why I'm a huge, huge fan of yours. Like, he speaks more than highly of you, but, yeah. And then when you finally grew up on the south or on the west side of Phoenix and, like, you know, didn't even have a computer. Just crazy, bro. And, like, he's the only podcast I did where I was like, holy, no way. Then what? Oh, my God.

[Tommy Mello]

Then he is a brain.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah.

[Tommy Mello]

Like, he sits down and I don't know how he does it, man, but you talk about brilliance. I don't know what his IQ Is. But I. I still.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

I was like, he's confusing. Even talk to, like, even I hang out with him. Like, I'm like, dude, like, I feel like I need a decoder to even talk to you. You know what I'm saying?

[Tommy Mello]

I. I literally was like, he's like, dude, I need grass your help. I showed up there with one of my guys. I'm like, hey, give him the nine, Fix everything, replace it all. Give them new openers. And I said, josh, give me one hour a month. And he would have done that for free. But he's like, dude. He's like, by the way, he's like, I know every group you're part of. He's like, you're one of the only real ones. He's like, these guys drive Ferraris, dude. They don't have any money in the bank.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yep.

[Tommy Mello]

But for sure, no, man, I appreciate it. Give me one book. Is it because you just got started getting into reading? Is there any books that you would recommend other than against all Odds besides against all?

[Peter Meyerhoff]

It's the only book that I can legit. Being real to my character and not lying to people is the Bible.

[Tommy Mello]

All right, let's go and finally close us out, man. One final thought. We talked about a lot of cool stuff. We know your story. Just give the audience something to think about.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Life is hard. It's hard for everybody. The only time that you're never going to progress is when you actually give up. The only thing that I did right for, I always say, 31 years of my life is that I didn't give up. I don't. I don't take no for an answer. If you believe in yourself, you can literally achieve anything. The fact that I'm sitting here today should show you that. And if anybody is not happy where they are, the only thing that's stopping you from getting the life you want is you just doing the the same thing over and over again every day.

[Tommy Mello]

Oh, I love it, man. Thanks, Peter.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Yeah, thank you.

[Tommy Mello]

I appreciate you.

[Peter Meyerhoff]

Appreciate it.

[Tommy Mello]

That's a horrible handshake on my part. All right. That was great, brother. Hey there. Thanks for tuning into the podcast today. Before I let you go, I want to let everybody know that Elevate is out and ready to buy. I can share with you how I attracted a winning team of over 700 employees in over 20 states. The insights in this book are powerful and can be applied to any business or organization. It's a real game changer for anyone looking to build and develop a high performing company team like over here at A1 garage door service. So if you want to learn the secrets that help me transfer my team from stealing the toilet paper to a group of 700 plus employees rowing in the same direction, head over to elevateandwin.com podcast and grab a copy of the book. Thanks again for listening and we'll catch up with you next time on the podcast.