Whenever I'm telling the story, like, you know, 1 year high school walked on and played in college at D3. And then, though, hustle my way into playing pro ball, it sounds a lot more heroic than it felt. I'm not a I'm not a big fan of everything in moderation. I don't like when I even hear people say that. It just sounds like average. Is this reeks of averageness being in the middle? Yeah. Just joining the masses.
You you never once said someone saw me play gave me, a full ride offer invitation, like, literally nothing ever. Period. Which is so relatable to entrepreneurs. Welcome back to Gathering the Kings podcast. I am your host, Chaz Wolfe. And today, we are joined by Dre Baldwin, a former ball player pro basketball player turned entrepreneur and author.
Dre's journey from Philadelphia to the global stage and his transition from athlete to keynote speaker on the TEDx Age, not once, not twice, but four times accounting. He's written 11 books, has over 48,000,000 views on YouTube and is truly inspiring. He's here to share not only his insights on mental toughness and confidence and discipline, but his work on your game program so that you can elevate, go to the next level. Here we go. Welcome, Dre Baldwin to the King stage.
My brother, how we doing? I'm doing excellent, Chaz. How are you? You know, today's Wednesday. You know, I love Wednesdays. Really? I love every day. You too. You do too, though. Right? Yeah. I mean, they're all doesn't matter what day it is. That's right. It's another day to get it. Dre, I'm I'm excited for this conversation. You have a super unique background that the listeners just got to listen to in the intro, but tell us what kind of business that you have.
Well, I hope I can move up to that intro. But, as far as, my businesses, it's called work on your game. Chaz, it it all sprouted from my background as an athlete. I was putting content online before that was a normal thing to do. And just for basketball players, just teaching them how to actually literally play basketball. And they just started asking me questions about my mindset because they found out about my background, which I'm sure we'll get into a little bit.
And I just started talking about the mental tools that I was utilizing to Excel as an athlete. So things like showing up consistently and believing in yourself and having a mental substance to deal with setbacks and not sitting around waiting for someone to do something for you, but going in, kinda creating opportunities for yourself. And when I started talking about those things, of course, the players appreciated it, but people who didn't play sports started hearing those messages.
And they said, well, Jerry, this step applies to people who are off the basketball court as well. So that was kind of like the light ball moment that told me what my segway would be out of the sports realm into the professional and business realm, and I've been there ever since. So I stopped playing ball in 2015. And pretty much been, doing that. You know, our framework is based around, yes, mindset, also strategy systems, accountability.
They've known that for almost the last 10 years full time. Wow. I love it. And, of course, you've been on some cool stages and spoken in front of crowds and and really been able to, develop a message, really, of this mental toughness. Gonna get into some of that, but the the truth is is that you've gotten to where you have been not by happenstance because you you said you had to kinda create some opportunities for yourself.
Give us just a quick, like, you know, you you played ball, but, like, you and I, as ball players, you played professionally way above where I was, but We know what that means, but, like, give us just a little bit more, a little bit of the history, but then what does it mean to play at that level? Because it was it was up there. Yeah. Interesting question. So I was always into sports growing up. I got into basketball.
I got around to basketball by around age four team, which is pretty late if you're trying to go somewhere in the sports, like, play college ball or play professionally, let alone professionally. So I only play 1 year in high school, sat the bench, the 1 year I was on a tee. I people. I had a front row seat to all the games right there on the bench. Front row seat. And, got out of high school.
Oh, I knew I was going to go to college, period, But as far as sports goes, it's not like I was being recruited. No one was checking for me because I hadn't done anything in high school because your high school performance gets you into college as far as sports goes. Yeah. So I walked on to play in college, and that was at the division 3 level.
For those who don't know what walking on means, it means you really just walk in there and you try to play your way into an opportunity because you were not invited. Nobody knew you were coming. And I did that, but it was only at the d three level, which does not produce the pro players. Again, people who don't know the sports world, division 1 college sports is the stuff you see on television.
Then you have division 2, which you rarely see, and then division 3, which you never see, the guys down in the basement. And most of us at the the division 3 level, Chaz, are not even thinking about playing pro. They usually don't have ambitions of pro ball. That's why we're playing d 3. We usually don't have the pedigree to be professional players. But being that I was kind of a late bloomer, as I told you I started, wait, I could still feel myself getting better.
So getting out of college, I felt like I could play pro ball, but the rest of the world did not Agreed. So, again, no one was calling me to play pro ball when I got out of college. So my 1st year out of school, I worked a couple, quote unquote, regular jobs. I worked at Foot Locker, some of the sneakers that worked at a gym called Bali Total Fitnesships. And Bali is out of business now, but not because of me. I sold a lot of memberships at Bali's. Right, and a a summer of 2005.
So, again, everybody time frame 2005, I went to this event called an exposure camp, which is like a job fair for athletes. Yeah. You go there. You pay to go there. There's enough free. You pay, and it's basically a casting call. So a bunch of people who all think they're good enough to play pro. Same thing I did. We all show up and we all basically play ball for 2 days trying to impress somebody.
And the audience are people who can help you, agents, cook scouts, coaches, owners from teams all over the world. They come to these events to find people like us, but not everybody's gonna get a job. So I went to that event, played pretty Wolfe. I leverage my performance there. I didn't get signed on a spot, but I've leveraged that performance into finding me an agent. And agent is basically the goal between between the job and the person who wants the job That was me.
And my agent helped me get my first job. So I got my first plane job, playing professionally in, late summer 2005 in Countess Lithuania. So that started what became an almost 10 year long professional basketball career. So that's how I got started in pro bowl. Yeah. I mean, I'm I'm so glad that you gave that story exactly the way that you did. You gave it exactly how I wanted you to because I wanted the listener to hear all of the roadblocks.
You you never once said someone saw me play and gave me, a full ride offer invitation, like, literally nothing ever. Period, which is so relatable to entrepreneurs. And I know that you know this. I know this, but the listener might have heard your bio. And been like, oh, dude play professional ball. Of course, he's mentally tough and high level and, you know, naturally gifted and all the things. Right? What would you say to that? Well, a lot of people assume that. Right?
And I don't always I don't always correct them, Chad. So sometimes I just gotta make it Hey. That's alright. Depends on what I'm talking to. It depends on how much time we have, right, because now I have to explain all this. That's right. But Yeah. You're absolutely right. That when I tell people, hey. Well, my background is an athlete. They just assume all these things. That's right. They assume, oh, well, of course, you have talent. Of course, you have, always been the person who was selected.
Of course, you've always been a person who was chosen. You don't know anything about not being chosen, having to work your way up, having to go create an opportunity because Our vision of a professional athlete is, I mean, which is true is these people who are in the top 1 or 2% of the thing that they do and it's not because we just worked our way into it. You have to have a certain amount of you gotta hit a a certain genetic lottery to be a professional athlete. I mean, that's just the truth.
A lot of athletes don't like talking about that because it kinda diminishes their superhero status. Yeah. But you have to have a you have to have to hit the Internet router in a way. I'm 6 feet, 4 in all. My dad's, like, 58. My mom's, like, 57. Alright. I just got I got lucky. Alright. Had I been there, height? We wouldn't be having this conversation. That's right. If he's not on Not at all. Yeah. Right? So that's part of the deal.
So, yes, people do make that assumption, but then once they hear about the background, then they say they get a whole different perspective. So you're right about Yeah. And I wanna give just a a smidge more context here because I think this piece here is gonna launch us into a lot of the things that you teach people on a regular basis, but now knowing their back your backdrop, Knowing that, like, okay, my story actually lines up to yours quite a bit. I knew I wasn't gonna play d 1.
And so I actually stopped playing in high school because I could foresee not playing d 1 and not playing professionally going, well, if I'm not gonna make money doing this, I wanna stop now and start making money. So I'm at Foot Locker selling sneakers too. And linking. 2005 about the same timeline. We were colleagues. I was just saying, look, I'm 64. My mom's 57, and my dad's 59. So, look, I don't know if we're the same human or not, but here's what I'm saying. Alright. We gotta do a DNA test.
Yeah. And for the for the listeners and the ones that aren't watching, that'll be funny or later when you look us up online. The the opportunity here for the listener, hearing your story, and just like 10 seconds of mind and how it's like yours, is that single mom family, I had to create the opportunity. I I chose no basketball, but business instead because I had been making money on my own since I was thirteen. So What what do you say for the guy listening right now who's like, okay.
I hear you. I hear the truth in both of your stories. But how does that apply to me? What do I do with that? That's a great question. Well, the first thing I would course, get more context from that person, but being, I don't know who that person is, is they haven't decide where they wanna go. What's their outcome? Because what is an interesting thing you said there, Chaz, because And you said you knew you weren't gonna make money playing basketball, so you decided to let's put that aside.
I'm sure you still maybe play it at the direct center at the playground, but or you watched the games, but you knew you weren't gonna dedicate your life to it because you wanted to do something that made you money. But you knew your goal was to make money. And if it wasn't gonna be through basketball, let's find a way that it is gonna be. Let me find the right vehicle. So in, in our space, I had this thing called the 12 work on your game. Commandment.
Ask me to name all 12 because I don't know them all top of my head. But one of them is the right vehicle. You have to be in the right vehicle to get to where you wanna go. Yeah. And I find that a lot of people, especially in the sports Wolfe. And, I mean, it's your shows.
I wanna interview you, but I find it in the sports world that a lot of athletes they get really stubborn and kinda kinda pig headed about that when it's clear to writings on the wall that they're not going to do it in that thing. But they don't know when to give it up. That's right. They don't know when to walk away in strength. I call it walking away in strength because you didn't it's not like you just fell on your face and did nothing in basketball. You decided this is not gonna be my thing.
Let me do something else. Yeah. But a lot of athletes who I talked to over the years, they didn't know when to do that even when clear that that it wasn't gonna go the way they wanted it to go. Yeah. And then when they hear a story like mine, they're like, okay. Well, Drey Chaz proved Chaz even when it doesn't look good, if I keep trying, it'll eventually work. Well, yes, but at the same time, that's not always the case. Yeah. So there's a fine line between the two.
And you and you're a 100% right. We're talking about quitting being a quitter and Mhmm. And strategically looking at something and going, is this the vehicle that is best for me? Correct. And so how does that person listening right now? Maybe they're not considering being a professional athlete any longer, but they're, you know, maybe a year or 2 into their business, and they're really struggling. First couple of years are tough.
Maybe it's them and a person or 2 or 3 on their team, and they're not really profitable yet. And they're wondering, like, dang. Do I just shelf it and try something new? Or do I press in and become mentally tough, which we'll get to here shortly, and really make it through this this piece. So I This is the question that they might have. What would you what would you say generally? Obviously, because you don't know them. Yes. That's a $1,000,000 question right there.
So how do I know when I should keep pressing on this thing that is not currently working versus when I should walk away from it and find something else. That is the that's basically the question of why right there because we only get one chance of this. So the number one thing I would say to someone in that position, especially in the business world, is because you don't need genetics to be successful in business. You just need the right strategy, the right systems, the right mindset.
So Where are you getting your information from? Because if your thing is not working, perhaps, maybe you just have an inaccurate formula. An inaccurate formula just means you think that I need to do a, b, c, but you actually need to do d, e, f, g, and h. You're just not aware of what you're not aware of. Basically, in con unconscious incompetence. And you don't know what you don't know.
So maybe you just need to plug into the right person who has the right information, and now you plug into what they're saying as opposed to what you thought And now things start to work a little bit better. So sometimes people just have an inaccurate formula of what formula of what they're doing. For example, before I started playing basketball, Chaz, I was playing baseball. And I went to baseball practice every day, and I did all the stuff I was told to do.
I just didn't have any talent for baseball. My ceiling was a mediocre high school player. Had I stuck with baseball because I I don't wanna be a quitter. We wouldn't be having this conversation right because I was smart enough to realize this is not the right vehicle. I knew I wanted to play sports, but baseball was not the vehicle. I chose a different vehicle of basketball and then things started working. So sometimes you're just in the wrong place with the wrong formula and the wrong process.
And the good news about the world that we live in today in 2024 is that The people who have the right information and the right process, they make themselves available and accessible to tell you that they have the information. Whereas Chaz in the nineties, You had to hope that you have the right information. And and if you didn't have it, you were out of luck. Now it's all available to you. All you had to do is plug into it. Yeah. That's right. That's what they're doing right now.
Listening to you, of course. And, of course, you've got resources online. Like you said, you're in, YouTube OG, really. And so they, you know, the millions and millions of views that you've gotten online, they they can be one of those and and find a lot of your content on this.
But in that in that moment where I'm deciding, okay, is this the right vehicle or or strategy, or is it the right or, sorry, vehicle or strategy of formula, you know, it it's it's really a, a deciding factor of what is my target? We both said the same thing. You said I wanna play sports. That was the aim, the the definite, the chief aim. Mine was Yes. Chaz point to make money. Okay. So we just pivoted inside of the same goal. The goal never changed. The vehicle changed or the strategy changed.
And so okay. We've given him plenty of that. Let's talk about that chief aim, though, because this is gonna get us circled up to mental toughness. You didn't actually quit on baseball because baseball was never the target. Sports was the target, and now I would even say it's bigger than that, Give us what is that bigger aim. Obviously, it was smaller back then. It was basketball, but really basketball even played into what your bigger aim is now.
Tell us what that is and how it all kind of comes comes together. Sure. The bigger aim today? Yes. Because I assume looking backwards now, basketball was the those the point then, but now it plays even into what's you're doing now, which is probably a bigger level, a bigger picture. Yeah. And I can actually tell you both. So when I was playing ball, even when I was a kid before I even got around a basketball, my vision for me was that I just I knew people were gonna know my name.
Know people were gonna know who I was. It was a matter of how it was going to happen. So I knew it was gonna be through something that could be kind of mass mass marketed, and a lot of people could see it all at the same time. Now, again, this is I was born 1982. So the we're talking about the nineties. This Chaz we're doing now did not exist. This is there was no such thing, but I knew that this is what I I want to do something where people can know my name.
That big aim now today is we want work on your game to become the most ubiquitous term when it comes to personal and professional development. So if you make a copy of something, they call that a Xerox. So you take a picture that's called a a what they call it, Polaroid. Right. Right? He what you well, you know, Chaz a clean we want work on your game to be like, just do it when it comes to personal and professional development.
So one of the things that I need to do is make sure that the word gets out to people about who I am, what we do, what this is, and why it exists. I would guess most of the people listen to this never heard of me before this conversation. Yeah. So that's why we're doing this. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. You're introducing it. Okay. So just to kinda recap for the listener here, you, initially, it was baseball. Then it turned into basketball.
Then it turned into helping other people, but then even that's formatted now to this huge worldwide synonymous household name of when people think personal development, they think work on I gotta work on my game. Whatever that game is for them. And so That's right. That didn't happen overnight. Although, the cool part is is that what you said is way back then, what you wanted, truly wasn't even to play sports even. It was to be known or that you knew already that I'm gonna be successful. Right?
And if you take my story and reverse it, it wasn't that I wanted to make money. Of course, I grew up poor. Like, of course, I wanted to make money. But that wasn't like the ultimate chief aim. Truly, it was like, no. I'm gonna be successful. People are gonna know me or fill in the blank of whatever success looks like. So here we are as young kids, thinking the same thing generally, but that's developed over the course of time.
What do you think, like, the one thing that you've done to develop that that maybe the listener either hasn't yet, or maybe he's in the process or she's in the process of doing but can keep following along your track here. When you say develop that, what you're referring to? That, like, that transition from 1, but, like, one belief to the next of it just keeping getting bigger and bigger and bigger?
Yeah. For me, it's always I've always been pretty good at reframing and just creating that new vision in my mind. So when I first decided to stop playing basketball, I knew I had to create a new vision in my mind because the vision would always come back to something I could do on the basketball court whenever I got no excited or I got an idea. How is this gonna translate to doing it on the court? Right. But I knew I had to reframe in my mind. Okay. I need to translate that to now?
How do I do it at the at a desk? How do I do it in a boardroom? How do I do it on the stage? How do it as a business person? So that's that comes back to mental conditioning. And the conditioning is just about what are you telling yourself on a consistent basis? And the subconscious mind accepts things based on either emotionalization or repetition or a combination of both.
So when you repeat any thought, tell yourself anything over and over, you and the subconscious mind eventually accepts it no matter what it is, even if it's not true. You will come to accept it and believe it as a truth, and then your subconscious will start to influence your habits and your behaviors to act on the things that your subconscious believes because it controls about 85% of our thinking.
See, we think when we're making decisions that we're consciously thinking about them, but most of our choices are made subconsciously, and then constantly become up with a radical justification form. So for me, I understood this concept of mental conditioning, and I just had to start rewiring in my marine. Okay? Instead of framing everything through the lens of how do I do it physically Chaz an athlete, even though I still work out every day. Now is about how do I do it? Mostly, he's immensely.
Do I do it intellectually as a business person and create my success that way? So that was a as a process, it doesn't happen overnight. But when you're conscious and intentional about it, then you have the ability to control it. Yeah. Let's let's go deep here for just as quick second because this is juicy stuff. One of your quotes is that you will be at the level of your belief forever. Blake. Wait a sec. Let me say that again. You will be at the level of your belief forever.
Now what you didn't say is that I'm stuck. What you didn't say is that I can't keep growing. But you said that I'm always gonna be at my current level of belief. And so if I tie that to what you just said about my subconscious, knowing that I'm basically operating every single day without thinking, truly. 85, 95% of my daily actions are subconscious. And you're right. Like, I just had a little itch on my face, and so I I picked up and I went, like, this over my beard. Chaz was afterwards.
I realized it. It was underneath that when this feeling happens, this is the reaction that my hand and brain does, And later, my brain recognized it consciously that, oh, I have an itch and I move my hand, but it it was already happening to your point. Right. And we do this in life. Right? Situations happen, and we react based on the things that our programming tells us to do. And then logically, we're making a justification a on our reaction or our our our action.
Okay. So inside of that, how do I change that? You said I have to I have to be able to fuel it, right, but how do I change it so that the level of my belief continues to rise up so that I can continue going upon levels, upon levels, and growing? Sure. The answer to changing it is, first of all, we have to get conscious about the unconscious.
Because since 85% of our thinking is subconscious, meaning we are not consciously aware of the faults that are going through our heads and habits that we're even engaging in the way we think, the way we talk, etcetera, First thing is we have to start becoming conscious of them, which means we have to do a little bit more mental work. Takes a little bit more effort. And thinking is a job. Thinking is a task. People think thinking is just something that happens automatically.
And it does on one level, but if you wanna change your thoughts, you have to be thinking about what you're thinking. And that takes mental work and The fact that matters is that most people are mentally and physically lazy. And this is the reason why many people don't change because it's easier to not change, and there's gonna be things as they are than it is to change and put the energy into adjusting your situation. That's just a reflection of the law of inertia.
So what we need to do is get conscious about how we're thinking, catch ourselves in our results and ask us, ask yourself, what am I thinking right now? Why am I reacting this way? Why am I feeling this emotion right now? What led to this feeling? What led to this thought? What led to this behavior?
And once we start asking ourselves those questions, then sometimes those are tough questions because the answers that we're gonna get are gonna be based on things that we're so used to doing Chaz even when we're aware of them, we may not even be willing to change them. But if you're aware of them, then at least now you are you have the opportunity. You have the potential to do something about them. You're completely unaware of, you can't do anything about.
So once we come once we become aware, we can decide, do I wanna keep this habit? Do I wanna alter this habit? Do I need to delete and replace this habit? But, again, we have to become conscious of it first, which means we have to put a lot more mental energy into what is going on up here in our brains. So that we have, again, the potential and the ability to do something about it. And most people never even get to this point where we are in this conversation.
Not alone that it gets to the point of changing. Yeah. Okay. So let's let's and I agree with you 100%. So you gave some early practicals in here. Gave some questions. Listener, write those down. These are amazing questions. In essence, what you're saying is you slowed down enough to catch yourself and ask yourself why am I even doing what I'm doing? Okay. Right. So I've slowed down I've thought about what I'm thinking about. I've questioned why I'm doing what I'm doing. Now what do I do with it?
Because like you said, questioning it and being aware of it or conscious of it is step 1 or maybe step 2, but the next level of changing comes from internal employee reviews. So I'll explain to you how this works. So anyone anyone Chaz ever worked in a company USA Corporation. I never was in any corporation long enough for this to happen. But from what I understand, they do employee reviews. Right? Maybe it's every 90 days, maybe it's every 6 months, maybe it's once a year. Right?
You sit down with your supervisor or someone who's hiring you in rank and they go over what you've done on the job, what you can do better, know what you're doing. Great. Do more of, etcetera. We're gonna give you a raise, your fire, whatever. They tell you how you're doing. So you need to do internal employee reviews with your habits. And those reviews don't happen every 6 months or every quarter. They happen every day.
Every day, you need to line up your habits, line up your behaviors, Notice them, see what they are, and then ask yourself, either, a, this is a good habit. I'm gonna keep it and do more of it on purpose. B, this habit needs to be altered or adjusted.
I'm gonna change it in these ways so I can get to the outcome I want or c, the tablet is completely not serving me is taking me backwards because in light, there is no neutral, you're either getting better at getting worse, you're building, or destroying. This habit is fired. It's keycard is revoked. I'm calling security is gonna export this habit out of the building.
You have to make a decision, and you have to be clear on it like this in the black and white in black and white language because when you're unclear, when we when we lack clarity on things, Chaz, what happens is that ambiguity leads us to doing nothing. See when we're ambiguous on things, we end up doing nothing. We let things stay as they are. And before you know it, a year has gone by. 5 years have gone by.
You still same goals you Chaz 5 years ago and you made no progress on it, not because you don't have the ability or the motivation or the the skill or any of that, then information or resources common things people say is simply because you didn't get clear on what needs to stay and what needs to go, what needs to change, and what needs to remain as it is. When you have clarity, It's much easier to take action.
Yeah. And and I think the clarity of not only how to get rid of, but you also gave the clarity of Chaz is it that I want? You didn't say it quite like that, but we've been talking about that this whole time. At first, define what I want. And then as I'm serving all of my habits, right, then I can go, well, does it help me get that? Nope. Out. Does it help me get that? Yes. Keep it. Does it help me keep that? Well no. Not really out. Right? Like, we can be honest.
But if we don't have that guiding, like, what am I what am I after here, that's gonna be really tough for them. And to that point, the clarity of the target. Right? You said they have the same goals over and over, but they're 2 vague. They're too general. I wanna be successful, Dre? But I'm not becoming successful is because how I haven't defined it. Right? Right. That's right. So a lot of people throw around the term successful. What was that mean? What is successful for you? What?
Yeah. The notes success, and each person gets to define their own success, but you have to define it. What is success? And you can have different levels of success. So there's success when you're in the gym. There's success when you're at your computer. There's success when you're with your family.
So what makes something successful and since most people are unclear on that, then it's hard to make decisions and it's hard to do anything or do anything different because you're not clear on what success is. So you can't look at something to say yes, no, yes, no, because we don't know where we're going. Hey, Kings and Queens. Chaz Wolf. I wanna talk to you about something that's super important to me. We put a lot of time and effort.
We, meaning myself and my team, into this podcast, into the content that goes out every single day. And if you have been getting any sort of value or insight from this, we want it to be able to reach other business owners too. So we would love if you would like, comment, share, leave a review, post, share again, all of the things on social media, on all the different platforms, or even on the podcast mediums of Apple And Spotify.
We would love to be able to get our content into more hands, more entrepreneurs so they can grow their as quick as possible. Together, we are building a community of like minded entrepreneurs who are committed to growing their businesses to new heights. So let's do this. Let's help each other. Let's help each other grow. Yeah. I wanna I wanna put a situation in front of you.
I want you to tell me what you think, really, for the benefit of the listener, the the phrase that you used eventually doesn't serve me in essence, which is a phrase that I've used for a long, long time. And, so I agree with you. I look at things as just we've just discussed. What's my target? Does this serve me? If it doesn't, I don't do it. If it does, I'm, like, 100 down focused, absolutely do it, no quitting, that type of thing.
So for for this example, recently, in the last probably year, maybe not quite, I decided that sugar no longer served me of any kind. And and so I I'm I remember posting him on Facebook maybe 9 or 10 months ago about how I had decided the sugar doesn't serve me. And and there was a gal who made a comment about, basically, everything in moderation and, like, you know, I she gets joy from eating whatever that was that she really liked cake or whatever, and it brought her joy.
That's how it served her. And, so I wanna know your thoughts on Chaz, but but before I had I ask you your thoughts on Chaz. I actually thought the same thing before she it, before I'd posted it, before I'd made the decision, I thought, I really liked chocolate chip cookies. I mean, Drake, still today, even though I haven't eaten them in almost a year, I think chocolate chip cookies are great.
One of my favorite things to consume, but If the if the if the ingredients don't serve me, then it was an easy like, oh, this makes sense. It doesn't it's out. Boom. And then the question I followed it with was if it bring if it serves me by bringing joy, and that's why I'm gonna keep it, is it the only area that I'm getting joy? Like, do I have to get Joy here? Cause I know it doesn't serve me, but I'm keeping it around in that example for her. Because it brings me joy. I was like, no. No. No.
I can't I'm joy in so many other areas. I don't need this joy. It's out. Tell me your thoughts on that whole thing. I'd be curious. So the first thing is I am not a fan of the phrase everything in moderation, number 1. I'm not a fan of that phrase. Pretty pretty vanilla. Yes. Exactly. And I I'd tell I've told my audience Chaz vanilla only works in ice cream, and it was one other thing. Maybe cake frosting and speaking of sugar. So I'm not a I'm not a big fan of everything in moderation.
I don't like when I even hear people say that. Yeah. It just sounds like average. Is this ricks of averaging this being in the middle. Yeah. Just joining the masses, everything in moderation. So, no, I don't I don't even like that freeze. So as far as the not wanting not having the sugar. That's very interesting. I couldn't live like that because I got sugar on my desk right here, so I I had to throw everything away. And this includes fruit. Not fruit. Okay. Processions. Chemical sugar.
Okay. Yeah. Gotcha. Yeah. Alright. So, I First of all, I write the fact that you made a decision as a clear decision, and it's there's no ambiguity with it because all you gotta do is read the label. Okay. So you can't eat the Snickers bar ahead 2 days ago. You can't eat the Skittles ahead yesterday. You can't eat the whatever this is on my my meal delivery service. Give me a little snack. I know it's sugar in there. So Chaz you couldn't eat that. You can't drink, Gatorade. Alright. No soda.
Alright. Nope. Alright. So all the sugars Auto Sugar's, you know, yes or no. Is it clear binary? Yes or no? And that kind of clarity, as far as as far as life goes, a lot of people don't have it. And when they have that when you have that clarity, it's much easier just to make decisions. You can do things a lot faster. You can be a lot more decisive. There's a whole lot less ambiguity.
There's a lot less, indecision in life, and then you can move forward on whatever you wanna move forward on much more easily. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. I wanna give the listener an encouragement because you actually did it, you know, subconsciously there even by saying that you still, you know, had a snickers bar and stuff like that. Just in order to be mentally tough, you don't have to give her a sugar. You don't have to fill in the blank. You don't have to do anything.
But what you do have to do is whatever's right to get wherever you wanna go. And so once you define that, then it's like, do you want it, or do you not want it? Because what I have found is that people say that they want something, but then they're not willing to actually do it. Talk to talk to the crowd just for a half second on, you know, on that That's a whole can. I get it. But, like, just give us your thoughts. Right.
Yeah. When it comes to people saying that they want things, I mean, all of us want a whole lot of things. The, excuse me, the biggest challenge, Chaz, is are we willing to pay whatever the price is to get it? So the first thing we need to do once we decide we want some, because another wrong one You can want everything that you want. The next thing you need to do is figure out, what does it cost to get it? And costs can be literal, like, financially. But it also can be, what do I have to give?
I wanna lose £20. So how often do I have to go to the gym? How many miles do I have to run? How many bottles of water do I have to drink? How many burpees do I have to do? Right? So you need to know what the cost is and then decide, am I willing to pay this cost, or am I not willing to pay this cost? And that's fine. If you decide you don't wanna pay the car, then that's fine.
You can walk away and do something different, but we need to find out what that cost is so that we can in our minds decide what we are going to move forward with and what we're not gonna move forward with because as humans, we have some limitations. We can only do one thing at a Chaz only be in one physical place at a time, and we all are literally on the clock because we all gonna reach a point called death where we don't have any more time to do anything else.
So we have to decide what we are gonna do, what the priorities are. Hopefully, we can get as much in as we can in the time that we have, but we have to decide what are we doing and what are we not doing and not have so many things kinda sitting in the the mental parking lot of I wanna do that. I'll eventually get to it, but there's no time on it.
And that's what tragically happens to a lot of us because we have all these things that we wanna do, but we never, you know, get urgent and serious about actually getting to it. Yeah. Chaz clarity PC gave to us a few minutes ago is a big part of that because if they're drifting, as Napoleon, he'll calls it and outweighing the devil, If they're drifting, then there's no clarity.
And so then, therefore, they're just gonna talk about the things that they quote, unquote want, but they don't actually really want them because they're just kinda drifting through life. They don't actually paying any attention to what they're doing or what their what their thoughts are, even going back to our earlier conversation. You've said publicly that you were just foolish enough to believe that you could fill in blank. Be successful, play, pro ball.
Like, there's been a lot of things that you've been able to accomplish. Even at a young age. And so what's that foolishness enough to believe feeling or belief that you have looking back? Well, looking back, I wasn't even seeing it that way. It's something I can freeze it that way now.
Sure. Because when I know whenever I'm telling a story, like, you know, 1 year high school walked on and played in college, d three, and then the hustle my way into playing pro ball, it sounds a lot more heroic than it felt, I guess, the best way to describe it, because when you're in the midst of it, you're not thinking about, oh, this is gonna be an amazing story because I'm gonna make it. And then the 20 years later, I'll be telling the story on a podcast. I wasn't thinking that way. Right.
I was just thinking, what's the next thing that needs to happen? What needs to be true in order for me to take the next step? And that's just the way I would thought. What would what would need to be true for me to play pro ball? Well, somebody had to sign me. Well, if I'm gonna play overseas, I've never even been out of the country. How am I gonna play overseas? They don't know me. Wolfe, an agent. They know the agent, so I need to get an agent, but no agents are trying to sign me.
So how do I get an agent the one assigned me? Well, I needed some proof that I can play against pro level players. I played d 3, so that's not proof. So I gotta go to this exposure camp. So let me play against these guys, and that can be proof. So then when I went to the exposure camp, okay, now I can go call agents. Now I have something to show them. So all I was doing was just deconstructing. And what we what we call that now, I call it the reverse road map.
So we just create that road map in reverse. For what would need to be true in order for this to happen, this to happen, this to happen, and I just worked backwards through those steps of what I needed to do. So I knew I could play And I just needed to prove it somewhere that mattered in front of people who matter, and I needed some evidence.
I needed footage So that was that was just the process that I had to go through, but I wasn't looking at it as I'm dumb enough to keep trying because in that myopic Wolfe. You run into a home with the players who play d 3 in small colleges and jukekos and didn't really play college ball at all, but they all think they can play pro ball. So we were all at that exposure camp.
Yeah. So when you're in that world, it doesn't seem that outlandish because you're around a bunch of people who are all thinking the same thing. Right. When you get into the bigger world and you're outside of that space, then it seems more, more incredulous, I guess, for lack of a better term, simply because you're around amongst people who don't think that would. Yeah. But at the time, I mean, I was young. I had enough time to go and try stuff. Right?
If I Chaz been 35 trying it, it'd been a different story than if I was 22 trying it. But, again, I was never looking at it as I was dumb enough to keep trying, but now I can say that now that it now I'm looking back on the story. Now somebody who tried the same thing to us and didn't succeed, they probably wouldn't use that language. Right. Right? Yep. And one of the things that I I tell people all the time is that because I get I would get this question often, especially from athletes.
And I'm sure you get it also from entrepreneurs. Now entrepreneurship is a little bit different from sports in that you can be an entrepreneur in your entire life. You can be an entrepreneur for 50 years. Sports career windows are extremely small. You only have this much time to be an athlete. Like, if I've decided I wanted to play basketball right now, it's 28. I don't have a physicality to do it.
So when it comes to the sports world, I would get people asking me, well, Jerry, how do I know whether I should keep going or if I should quit. And there is no black and white answer to that question in anything. There's no black and white if this is happening, quit, if this is happening, keep going. The real answer is we won't know till we get to the end of the story.
Yeah. And the whole thing with me and given my background, the reason why I can tell this story now, and it is a great story great origin story and background story is because I ended up being successful. I ended up making it as an athlete, so the story sounds great. But somebody who had the same background who didn't make it, they're not gonna tell this story.
They had to their story has the bill a little bit different, and they had to figure out a different way to talk about it because It doesn't in the exact same way. So we don't know till we get to the end of the story whether you were right or wrong.
Yeah. And I and I love that you've positioned it as a story because even for that person who maybe did have the exact same circumstances, but didn't didn't play final, you know, pro ball and the and the final, storyline there, Is that is that truly the end of their story? We both know. No. That's that's absolutely not the end of the story. It wasn't the end of your story. That's just a segment of your story that you can leverage now.
And so for that other person who might be listening, literally, it was like, oh, I tried to play it. That's me. You know? The the cool thing is is that the story is not done, and you can still leverage how I pressed and pushed and tried to play poor ball. And I and and it didn't work. But I then the rest of the story. You know? That's the beauty of it is that we control the rest story, even still today, even though, like, quote, unquote, Dre, you've made it.
And now you're helping other people make it. You're still today writing your story, and the Dre at 50 is gonna look back and be like, dude, I was on this crazy podcast with this other guy, like, the white version of me, you know, and we talked back and forth. And it was, like, this incredible conversation, but, was, like, 30 years ago, man, and maybe we're on a beach together or something. I don't you know what I mean? So right.
We can still write the story from here, and so that's the encouragement to listener. You you just to kinda fill in some gaps here for the listener, you've you've done 4 TED Talks, but you've applied, like, 30 something times. You know, we can keep going down the list, right, of all the things that you maybe, like, hit the ceiling on and then press through. I think that there's, like, a commonality here.
Give us something that you pressed up against that you actually did pivot away from outside of baseball. Outside of baseball? Man, well, Someone was asking me this other day, but I've probably put out for every product that I put out that did pretty Wolfe, like, did made sales. I probably got 20 that did not didn't make any sales. Maybe 0, maybe only a handful.
Maybe I put it out and said, I just brought it actually, when I'm explaining to the public doesn't sound as good as it sounded in my So I've had plenty of those. I remember there was a time when I was gonna sell a autographed photos of myself. Nobody bought any Chaz was a huge relief builder. Yeah. And this is a right around the time when, you know, Chaz social media and all that was starting to become a thing.
So selling a picture of yourself, I guess, wasn't that good of a deal, or maybe I'm just not that as famous as I thought I was. So, yeah, that that was one. But as far as, products, again, I've created so many, especially back in the basketball space, I created a bunch. And some of them did really well, and they basically made up for the rest of them. The eightytwenty principle. So 20% of products made up for the 80% that didn't do anything.
Yeah. I I'm so glad that you put that in there because, obviously, you know, with with the story that you've given so far, they might be wondering, well, you know, it's just a golden glove, you know, everything he touches he he wins at, but we both know that that's not true either. It's not true for that. For for some kicks and giggles here, like, you've got one video from back in the day. I don't know the exact date, but it's got over a million views. There's absolutely no talking.
It's just you running drills, and millions of people have seen this and and hundreds and hundreds, maybe even a couple thousand comments. I can't remember exactly what's on my head, but did you ever think Chaz would happen. Like, that would be maybe one of your ones that clicked and helped bring you to where you are. You mean, the video itself or do it with you? And or just like the creation. Like, when you were thinking, like, alright. Let me set up the camera and we're gonna run some drills.
Like, what were you in the moment thinking? And then now what do you think looking back on that? So I think I got a couple of videos that are at that level. Those I pretty much knew once I saw how they started to go. So when I got on YouTube with the basketball stuff, I could see, by the way, the audience was responding, like, okay. I'll just keep doing this. But I never had a video go, like, viral. Those videos got to a million views over years, many years of being viewed.
I had a a piece of content. I was looking through my old stuff just the other day, so it's funny that you mentioned this Chaz. I tell people, I got, like, 20,000 pieces of content out I'm open 20,000 when it comes to going viral. I've never gone viral. Nothing. So only thing is I put out 20,000 pieces of content. That you just multiply that by, you know, a few eyeballs each one, and then you have a name. And then you can you can Google yourself, and there's a bunch of results.
I knew sometimes when I make videos that this one is gonna be good, this one is gonna pop off. A lot of people are gonna see it, but at the same time, the ones for which I was right, I thought that about 10 different videos, 1 out of 10, it actually did it. Yeah. Right? So there are times I put out a video on my this is gonna be amazing. People are gonna love this. And it didn't really do anything. Yeah. Might get 500 views and it it dies. Alright?
And then I'll put out something and I'm like, I don't even like that much. I don't even think this is that good. I might not even put this out, then I put it out and the audience loves it. Yeah. So you never really know. Yeah. Your big project that you're working on now, you've already made it clear. It's work on your game, becoming synonymous with personal development. I believe you have a tattooed on your arm as well. Like, I do. You wanna talk about some deep belief. Right?
What is work on your game? Make you know, make that clear to the listener. How can they engage with you? And and put all this in the show notes too. I'm not just like, hey. Tell tell me about it. I want you to, like, really walk me through. I think we've done a pretty good job already in the show of walking through what they might experience with working with you. But Give us just a little bit more.
What is work on the game and why would an entrepreneur or really anybody for that matter wanna engage with your product to be able to develop themselves. Well, thanks for the question. So work on your name is where we take the tools to help athletes get to the top 1% of the sporting Wolfe, and we translate those tools over to the business world and to everyday life to help professionals perform at their highest level, do so consistently. And, of course, make more money in your business.
That is literally what we do here at work when you're getting. And it started with that framework. It started with mindset. That's where it began. So the discipline and confidence mental toughness personal initiative, that's the first piece of what we do. Then it moves into the strategy. We talked about the road map in reverse. Then we move into the system. How do we do the same things, the same way every time? In other words, how do we create that consistency of outcome?
And then the last piece is the accountability. How do we make sure that everything is working as it's opposed to be, and how do we make sure everyone is working as they are supposed to. So those are our 4 pieces, mindset, strategy, systems, and accountability. I love it. And who's a good fit for work on I mean, you wanna make it synonymous, so I get it. It's everybody. But Yeah. Right now, someone's listening, call them the good fit is the ambitious person.
Person who is ambitious, you have Right now. Big goals. You have big things that you wanna achieve. You're not okay with just being okay. You're not okay with just being amongst the masses, being amongst the group, and what you do. And not only are you ambitious, but you have a sense of urgency about reaching that ambition.
And you appreciate someone who's just a straight shooter where you can just get to the point, talk about where you're at, where you wanna go, what you feel like might be on your way, and you just wanna make sure that you have crystal clarity as to where you're at, what you need to do next, and you know exactly what those next steps are that you need to take. That's really what I like to give people.
And when I'm having my conversations with people who I work with, those are the things they most point out. Like, I appreciate that now I have clarity. I came here confused and not knowing, but now I'm clear on what I need to do next. And next time we talk, I have those taken care of. We can get on to the next thing. Looking for that ambitious person who also has the urgency and they have the skills. They have the tools.
It's just that they need clarity on what to do, how to do it, when, and where to do it. Yeah. I just wanna put a little plug in here because we we've just met here today, but I just I just think so highly of you already and there's a lot of people that help listeners, entrepreneurs, me, you, whatever, get clear. And I love that. That's a huge part of what you do, but I think you displayed an amazing, show here today of what looks like, what it looks like after clarity.
Because it can't it can't just be like, hey. I wanna work with you, Dre, and you got me clear. And that's cool. But then, like, we'll see you later. You there's multiple steps after that, you outlined them, and that's what I actually appreciate about you the most, is in your story, it wasn't just the, maybe naive or foolish belief. Yes. It wasn't just the mental toughness to go, you know what? I'm gonna freaking stick to it. It wasn't just the, you know, clarity on this is exactly what I want.
Here's what go do. It was the due wing. It was the deciding and then the due wing. And, of course, you gotta you gotta you gotta move that and and and modify that as you go and as you change, but you gave plenty of examples of how you made it to the pros or how you've been successful in business. Through all those things and then execution. And so that's what I just appreciate you about. You didn't you didn't toot your own horn in that way. Enough, I felt like.
And so I just wanted to do it for you. If I drag out one last question here for you, brother. If you had the opportunity just to roll back the clock, you got the younger Dre in front of you. Tap him on the shoulder, and you whisper in his ear. What do you tell? Starting investing in yourself as early as possible. That's the number one thing that I would tell would tell my will tell my children Chaz, and that's what I would tell my younger self.
Investing yourself as early as possible in forms of the material you're taking in, of course, you can financially invest in yourself and getting around the right people. 1, 2, and 3. Yeah. Love that. The impact has Not only being great for you, but I can second those things. That's what I'm currently doing with my children and what I would absolutely do with myself. The next step for somebody to find you, give us a quick spot on how they can engage with you or find you online.
The Best Place to find me online outside of social media is work on your game, university.com. That's what we do. That's where all of our focus on attention is right now. As we do all our coaching, our programs, etcetera. As far as social media, I'm on every single platform. I'm public on every platform, so I'm very easy. I'm hard not to fine. So I'm very easy to find, probably most active on Instagram at Drake Baldwin, but we publish on every platform at least 6, 7, 8 times a day.
So Like I said, I'm hard to not find. Just whip me up on whatever your favorite platform is. I'm there. Yeah. I love it, Dre. You're an incredible, not a human, but a mind that's, now impacting others by the thousands or maybe even millions at this point. So congratulations to you and your success. Thank you for being with us for just a short time. Pouring into those that we may never even know by name. That's how I define a king. So thanks for being here, brother.
Appreciate you. Well, Chaz, I appreciate you sharing your platform. Thank you for the opportunity. Thank you for listening to gathering the Kings today. I hope that you were able to pull out a few nuggets to go apply into your business right away. More importantly, though, I hope you're realizing that it takes more to be successful than just being by yourself, doing it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself.
What I have realized, not only in my own journey from multiple businesses and multiple different industries, and now interviewing over 2 or 300 other very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is that it's tough to do it alone. And so gathering the Kings exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs. In fact, we are putting together 1000 teams, specifically who are grateful, but not done.
We're intentionally assembling kings who fight tooth and nail for their business, family, and communities, and here's what we believe. That in the pursuit of excellence in those areas, that it ignites within us the responsibility to governed power and forge a lasting legacy. So if that relates and and resonates with you and you know that you need people around you sharp. Qualified other very successful business owners, I want you to go to gathering the king's dot com.
I want you to take a look at what doing and see if it makes sense for you to be part of our pursuit to 1000 kings. Talk soon.