This. Podcast
A podcast experience about friends sharing their views on society and culture. Hosted by Jay Cain, with Courtney Hysaw and Damion Wright. They have compelling stories, amazing guests, and more. Topics range from politics, music, sports, you name it they'll talk about it, but for the most part they like to have fun and laugh!
This. Podcast
#117 - "Beautifully Savage" (ft. Joe Buckner)
In this weeks episode the Jay and crew sits down with Joe Buckner. A community pillar, fitness studio owner, and a resilient spirit who has walked the road less traveled.
Growing up as a minority in Fort Collins, Joe's journey is woven with challenges, resilience, and lessons learnt the hard way. From unfolding the layers of his unique upbringing, his stint as a Subway employee, his foray into the drug trade, and to his transformative journey into entrepreneurship - Buckner's narrative is a testament to the power of perseverance. Hear about his time in prison, the life-altering boot camp experience, and how a passion for boxing became his vehicle for change.
Transitioning from a problematic past to owning a successful boxing studio, Joe's story is an inspiring narrative of transformation. His insights on the potency of a name, the responsibility of greatness, and the importance of fostering excellence in others, are compelling and thought-provoking. We also touch upon his potential political ambitions and the experiences that have molded his understanding of perseverance and self-confidence as stepping stones to success. Buckle up for a roller-coaster ride of life lessons with Joe Buckner.
This podcast Bussin' Bussin'.
Speaker 3:Welcome to thispodcast. I'm your friendly host, jay. Join by my friends. We got Co man man, man, man man man, what are we talking about? And then we got.
Speaker 4:Uncle.
Speaker 3:Dainmo.
Speaker 1:Hi, my name's Uncle Dainmo.
Speaker 3:You can catch us at all streaming platforms and video on YouTube. Shout out to the incredible Lawrence and Larimer. You can catch them at 3225 East Co Facts, or you can go to LawrenceandLarimercom and get you some nice summer drip. It's the fall now, y'all, it's almost here.
Speaker 4:Hey, they're switching over in here, you can tell.
Speaker 3:They are yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:Yeah, we going into the fall. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:They got it. They got everything you need, Although I see the halter tops still.
Speaker 4:There's a couple long sleeves in here.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:I just see a boxing glove. Yeah, that's what I get excited about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's what I get excited about yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:Ready to whoop some ass. It's beat all odds. That's their slogan. Oh, that's their slogan.
Speaker 3:Absolutely Well, let's get right into it, the voice that you are hearing. He is a community leader from Fort Collins. You're the first guest we've had from Fort Collins, so get it up for Fort Collins. And owns the boxing studio Beauty Savage.
Speaker 2:Beautifully Savage, beautifully Savage.
Speaker 3:Yeah, let's give a round of applause to Joe Buckner for joining us today. Absolutely, man. Welcome, man. It was a bit of a drive for you down here. We were trying to figure it out as far as the timing and everything but you made it, I did.
Speaker 2:I mean, this is normally my bedtime, so that means this is a big deal to me.
Speaker 3:That's the first thing Dave will tell me. He was like. I was like can you ask him to push it out? Just you know, 738? He's like oh man, that's cutting into his bedtime. But I felt you, I felt you, I felt you. Yeah, that's what I responded, so I get it.
Speaker 2:No man the transparency is key too. And it was a cool opportunity to come connect with, like some great black men and have a cool conversation, and so I just I'm humbled anytime anyone asked me to be a part of one of this. So one Friday I can stay up till 1030.
Speaker 5:Well, that tells us you got to get out of here a little bit.
Speaker 3:Well, we're excited to have you because it's a long time in the making. You and demo got a special relationship because you guys went on a coaching seminar together.
Speaker 3:Not coaching certification, certification Got it and that's how the two of you hooked up. But I mean, even before that I've heard your name out there of like all the stuff that you're doing, especially, you know, helping out the youth, your trials and tribulations that you've gone through, and we'll go through that. But yeah, tell us a little bit about you growing up, because we off camera, we were talking about you just growing up in Fort Collins. Tell us a little bit about just that experience of you being black in Fort Collins and what that was like in the what?
Speaker 4:early, early 80s, yeah, early 80s yeah.
Speaker 2:So I was born in 1975. And, to give more context, I'm black, but I'm also half Mexican. So yes imagine seeing a little black kid that can only speak Spanish, like that was the beginning of my life, because my parents were young. My father was 16 and my mother was 18.
Speaker 3:You grew up with your grandparents, and they were from Mexico.
Speaker 2:They're from Mexico, yeah absolutely. The only language I knew how to speak was Spanish. So people that have known me since I was a pup like it's so weird to be like this little jet black kid that only knew how to speak Spanish, so Spanish was my first language Growing up in Fort Collins.
Speaker 3:See, if you were in New York, though you that that'd be.
Speaker 2:Dominican? Right, yeah, that'd be Dominican. Growing up in Fort Collins was the second time actually I've answered this question in two days. Growing up in Fort Collins for me was cool because I was an athlete growing up so I learned in five varsity sports, so I played football in college so I was celebrated, so it wasn't bad for me. Openly Got it? Right, yeah, because that's the equalizer Sports. So on the flip side, I want to add this caveat I got to see my children grow up in Fort Collins without that and the stuff that they had to deal with and the names they were called and the bullying that happened. Because when you're the one of the two people that looks like you in the space and you're not in the front of the newspaper every Friday, or it's different right.
Speaker 2:So I always acknowledged my privilege growing up in a place like Fort Collins.
Speaker 5:Wow, really that's deep.
Speaker 2:I went to phenomenal schools. I got to see that, even though I was poor, everyone wasn't poor, right? Because if you grow up in a place where everyone is poor, that just becomes your lens of the world.
Speaker 2:You can't aspire to something you've never seen, but my friend's parents were judges, doctors, attorneys, and they always wanted me in right, and so I constantly acknowledged my privilege as well, as I didn't grow up seeing rampant crime, police brutality. So my view of the world was always like the world is a just and fair place and I can get whatever I want to get because they got it, so why can't I? So, while there was challenges being the only, there was also some privilege, because as I got older in my life, I had those connections. So if I want to do a business, hey, I need 50 grand. Oh, we got you.
Speaker 2:A lot of people don't have that right. Or, hey, I need these permits to go through. My friend works in the permit office. Right, I need to talk to this person at the bank. Oh, my friend's dad is the VP of that bank. So I always want to make sure I acknowledge my privilege. Growing up in a place like Fort Collins, as well, as I'm comfortable everywhere, I'm comfortable everywhere, right. So it was interesting being the only, as well as it had some advantage.
Speaker 3:You know about that because I like how you phrased it. You being in that environment probably made you comfortable being with white people or people that were not black, just being in different cultures. Right, and I do think Coz even talked about this. Not to put you on the spot, co, but going to that environment and then just growing up in that and then when you have to go to, like corporate America for example, then you might not know how to operate and navigate and might either make you or break you in some cases, right, like. So I do think that's cool that you do say, hey, that is the advantage that you know I was the only black kid there. You know I was the only unicorn there. So operating in that atmosphere made me a better communicator, better just skills that you pick up doing that.
Speaker 5:So you never. So we was talking earlier. We were just talking about, you know, predominantly black cities, but that you visited. You said you had, like you had, moments where you've got overwhelmed with emotion, kind of being on the flip side of things in regards to not being the only black person to build him, man, but you never want to hold your keys a little tighter.
Speaker 5:No, you never like no clutch your wallet a little bit man amongst your people, Amongst my own people, amongst your own people, being a being that you grew up in. No, no for college.
Speaker 2:I mean, I've been boxing since I was six, so I've never been afraid. There you go, you got those hands and I'm not saying that from an arrogant standpoint, like that's what I feel like combat sports teaches you is confidence.
Speaker 1:I agree.
Speaker 2:I've never and I'm not saying that from an arrogant I've never been afraid of a human. When I went to prison I was never afraid because I know how to take care of myself. So if it turns into that, like I'm good, so I've never. You know, when I was young we were poor, so I used to go to free, free summer camp salvation army camp and the kids from Denver that looked like me would make fun of me. They said, oh, you talk like a white person, or they would pick on me. But I mean it didn't bother me because I just knew we were different, we didn't come from the same place. So no, I never. I never had that. But again, my daughter, for example, the oldest, who lives in Baltimore now when we were young, when we would drive to Denver she'd be like dad, lock the doors. Oh, wow, lock the doors, right, my little girl's 11. Dad, I don't want to go to Denver, like it's scary, right, wow. And so me, no, but I've seen it in my children.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and you know, one thing you talked about that we didn't sit on is you said you know I am like this little black kid that English is the second language. As my bed, english is the second language. I was raised to speak Spanish. Talk about that dynamic and how that even started, because that, like when we were talking behind the scenes, that blew my mind.
Speaker 2:Well, my like I mentioned earlier, my father was 16 and my mother was 18 when I was born.
Speaker 2:They were married and then he left, and when I got older, I was easy to reconcile that because I'm like God, I couldn't imagine being 16 with a baby. So my grandparents took care of me because, well, I've actually never shared this before, but I'll share it with y'all they took me when I was about almost two because my mom had gotten me some childcare and like some bad things that happened to me. I was with these people and my grandparents just felt like I wasn't safe anymore, and so my grandparents took me and they kept me for three years, and so really, I mean they're Mexican people Like my mom, to this day predominantly speaks Spanish, so that's the only language that was spoken at home. There wasn't really any reason for me to speak English, and so that was my whole lens. And if my cousins were in here, actually, can I tell you a funny story?
Speaker 3:Please yeah.
Speaker 2:So my cousin Mark Anthony, two summers ago I was helping these guys with some branding for their business and I said, like this is what the logo should look like, so on and so forth. And another guy came in that was also half black and half Mexican. And my cousin Mark Anthony, I love him. But he points to the guy and he says, thomas, come here, we need a black guy. To look at this. I said I'm sitting right here.
Speaker 1:I said, no, you're not black, you're not black.
Speaker 2:He's like you eat menudo and pozole. You're not black.
Speaker 2:We need him over here and I was like but like that's the lens, Like they don't see me as that because all they've known is like I'm Mexican, yeah Right. And so my oldest friend's name is Jeremy. When we were younger, I spent the night at his house one time and his mother is white and I ran upstairs. I'd never seen his other grandparents before. And I ran upstairs to get some cereal and I stopped. I saw two old white people sitting on the couch and I was like, uh, I'm going to be right back and I ran downstairs. I said, hey, man, it's too too old white people sitting on the couch upstairs.
Speaker 1:He says uh no one in your house even speaks English.
Speaker 2:Why is that weird to you? And I was like, Touche, I'm going to go. So that's where it comes from.
Speaker 4:But that's my life, and let's go one step back.
Speaker 5:We've got you, we've got you to Fort Collins.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, so that's oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So, um, my, my grandfather met my grandmother in a little town in Mexico called Musquis, which is in Cahuila. So a lot of black people who couldn't go north ended up going south into Mexico and this particular town it's called Musquis, you can, you can research it. These people were referred to as Moscow go people. So they're black people that were Mexican, and so some of them also had seminal, and so there's a whole town there where the people are their dark skin, they have nappy hair, but they're Mexican and that's where my grandparents from. That's where my grandparents met. So my grandmother is Maria Angelito Rosales Gonzalez, but my grandfather's Ralph Wilson. So that's where they met.
Speaker 2:And then from there my grandparents moved to Colorado to be potato farmers and all the kids from the age of five on worked in the potato fields, and a lot of Mexican people back then in Fort Collins Fort Collins back then had signs that said no dogs are Mexicans. So they all worked in the fields. So that's how my family ended up in Fort Collins, colorado was that. My grandparents moved there and, ironically, my grandfather brought all of his brothers and sisters which is normal back. Yeah, my grandma brought all but two of her sisters. So I sometimes joke like 95% of the people I'm related to live in Fort Collins, colorado. That's amazing, literally. Oh, that's my cousin, oh, that's all my cousin. That's also my cousin.
Speaker 3:You know that's crazy. I don't think that gets talked about enough. Just the you know African diswaro that's in Mexico. Yeah, because when you go there and you visit you see dark skin Mexicans and you're like, oh, like you know, to Americans, black right, like that's how we just differentiate it. But it is amazing that that history that's there that doesn't get talked about, talked about as much.
Speaker 4:And Jay, to your point, mexico, central America, South America yeah, it's like the gamut. You see the same thing.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely yeah, Across Central America, even in South America, like we've been there.
Speaker 2:It's like we talked about earlier. Mexico celebrated Juneteenth as a national holiday before the United States of America. That blew my mind.
Speaker 3:That did Really Wow. I never knew that.
Speaker 2:Juneteenth is a big deal of Mexico, wow.
Speaker 3:Northern Mexico.
Speaker 4:Northern.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, like Tijuana, like right by Texas.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like all by the border. Yeah, so like Matamotos, which was another place where a lot of black people ended up. But interestingly enough, matamotos actually means like, kill black people.
Speaker 4:Damn.
Speaker 2:Wow, it's yeah. So yeah, like right there on the border, yeah.
Speaker 3:Okay, it's a big deal, yeah, cool, well, moving along. I wanted to talk about so that's awesome how you got the four Collins, and then let's talk about you know how you met your bumps and bruises in a row, like along your journey is like where you got to today, and a little bit of that and I want you to tell the story is that you went to, you went to jail the county.
Speaker 2:I went to prison, prison you went to prison and okay, okay, yeah, let's give it all to him. I went to.
Speaker 3:Yeah, department of Corrections. Yeah, department of Corrections, that's what I was saying For you to get there. And you talked about it because I was listening to a particular pod. It was just like long story short. You were working like a nine to five. Somebody asked you hey, where can I get some drugs? Yeah, that drug actually was ecstasy. Yes, you was like I don't do that, but I can figure it out, like I know somebody.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And then from there you kind of got onto this drug dealing trip. So tell us a little bit about that journey and how you got locked up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and actually what he said to me, his name was Dan, to this day.
Speaker 5:I would love, I would love to like everybody knows, dan wanted something, so I would love to find Dan.
Speaker 2:Oh, so you don't know where Dan is. No, but like, like thinking back in hindsight, and so we talked about growing up in four Collins. The other thing it makes you really good at is code switching.
Speaker 3:We could be doing this, since you were this big right Code switching right.
Speaker 2:So when you're at work you never want to be the angry black guy because you got to keep this job. So when Dan says, hey Joe, you're black, do you know where I can get some drugs?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Maybe, so so so he looked at you as a black man, right Astacy.
Speaker 2:No, no, what he said was like he just said drugs. I'd have been like I'd have been like crap. He just said drugs Like. He just made a sweeping generalization of like drugs.
Speaker 3:Yeah. If I wanted, he got because I want to get into a like the difference between the crack addicts and the ecstasy addicts Like what? Is that dynamic?
Speaker 4:But keep telling your stories. Black.
Speaker 2:Dan and white Right.
Speaker 1:There, you go so.
Speaker 2:So, dan, dan asked the question and gosh, I got to tell you, man, anybody that is an entrepreneur that has, like you're, just kind of made different, yeah.
Speaker 1:And you've known it your whole life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you will leave your job at Subway on your lunch hour because you're like I can't handle this Right. And then you'll take the whooping from your mom because she told you needed to get a job. You're like I can't have these people telling me what to do. Hey, I boy Darcy's like that. So when Dan says, can you do this Like I knew dudes that, like my little cousin sold weed, I can say it now because he got in trouble, like whatever it was a long time ago. He had a Lexus I was like he don't even have a job.
Speaker 5:Well, he had a job.
Speaker 2:I mean not really, he had work, no, no, he had a legal job he didn't have a W9.
Speaker 2:So. So so I just saw an opportunity to make some extra money because I was selling furniture at the time. So I just saw an opportunity to make extra money, got it, and I called the only guy I knew that did dumb stuff and I was like, hey, can you help me? And he helped me and, like we saw earlier, I'm good as simple math. I made $100 in 30 minutes and I was like I ain't make this in a week.
Speaker 2:I make about 1300 a week and I got to work every weekend and holidays. Now I could probably do this, but I didn't even know where to go from there until Dan asked me again. And then Dan said hey, my friend needs to buy 100 of those. I had already done the math. I was like these sell for $25 a piece in the nightclub. I'm paying 10 for 100. I'm going to pay seven. 100 times 18 is 1800. And I could do that in two or three days and I could stay home and play NFL 2K on the.
Speaker 2:Sega, dreamcast, dreamcast. Yeah, I'm good, I'm not selling any more couches and I just stopped showing up to work. And they called me every day for two weeks. Hey you coming back in? I was like no, you going to clean out your locker? Probably not, probably not. So they gave all my stuff to my friend's mom and she was like I can't believe you just didn't come back to work. I was like, no, never coming back. But from there it escalates. Right, because you're in the game now and people say, well, if you can get, if you can give me an escalate, you could probably get me a CSV. So I'll call you you know our guy.
Speaker 2:And so then from there, the guy who was buying the hundred because I was already turning my money back into it so I can make more money, and you know, when that starts happening like everything's good, you got cash handover fist. And I didn't want to be a drug dealer, I didn't want to be poor. I've been poor my whole life.
Speaker 4:Because you talked about the you grew up seeing not just poor. It goes back to what you said about the attorneys, the doctors, the this, the that, that right. But you saw what the other side of it Again.
Speaker 2:You can't aspire to something you've never seen, so you get to see it over pizza, but then you got to go home. You don't get to see that dad get up every day and what he does for work.
Speaker 2:And so you got to go home and when you go home it's back to food stamps and you know the black and white cereal boxes and the powdered milk and like do you know, the phones cut off and there's no water and I just didn't want to be poor and I didn't know how not to be poor anymore.
Speaker 5:Man yo. So how did you square having to serve your friends, parents and aunties and uncles and shit the people that had the money, because eventually, if you're in Fort Collins, man, and you are in that world, you're serving them. No, I got the money to buy XC pills.
Speaker 2:That's a great question. And again, like I've always been a business person, so as soon as I got into the business I said how can I make the most money with the least amount of effort?
Speaker 4:Yep.
Speaker 2:That's why I went from the 10 to the 100. I'm like, well, let me get the 100 and give them to the people that are going to sell them in the club. So I might only make 10, they're going to make 18, but I got my 10 and I didn't have to do any work. So then, when it came to, hey, joe, I need some cocaine, as soon as I found out where I could get it I said well, okay, if I get nine ounces, how much does that cost me? Well, that's gonna cost you $350 an ounce. Okay, cool, let me go to the guys that I see in the club serving it up and say let's meet somewhere, let's get some lunch or something. How much do you pay for that? Oh, I pay 5,500. If I could give it to you for 4,500, would you buy it for me? I'll buy two of them today. Great, I'm gonna touch base with you in two hours. No, but what is?
Speaker 5:but so this is what I'm saying. No, let them finish.
Speaker 2:But to your point, I wasn't serving anybody because I never wanted to be that guy. I didn't want anybody calling my phone at midnight, stopping by my house, because that's how people do that, and I would see it, because I'd be out and I'd see people come by my doot house two, three in the morning. Hey, let me get $20. And I'm like no, no, no, that's not how I want to do it. Plus, I didn't want anybody to know who I was.
Speaker 5:So again, knowing that your product is out there, right, your homeboy that you played on the football team with that was Affluent, you walked down the I don't know Old Town, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Fort.
Speaker 5:Collins and you, just, you know, yeah, I'm not doing it hand to hand, but you see him coming around the corner. Just no, just powdered up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, God bless him.
Speaker 5:God bless you. You have to think of your mind like you know I could have. I could have been my badge that my homeboy just got all over his face right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Like, like, like, like.
Speaker 2:so I love the question. I can actually give you an actual example.
Speaker 5:Yeah, because you could distance yourself away from it. But for a college that's so small, you're still really close.
Speaker 2:So a good friend of mine her name was, her name was Kim she, she I won't say her last name, but she's far gone from all this and I got her started in the meth game because you constantly get bigger and bigger and bigger and in seven months I watched her lose her job, her house, her car, her child from this drug everything right. One of the things that I don't think is talked about enough is the story that you repeatedly tell yourself just becomes your reality, right?
Speaker 4:Say more.
Speaker 2:So my story was there's a difference between doing wrong and being wrong. Mm-hmm, right, right, I run a business. If I didn't hand it to you, I'm not responsible, right? That's the story I told myself. Also, the story was well, you're going to buy it from somebody.
Speaker 4:Might as well be me, might as well be me, might as well be me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, because I got mouths to feed, I got a place to pay for, I got cars to pay for. I have responsibilities. What I do with my money is I take care of my family. Right, I don't have a. My friend had a Cadillac with spinning rims. This is early 2000s.
Speaker 1:Like I don't have that.
Speaker 2:Right, I'm not in the nightclub like doing too much. I'm at home playing video games Like this is business to me.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Right. So that was my narrative, was there's a difference between doing wrong and being wrong? Yeah, it also goes to something that I really truly believe now, and that's I don't care what you did, I care why you did it.
Speaker 3:Tell us more, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Sir, I saw you stole some bread and some food from the store. That's against the law. My mom is sick, she has cancer and there's three of us kids at home and we don't have any food to eat. Mm-hmm, kind of Well, technically it was wrong, but the posture of your heart was right. So I have no judgment on that Mm-hmm Versus, like, oh, I just did it just for the thrill of it, I just wanted to steal some shit. The posture of your heart is different.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I know me personally. Even when I was doing wrong, the posture of my heart was always good. I was always giving to people helping. So it's easy to convince yourself that you're not the bad guy. Yep, if you oh, I helped someone pay their life bill, and that's where I was trying to get to.
Speaker 5:Yeah, how did you square it to make yourself feel like you was OK in a city as small as Fort Collins? And that's the answer.
Speaker 2:And I also stayed anonymous. Right, I sold to the dealers. I didn't sell Right.
Speaker 3:So one time so you felt you were like removed.
Speaker 2:Definitely, Actually, one time I was sitting on the couch just like that with the guy I was dating at the time, and the guy that I mean worked for me. He was having this party and everyone was there and there was a bunch of dudes from the football team, all these people and they're just getting blowed and me and this girl are sitting on the couch and everyone's patting him on the back. They're like you're the man, you're the biggest dealer in town, blah, blah, blah. She leans over and she goes how does that feel? Because I know he gets that stuff from you. I said do you think I want people knowing that about?
Speaker 3:me Exactly, Frank Lucas. I said do you think I want?
Speaker 2:people saying that about me, absolutely. I said hell no, because one of those people someday is going to get pulled over randomly just driving. Maybe they didn't put on their blinker and they're going to have something left over. Whose house you think they're going to go to? Here's our mine. I said so I'm good sitting over here. So my philosophy is I always want to be like the stage blacks you guys familiar with that term.
Speaker 5:No.
Speaker 2:So when you go to the Usher show or something like that, anytime the lights go down. When they come back up, everything's different.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 5:Everyone that works on the stage has to wear out black, so you don't see them moving around.
Speaker 2:They're not the star of the show, but the show can't go on without them. They're important. I know exactly what you're talking about. They're vital. Yes, absolutely. That's why my company is called Stage Blacks LLC. I'm good being in the back. There you go, I like that.
Speaker 5:I love that.
Speaker 1:Get this part of the cast Bustin', bustin'.
Speaker 4:You're invisible until you're not. Yeah, tell us when you became visible and how all that transpired.
Speaker 2:Man, I'm going to say this and I don't mean it as a slight to anybody, but it's what it is. In that world you don't usually get caught. Somebody tells on you.
Speaker 4:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Right, 100%, yeah, definitely. And so for us we had a great business going. And the guy I was mentioning before he had this slacker roommate that lived with him. Man dude was in his 40s, damn, and he was living in this guy's room and he had no work, no, nothing. But he was always trying to get put on and my guy would never put him on because he was like you ain't going to do nothing, right? And finally one day he was like here, I'm going to put you on, here's two ounces of white.
Speaker 2:And this genius takes it to his ex-wife's house and hides it in the garage. For some reason, the ex-wife hated all of us. She had called the cops on me so many times to have my house raided. She hated us, right? The kids are like oh hey, dad was here earlier, he was in the garage. Guess what she does? She goes and tears that garage up and finds this and calls a sheriff and they snatch him up. What do you think he does? No, he tells on his friend, the guy that's been taking care of him for a year. He tells on his friend he's like I got it from him. Will you bring an undercover cop into his house? Yes, absolutely Whatever it takes to save me.
Speaker 2:This man had been letting him live for free. Anytime any of us went out, he paid for him. He brought the cops to his house for a year. They came to his house and we would see the guy. I could point the guy out now today. And then at one point they didn't sell meth. We sold meth because we were like that's where all the money's at right now, and the guy said well, we need some meth because Larimer County was cracking down on meth. My friend, not knowing this guy was a cop, was like well, let me hook you up with my boy Because you've been coming here for a year, so you're probably you're good at this point. Right, that's how we got connected with the guy, because my guy vows for him, got it. I've been seeing the dude for damn near a year. So I'm like if something was gonna happen, it would have happened already. Sure, because I'm naive, I'm untouchable. And then one day it all came crashing down January 3rd 2003.
Speaker 5:Wow, so that is so, man. That is so fascinating and it prompts me to ask, because you know, it's this huge conversation going on around people take plea deals and when you take a plea deal, you get up there and you basically say what you did, who you did it with, and there's some people that say, okay, that's snitching. And you have people that's in a situation that's like no, that's not snitching, that's part of my requirement of taking a plea deal. Can we square that for some people?
Speaker 2:I mean, it is snitching.
Speaker 5:Take a plea deal of snitching.
Speaker 2:And I can tell you, as someone who's gone through it, the people that you're not supposed to snitch on, they ain't gonna do nothing for you when you're locked up. My little brother, who I love dearly, was my co-defendant when we got caught. This was his third time in a row. Ooh, for the same dude that we worked for, my brother never told ever. My brother took an 18 year prison sentence. This man never put any money on his books, never offered to help our mom Both her sons were in prison. So it is snitching and at the end of the day, you gotta look out for yourself, because that's the only like. I was in prison. I didn't have a person put money on my books. I didn't have any of these so-called people write me a letter. How long were you there? So I was gone for 10 months. I got a five year sentence. I was gone for 10 months. With the grace of God, I was allowed to go to a boot camp program. So it was, for first time, nonviolent offenders.
Speaker 4:Is that what you did, Weezy? But did you go through the boot camp?
Speaker 2:Got it okay. Yeah, so mine was called CCAP. It was in Buena Vista and it was, for first time, nonviolent offenders, and I mean I smashed it. I smashed that thing, cause to me it was a second chance at life. Got it, and that's the perspective I took to it. I wasn't like, oh, I'm being punished. I was like, oh, I get as much time as possible to become the kind of man that will never go to prison again. I don't gotta pay bills, I don't gotta go to work, All I gotta do is get my mind and my body right. So when I get up out of here, I'm never coming back.
Speaker 4:And you in 2003,. What are you? 20,? What 24?
Speaker 2:Let's see I was born in 1975. So, I was almost 30. Oh, yeah, yeah, I was full on grown 28.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And I mean I was a loser. I went to college and I was a loser man and I'm not saying like why would you call yourself a loser?
Speaker 4:I always had an excuse for why things didn't work out for me.
Speaker 2:I quit everything. When it got hard. I was always one step forward, five steps backwards. I was in and out of jail all the time, not because it was committing new crimes, because I wouldn't follow through. Hey, you need to do 20 classes, I do two and stop. Hey, you need to do community service I'm good. You need to pay these fine? No, I'm okay. I was being taken away from my children, from everyone who loved me, because I didn't know how to follow through. So that's why I say I personally was a loser. I'm not talking about anybody. Yeah me, that's legit.
Speaker 3:So with the boot camp you come out of that new person and then you find new life.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 3:And then you have this passion for boxing. Yeah, tell us how. Boxing specifically? Yeah, cuz you. Prior to going to prison, you said you could fight. Oh yeah, so were you doing a Boxing? Prior to that, you were.
Speaker 2:I've been boxing since I was six got it, so I come from a tough family.
Speaker 3:A lot of people do and then you said you don't trust anybody that hasn't been punched in the mouth or punched in the, literally and metaphorically. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Anybody that's never been through some of your easy life, yeah if you had a easy life out. I want you in my foxhole Mm-hmm, cuz I don't know how things are gonna go down when it gets hard. Right now, absolutely, I don't know what. You might just cut and run, and then I'm just there by myself.
Speaker 4:But that was you back in the day.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I would. If it went down, I'll fight. Okay, I would quit on like I Don't like working in safe way. That's what I'm saying right, yeah but I got bills to pay. Mm-hmm, I shouldn't quit, but I don't like it, so I'm gonna leave God. So that's, that's what I mean.
Speaker 5:That's crazy. How about? This is how I love fight and that's what I'm saying. It's crazy how we love to fight but to leave a job in a second.
Speaker 4:Yeah where we're committed, it's bush, who is we?
Speaker 2:we as you a fight that long though.
Speaker 5:Oh, we know what you gonna do.
Speaker 2:Fights that long.
Speaker 5:We know what they won't go, do they?
Speaker 3:won't never been punched in the face.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 2:So a few things. Number one boot camp turned me into a man.
Speaker 4:There you go.
Speaker 2:There it is. So if you don't have a man in your home, you don't know what it is to be a man. I love my mom. I love moms. I've been on my own since I was 16. So I didn't have that. Every day I can put my eyes on a man.
Speaker 2:And see what he looks like what he does, how he reacts when he's upset, when things don't go well. I didn't have that. Boot camp turned me into a man, mm-hmm. First phase they break you down because obviously you shouldn't have been in prison. So something's broken, right, yo? First phase they break you down. If we're standing on a line and you scratch your nose, everybody's got to get everybody trashes. Oh, oh, my actions have a ripple effect on people around me. It's not just me, mm-hmm. I'm learning something, right. Second phase now we're gonna build you back up, right? Well, you have the rubber pillows. If you want a nice pillow, who wants a nice pillow? Let's go in the gym. We're gonna trash for an hour.
Speaker 2:Trashing was just calisthenics, but for some people was punishment. For me, I was like oh, we're just working out, right, this is dope. Mm-hmm, right, exactly. You want better toothpaste? Yep, put on every piece of clothing that you have. We're going to the stairwell Turning the heat up to a hundred. We're gonna run up and down these stairs. I'm gonna call somebody's name. Their job is to get past the first person. If they do, you guys can stop running. Nobody does it. Nobody does it. Finally, bobs goes. You guys ready to ready to stop running. Yeah, buckner, catch them snatched. Oh, I have to work for the things I want in life.
Speaker 1:They're not just yeah right, even toothpaste, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:A nicer pillow bet. Third phase let's see if you learned anything. We're just gonna observe. Let's see if you learned anything, or have you been faking your way through this whole thing? We started with 42 guys. Only 14 finished Well all right, it's a hard program, 60% failure rate, but 60% still, better than the 75% percent of, is a merit that we have in our country.
Speaker 2:So I'll talk about boot camp, because boot camp is where I learned how to be a man. Even attention to detail. Your toiletries need to be two fingertips apart. Your clothes need to be folded Bible size exactly Bible size. Your bed needs to be made to inspection. Oh, we're tearing everybody's bed apart and you got six minutes to do it again. Got it? Details matter right.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm, absolutely got it understood. So when I came out, how can you be the same person? If you took that seriously, mm-hmm? I was the only guy from my platoon that got sent home. They try to put me on probation. I was like nope, I need to go to a halfway house Because if I go on probation I'm gonna be homeless. I don't have clothes, I don't have money, I don't have food, I don't have a home. Homelessness will put me in desperation. Desperation will put me in situations where I know I can get money fast and I'll be back here in a few months. But if you put me in a halfway house, I got a roof and I get to eat three times a day. You have the bare necessities. That's all I need.
Speaker 3:I'll take it from there.
Speaker 1:That's smart thinking, right there.
Speaker 2:And so that's how the transition came, and that's when I knew like I'm different, I'm not coming back to this place ever, for any reason and all fairness.
Speaker 4:you were 30 years old too.
Speaker 2:I was 30 years old, so your mindset was different than somebody who was 18, 22, 23, 25. We could say that, and we also should acknowledge the fact that, even though I was 30, I'd still been going to jail three times a year every year.
Speaker 4:I'm not diminishing what you're saying. By the way, In that journey I made a decision.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's what I'm saying, right? I made a choice, a mature decision, and I made that choice every single day since then Shout out to the boot camp.
Speaker 1:Not seriously, that.
Speaker 2:And, honestly, it was my kids. If it wasn't for my kids, I probably wouldn't not change my life.
Speaker 3:So at your boot camp you was running stairs I feel like at Wayne's boot camp they was doing them but push ups and bench.
Speaker 1:Because I've been a good boot camp.
Speaker 3:He's been like 500 pounds since he got out.
Speaker 2:We did a lot of push ups. I mean like my shit wasn't made right there, they threw all that shit off the tier.
Speaker 3:Yeah, got it, got it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they used to take everybody's If it wasn't made. Or they would take everybody's stuff and put it in the middle and tie it in knots and like scatter it all around and your job was to find your stuff and get the whole pod inspection ready in six minutes, damn. Or they would tear it all apart again. Wow.
Speaker 3:Breaking y'all down. Huh, Just breaking y'all down.
Speaker 5:There's a lot of fights, boy, wasn't it?
Speaker 2:No. If you fought, you went straight to prison. If you argued with someone, you went straight to prison. Boot camp was an opportunity to get your sentence reconsidered.
Speaker 5:So it's like why always? Yeah, like why always exactly.
Speaker 2:So it was an opportunity to not go to prison. But if you fought, you go straight to prison. If you talked to a girl, you go straight to prison. If you break a rule, straight to prison.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:All right, well, before we move on to more of your story, we're going to play this game, which you call this or that.
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 3:Beth, all right Choice, one or the other, no context. When you choose, though, you can't be like I'm going with this, because All right, so here we go, this or that. This podcast Since you're back we got a little bit of boxing football, everything. So first question Floyd Mayweather or Terrence Crawford? Floyd Mayweather? Ok, Sugar Ray he's about to ask why and I get that Sugar Ray Leonard or Marvin Hagler, marvin.
Speaker 2:Hagler All day.
Speaker 4:You look like him. Yeah, I saw that. Oh, brawler.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson.
Speaker 4:Muhammad Ali Whoa. I didn't expect that one. I didn't either.
Speaker 3:The heavyweight division or the welterweight division.
Speaker 2:Walter weight.
Speaker 3:OK, running back or lying backer.
Speaker 2:Running back.
Speaker 4:Three years in the league and you're out Three years and no money?
Speaker 3:Fantasy football or pick them leagues I don't actually know what that is. All right, we'll pass on that. What do you say? Demo?
Speaker 4:Pick them. Yeah, I thought so no, like, so, like Gambling.
Speaker 2:No like something you don't stay away from.
Speaker 5:You don't play football, right.
Speaker 2:Gambling and then pick them. I know what it is. I don't play it. There you go.
Speaker 3:You just say that so with the pick them leagues you don't pick players, whereas fantasy league you do pick players, you just pick teams and then pick them league. Oh, I would say pick them, there you go, ok. Heated rivalries or dominant dynasties.
Speaker 2:Dominant dynasties.
Speaker 3:OK, diver Nuggets or Denver Broncos.
Speaker 2:Denver Broncos.
Speaker 3:Wamp, wamp CU Buffaloes CU Buffs. Csu Reigns.
Speaker 2:CU Buffs All right OK. Let's go Buffs.
Speaker 3:All right, arrive early or stay late. Arrive early, all right, thanks for playing.
Speaker 1:Just Paul Katt.
Speaker 3:Really, you didn't even let me get the CSU Rams out.
Speaker 2:Buffs over everything.
Speaker 3:Really Growing up in Fort Collins. I'm surprised.
Speaker 2:You know, earl Bruce was the coach when I was in high school and I was one of the best players in the state. He didn't even send me like a recruiting letter, didn't ask me to come on a visit. Nothing but the Buffs did so. Ever since then I've hated it.
Speaker 1:There you go.
Speaker 2:There it is Some of my best friends went to CSU, but I don't give a damn about the Rams.
Speaker 3:Got it, got it.
Speaker 2:All right and plus. In the 90s, the Buffs were one of the best teams in the country they were.
Speaker 3:I'm all Heisman Trophy winners, Thorpe Award winners, National Champions. That's a bet. No, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And my favorite player ever is their coach now.
Speaker 3:The Big Eight was nice.
Speaker 2:That's my favorite player ever. He's their coach now, exactly.
Speaker 3:Scope Buffs. What do you think is going to happen to his first year?
Speaker 2:I think they'll win five games.
Speaker 3:Six, you give them five, I'll give them five.
Speaker 4:I'm saying six and going bowling.
Speaker 3:And bowling.
Speaker 2:They're going, six and they're going bowling.
Speaker 5:They're like the raising bowl yeah. I'm saying, hey, that's cool, it's better than one in 11.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I'm saying six games.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just don't see the sixth game.
Speaker 4:It's going to be an upset. You know what upset I'm calling TCU? Oh, that's not an upset to me?
Speaker 2:No, it's not.
Speaker 4:And they were in the national championship last year.
Speaker 2:Did you see what happened to them in the national championship?
Speaker 4:But like a lot of people, don't know that, so they're. They're boosting TCU up Right and they lost a ton of players.
Speaker 2:They lost everybody that mattered.
Speaker 5:Yes, I think an upset USC.
Speaker 2:The no not going to have? I don't think that. But the thing about TCU, they're there like. The biggest thing that a lot of people I don't think talked about with the national championship game was Georgia had the number one recruiting class in the country. Tcu had the 27th. That's not a national championship team. You can't reload at 27. You see what I'm saying. It's hard. If you're number one, you're going to be in that top.
Speaker 2:No, absolutely 27 is like Good job, yeah, like you got like two guys that you wanted to see, you brought some dogs, so they're going to be TCU, they're going to be CSU bad.
Speaker 4:They're going to be Nebraska.
Speaker 2:They're going to show up in Eugene three and no Confident Right, I think two and one and confidence.
Speaker 5:And see, always loses a game they're supposed to.
Speaker 4:I agree, yeah, and you think that's I eat.
Speaker 5:Tulsa.
Speaker 1:And I'm going to. I'm going to? Yeah, I'm going to it could be.
Speaker 5:I'm going to start at US. I'm going to start at USC.
Speaker 4:If they do that sauce.
Speaker 5:Is that in USC?
Speaker 3:No it's here. That's why I started, that's why you?
Speaker 4:said they could, yeah, they could.
Speaker 5:That's the one is here in Colorado.
Speaker 4:If that happens, we're running this clip back. Amen, all right, let's do it.
Speaker 3:Moving along. So getting back to you, boxing, you're just in the fitness now and I think, like myself, I've boxed and I love it, like I love boxing and then I also crossfit and I just think those are two fitness areas that are one in the same. It's just different modalities, but anyway, you've created beautifully savage, and with boxing you gotta be disciplined to be good at it and you're very disciplined and you have this coaching aspect that you have with it. Just tell us why you decided to start the studio.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a great question. So my background is in business to business, sales major accounts, and while I loved it, because sales can be a very lucrative career yeah, absolutely. I used to wake up every single day thinking there's more for me in this life.
Speaker 1:There's more for me in this life.
Speaker 2:And a turning point was my best friend is a president of a probably $400 million construction company.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I said I called him and I said I wanna start sharing my story. You know, I went to prison, I was homeless Now like my life is good, and he said to me you can't you call on C level executives. Nobody's going to take your call if you start going around telling everyone you went to prison and you're homeless. And I thought gosh, that's sad, though, cause that's a big part of this thing and that might help somebody. That's a big part of you, yeah my story, yeah, I said that might help somebody.
Speaker 2:So in 2013, I helped open up title boxing club in Fort Collins and I just did it on love. The guy asked for some help. He asked three guys in town that were known for boxing. I was one of them and the other two poo pooed him. They're like no, that's not real boxing. We're good. I was enthralled, Like there's ladies and dudes and but this ain't boxing. This is boxing for fitness.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:It's a business. I grew up in dingy boxing gym underneath a bar that the roof leaked.
Speaker 5:So it's tied up like the great clips of boxing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, yeah, like great clips, sports clips, like I just, I just, I just.
Speaker 5:I just gotta you know you said you not cause you saying people was kind of poo poo, they was kind of poo poo, they were, they were.
Speaker 2:But my one friend, he he's probably the best amateur boxer ever to come out of Colorado. He said, oh, that's girl boxing. I was like man, some girls can really box. But my point was I was just. I've always been enamored with business, yeah, and I've looked around this room and I'm like there's 50 people in here. I've never seen 50 people in a boxing gym.
Speaker 5:Start calculating, like you, calculating impacts, I start.
Speaker 1:I hear what it's like.
Speaker 3:I'm like, I'm like 25 dollars a month, I got 15.
Speaker 5:Hey it's called monthly rear curb revenue and it's a formula that's already put in place for me to maximize these moments, absolutely man, and so I asked if I could help.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. So, can I help? I'll work here. Like I have a background of sales, you should have me help and they did, and I just learned. I spent three years there. Wow, I would take classes, I would learn, I was some memberships. I went through instructor training. You know it's funny. I'm always gonna tell this story cause you fucked up. Sorry, guys.
Speaker 3:No, no, no, no, you're good.
Speaker 2:I went through their instructor training and at the time they said the head and head instructor from title, he pulls me aside with the owner and he goes you're the best person in here at boxing. I'm like yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah what'd you think? But you don't look the part of a trainer. So what we'd like to do is ask you to work out here for three months and if you can get in better shape, we can make you a trainer. I said that girl's a cheerleader at CSU. She never taught boxing the day in her life. Yeah, but she looks the part of a trainer. I said, bet, okay. So then I steeled my mind. I was like I'm hoping one of these and I want to become one of the baddest boxing fitness trainers in the country. And I can promise you right now you go anywhere in this country. Talk about boxing fitness. My name rings out. What did you?
Speaker 1:look like this podcast.
Speaker 4:Like why didn't they say you looked the part.
Speaker 2:I mean cause I hadn't been working out like whatever you know what I'm saying. But to me I was like but I know how to teach boxing Sure.
Speaker 3:You got the skills. You just don't have to, and charismatic as fuck.
Speaker 4:But you weren't out there, sloppy.
Speaker 2:I might have been.
Speaker 5:I don't I might have been cause I wasn't working out Like you never seen the average. The average Calvary and fish, doc. Yes, Like they like yo, like they want you, they, they. It's not about the quality, it's the look. Yes, and I may have been sloppy, I hadn't been working out.
Speaker 2:I was. I was homeless four months before that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, I'm with you.
Speaker 2:I was in a bad spot in life, but I knew I had a heart for people and I knew I'd be great at that, yeah, and then they turned me down.
Speaker 3:And that fueled the fire. That's all you needed.
Speaker 2:Bad. So I stayed there and I learned I would learn everything. Okay, how do you place orders, how do you charge for a membership, like, what does it look like when someone wants to cancel a membership? Like I learned everything and then at about the three year mark, I was doing great at my job. I was making 100, 140 grand a year. I was in a good place. I went to them and I said I know, per your franchise agreement, you're supposed to open three of these in three years. It's been three years and you've only opened one. You should open one in North Fort Collins, which is seven miles from you per your franchise agreement, and let me run it. Oh, we're not interested in that part of town. We just, we just don't think it would work. I'm like you know the country club's up there, right, I'm like you should open one Now we're good. I said, bet, mm-hmm, bet.
Speaker 1:There you go, busted down.
Speaker 4:Is that where?
Speaker 2:I opened my gym.
Speaker 4:Love that.
Speaker 2:I opened my gym. That's right.
Speaker 5:Yes, pro, and we picked box and took that whole business Savagely beautiful, beautiful savage, beautifully savage.
Speaker 2:Beautifully savage and the flip side. I just I want to answer the question specifically. No shade to title boxing club, but it's only bags, and I know how fighters train A fighter not just going to hit a bag as hard as he can for 30 minutes every day. I said how can this be different? Well, we need a strength training component to it. We need functional fitness. We should be jumping rope, we should be doing pushups and sit-ups. Right, there's is an active rest for a minute. I don't know about you, but you do one minute of sit-ups. Do you feel like you got to work out? Now? Your legs feel like I got stronger today? No, absolutely not. So I said maybe I can't do it better. They're bigger, they got more money, but I can do it different. And when we started, we were allowed to have our own playlist, but it's corporate right. So then they became out with title boxing radio, so you might hear an edited Tupac song, followed by Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift. I said I'm going to play the dopest hip hop music.
Speaker 5:Oh you, oh you, oh, you're getting raw yeah. Oh they was.
Speaker 2:We're going to give the vibes right and I'm going to create a space that I would want to work out in.
Speaker 5:Well, if they're looking good up in your gym.
Speaker 1:But that's the thing right, that's also the thing I said.
Speaker 2:I said, if you haven't been, training I did, COVID closed it, oh damn.
Speaker 4:Really.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Hey man, I saw your gym on IG. That thing was packed. It is packed.
Speaker 2:Packed and the thing is like I'm grateful for everybody that's believed in this, because this was just a dream a dude had of like how to help people Because, to answer the question fully, people were pushing me more into speaking. I'd done the TEDx thing and oh, you should speak, you should speak. And I was like, no, and I do it. Yeah, I was going to say you should do it, the money's right.
Speaker 2:I do it, yeah, but I just thought how can I serve people better? Well, let's see, I can put them in a room six days a week, 45 minutes at a time. I can put a microphone on Whatever I could say on the stage, I could say in the room, but we're going to put some dope music behind it, some shared suffering, and that's how I'll get to them. That's how I'll get to them.
Speaker 3:So I have a question for you.
Speaker 2:My spoon, full of sugar, is boxing and it helps the medicine go down.
Speaker 4:I love that. I like that Along your journey. What have you learned about people?
Speaker 2:Would you be willing to elaborate, because I've learned a lot about people I want the.
Speaker 4:I don't know that I'm looking for anything specific, but you've learned something about people along your journey that's activated your success Because you work through people, you work with people, you're a people oriented person. But what have you learned that helps you thrive and others thrive?
Speaker 2:I would say what I've learned is that and I mean this with kindness and love always, sure, most people that we encounter have forgotten to love themselves. I have a four year old grandson. His name is Alastair. I love this kid. He's a little brute, right, stud. They were here visiting a few weeks ago and I was helping him get his shirt off to go to the swimming pool. I unbuttoned. He had a little camp shirt on because he wanted to dress like his grandpa. I unbuttoned his shirt. As soon as the shirt came on, he went Ta-da and I said that's how I want people to feel when they come into our space. But most people don't feel like that.
Speaker 1:They come in there yeah.
Speaker 5:Most people feel like I ain't good enough.
Speaker 4:That's society, man.
Speaker 5:Regardless of what the capabilities are.
Speaker 2:Then they come out and they go oh man, steve went and got a new truck. I'm getting my old little car here. They're getting their landscaping done Damn, I wish we had the money to do that. Like they just at some point forget Ta-da, yeah, right, no. So what I've learned is that they don't really need me to tell them. They need me to hold up a mirror and remind them.
Speaker 4:I like that.
Speaker 2:And sometimes it's as simple as I know. You don't want to try that 12 inch box jump, but I need you to try it Because in this space we don't say we can't without trying. I don't want to try it. Great Music off. Class stops, everybody stop.
Speaker 1:Nobody gets to work out anymore.
Speaker 2:Music off until she tries this boxer jump Going back to boot camp. You can do it. Come on, you can. Everybody's cheering Boom. 12 inch boxer jump. Oh shit, she's pumped right.
Speaker 2:You did it. Everybody's loving on her. At some point in your life, somebody told you you can't do things. My job is to remind you that you are incredible and invincible and from the moment of conception, you were a champion. There was a death race and you didn't just win. You were chosen, because, if we learned about biology, it's not just a random thing. You're chosen right, you were chosen. You don't have no reason to be average or live average.
Speaker 1:Well, that's dope Joe I love that and you know what, and the great thing about it is really having the foresight to transitioning that into your parenting.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you know what I mean, because when I speak for myself, it's like because my son always has to be on stage and I would like, dog, you don't have to be on stage all the time, tone it down, right. But trying to find that balance between, hey, man, tone it down a little bit, and then also showing that mirror to him about how great he is, yeah, and I think as adults we get into that way of thinking. It's like man, either I'm not good enough or even if I'm good enough, I shouldn't be showing off.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 5:And man, so that's just so profound what you said. Yeah, it's all right. It's all right to be this Ta-da.
Speaker 4:It's all right to be ta-da and you know, like real talk, that was a borderline emotional right, just reflecting on how adults think, yeah, and like every one of us has thought at some point in time, why am I here? I'm not good enough, whole imposter syndrome. I can't, I won't. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. But you get to a point where you're like I have to, yeah, I have to do this, and that's the people rallying around you saying you're gonna kill this box job.
Speaker 2:And you hope to get to that point. To go back to, what I feel like I've learned is most people aren't gonna get to that point. If you look around, you can count the amount of great humans that you know or have known 100%. Most people, in my opinion, are just okay, playing the background, being average, mundane, because they don't realize that greatness was anointed on them from perception, 90% of the people are good in that position.
Speaker 2:They are, and when I was in boot camp, one of the drill instructors one day you know we had been being bad or whatever he trashed us and put us online. He said do you know why people choose not to be great? Anybody, humor us, because once you've shown that your great greatness is expected of you, got it.
Speaker 1:He said if you're Michael Jordan and you go out and score 25 points and have nine rebounds.
Speaker 2:that's a bad day, but for somebody else, that's the best game of your career. Yeah, he said so. Once greatness has been shown greatness is expected every day. You don't get to have off days this podcast.
Speaker 3:That's funny you say that because that's what separates those guys that are up there, from like Courtney, great athlete, great football player, on it, not on any given day, but if he needed to go out there and you know, just have this monster game. Same with demo, have a monster game in football. You can do it, but can you keep doing it? You know what I mean. Can you keep repeating it? You know what I mean. Can you keep repeating that greatness that is hard to strive for and then it comes with a lot once you do that.
Speaker 5:And then what's crazy is, you get so good, you are so great, stick under that, you're fucking trash Yep. And that's what LeBron deals with.
Speaker 4:So I agree with you, salis, and my experience is a little bit different. Nobody believes you. No, no, like real talk, dude, like you were an exceptional athlete, dude. I wasn't Joe. I didn't know how good I was, I didn't know how good I could be, and you know there was a select few that were around me like I don't want to say you, but it was somebody like you who helped me unlock myself right and oh that is him.
Speaker 1:That's just my fault.
Speaker 3:I thought we're the popo.
Speaker 4:And until you get somebody like that, you're not going to perform at that level. And let me give you one like tangible example. In college I performed at a high level, not the entire time. It was my Redshirt sophomore year when I started playing good. When I went to the next level I was like I made it, but I didn't. You know what I'm saying no absolutely Like I was comfortable being there, but I didn't know what it took to be great. Yeah, to your point.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, because, to be honest, great is also. It's the sacrifice, Right and people. You know I don't want to give up my Saturdays and Sundays whatever it is, you know what are you willing to?
Speaker 4:say no, yes man.
Speaker 3:Are you willing to go create the business and say I'm done with my nine to five? You know, what I mean. Like am I willing to jump off and do that? So it is.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't do that, just say no, no, no.
Speaker 2:Keep the nine to five until the business can fully provide for you and yours, then get rid of the nine. No, absolutely Absolutely.
Speaker 4:Damn.
Speaker 2:That's probably the only regret I have Joe brought that heat today.
Speaker 4:Boy, he did man man.
Speaker 3:Thank you, Joe, for all the inspiration and everything you've brought.
Speaker 2:And man, thank y'all for having me Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Taking the time from your long drive from Fort Collins to Denver. I know it was like 45 minutes.
Speaker 4:Oh no, it's longer than that, that boy living well into him.
Speaker 2:It took me almost two hours.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it's about two hours right.
Speaker 3:That's a two hour drive.
Speaker 4:Man that boy damn near and laring me.
Speaker 2:Well, not that soft. Oh close, close, I'm probably 30 minutes from.
Speaker 4:Cheyenne. I mean, that's why I'm in Cheyenne. My bad, oh got it.
Speaker 2:It was a strike, jeez.
Speaker 3:Well, now I gotta go back.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And, with respect to your time, did you have a good time?
Speaker 2:today I did. This was great. I'm glad I got to come down here. I feel bad. I didn't get to really learn much about y'all, so like I'm glad you watched the pod man you did you liked about?
Speaker 3:us. This is all about you. Yeah, it was all about you.
Speaker 4:And you know, joe, he hit us up in our comments. He was like D, I'm ready, he did, he did, let's go, joe, I'm ready, I'm ready to go. But like in all seriousness, man, thank you for like taking time away from your family, the two hour drive, all of that good stuff. And with that being said, who would you recommend to be on the show?
Speaker 2:Man, my guy here. His name is Elliot Clark. I would definitely recommend him. What does he do? So Elliot is mainly a social media influencer, content creator, marketer. He's maybe the most well-known bartender on social media oh wow. But he's never worked in a bar, oh shit.
Speaker 4:Oh wow, wait, it's not that dude that makes the big like crazy drinks, is it? That has an accent? It's no.
Speaker 2:His name is the apartment bartender. Oh no, I haven't seen him, and he's just a great example of someone who went all in on himself, went to college, got the good job and was like this is my passion, though, and went after it, and he's built a beautiful life from that. My friend, ryan Harris, is here. You guys might know Ryan, he's played for the Broncos.
Speaker 3:Yep, he sounds like that.
Speaker 2:Ryan's a great guy and he's doing a lot of great stuff with financial literacy.
Speaker 1:He does.
Speaker 2:So Ryan would be a good guy to have on and you won't have a hard time getting him to talk. So Ryan's a great dude man. I could go on and on and on and on.
Speaker 4:No, that's great man, and if there's somebody that you forgot, that you want to add when we post this, just tag them in. I forgot like 30 people. Yeah, it's all good, I'll put you on the spot. Yeah, absolutely, respect, joe Buckner.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. Thanks for coming on, Joe. Respect Let me give you a round of applause. Do you want to plug a beautiful savage like how they can find it? Or they can find you, yeah, you know a beautifully savage.
Speaker 2:You can find us on Instagram at beautifully savage boxing. You can find me on Instagram at Mr Joe Buckner. That's MR Joe Buckner. My TikTok's a little bit bigger at Joe Buckner. Won't be mad if you follow my growing YouTube channel, also at Joe Buckner.
Speaker 4:There you go, plug it on, yeah, I wonder how you got that at Joe Buckner on YouTube, that's good man?
Speaker 3:That seems like that.
Speaker 4:So it was difficult.
Speaker 2:A few months ago they were like you can claim your handle at Joe Buckner. I should have just taken it at Joe.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you're right, at Joe At.
Speaker 4:Joe would have been dope. I'm kind of fond of my whole name.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think your whole name is powerful man it is. You know people will say to me like are you famous? Why do you say your whole name? I said you know my uncle Munro, who's one of those prison philosophers. He'd been in prison his whole adult life. He used to tell me a man without a name is like a fire without flame Damn. So whenever I meet somebody, I'm Joe. Buckner. Why you say your whole name? Because you might know a lot of Joe's, but you only know one Joe Buckner.
Speaker 5:There you go, there it is.
Speaker 3:And I can't front that's like a politician name, Like because every time I said like when I was like we were going to do this pie and I'm like we're going to have Joe Buckner on, you're like, well, that name sounds familiar, are they a politician? Or something like that.
Speaker 2:Don't be shocked if that comes next.
Speaker 4:Yeah, let's do it.
Speaker 2:Don't be shocked if that comes next.
Speaker 4:Absolutely, I'll respect Joe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Now I appreciate y'all yeah.
Speaker 3:Thanks for coming on, and you never stumble upon the unexpected if you stick to the familiar. So Ta-da.
Speaker 1:This podcast Bussin Bussin.
