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Good morning, good evening, good night, good afternoon, whatever time you're listening
in, wherever you're listening from.
Shout out to my Spotify listenership, Apple and Google podcasts, and YouTube if you're
watching in.
Thanks for giving me a reason to get dressed.
You could have been anywhere in the world, but you're here.
Be present and recognize that it's now, right now.
Whether your right now is working, flying, running, driving, be thankful we're alive,
baby.
Failure can be frightening.
However, as Winston Churchill reminds us, success is all about going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.
This is I Will Not Lose Podcast, where we set out to prove everything is learned from failure, and we must persevere and recognize it as one step closer to success.
I'm your host, Tony Ortiz. Let's jump right in.
So you can give it a shot.
Yeah, but I want to look cool.
I can hear you.
Oh, yeah.
I just want to look like I'm podcasting.
Yeah, I can hear everything perfectly.
All right, we're good to go.
What's up? What's up?
Good morning. Good evening. Good night. We're back. We're here in the building at Exalt Jiu Jitsu
360 Fitness over at 1450 Stefco Boulevard. We're live with Mr. Evan Robinson and Coach Joe
Graziano. What's up, gentlemen? What's up, Tony? Man, we've been trying to get this to go for a
while. So I have had the pleasure to have Evan in my circle. I've got to know his story a little
bit. This is one of the most inspiring people that you're ever going to meet. You know, we've
had quite a caliber of guests on the show, but I think you're really going to want to sit in.
We're going to get into the conversation. How did he get where he's at now? Multiple business owner,
brown belt in jujitsu, training a whole flock of new school. Welcome, man.
Thanks for having me. Thanks for having me, man. Oh man, it's been a long time
trying to get this together. Since I started. I had you written down when I first started as
someone i wanted to interview that was a year and some change ago yeah no yep yep so i don't know i
don't know what to talk about what we talk about how we start this well we'll just say how we know
each other so i had a client that actually referred me to a few of his friends and through the
relationship of business we became almost brothers where they invited me into their circle to set
goals to be held accountable for things like that um the podcast ended up becoming one of those
goals about two years ago and by the end of the year I got the stuff together and started out on
that journey but if you just want to go shout out a couple of the guys and talk about the importance
of just having a circle yeah no I think uh all right so first I'm gonna backtrack on something
you said uh he said he uh became like a brother he is a brother uh so we got a group of friends
It's me, Jason, Fredo, Lawrence, Isaiah, Tone, Joe, Haciel, Renard.
Am I leaving somebody out?
Wag.
Man.
Am I leaving anybody out?
Real estate.
I'm trying to think.
Real estate.
No, I said Renard.
Oh, okay then.
Yep.
Got everyone.
So what we do is, I don't even know how we all get together.
But over time, through friends and other acquaintances, we all kind of came across each other's radar and we get together and we hold each other.
We push each other to to be better. And I think everybody should have a group like that.
And I'm blessed to be a part of the group we have. But everybody needs that.
it's like a it's like our version of our own barbershop movie we always go to the barbershop
and uh lawrence shout out the barber pill um shout out laura the barber uh we go over there
normally fridays or whenever we can and we all go out to eat and uh and just talk about life
talk about things we gotta get joe with us yeah get joe with us in one of these
and i'll introduce to his left we have mr joseph graciano why don't you tell people a bit about
you so yeah so um i met i met you know sorry about that so i met tone obviously i started
coming to ev's class just looking for something to do fitness wise and i didn't really realize
you know what i was going to find here right um i had some shoulder surgery i was laid out for a
few months and felt like i wanted to start getting back into physical fitness and i happened to live
down the road i saw ev's gym gave him a call i said hey you know good fitness opportunity he
said yeah if you want it to be that for you the long and short is it's been a year right and i
met two really inspirational people um you know i'm i'm happy to feel like i'm starting to be
included in the circle uh because to be honest i think there's just a lot of value in having
friends who push you who don't who don't accept that you know um complacency in in everyday life
and you know whether it's just joking around or working on the mats or whatever the case is i
mean ev is always just spitting inspirational stuff i mean you can't come here and not smile
You can have a bad day.
Ed's going to make you feel better.
He's going to make you work hard.
And same with you.
I mean, I met you here.
We trained together.
Seeing the growth here with you is one thing.
But I check in on your podcast once in a while, man.
And I heard your story about how you got started.
And it's just super cool to see.
What is it, a year now?
Yeah.
Have you been doing this?
Year was October last year.
So maybe like a year and two months or some change.
Yeah.
So yeah, I mean, that's my story.
I came here just trying to get some physical fitness.
and I found some people that I'll probably be friends with for the rest of my life. So that's
awesome. Yeah, absolutely, man. That's good. So in terms of keeping accountable, so what we'll do
is we'll get together for dinner and we'll sit down three goals, uh, maybe a one month, a three
month or a three month, a six month and a year long goal. Um, my one month goal was to abstain
from alcohol um i'm going on two years for that now the boy second one i can't remember i think
it was lose some weight i think i lost like 60 pounds after i made the idea because i was 237
i'm like 190 now so 50 some pounds or so yeah um and then the third one was i didn't write it down
till later in the year but i wanted to have my voice get out there in some way like start a
youtube channel or something and then the the podcast became something and these guys have
done nothing but support we've had law on the show he's actually been on the show twice you know
gotta get fredo and isaiah on there asiel as well we'll we'll uh now that i could bring the show to
them yeah there's no excuse i'll bring this to the barbershop oh that would be that would be dope
and go from there but i think you know i hate to interrupt him but i think you hit on something
really important there that you guys do. So in my professional career, the company I work for is
they had something called a mentor program. And I signed up for it when I was young, probably
23, 24 years old. I had just kind of gotten out of an operations environment into more of a business
environment and customer service. And, you know, I thought it was going to be about the company and
your daily, you know, grind of work to, you know, what to do tomorrow, kind of day-to-day stuff.
and that's not what it was at all. They paired me with a gentleman who had been around a long time
and had a really successful career. Like a mentor? Yeah, exactly. And him and I would go to lunch
once a month and he'd give me kind of assignments and things like that. But the year-long program
really culminated in one message that I took away and I still carry. And it's exactly what you said.
It's at any point in life, if somebody asks you, what's your current short, mid and long-term goal?
And it could be one month, three month, a year. It could be a year, five years, 10 years, whatever it is.
But him putting that responsibility on me, I think, is what really helped me grow as a person.
You know, whether it be in my career at home as a husband, just a citizen of my community, you know, being able to know at any time that you're driven for something is always going to make you more successful than than complacency.
Right. So I think it's awesome that you guys do that.
Yeah. Super important, man. Thank you. I appreciate that. So let me ask you this for a segue. What was your impression when you first met Evan?
um yeah i mean it's evan's story so i want him to talk a whole lot more than me uh i just happen
to be here today um but no i mean my impression when i first met evan was just kind of wow right
and and not in the sense of like jujitsu and getting on the mat and be like wow this guy's
awesome at this stuff um it was wow in terms of how open he is um how willing to share all of
himself with anybody who's around he is, because I think that lifts people up, you know. So being
around Evan and, you know, it wasn't more than an hour before he told me at least the base of his
story. And, you know, I think in life, some folks with a story like that might not be as willing to
share it. And I think Evan shares it from a positive standpoint that says, hey, look, you
know, everyone can make a mistake in life. Everyone can do something that maybe they wish they did
differently. Um, but how do you learn from that? How do you grow from that? And how do you build
it into what Evan's built here, which is more of a brotherhood in my opinion, than, than a school
where we trained jujitsu. So my first impression of Evan was just, was just, wow, that's, that's
a person that I would like to have in my life because even on a bad day, you can't have a bad
day. If you come hang out with Evan, I'll just be honest. You really can't Mr. Live, laugh and
love so something like that love laugh love y'all why don't we take it back to the beginning man
oh the beginning the beginning beginning now let's say um well tell your story if people don't know
okay so uh the way my story goes is um like most people uh when i was younger and my teens coming
out of my late teens um i wasn't sure who evan robinson was i mean in a nutshell uh i always
say it the same way. Monday, I was Biggie Smalls. Tuesday, I was Tupac. Wednesday, I was Evan
Robinson. I was trying to find myself. And in the process of trying to find myself, I was hanging
with some good people and hanging with some bad people and making good decisions and making bad
decisions. And one day, I don't know whose crazy idea this was, but we started talking about
robbing drug dealers it's crazy right it's crazy to think that this conversation came up
and what's crazier is we thought it was a good idea it made a lot of sense at the time
so uh yeah uh late nights uh i was working at a place called sneaker zone and downtown easton
in the mid 90s um helped build the place too but uh working there and uh we'd always see the guys
that always said they had all the money and pull up and buy every shoe on the rack you know those
kind of guys and uh kind of put them on our radar and and uh night after work we go into robin hood
mode and literally start robbing dealers and then uh on one particular robbery it kind of caught up
to me and uh that's that's faced with some hard choices it was uh the law came coming down and it
was it was kind of like telling the folks you're with or you're gonna eat the brunt of the the case
and stuck to my guns and uh telling on nobody and next thing you know 20 years later oh man so they
gave you 20 years for that yeah they gave me my sentence my original sentence was 240 to 480
months um for robbery and conspiracy to robbery and uh i was blessed to go back to court a lot
of people in the in the community especially of easton where i was living at at the time came out
and my support um my my high school principal my my boss at my job like a lot of people
a lot of people couldn't first off they was like you got the wrong kid not him
yeah so when I when I had to tell them yeah I really did it they was like huh but uh a lot of
people came out of my support and uh lawyers and whatnot so they got me back in front of the judge
uh I came back down and the judge changed my sentence from 20 to 40 to 14 to 40 so
that was a blessing and I'll never forget uh um his name was Jack Piniella I was uh talking to
Jack Piniella after he he resentenced me and he was like Mr. Robinson you know he would say you're
a good kid you're a good guy you made some stupid decisions but he said I'm giving you another chance
kind of like with this resentencing because he said you would rather and I'd rather you do 14
years than 20 years you know you know what I mean he said you still have a lot of life left but
you know you gotta you gotta man up and uh i did wrong and i gotta do what's the word i'm
looking for this the consequences of my actions music face the music so i was like yes sir
and uh so i went away did your accountability come right away or did that take some time
no no that that came right away um i'm i'm the child of a of of of military people and school
teachers and you know what i mean i've always grew up there's always been a father figure my
mother and father always got along um and even though they remarried they it's like now i have
two sets of parents so i always had guidance every which way and and i knew i was wrong i mean my
mother always said from two wrongs don't make it right you know what i mean but at that time it
sounded i don't know why it sounded like a good idea like we could go out rob the neighborhood
drug dealers who cares no one's gonna know about it no no doesn't work that way so uh
i mean i don't know if it's it's like a weird morality it's like uh i mean i guess if you're
gonna rob anybody society would come down less on you like i'm just trying to think what was
going through you guys's head i mean my question is like do you think you said it sounded like a
good idea but you said it in a really apprehensive way right and i think that's for obvious reasons
you're looking back and realizing like there's no way that was a good idea right exactly um but
was it was it a good idea because it's just going along with what your friends were doing do you
think that that's kind of what drove the decision making process or was was it hey i wish i had the
money those guys had was it some mixture of those things it could have been it it could have been
um but i can't blame them because like i said i i went along right with it like it was it literally
sounded like who we hurting you know what i mean all crimes have a victim but and that and at that
time it sounded like well this is definitely a victimless crime like who am i hurting if anything
they could go re-up or whatever the case may be we're all doing wrong so um but it wasn't really
money and having i i grew up i didn't grow up rich but i grew up all right i grew up i wasn't poor
I was
I always say two separate sets of parents
Because my mother, my father
And their spouses
So I was always good
I never wanted anything
I never needed anything
I probably wanted everything
But I never needed anything
It's just at that time
It really sounded
I don't know
I was living on my own
Everything was going well
I don't know why that sounded like
yo it's fast money we could get it this way no one's ever gonna get hurt by it i don't know what
i was thinking i don't know what but uh but you had so i know a bit of your story you had trained
jujitsu going up into that point right a little bit yes um a good friend of mine back then more
of a brother his name was joe van brackle introduced me to jujitsu in 95 uh 1995 he
introduced me to jiu-jitsu and uh i had just started training there were two places in well
there was one place in pennsylvania in particular uh there was maxercise up in philadelphia and then
we would also travel down henzo gracie nyc and uh i had about i had about uh hmm i didn't have a lot
of jiu-jitsu under my belt at the time but i had about six seven months tops but i've fallen in
love with it because i wasn't a good fighter you know what i mean now i'm running around the
streets with guys the tough guys i'm not the tough guy in the group i've always wanted to be the tough
guy in the group but i was never the tough guy in the group but uh uh it it showed me that even if
i can't fight and i still feel that way today sometimes like i say i can't fight but jiu-jitsu
showed me i can defend myself and that's what i kind of fell in love with jiu-jitsu i was i was
like oh man i i'm not gonna get hurt okay we swing on each other and all that stuff oh cool
um but i felt like wow this really works this i could defend myself so i gravitated a lot towards
jujitsu and and i felt like after i caught the case and went and went away probably all i thought
about like anybody who was there with me can tell you all i did was talk about jujitsu and
It was like, Jiu-Jitsu, what?
He's talking about some kind of karate or something.
You know what I mean?
UFC was not as big in the 90s as it is now.
Nope.
No, it didn't blow up until about 2000-something
when The Ultimate Fighter started showing on television.
That's when people started saying,
oh, that's what he's always talking about.
Yeah.
So, yeah, but I love it, man.
I love it.
I think Jiu-Jitsu saved my life, honestly.
I can see that.
So now fast forward, you have a gym.
you have, this is not your first business. You've been an entrepreneur since coming home pretty
much. Yeah. Um, so, uh, as my story goes, I, I got out in 2013, um, March, 2013. Uh, and since then
I've been kind of on a one way path to where I'm at now. Um, I wrote down in a book, you know,
in jail, you get a lot of time to read. So I was, I was reading all these books and all,
all these people i looked up to all said the same thing um if you can find uh what is that saying if
you find uh something if you find a hobby you like and can make it your career then you you've made
it and uh in general all i did was pretty much read work out and and think about jujitsu i would
practice jujitsu too i had some uh cool experiences and and was able to roll around in laundry rooms
and stuff had some cool guards i would let us practice so it was kind of cool um but when i
came home um i was really focused like i want to open a gym i want to i want to be a part of
jujitsu till i till i die how do i get back to it and uh it started like a lot of people chasing
to go odd jobs working working the worst jobs ever just because you know you needed a paycheck
you got to pay the bills um and i just grinded and grinded and grinded and and then i was blessed
i was blessed like like joe i i uh i met my wife and my wife like myself i think she believes in
everything that i believe in just as fast as i believe in it if that makes sense like i i can
support i can come up with an idea and she doesn't shoot it down she might analyze it better than i
do but she doesn't shoot it down so um she's always been a a great partner and what do you
think about this i could do this and and she she normally says you know what let's sit down let's
put it on paper this is possible let's go make it happen so i think with with my drive always
trying to push something and with her drive always trying to push me to push something and
and then i met brothers like you who always pushing me yeah he talked he talked about how
he felt like the guy in the group that can't do anything just so we know like and this is not
calling anyone out but fredo's a world-class jiu-jitsu who's doing cage fighting uh isaiah's
a former marine um lawrence is literally training for his fourth degree taekwondo black belt as we
speak and for people just listening in we're currently in evan's gym the floor is still
sweaty we have to mop up after the podcast because people were going to war in here a second ago so
i i understand the feeling of rolling around with the soft guys evan of brown belt himself but
um yeah no it's amazing and it's just so much more fulfilling to accomplish things have goals
and you don't even realize it but your people that don't push you you just stop seeing them
yes you know the maybe a like or two here or there on facebook but you stop hearing from them
you stop doing things and maybe that's for the better you know yeah it's a it's a there's a
saying i i forget how it goes but it's it's very true when you start to grow your circle grows
smaller i i don't know why that is um i'm not saying i don't believe people hate like people
always say people are hating on you i don't know if they're hating on you and i don't really have
time to think about that but i i just think maybe in their own way they're happy to see you
you're succeeding and don't know how to say it or especially from our culture you know how our
culture is if you if you congratulate somebody too much you're you're you're you can curse on
the show you're dick riding dick riding or some some craziness like these people just can't be
happy for other people and and so hopefully that changes in the culture but yeah we just just keep
plugging along man every day is about getting up waking up and pushing forward for the next goal
next achievement that's something interesting you do every morning you're on either singing
some r&b or just telling everyone good morning from the car yeah no um can i say can i say
something funny about that yeah so i mean not to be too graphic but every morning we all got to
wake up and probably use the bathroom evan is the second face i see every morning i wake up i see my
wife go to the bathroom open up my phone and there's evan every morning without fail telling
me mr what is it mr love laugh lift or whatever just tell me to have it so even if i wake up
that's why that goes back to what i said you asked me what my impressions of evan were and just i
could wake up in a bad mood i had bad day at work i got a bad day at work coming whatever it are i
know i got a deadline to meet or something like that first face i see in the morning is my wife
love my wife shout out to jules if she ever sees this second face i see is usually evan he's always
the first person on my facebook feed every morning just you got the little graphics you're smiling
there's a coffee emoji in there somewhere i just i love that about it i really do it's just he's
always so positive and i just you said something about as you grow your circle grows smaller i
think it's i think it's a positivity thing and having less time to waste time right you know so
you know when you're young you got a lot of friends and what do you really do with them
nothing you know and as you get older you get you get friends that you yeah you have fun with but
you also you improve yourself when you're around those people you know i mean i think that's what
you're talking about is as you grow circle grow smaller right because less time to waste time i
got i can't go do that with you today because i have something to do for me and it's not because
i think i'm better than anybody but it's because i have my goals in life and i want to succeed
i want to go and achieve that goal and i think that's really what you're talking about i don't
want to speak for you but no i hey hey i like how you summed it up but you know it's true and uh
whoever's watching this i do say good morning every day just about so if you don't see me in
the morning call the police because something happened to me but uh people always ask me why
i'm that way and i tell them i said uh my honest answer is jail was my my low point um little
history i'm the only member of my family uh that's ever been to jail that i that i know of
and then i have a few exclusive people in my family and it's uh i kind of feel like uh now
looking back on it that i didn't really represent my name my family name well um by doing that so
i try not to do too many things that could fall back that they could say uh the robinson no don't
don't don't don't put my dad mom or you know you don't oh no so uh but I'm thankful I'm thankful
for everything a lot of people I don't think a lot of people are thankful for the gifts and
blessings they have and I just feel like if you wake up in the morning if you're blessed to wake
up in the morning you're you you've been given that chance to start anew do whatever you want
to do chase it down whatever because you got a brand new day at it and I forget what the number
is but like 12 000 people didn't wake up this morning that's a crazy number you know what i
mean yes one you had a guest on wesley morris i have to introduce you to him he's good people
oh do you know all right cool we had him on the show yesterday i was recorded with him
but he says um i said you know is there ever any failure he was like i'd say suicide that's the
only failure because if i have breath in my lungs i can come back yes yes that's so true that works
out well man yes cool yeah no it's funny you say that i was talking to one of our one of f students
carlos um he's younger right he's always asking lots of questions and he's like what advice would
you give somebody who's 23 years old and it just organically came up today but you you hit the nail
on the head when you talked about failure um you know what i was talking to him about was like just
learn from everything, right? Learn, learn from it. You guys are entrepreneurs, right? I'm not
as much of an entrepreneur. I'm a career person. I work for a corporation, but I still have plenty
of opportunities to learn. And I still look at it as my brand and my business within the entity
that I work for. Right. I mean, we employ, I don't know, five or 30, some thousand people
nationally or globally. I don't know. So I still have to have a brand there. I still have to grow
myself there. And what I was telling Carlos was, you know, I've been there for 18 years.
I've got, I've been fortunate enough to get some promotions in my life, but I've been told
no way more than I've been told yes. And those weren't failures. Those are opportunities to
grow. If somebody tells you, no, the first question you should ask is why? And ask that
person why? What happens if I come back in a year? What can I do differently then? Or what can I have
brought to the table then where you won't tell me no next time? And if that person is honest and
upfront with you and they give you a good answer, then go do those things. It's not failure. It's
an opportunity for growth. And I think that's what your buddy Wesley's talking about. Everything's
an opportunity to grow. Absolutely. Well said, man. Very well said. Mr. Joseph Graciano,
ladies and gentlemen. Getting deep there for a second. But just my experience with coming,
meeting the guys, one of the goals that Evan, at the same time I said I would start the podcast,
this is why it's so great that it's coming together. He said he was going to start a gym.
And I said, you know what? I've always wanted to train jujitsu. I wrestled in high school and I feel there's a gap missing. As soon as you start a gym, I'll sign up and we'll be there. And, you know, we made it happen, made it happen. So if you get a chance to come to XL Jujitsu, just sign up. This is everybody, ladies, especially any age. We have people that range the gamut, all ages and all ages.
and uh 23 to 59 yeah 23 he knows the actual stats but that's just crazy what you think about that
for a second what you built like everybody can come here right it's not you know no uh all right
so jujitsu is for everybody it is that's not like a crazy saying that jujitsu is for everybody but
um i think i think the the beautiful thing about jujitsu is is it gives you and it's not just
it's all martial arts all martial arts kind of have this thing um but confidence when you start
to develop a skill that you know you can defend yourself or protect yourself and and then you
you get like in jiu-jitsu you get to put it to the test all the time because you're always rolling
around with people and stuff but you get to see that it works it's something about when your
confidence grows your spirit gets better yeah you feel more alive it's and i'm pretty sure that
carries over to all all martial arts um but yeah no it's it's a great tool for you learn a lot
about yourself there there are times when there's times where i totally want to give up rolling with
somebody especially when i'm at henzo's my main school shout out henzo gracie pa out in half
phil pennsylvania um it's there you you really learn about a lot about yourself in martial arts
and uh it makes you want to be better you want to get better at jiu-jitsu it makes you start
doing things next thing you know you're stretching at two in the morning you don't know why because
you want to be better at jiu-jitsu you do things you normally don't do like you see me jogging
i gotta get my wind up you know doing it for myself but i'm probably doing it for jiu-jitsu
then doing it for myself but jiu-jitsu just makes you it makes you want to be better and that's what
I love I love about it. I love about it. Yeah. I mean, all the guys that I know that train are they're doing really well in their personal lives as well, too.
You know what I mean? I don't I'm sure they're out there. I'm sure there's somebody, you know, triple black belt homeless, maybe.
But I don't know. I'd probably be really surprised. Yeah, I would.
Yeah, that would catch me off guard. I just don't like to generalize. But no, I think it's I think definitely everybody should have martial arts, something like that. What could you I mean, I wouldn't say everybody should go to prison, but I love your story because you made something of it. I know people that come home and feel like the system destroyed them or they they have to be the bad guy from now on.
Well, for myself, and it's not to myself. Believe it or not, I was surrounded by a good group of guys in Somerset. I was in a SCI Somerset right outside of about an hour outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where the second plane went down during 9-11. One hit the Pentagon, one in New York, and one in Somerset.
um what i realized while i was away was first and foremost like i said uh my i come from a
great family my mother was in law enforcement my entire life there's always been like a sheriff's
car or something in my driveway my entire life so i definitely knew right from wrong um i grew
up a military brat in that in regards to so i definitely know the between right and wrong um
so i wasn't passing the blame i've noticed inside a lot of people always pass the blame
why they're there what their circumstances were i gotta do it because of this or that
and the honest answer that you didn't or you don't everything we do we do because we decided
to do it i've seen some cases i have seen some cases some people were yes conditions were
horrible and i i don't knock i i know some people who sold drugs and that at that time maybe it was
the only thing they can see to do i don't knock it their conditions are far worse than mine but i say
the same way i would tell i'm saying now i tell them once you started getting the money
and once the conditions started getting better why not put that towards something
more you know what i mean why stay keep doing the same thing um but other other than that man my i
looked at prison as i'm here my body's here but my mind does not have to be so uh i i read a lot
of books took some college courses it's a good thing having a family on my mother's side of the
family my mother has five sisters all my aunts are school teachers retired school teachers if i
you the book you got all school teachers yeah yeah hey can somebody send me it's here the next
day so um i got a chance to read a lot and i was also would you read sorry to cut you oh no all
kinds of books uh uh secrets and traits of powerful and successful people i think that's
my truck actually as we speak you know it's just all all kinds of books like that and autobiographies
of people that um i look up to um oprah winfrey type you know people people i look up to and just
see i try and pick people who really started and came from nothing and turned themselves into
something like tyler perry's of the world and stuff like that and i i said wow yeah if i can
do it if they excuse me if they can do it i can do it you know what i mean and then my buddy who
i've mentioned earlier uh joe vanbrackle joe um sent me a letter early early on i've been looking
for this letter too i know it's in my house somewhere um but the thing that stood out to
me was joe was saying i used to tell joe i wanted to be like him as far as in a lot of ways but as
far as like the martial arts side of things because when joe was when he was focused on
something that was it and his whole focus for a long time was before he earned his black belt
it was workout gym jujitsu like there was nothing else in between he was solely focused
on getting that done and i used to admire that a lot because nothing would get in the way
of training it was crazy so i used to tell him all the time while i was away at this time he
was living in california after he left pennsylvania living in san diego but joe wrote me a letter and
And at the end of the letter, what hit me, he was like, Ev, you've always had more skills, natural skills than I have.
He said, it sounds racist, but he's like, buddy, you're black.
He was always stronger.
You could run faster.
Like you had all the abilities and all.
Yeah, he was gifted.
And man, you just had it.
Like I had to work twice as hard to get what you could just do.
he said but you sold yourself short you kind of lost track of the the goal and started doing
knucklehead stuff and hanging out with this person and hang out with that person and just doing
stupid shit that's what he would say he said you lost track of the goal so he said i believe you
can do anything you want to do in life as long as you don't sell yourself short and that has
always stood out to me that don't sell yourself short i tell it to people now all the time
but it's because i heard it from him he that always has has when he said it it hurt when
he said it too i was like oh it's the truth you know they say the truth oh yeah it's got me
thinking about my own life i'm like oh man am i am i selling myself short i think i was gonna say
I think that goes full circle to what you guys are talking about with the brotherhood.
Right. And holding each other accountable and stuff, because I found even in my own personal life, it's weird.
The people around me, at least the ones that I've kept in my life for my whole life, they're always willing to tell me that I can do more than I think I can do.
And I think it's just a natural human trait, like to just think that to see something and think, well, I couldn't do that.
It's just it's almost easier to just believe I can't do that, you know, than it is to put in the effort to go and do it.
And so, you know, my life, I've been fortunate enough to have either a wife or a mom or a mentor at work or somebody who's always said you can do more, but you just have to go and put that effort in.
And I think that's the message that your buddy Joe was giving you.
And it's just a lot easier to say to tell yourself not to do it because then you can go and do the work.
Right. But yeah, having that positive influence in your life.
somebody who tells you you can do something that might i always talk to my wife about stuff i would
say the hardest step in anything you do is the first step it's always the hardest step so if
somebody just can give you that push get you to make that first step all of a sudden you realize
like the second third fourth fifth i'm on the way you know i just gotta get in the car and start
driving you know true true story now when i started a year ago go back and look they're
still up there they'll be there forever but there's like my first episode i had a computer
monitor oh i'm knocking the mic now i had a computer monitor stand that holds two screens
and i had two mics garbage tied not these nice mics but they were garbage tied so it would go
to the side and i could have like i didn't even have any guests scheduled i didn't tell anybody
i was just like all right i'm gonna do this and i set up the two mics and everything i didn't think
i'd be coming on location three weeks ago i didn't think i'd be able to do this but right you don't
know it's the other people that tell you okay i can see you doing this that's why i keep doing it
i don't get hung up too much on numbers but you go and you see the people that you influence and
the people that are like hey i saw that clip you know yep um shout out to my little cousin itana
she reached out to me after seeing some clips and just said i love your podcast it's really good so
you know shout out to everyone listening the spotify wrapped numbers are out man
i'm gonna get a big head no but you create something big shout out to deb
that boys listens in and comments on stuff i had a i had i gotta get her on another episode
yeah oh you had her on i had her on right but uh the cameras failed oh so i didn't want to and
she's like you know we didn't really talk about we have conversations on the phone and through
email that are like super deep and we started like talking about the cat we got caught up
It was just having a friend over.
So she's like, I think we could redo that.
Really talk about education or some stuff like that.
Right.
It comes a lot better from a doctor than a college dropout.
So I like to have somebody qualified for me to talk about education.
It's like, OK, that makes sense.
Just out of respect for it and things like that.
Yeah, man.
So what else you got going on today?
Today?
Let's see.
the wife and I
are probably
hitting the movies
and going out to eat
then after that
it's
get ready for Sunday
pretty much
what movie
Silent Night
is it gonna be
Silent Night of Napoleon
so
I don't know
either of those movies
are out
is Silent Night
like one of those
violent Christmas movies
it's a sound boom flick
where did you see
the other two
that came out
there was one with
like Kurt Russell
he played
there was like
one was called
I think it was called
Thanksgiving
them there was what one had uh mel gibson and one had the guy from stranger things what's his name
david harbour but they both play some like crazy evil santa so if any listeners want to watch like
a different kind of christmas movie check one of those two out yeah i don't know the names of the
movies but look up david harbour santa or mel gibson santa you'll find them but silent nights
like that yeah so from what i've seen in the trailer silent night is uh silent night is a is
a guy uh i'm trying to think where i know this guy from i don't know his name but the actor
he's playing a bunch of stuff but it seems like he was out uh with his son his son gets
hits by there's a car chase the car hits his son or whatever and he goes in a john wick mode like
everybody's gonna get it and uh it is it's bloody action-packed i was like yeah i need to see that
that's a great name for a movie silent night that's great so it was either that napoleon
but we'll probably see them both uh amc pass shout out go see all the movies you want
oh man my wife wants to see priscilla what is that still over it's like the presley or whatever
yeah i don't know if it's uh autobiography like a biopic or something i'm not sure she's super
into history and stuff shout out to my wife she won't watch john wick with me but i'll watch
you know bridgerton but no i appreciate the the theater and that stuff you may go and check her
out to see it uh one of the thing that's sticking with me it always when i have guests things stick
with me is part of the reason why i'm addicted to keep doing this but they're talking about life at
eight miles an hour which is how you have to hit the brakes sometimes and how beautiful life is at
eight miles an hour right it's another one for my boy wesley yesterday and i'm thinking i'm not
good at hitting the brakes no i recorded yesterday i'm recording today i'm working tonight editing
tomorrow i don't know how to do that just yet but you have fun i always see you out having fun
golfing swinging the stuff all right so but i think it's because i'm enjoying each each moment
each moment of the day that i can't no matter what the moment is because i was inside for so long
when you're when you're i don't want to call it a six by nine because it's a little bigger than that
uh i see i'm six months so seven by twelve maybe when you're inside a cell for for decades
any any any moment in time is it's like a great day you know what i mean like if you can find
something to do with your time even if it's just by yourself chilling you should see me at home
When I'm by myself, I know my wife thinks I'm crazy.
I sit up there in my Spider-Man onesies.
Bro, we see you on Facebook.
I'm like a big kid at heart.
I'm sitting there watching Star Wars cartoons.
I enjoy every moment.
I am free.
Life is good.
Life is what you make it, though.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, I got to be honest.
To your point, I'm terrible at that.
like i my wife gets on me all the time about it she's like joe why don't you just
slow down and like enjoy some i'm always on to the next on to the next what can i do
even if it's just at home like out similar couch to watch a movie i see like dirty dishes in the
sink i'm gonna get up go wash the dishes i like i can't i just can't find that ability sometimes
to sit back and relax and enjoy the present and when i can when my wife convinces me to
it's it's uh really rewarding so i'm a little jealous of your no your onesies don't be jealous
i wish i i wish i could wear a onesie sometimes and just sit there and watch star wars
business guests will get some onesies for everybody man no but seriously man look i i think i think
the system has shammed a lot of us uh and and this is no disrespect i don't want nobody to
take this the wrong way but our parents told us our our grandparents told our parents we're
supposed to go out there and and and tackle the workforce and go to school forever and do this
and do that and do that and all these things and then hopefully at 65 you retire and you can start
living your life in the golden years just unfortunately today's world at 67 you die
so i'm like nah that's not how it's going you know what i mean like if you if you got time to
do whatever's on your heart what makes you happy do more what makes you happy because it's no it's
no telling if we get tomorrow matter of fact there's no telling we're not promised tomorrow
we're not none of us so so try and whatever whatever it is that if you're going through
anything i always say you know what if you can't um the best way to think about it is
it's whatever you're going through if if it if it can't be resolved or whatever let it go
let it let it go don't let nothing bring you down just let it go especially if it's out of
your control yeah sometimes we're always fighting over things it's not in our control if it's not
in your control just completely let it go but if it's something that's like let it go let it go
and enjoy what brings you joy like it i always heard a good rule of thumb i don't remember who
said this uh maybe i'll attribute it to confucius for all i care but it was it was you look at it as
how long will whatever's bothering you affect your life in a negative way and so like if this
is something like oh man i got an argument with with my wife or my friend maybe that's going to
affect my life for like an hour or a day well then i can be mad about that for like a minute
you know right it maybe i got in a car accident it's going to take me a couple of weeks to get
my car back and get my finances right well i can be mad about that for like an hour and it's like
it's it's all about relativity right and i think that's to your point if you can't control it
and you know you got to give yourself you got to give yourself opportunities to feel things right
It's not great to just compartmentalize and, and, and not go through that, you know, human
process.
But at the same time, like there's times at work where something that I'm going to get
through it in like a couple of minutes, but I get so heated about it.
Cause I just, I was like, why is this happening to me right now?
I got to take a step back.
Like, man, this is in an hour.
I'm going to forget that that ever happened.
So why am I going to dedicate the next 20 minutes being pissed about it?
You know what I mean?
I think it's a good rule to like, think about it, make it relative.
That's a good way to think about it.
I will tell you one thing that I've done is like, I won't even, I won't even get upset about it.
Like I, um, people know I freelance graphic design. My laptop is like, that's, that's my
baby. The wifi went off. So it's essentially a brick and I can't open a support ticket and send
it out. And instead of freaking out or thinking, Oh, I'm not going to be able to pay rent. I just
said, the biggest problem that I have in my life right now, honestly, the worst shit that's going
on right now is that my Wi-Fi is broke. This is good. This is a good life. I'm cool there.
Exactly. Exactly.
So it helps with that perspective. But I think the, and I'm a bit of a hypocrite. I tell my
listeners every time, be thankful that it's now. Take a moment to recognize that it's now,
right now. Like you could have been anywhere in the world, but you're here, you're listening.
and this is kind of my moment when i'm doing this you know we're gonna start landing the
plane here in a second but joe did you you know we've been recording almost an hour
no not at all but it's been a lot of it's been a lot of fun to be honest just to sit here and
talk with two people i mean you guys posted on facebook the other day and i i was probably doing
my morning routine that i referred to earlier in the show and i just said good morning positive
people because i see you guys and it's just maybe i wasn't having a great day when i woke up but
But just seeing that, it's like, you know, I'm awake.
I'm alive.
If the worst thing in my life is, you know, like, damn, I don't got eggs and I got to go buy a sandwich, you know, whatever.
Right.
These guys are these guys are living out their dreams.
How am I going to look at them and just, you know, be miserable today for just no reason other than I don't want to go to work?
Like, come on, man, get over it.
So, yeah, no, didn't realize it was an hour.
Yeah, that's wild.
No, I know.
Any closing thoughts of telling people how to find you, telling what you're supporting, what your goals are?
Okay, so if you're interested in working out, we do one-on-one personal training here.
We have two businesses under one roof right now.
We have 360 Fitness and Exalt Jiu-Jitsu.
On the Jiu-Jitsu side of things, I focus 100% on the self-defense aspects of Jiu-Jitsu.
I feel a lot of people have, a lot of schools have kind of forgotten that.
And when I look at self-defense, for me, it's self-defense.
My always goal is to make it out the parking lot safely.
So that's what we concentrate on here.
And like I said, if you want to come in and work out, burn some calories, build some muscle, laugh while you're doing it, laugh, talk, cry.
We've had teary moments in here.
Whatever you like to do, we do that too here at 360 Fitness and Exalt Jiu-Jitsu.
Joe, take it away.
Only takeaway I got is come see Evan.
He's going to make your day better.
no matter what kind of day you're having.
Thank you.
Thank you.
All right.
Thank you all for listening.
Thank you for listening to another episode
of I Will Not Lose Podcast.
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