The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett XX
[0] I'm either gonna make this or get taken away on a stretch.
[1] It changed my life completely.
[2] Tony, hold on.
[3] Are you prepared for that?
[4] How could you prepare for anything like that?
[5] Tony Hawk began riding a skateboard when he was nine years old.
[6] And when he turned 16, he was the best skateboarder in the whole wide world.
[7] Are you kidding that?
[8] Being the outcast and the outcast activity, I got picked on, I got bullied.
[9] Even when I turned pro, I would leave high school for a big skate event.
[10] I'm signing autographs and then I would come back.
[11] and be a ghost in the hallways again.
[12] I just wanted to see skateboarding get more popular, but I got famous by accident.
[13] Suddenly, I was a chosen ambassador.
[14] I was making the income.
[15] I owned a house in my last year of high school.
[16] So I was doing talk shows, and I was doing big appearances.
[17] My video game was a big hit.
[18] How much revenue?
[19] A billion dollars.
[20] Wow.
[21] The trajectory just seemed like it was never going to end, and then it dropped very quickly.
[22] I was so hyper -fixated on my skating.
[23] I didn't really work on my humanity, I was a machine and I'd go and do the event and win the trophy, go home.
[24] It didn't allow me to be myself very much.
[25] Did you lose people?
[26] Yeah, made them feel like they weren't the priority.
[27] And a lot of it was just being afraid of intimacy, and I regret that.
[28] I started getting burned out on competition.
[29] The term burnout is used a lot these days.
[30] What did that experience teach you about what causes burnout?
[31] It taught me that...
[32] Tony, not sure if you've ever listened to this podcast before, but I'm quite predictable with how I start these conversations and I'll be transparent in terms of my rationale.
[33] When I read about a story like yours and I read about how much of anomaly you were in many respects of your life, I always ask the question, why and how?
[34] Where did that begin?
[35] Where did that start?
[36] And having, you know, read right back into your parents' history and your history, I saw signs of that.
[37] But seeing as you're here, Best place to ask you, can you give me the context that you believe was pivotal in shaping you to become the person that you are today?
[38] I think early on, I was obsessed when I first started skating.
[39] I found something that spoke to me. I found a community of people that we were just a bunch of misfits and outcasts that sort of fit together somehow.
[40] and I loved what skateboarding brought to me in terms of my sense of identity, my sense of self -confidence, and the creative aspects around it.
[41] I just loved it, and all I wanted to do was it as much as possible.
[42] And there was no end goal.
[43] There was no fame or fortune in the cards because no one had ever had that from skating, even the top skaters.
[44] So what was it?
[45] It was just an obsession.
[46] And I wanted to do it as best I could always.
[47] Even when I reached the top of the ranks of competition, I still wanted to get better.
[48] When you say obsessed and the way you describe, it almost sounds like it was medicine.
[49] Yeah, and in a lot of ways it was.
[50] I mean, I was a smaller kid.
[51] I got, we used to call it picked on.
[52] I got picked on a lot, bullied.
[53] And I didn't excel that much in team sports.
[54] I just kind of was middle ground, if that.
[55] And then when I found skating, every time I'd go skate, I got better at it.
[56] And it was incremental, sometimes almost immeasurable.
[57] But I knew that I was getting, each time I was improving, and I couldn't say that about any of the other sports I was doing.
[58] I mean, baseball basketball, like, yeah, sure.
[59] sometimes I'd score, mostly I wouldn't, but I never felt like, oh, I'm really, I'm really getting to a different level of this.
[60] It was more like I did it because it was expected of me. And every time I skated, I got better.
[61] Every time I would go to the park, I would learn some little new technique that would lead me to something else.
[62] What was that progression doing for you on a psychological level?
[63] It gave me a sense of purpose.
[64] It gave me an outlet for my energy and my frustrations and it gave my my parents some um much needed reprieve from my from uh my determination that's my that's my what my mom put it uh in her best way is that I was I was difficult I was always very thick -headed I wanted to do my things my way I wanted to do on my terms and she said when I found skateboarding, I really found a directive for that.
[65] And when her friend would say, he's such a nightmare, she'd say he's just very determined.
[66] Nancy, that is, right?
[67] Yeah.
[68] Frank and Nancy, your parents.
[69] What was your home life like with them?
[70] It was pretty quiet.
[71] I don't know.
[72] My parents were older when I was born.
[73] So it kind of felt like I was, raised by grandparents because my dad was 45 my mom was 43 by the time I was at an age where I was being very active and doing things they were they were kind of in retirement mode um so and and they I can't say they were I don't know they weren't they weren't close it was almost like they were just roommates and so that I definitely rubbed off on me in a lot of ways but but it just felt like oh this is just a functional household that's not full of love necessarily I'm the youngest of four um I sometimes ponder whether sometimes the youngest child of the bunch because you were the youngest of three right um the parents almost think that they've finished with parenting oh for sure in my case my my older siblings were all my my brother is closest he's 13 years older than me so absolutely they thought they were done raising children i was i was not planned and and i think that my parents were kind of reaching a winter of their of their marriage um even before that or just after i was born so it was a little icy and i think that because they were from that generation they you know those generations you just stay together no matter what and so they did and and um it's not like it was it was terrible it like i said it just it just wasn't that warm i can also relate to not being necessarily planned was there ever a were you ever cognizant of that is in like were you ever aware that has did that ever have an effect on your psyche that you weren't planned at all no i never thought about that i guess i i I was never that deep in my introspection to worry or concern myself with that fact.
[74] I just knew that I wanted to go skate.
[75] You were really, really intelligent, kid.
[76] I read that your IQ was like 144 or something.
[77] Yeah, maybe at one time.
[78] Which is surprising.
[79] Typically, I think, of a child that has that void of independence, which it sounds like you had, of not necessarily.
[80] necessarily being the best academically or in terms of smarts, especially if they're distracted or preoccupied with something like sports like skateboarding, one would think that academia or intelligence might fall by the wayside.
[81] No, I always relied on that.
[82] I was in the gifted classes growing up.
[83] And so I was with other kids that were of that same ilk.
[84] And so I always thought that my path would be more academia -based.
[85] I thought that I would be...
[86] I actually thought I was going to be a math teacher because I excelled math and I liked helping my friends with it, so I thought, oh, that is the...
[87] Maybe that's my trajectory.
[88] And then when I found skating, it wasn't that my academics fell by the wayside, but it was more that, oh, maybe I have something else here.
[89] And it really wasn't until I was in high school that I realize more of the potential of that.
[90] I feel like skating these days is still is really cool now.
[91] But having read back through your story, it seems like it wasn't as...
[92] It was not.
[93] Not at all.
[94] In fact, in my early high school days, I had to hide my...
[95] I had to.
[96] I chose to hide my skateboard in the bushes behind the school because I used it as transportation and because I would get hassled carrying it around school.
[97] You know, they would say not so nice things as I would walk, stroll by with my skateboard, even though I was starting to find some sense of success with it.
[98] I was actually, at that point, sponsored.
[99] I had a company that was giving me boards, that was sending me to events.
[100] And even when I turned pro, which meant that I had my own skateboard model, it was just not cool.
[101] So it was cool in certain sex.
[102] Like I would leave high school.
[103] I would go to, for instance, for a big skate event, and there's all kinds of skaters there.
[104] I'm signing autographs, taking photos, and then I would come back from that weekend and maybe even have won some money to go to high school and be a ghost in the hallways again.
[105] That's the kind of dichotomy I was living.
[106] You talked about how the progress was like a motivating, a driving factor, that, you know, getting incrementally better every time you did it.
[107] Outside of the technical aspect of skateboarding, what was the value for?
[108] for you outside of like doing the tricks and stuff what what what was like filling you up uh the the culture the community of it i loved everything about it the i love the attitude the DIY aspect the the the renegade um attitude that you would you have to hop fences you know to go skate an empty swimming pool or to a to go skate of a school yard and and it was just so there was so much art and creativity involved it was like any skater it's more most likely they're going to play also play music or they're also going to be artists or do other interesting things and so there was a soundtrack to it it was it was embedded in in punk music because that was the same sort of vibe and attitude that we had and um it was just more like oh this is this is my scene this is this is I have the sense of belonging here and I don't care if I don't fit in with my classmates or my peers and so you started you got your first hand me downboard at eight years old uh yeah like nine or 10 yeah from your brother from my brother yeah and by 12 you're you're sponsored um by sponsored yeah which which basically meant that I got free skateboards once in a while it wasn't some there was no contract it wasn't like a million okay no and then at 14 um I turned pro but all of that really meant was that I moved up a category in competition so there was there was sponsored amateur and then there was professional and to be professional just meant that you were competing for a $100 first place prize money at what point did you realize that you were good.
[109] Comparatively?
[110] I think it was, it would have been later on in my pro career when I started to figure out how to do these, what they called, they used to call them circus tricks, but I like to think they were more avant -garde.
[111] And I would do these, these sort of unique moves that I created, but I started to learn how to do them more in the air, like an impressive height.
[112] And I think it was around probably more around 16 age 16 when I started to realize like oh I can do these things at heights that is reserved for very few and I can do them on other terrain besides just my familiar home park and I guess that's probably the point where I felt like I have something that is more valid than just a niche style of skating that only happens at my hometown park you know when you think about why you were able to do that like why you were incrementally better or you know significantly better than your peer group have you ever figured out in terms of what they call talent why that is is it smarts is it physical attributes is it um i think it was that i i wasn't afraid to step out of my comfort zone and i also wasn't afraid to get heard along the way and I accepted that as part of the process and I can't say that very many people did that I mean definitely definitely my peer group the ones that were skating at the time they knew what it took to get that far and they were willing to take the hits for it but also I like to explore other techniques that weren't comfortable or maybe that I even thought were cool because I wanted to learn everything and so I would I would start I would go off on these tangents of trying certain tricks or a board manipulation and then lean into that and do every single variation of that and then move on to something else.
[113] And then all of that started to combine into this trick repertoire that I had that was that was pretty deep.
[114] You know, they say if you want to master something, you've got to do 10 ,000 hours.
[115] Yeah.
[116] Sounds like you did a lot of hours at that very I mean, at some point I was probably doing just one trick 10 ,000 times.
[117] We say all of this.
[118] You know, you said later in my pro career and then you said you were 16.
[119] Yeah, well, I've had a pretty lengthy pro career, but I would say that around age 16 is when I started to come into my own and was able to shut down any of the pushback or the haters, so to speak, because they were all saying, oh, he's only good at his home park.
[120] Or he only, you know, he only does these goofy little tricks.
[121] And at some point it was like, you can't really deny.
[122] and I that I'm doing these tricks in the most difficult circumstances and consistently.
[123] And so I had this run of success in my late teens that was, I thought, unparalleled.
[124] I mean, in terms of suddenly I was making income.
[125] I owned a house when I was still in my last year of high school from my earnings.
[126] And everything's, the trajectory just seemed like it was.
[127] it was never going to end and then it dropped very quickly in the early 90s and then I had a good three or four years that were very slow and and touch and go in terms of trying to make a living provide for a family and then things kind of came back around in the in the late 90s so when I say early in my or you know late in my career there's a few stages of that and that first stage is from 16 to 25?
[128] About 20, 23.
[129] 23.
[130] Yeah.
[131] And at that point, I read that by 16 years old, you were the best in the world.
[132] You were widely renowned.
[133] I had, well, I was ranked number one for a while, yeah.
[134] And it's tricky though.
[135] I mean, I don't like, I don't like saying that just because skating is subjective and it's apples to oranges.
[136] So who's the best?
[137] That's all in the eyes of the beholder.
[138] I did well in competition.
[139] I got good scores.
[140] and I had a good run.
[141] I mean, I think you're slightly underplaying that because I, you know, I was reading through some stats and I read that 16, you were widely regarded as best skateboard in the world and by 25, you'd won 73 of the 103 professional contests you'd entered finishing in second place a further 19 times.
[142] Which is for me pretty freakish.
[143] Yeah, I mean, like I said, I had a good run.
[144] But also, it's a specific style.
[145] So I was skating pools and half pipes.
[146] And then in the early 90s, street skating came into its own and what you see today with people jumping downstairs on handrails, ledges, and things like that.
[147] That was just starting to blossom.
[148] And I realized pretty early on that that was not my strength and that my ratio of success to injury was much higher doing that.
[149] So I kind of gave it up.
[150] I was in it for a while.
[151] skating some of the competitions and I was doing a lot of tours and things and then at one point I was driving home from a tour um I had sprained one ankle almost to the point of breaking it but somehow didn't and then in the process of nursing that one I was still skating because we were on tour I I rolled the other ankle trying to save this ankle and then I'm driving home with these with these with ice on both ankles with a car full of of skaters and in that moment I thought I can't keep doing it this way like this this is not sustainable I'm not going to be able to be a pro skater much longer if I'm if I think I'm going to do this type of skating and so I'm going to stick with more of the half pipe which which is what I know even though that wasn't the popular way of skating I just knew that if I wanted to keep skating into my adult life, I was going to have to stick with my expertise.
[152] And I'm right in thinking from what you've said there, that your skating career started to really take off, you know, 15, 16, kind of peaks at one point at around that 23 -ish age.
[153] Around, I would say around 21, 22 is when it started to peak, yeah.
[154] And at what point in that journey did you think I'm going to skate professionally for the rest of my life?
[155] Was there a point where you go, this is my job now?
[156] You never?
[157] No. In fact, when I was 24, is when I started my company Birdhouse and I honestly thought starting a company was my way of sort of bowing out of the spotlight and not being a so -called professional skater because there was very little opportunity for me as a half -pipe or vert skater to be doing anything and I was trying to nurture a group of skaters that were mostly street and trying to give them new opportunities and trying to have them promote our company as well.
[158] So I thought that I was curating a team and that I was going to be sort of the ringleader of it, but not be considered a pro myself.
[159] I never quit skating, though.
[160] That was just in my blood.
[161] And so at some point, a few years later, things started to pick up again.
[162] The X games happened.
[163] They had a half -pipe contest, and I was still on top of my game.
[164] so after that I started to compete a lot more because the interest grew and then I was I was winning a lot of events we don't often think it's possible for a sport to kind of experience a downturn right commercial downturn like thinking about the big sports of today the NBA basketball whatever it be the thought that it could kind of have an economic downturn and put the athletes out of business for a while is kind of inconceivable for me so I mean I most of most of my peers quit in the 1990s because yeah I or quit or not I can't say quit most of them found jobs because so what what happened in the skating industry the commercial side of the business there was a few things I think that skating had gone through cycles in the past in the late 70s skating was the new fad it was like the if for especially in the US was like the yo -yo and it's the new toy and it's a transportation and you can do all these things and then and then that that fad kind of faded out and then in the 80s it became this thing because we were skating the empty pools and there was this attitude and the music and the hairdos and the graphics and then it and back to the future and so that was another spike in popularity and a lot of skate parks were opening in those days and I think in the late 80s the liability became too much for these skate facilities and they just started closing very quickly I mean there was just a toppling of skate parks through I would say 89 to 91 and then there was no place to do it because there were no public parks they all these facilities are private there were a few but they were not good um and so all these private parks were a closing shop and then we had as skaters had nowhere to go so that's when skating took to the underground and became more street centric your dad was working in the industry as well around this time he was in the in the 80s yeah he helped to form the national skateboard association which sanctioned most of the events through those years how did how did he get into skateboarding just he saw he saw me and and he saw how much i loved it and he saw a very a serious lack of organization um and he was always very supportive of his kids me my brother was a surfer he would drive him to the beach at dawn to to get the good ways my my sister was in a band he would he would be the roadie for the band and drive all their gear to the gig so when i started skating he was all in on supporting it but he saw that it was just sort of chaos there were there was very little organization there were very few events and he saw a group of kids like me that loved it and had very little support something quite entrepreneurial about that about your dad founding the, yeah, I don't, he never did it.
[165] He never really got paid.
[166] So, you know, to think that it was entrepreneurial, it was, it was more altruistic than anything.
[167] Did that create a conflict of interest or like, it was hard.
[168] Yeah, it was absolutely difficult for me in those years because I was doing well.
[169] And then there was, there were, uh, claims of nepotism.
[170] Um, there was a lot of animosity and it was uncomfortable for me because my dad was always there and I was doing well so it would be one thing if I wasn't skating that well if I was just sort of mid range um but I think that all of that just drove me to get better and prove everyone wrong I mean I'd like to say that I didn't I didn't enjoy it but it definitely lit a fire it's interesting when when people attack you in such a way or they try and discredit you especially when you're of course only when you're doing well it can evoke a series of responses in you yeah i i i was under a lot of pressure and a lot of accusations like that and um i just kind of put my head down and just focused on my skating until until i shut him up um but even then it was it was always tricky you know it was like that then my dad he got out of it um and not long after that he got sick and passed away at lung cancer but then the X games came around and like I said I was still on top of my game and then I was the I was sort of the one they were focusing on because my name had resonated from the previous generation and then I was I was doing well in competition so then the other skaters were accusing me of hogging the spotlight I'm not choosing the programming here and so that was tricky too but I I think I learned so much from my early days of sort of being the outcast and the outcast activity that you weren't really going to I I had sort of built up a resilience to all that but it's still difficult right like the outcast and the outcast activity oh yeah I felt very isolated yeah in real that that's a word isolated but in real terms what does that look like for a young man who's doing something that he loved just got really fucking good at it so now there's they're pointing the camera at him there's all this commercial pressure what impact does that have on on the love for it well luckily i had been doing it for so long at that point and had seen it come and go that i was excited in the sense that skateboarding was going to get a new a renewed interest and if i was the conduit to that then i'll accept it i wasn't trying to get all the glory i just wanted to see you skateboarding be more accessible and get more popular.
[171] And so at some point, I don't want to say that anyone appointed me, but it was definitely, I was this chosen ambassador to skateboarding because I could do interviews and I could speak on behalf of skating at its core, but also to a mainstream audience to make them understand why skating could be valid or why it would be a positive influence on their kids.
[172] One of the reasons you gave for why you love skateboarding and why it filled you up originally was because of that camaraderie, though.
[173] And isolation seems to be kind of the opposite of...
[174] I was isolated in the sense that the hardcore skaters, the older generation, didn't support me, didn't want anything to do with me. But I did have my crew.
[175] I mean, it wasn't completely isolated.
[176] I had a few friends that we all had the same sense of values and the same sort of directives for skating.
[177] So I would bounce ideas off of them and we would come up with tricks together sometimes.
[178] Sometimes it was just something that they were asking me to do.
[179] But that sent some camaraderie is what I'm talking about.
[180] But it was a very limited crew.
[181] And yeah, I mean, I chose to do this outcast activity as a kid already separating me from my classmates, my peers, kids my age.
[182] You're like, skateboarding is so lame why are you doing that then I choose a skateboard my style of skateboarding is not cool it's considered a circus like I'm just a circus freak doing these little baton twirls with my skateboard so then I'm cast aside from the skateboarding community and that that's what became that became isolating but that all that stuff just would fuel me to to get better and I didn't, it's not like I'm thankful for it, but I accepted it and I went out to prove myself.
[183] I am, I sat with a motivation psychologist called Daniel Pink and he was telling me one of the, they did these studies on people in terms of trying to figure out how their motivation fluctuates.
[184] And he found that when people get paid for something that was once a hobby, their love and motivation for it declines, which I thought was really paradoxical.
[185] I wouldn't expect when you get paid to do a hobby, you'd expect motivation to increase.
[186] I agree with that, except that, When I got into skateboarding, no one was getting paid.
[187] No one was getting accolades.
[188] No one was getting attention.
[189] And so I never aspired to that.
[190] And what I see now is I do see kids that get into skateboarding with the notion that they will get rich or famous or and or famous.
[191] And if they get any sense of fame or fortune, they lose their motivation.
[192] So I agree with you in that sense.
[193] but if you're getting into an activity, a sport, an art form, or whatever, that has not been established and it's not, there's no clear path to success, I feel like your motivation is always just to get better at it.
[194] And the money and the fame and everything, that's all incidental to just being able to keep doing it.
[195] Did your love for it ever fluctuate?
[196] Only when I started getting burned out on competition.
[197] sometime around 1988, 89, I was doing really well in the events and it started to become repetitive for me. I would go to an event.
[198] I'd have to hide new tricks from my competitors and from the judges because at some point the judges were giving me scores based on what they thought I could do, not compared to everyone else in the event, but just what they thought I was capable of.
[199] So if I came to an event with some new tricks and they saw me doing those new tricks in practice and I didn't do them in my competition runs, I would get marked down based on what they, you know, based on judging me against myself.
[200] And that was fine.
[201] Like I accepted all that, but it was more that it got repetitive.
[202] It started to get, it started to suck the fun out of it because I was just this machine like this competitive, machine and my competitors who I thought were my friends who I still do were very much under the impression that oh well Tony's just going to win so we're hoping for second and they would tell me that and they thought that that was a compliment to me to me it was just it was crushing because it just meant that somehow they were separating me from the pack and the the the crew that I loved like the I love the camaraderie of the team and the camaraderie of all the skaters and it was like they're just pushing me out from that because they think that I'm on a different level or plane or whatever it was and I as much as you think that's a compliment it it wasn't the term burnout is used a lot these days um to just people use it in in their jobs in works and hobbies and such what what um what did that experience teach you about what causes burnout um well it taught me that even if you're doing what you love it's not always going to be enjoyable because of the pressure of success because of the self -imposed pressure that you put but what it did teach me was the value of letting go and when I let go of that even as hard as it was because my sponsors were saying if you quit competing you're out there was no other path to success in skateboarding you couldn't make a living on YouTube on social media you know a reality show whatever it was it was just your competition rankings that was it that's what your that's what your success was and they told me you know what are you going to do how you expect to make a living and I was like I don't know but I can't keep going this direction and what happened was when I was when I was removed from it I started to appreciate the process of learning new tricks more I started to appreciate the idea that I could be more creative and take more chances and at some point I missed competing but I had to sort of discover that within myself on my own terms and then when I came back to competing I let go of the idea of of perfection.
[203] I let go of the idea that I had to do the best every single time and I took way more chances and sometimes it didn't work.
[204] Sometimes I didn't make the finals.
[205] But when I did make the finals, I was doing it on a level that I was proud of.
[206] I wasn't phoning it in, so to speak.
[207] I wasn't being conservative with my approach.
[208] And that became much more fun.
[209] It was more risky.
[210] but when it would work, it was something that I was much more proud of.
[211] Is there, is there, is there, um, it sound, I sound a lot to me like you're, you had built this identity because you've been so successful and you almost had to kind of decouple from that identity, which always feels like a big risk to people in their jobs.
[212] It was, yeah, it was.
[213] But, but, but it was either that or quit, quit altogether.
[214] Because it was really weighing on me. It was really, it was very difficult.
[215] When you say very difficult, what does that mean in in practical terms you mean like sleepless nights or it yeah and and dreading events going going to an event and and dreading it i mean it's it's it's almost like pink floyd the wall it's just i was building a wall around everyone around myself and and performing was just obligatory because everyone expected me to do it everyone expected me to do well to win the event, whatever it was and there was no celebration in that there was no there was nothing that that made me feel elated it was just it was I was a machine and I'd go and do the event and win the trophy prize money and go home and then go skate and go try to learn new tricks that was the fun part but really what I was doing was just trying to prepare for the next event which is probably another in a week or two away it's quite surprising but it's a story that I've heard over and again this idea that your success almost disconnected you from from something it disconnected you from others and probably from yourself in many respects and I think I think about this a lot how when you become successful you can you need to be careful that you don't get disconnected along the way there's lots of temptation with talent to disconnect yourself whether you're a lawyer and you've just been good at being a lawyer and you end up 20, 15 years down the line and you go, what the fuck am I doing here and who have I become?
[216] Or you're a pro skateboarder and you kind of drift away from from the essence of what makes us feel connected.
[217] Oh, for sure.
[218] And I saw plenty of my peers.
[219] I think one thing that saved me is that I love the skating so much that I saw my peers get distracted with partying with the excess and they would start to lose their motivation and their and their skill sets and I recognized that very early on and thought I don't want to go down that road because the skating is too important to me this that I want to keep performing at a top level um and for sure I had my I had my distractions through my through my life and through my adult years but um but skating was always such a high priority that that i never lost that did you have to you talked about you've seen some of your friends at that time go down the wrong path because because of temptations yeah did you ever notice yourself drifting down that path um yeah i think it was more the when i got caught up in the fame of it all in um more in the late 90s early 2000s when my video game was a big hit and suddenly I was not just doing skate events.
[220] I was doing talk shows and I was doing big appearances and getting caught up in that level of fame is very disorienting.
[221] And I could see myself, I could see myself falling into that where it's like, well, now I'm a celebrity and now I will go to the red carpet events and do the, you know, and the clubs and all that.
[222] and I definitely indulged a bit in that but at some point recognize that this is just not what I want to be doing and this is not this is not as fun as skating and these are not the people I really identify with I mean a lot of the people that I saw through those years especially at the big events and stuff they all they really wanted was to be famous and at some point I got famous by accident and it's not necessarily what I wanted.
[223] And at some point I took inventory of that and I realized that I don't really care.
[224] You know what I mean?
[225] Like I don't care if I don't get into this VIP thing, whatever it is.
[226] Like take it or leave it.
[227] I, when I got a little bit of money, I think my insecurities meant that I had to have certain beliefs fail me before I learned them.
[228] So I was the kid that went to like, got a little bit of money, started going to the nightclubs, buying all the champagne.
[229] leaves you feeling fairly hollow after a while if you're paying attention absolutely yeah i mean that's the thing is i just felt especially in through those years when i was going through the the fire of celebrity culture i never felt fulfilled and you'd wake up in the morning it's like what what was that what good and also it was it was distracting me from my own kids and i think that that's really what what made me want to make a positive change in my life is that that I felt like I was not, I was not, I was there, but I wasn't really available emotionally to my children as much as I could be because I was so distracted with all this other noise.
[230] And I pulled it around.
[231] I mean, I was able to get back, get, be more connected, just be part of what they were doing even on a more basic level.
[232] And that, to me, is way more fulfilling.
[233] I mean, that's just, you know, I could, I could wax poetic, but I do feel like, I feel so much more confident and fulfilled and excited about all those things to see my kids, to see my kids thrive than to care about getting invited to the Oscars.
[234] Sometimes in my life, my partner's been the person to point that out before I've noticed it in myself.
[235] So my girlfriend will notice that I may be losing my.
[236] way a little bit in terms of priorities and it'll require her feedback to tell me that I'm losing my way a little bit for me to really notice it in myself do you resonate with that at all um I I would say yes if you were asking me five 10 years ago but now I do see it I see it myself it I'm I'm much more cognizant of it in my own choices and it is wild I mean I never imagined that I'd be a pro skater a past 20 honestly because when you were when you were my when you were a kid skating in my era all the once you reach an age of responsibility you had to quit because no one could make it wasn't anyone's job right so to be skating in my 20s and then into my 30s was wild it was I mean I was an uncharted territory but I was still getting better at it and then when I reached my 40s it was like really still you guys still think think this is okay for me to do and not that I was looking for that in that kind of approval but it was kind of a surprise and also I kept getting better at it in those years and then to be doing it in my 50s it's just like a lucid dream it's crazy that um it's funny I kind of went through the fire it was like when I was a kid it was like oh you're pretty good for your age and then when I got into my 30s and 40s like you still skate like haven't you grown out of it and now when I'm in my 50s, it's like, hey, you're pretty good for your age.
[237] When was your, when do you, if you look back on your years of, in terms of technical ability, when was your professional peak?
[238] Or is it now?
[239] Oh, I think it was in my, probably in my mid to late 30s and early 40s, because that's when I was still doing all of my high impact, high risk moves, but combined with highly technical moves so I kind of had I had the the gamut of of the skating in terms of being able to do the big stuff the dangerous stuff and also the very the very technical stuff and so as I've moved into my twilight years I don't know what you call this but I've learned to to focus more on the technical because it's it's more low impact, and it keeps me healthy for the most part.
[240] I mean, I am nursing, I'm still recovering from a broken femur last year.
[241] But even that has taught me that I still love doing this, and I still love it even if I'm not going to be at the top of the game.
[242] Or if I'm even going to be on video or doing it in front of people, I still want to do it.
[243] And I still love it.
[244] And I still love it.
[245] But like I said, I've, I've sort of focused my energy more into the technical moves.
[246] And I would say the tricks that I was learning before I got hurt were more appreciated by skaters themselves.
[247] They weren't going to move the needle on X -Gams or anything.
[248] To get to your level in any industry, if you were advising a kid, that's maybe an artist, a DJ, whatever, when you look back on what it takes to get there, what are the, like, core components of that level of mastery and success.
[249] And like, you must have sometimes think like, like, why me?
[250] Because, you know, living such an anomalous life and becoming number one in anything, I think I've seen it over and over again where people start to ask themselves the question, like an existential question, like, uh, sure.
[251] Yeah, I, every day.
[252] But, um, I think to answer your question, the focus it takes is, is pretty intense to, to get to do, especially what I do, for so many years.
[253] And also, I think that the ability to listen and to take cues or inspiration from others around you in terms of inspiring or influencing what you do.
[254] And I don't mean like, I'm not saying like borrowing or stealing styles or anything.
[255] I'm talking about just being open to, oh, that's a new way to.
[256] do it and even collaborating with people and what if we tried this or maybe you did that and and um not just living in your own in your own bubble um because some people tend to do that they have they have they have they found what how they succeed how they keep moving forward and they stay in that lane they stay in that bubble and sometimes that works but for the most part you can only go so far with it and you've got to start to sort of branch out and see what else Is there in terms of your chosen activity, sport, art, whatever it is?
[257] And I love that idea that I'm getting out of my comfort zone and trying something weird.
[258] And it's probably not going to work right away.
[259] And it's probably going to be super ugly when I finally do it.
[260] But I'm going to get to a point where it's more natural.
[261] What's the balance between learning the rules of the trade, i. how it's already been done and learning to do it your way.
[262] I always think this.
[263] To become great, do you need to like be the best at how it's done now or do you need to like add a little sprinkle of yourself?
[264] Well, luckily skating is so subjective that adding your own flair to it is always encouraged.
[265] And so for instance, there is some tricks, basic tricks that, you know, 80 % of professional skaters can do this one trick.
[266] But if you take a picture of one of them and put it on silhouette, I can tell you who it is.
[267] Because everyone has their own style of it.
[268] And what makes for a good style, subjectively?
[269] I'd say it's sort of the flow of the move from start to finish, including when you're, before you even leave the ground or the ramp or whatever it is, you know that you make it look like one one fluid motion and that you can twist it, torque it a little differently than someone else, but stay in control.
[270] That's what it's about.
[271] It's, it's really hard to convey.
[272] And some of that has to be like, you know, talent.
[273] I'm struggling with the word talent, but some of it.
[274] Oh, nature over nurture.
[275] Everyone has their own different body types and their own.
[276] own thing.
[277] But you can see influences like, for instance, we have this girl on our team, Reese Nelson.
[278] She's very young, but she skates for ramps.
[279] And you can tell who she skates with by her trick selection.
[280] Really?
[281] Because she's influenced by the certain skaters that she's with.
[282] And some of them have very specific moves that are associated with them.
[283] And, like she just learned kick up nose slides all right i'm just i'm gonna go into the weeds for you she's like kipn no slides which is a signature move of a skater named colin mackay and i and i literally said have you been skating with colin she said yeah he comes here in the morning sometimes and skates with me it's like there it is interesting when i when you speak to surfers they talk about how surfing's like a metaphor for life and they like wax lyrical about you know what that metaphor is is skating a metaphor for life uh it can be sure i i i i I think the value of not giving up, the value of believing in yourself, and the value of working through your own challenges.
[284] I think that's probably the biggest metaphor.
[285] And for me, what I learned from it is also the value of taking risks.
[286] You know, in the greater sense of becoming a businessman, I wasn't afraid to take risk skating.
[287] I'm not afraid to take risks in business.
[288] The value of not giving up and taking risks.
[289] I had you spent 12 years trying to master one particular trick.
[290] Yes.
[291] Called the 900, which I think I did on the video game back in the day when I was younger, which is like a two and a half.
[292] Two and a half spin trick.
[293] And it took you, you tried for 12 years.
[294] Off and on, yes, from the first time I tried it.
[295] Had anyone done it before you?
[296] No. Yeah, that was a battle.
[297] So I learned 720s in 1985, and the next stage of progression for that in terms of spinning and for skating would be 900.
[298] What makes it so much more difficult is that you're blind to your landing zone twice when you do a 900.
[299] When you do a 540 or even a 720, you're only blind to your landing zone once.
[300] and when you pass it twice it's very hard to spot where you should be or to even know spatially where you are so it took me the first probably five years of attempts just to figure out where I was in the air and when I say five years I'm not talking about like every day it was more I would get fired up I'd had a good session or I was skating a really good ramp and then I would try a couple and they always ended in some sort of vengeance You know, you weren't it was very hard to get out of it safely.
[301] I broke my rib one time when I really thought I had it But once I figured out that spinning then I started to explore okay, how do I get the landing?
[302] And that's when I started actually pursuing it.
[303] I would say more in like the years of 94 to 96 I was actively trying it regularly and when I finally thought that I had it I put it down and then I broke my rib because I was leaning too far forward and in that moment I kind of gave up on it that was in 96 because I thought I had all the pieces to it I had every element I had in my head I had it was the it was the right takeoff it was the right setup was the right spin and apparently I can't figure out how to how to land it properly so fast forward to 1999 they're having a best trick event at that the X games and halfway into the event, I did my best trick, which I had planned that I had only done once before, and it was a variation of a 720.
[304] It was a very old 720.
[305] So I did that trick, and then I had 10 minutes left of this event.
[306] I don't know where else to go from there, except try what the next trick that I would like to do, which is the 900.
[307] And when I started trying it, I'd say the first few attempts I just did for the crowd.
[308] It was more like, this is my next state or this is what's next.
[309] Maybe it's not for me, but, you know, this is what I would like to see done.
[310] And then somewhere around my fourth or fifth try, I realized that I'm always getting the right amount of speed.
[311] My snap is good.
[312] The snap is the take off when you actually leave the top of the ramp and grab your board.
[313] Because a lot of times the snap is, if that's off, it's tragic my snap was good i can see the landing zone and i thought you know what if i'm ever going to try to land this again it'll be tonight and if i break a rib so what like i'm either going to make this or get taken away on a stretcher those were the only two outcomes um and then when i did finally try to make it somewhere around the i don't know ninth or tenth attempt i fell forward again but I didn't get hurt and something there was something clicked in my head that said why not shift your weight to your back foot during the spin and then try to land it and for some reason I never had I never had that clarity because when I would go to try to make it I'd get hurt and I'd have to go home so in this particular instance I didn't get hurt so I thought okay what if I shift my weight towards the back?
[314] And then I shifted my way towards the back and I fell backwards.
[315] And that was the epiphany.
[316] Because all I have to do is split the difference.
[317] And then I made the next one.
[318] All they have to do is split the difference.
[319] I mean, to a muggle like me, make it sound easy.
[320] What was that moment like?
[321] It was just a big relief.
[322] I mean, it was definitely a highlight of my skate career, of my competitive career.
[323] but for me it was just this weight lifted from me because it had always sort of hung on me that, oh, 900, it's got to be possible.
[324] And there were a few of us chasing it.
[325] There were other skaters that were getting pretty close to it too.
[326] But no one had figured out how to ride away.
[327] Once you'd done it once, was it easy to repeat?
[328] Yeah, it took a while for me to do a second one.
[329] And then after I did my second one, then I could do it pretty regularly.
[330] And at this time, you've got this deal with Activision bubbling, bubbling away.
[331] At that time, we had been working on a video game for about a year and a half.
[332] So there was definitely a crazy synergy, perfect storm in that moment because I did that trick.
[333] That drew a lot of attention to obviously me, but not just me, but skateboarding in general and the X games.
[334] And then that was in June.
[335] And then we released what became Tony Oxprop Skater.
[336] September.
[337] Wow.
[338] And I was watching the video of you saying that you called the guy Activision to ask him to include the 900 trick.
[339] NeverSoft, yeah.
[340] I emailed him.
[341] Yeah, that's a good story.
[342] I emailed NeverSoft the next day and I said, hey, I did this thing and I think that people are going to expect to see it in the game now.
[343] And I know we didn't animate a 900, but I feel like if you guys have time to squeeze it in.
[344] And we were already in beta with the game, which meant that we were going to submit it to the console manufacturers.
[345] And once you do that, you cannot edit it.
[346] You can't alter it.
[347] And I remember Joel, who was the head of Never Soft, he emailed me back right away and he said, way ahead of you, you fucking rule.
[348] And then they got it in.
[349] I mean, and the rest is history, right?
[350] I guess.
[351] hoped i like to think i'm still creating it you know that your father frank he'd been such an avid huge support of you up until that point but he didn't he didn't get to live to see the real all of this stuff after you were sort of 27 28 years old right no he he saw the first x games right and to him that was his biggest things could ever get because he was a big sports fan not just you know obviously he loved skateboarding but he also loved team sports and um for him to see skateboarding on the sports network that was for him the coming of age gosh i bet he couldn't have imagined what would no i mean and to think that it's gone on to be such a uh uh beloved sport internationally and in the olympics i mean all that is is just beyond what he would have imagined do you has it ever crossed have you ever wished that he could have seen the what would happen with your career professionally but also in business i think i'd rather wish for him to see the rise of skateboarding in general because he was so integral in keeping it alive at a time when it was struggling um through through sanctioning events so i mean sure my own success yeah but but i do feel like on a on a bigger scale and more lofty terms, just the success of skateboarding is something that he would have been very proud of.
[352] That video game deal, we all get emails, and these emails often contain opportunities.
[353] And sometimes we look at these emails.
[354] We're trying to figure out if it's an opportunity or not.
[355] Sometimes it looks like an opportunity.
[356] Sometimes it's a waste of time.
[357] Sometimes it's just someone, yeah, wanting a meeting to pick your brain about something.
[358] As you reflect on your decision now in hindsight to proceed with that video game, Was there any close calls?
[359] There was another group doing a game that had contacted me, and I went down the road with them a little bit and realized that what they were trying to do was so much more, I don't know how to explain it.
[360] It was more technically difficult to play because they were trying to truly emulate skating.
[361] And I felt like I understood that approach, but at the same time, skating wasn't that big when we released this game or when we were going to release this game.
[362] And I wanted something that would be more friendly to the non -skater to play, to understand, to be able to just pick up and start doing tricks.
[363] And when I saw what Activision had, they had a very, they had a very early version of a skater doing tricks the way it moved and to me it was it was intuitive it was perfect it was like right away I started playing it I started doing tricks it was almost like it was an extension of my body to start doing this on that screen with that skater and it's something innately felt right about it to me and so was there a close call I would say if Activision maybe had called me a month or two later I might have already inked a deal so but I felt very lucky on the commercial front I read that you'd been offered a kind of a flat check well when they were close to launch of the game they started to sense that there was buzz about it it was already getting good reviews from previews of the game publishers I mean not the the magazine publishers so they knew they had a good game overall and they felt this the surge of interest and so they offered me a buyout of future royalties right before the game launched um which at the time it was they offered me a half million dollars and they said you know what does that mean they said well that that's you get that right now and then no money going forward.
[364] And for me, having lived through some really lean times, when they say a half million dollars, to me it sounds like a billion gazillion dollars.
[365] I mean, no one had ever spoken those types of numbers to me before.
[366] But I felt like I was in a pretty good place.
[367] I was, I was doing well in other ways.
[368] I was still skating a lot.
[369] I was doing events.
[370] I was, I had good endorsements I was I was doing we had birdhouse was starting to actually be profitable my skate company and I had just bought a new house with a with I not you know I had a loan but my loan was manageable and I thought I'm going to take a risk because I'm doing okay and I don't need that money right now and even the timing of that like if it had been just a few months before that when I was looking at houses maybe I would have taken that um But I didn't, and that was definitely the best financial decision in my life.
[371] Because that game was a success, to say the least.
[372] That one, and the ones after it and the ones after it, yeah.
[373] How does one that might not understand the scale of that success quantify in a dollar amount, how much revenue Tony Hawk Pro Skater generated in its legacy?
[374] I mean, I know that they talk about a billion dollars for Activision.
[375] you know my take is not that grandiose but i am never going to complain it changed my life completely a billion dollars they they generated in sales that that was that was always their big buzz yes so much i mean so much happens obviously that that makes you financially free um for you know but also you'll you become like the michael jordan of skating you are you know i'm I was playing you on my video game on the other side of the world when I was, how old was I?
[376] I'm going to say eight, roughly eight, you know, you become this global icon of a sport.
[377] And it's funny because I didn't know skating before I knew the video game.
[378] The video game was my way into even understanding that the sport existed.
[379] And I would play it with my brothers.
[380] That's going from zero to a thousand in terms of notoriety.
[381] Oh, for sure.
[382] And that was never lost on me. I mean, I felt very lucky to have my name synonymous with a video game and with skateboarding because I had devoted my life to it.
[383] Were you prepared for that?
[384] No. No, how could you prepare for anything like that?
[385] There's no way.
[386] I mean, to have that kind of success, especially in video games, is reserved for someone like Madden or Call of Duty or Grand theft auto i mean it's you know to have be your name was wild and and nowadays i mean we've come a long way we did a remaster a couple years ago there is a whole generation of of kids i'm not kidding that have asked me if i was named after a video game would you tell them sure that's what it is if you were named after a video game wow what would you what advice would you have given yourself if you could have to prepare yourself you could just whisper it in your ear I think I would have I would have told my younger self to work on your state of mind and your priorities with equal effort as you do your skating I was so hyper fixated on my skating and getting better and my success in skating that I didn't really work on my humanity.
[387] I mean, in terms of my relationships and being present and maybe that's what it took to get that far, but I think I would just tell my younger self like to figure out how to function more as a human than just a professional.
[388] Did you lose people?
[389] Yeah.
[390] And also gained people through, through my um changes and through my through finding my priorities and i mean honestly like i'm i'm in a incredible place i'm happier than i've ever been and i have much better relationships with my kids even though most them are adults and i'm just more reliable what is um what is skating without the relationships like what is skating for you so if you were to if i was to say okay you can skate forever and carry on doing your skating but i'm going to take away the family and the meaningful relationships what does life become then um that doesn't sound as fun it's uh it's not the end all for me anymore i love it and i'm going to keep doing as long as i can and probably still push myself in a lot of ways but that is compartmentalized and it's when i do it i'm all in on it and i'm doing it and then i leave it there i'm not just obsessing on it the rest of the day i am i was speaking to a i think a neuroscientist on this podcast who told me that the brain actually changes as we as we age up until about 30 where i think for a male it roughly stops changing when we get to 30 i think he he's said to me um and with that our priorities changed so in our early 20s we're like trying to get laid and like trying to do the things that or whatever and then as we get into our 30s and beyond our priorities and life shift did you notice with age your priority shift or was it the children um i think i just noticed that i was stuck in a cycle of compulsive behaviors and something that that i didn't enjoy and didn't feel like it was helping me to have good relationships with my family with my kids and i think i just took inventory and thought i got to make a positive change and so it wasn't it wasn't like my brain was changing and I figured you know it was it was more that I had to go get help lean into therapy figure out how to process all these things and how to how to move forward in a much more congruent way with my values and I was able to do it it took a while but it was more into my 40s that that happened what did what did therapy help you to realize about about yourself and why you were exhibiting compulsive behaviors.
[391] Did you ever figure out why?
[392] Yeah, I think a lot of it was just being afraid of intimacy.
[393] And a lot of that, I'm not blaming my parents, but definitely I didn't have great examples of it growing up.
[394] So I had to figure that out.
[395] And how to be vulnerable.
[396] I think I was always very guarded.
[397] You and me both.
[398] It was, I mean, and also in those days of having this sort of unwanted, attention made me more guarded because it was like oh i can't do any i can't say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing and and it didn't allow me to be myself very much and and i think i'm much more comfortable in my own skin now and able to able to to hold more interesting conversations do you you know i often think about like generational cycles i think about the like the intimacy or the emotional expression that I didn't learn from my parents and like a fear that I have had hanging over me is that I might replicate that for my children.
[399] Sure.
[400] Accidentally.
[401] Yeah.
[402] And I was definitely worried about that.
[403] Like my dad never never said I love you, never professed that kind of thing or was warm in that sense.
[404] And so that was more my example to live by and through the years.
[405] and I was very much kind of the same and at some point, let go of that.
[406] I still struggle with it now.
[407] Yeah.
[408] You know, it's funny, again, I've spoken to lots of just sort of childhood therapist, Gabalmarte, and they talk about like these different types of traumas that we have, and one of them is called goblins and the other's gremlins, and he talks about how goblins are usually before the age of 10 years old, and they're very, very hard to shake.
[409] So they always kind of live there somewhere in us.
[410] So even sometimes saying being intimate now or being vulnerable or saying, I love you, it's like, it's difficult for me. I get that it's uncomfortable, yes.
[411] I'm starting to get much more at ease with it, though.
[412] With practice.
[413] With practice, yeah.
[414] And running the experiment, I guess.
[415] Yeah.
[416] And also I see how it makes my kids feel, it makes them feel seen and loved and important.
[417] And it's particularly important as I've come to learn if you want to have a good relationship with a woman, all man, but my girlfriend is very much the opposite in terms of intimacy.
[418] So it's kind of ongoing friction.
[419] What role has your wife played in the broader context of your professional success?
[420] Just a feeling of, well, she's just so grounded.
[421] and she gives me a sense of home and she is very supportive but also has her priorities intact so when in deciding what to get involved with she's my sounding board and and she's the one who I trust the most with her opinion and and she understands that that I am challenged in terms of my sense of intimacy and how to navigate fatherhood.
[422] And she has been so great in opening that up for me and helping to show me the best way to navigate it.
[423] And just she's not swayed by fanfare at all.
[424] At all.
[425] She could do away with it all together.
[426] And I love that.
[427] And I cherish that.
[428] I guess that's what makes it feel like home, right?
[429] All the noise is parked outside.
[430] Yeah, absolutely.
[431] I mean, if you catch us on a Saturday night, we're, and a lot of times, like, a couple of our boys are in college.
[432] One of them's in college up here in L .A., one of, we have many children.
[433] So let's just say that sometimes they'll come home for the weekend.
[434] And as much as we like seeing them, if you catch us on a Saturday night, they're downstairs.
[435] watching UFC fights with their homies, and we're upstairs hiding from everyone.
[436] And we're asleep by 9 p .m. That's pretty much our big raging weekend.
[437] You know, after you become the icon of a sport, what does that do to your sense of identity?
[438] I'm asking that question because now everyone assumes they know you before they've met you.
[439] They kind of see you as this character from a game.
[440] I think what you see is what you get with me. I'm not trying to present some other persona and like I said, in the past maybe I was more guarded with who I was or how I was trying to be and now I think I'm just more much more natural and much more real and this is it.
[441] You know, I'm super thankful for what I get to do.
[442] I do not take this for granted at all and I know it could all be gone tomorrow but I'm going to seize opportunities and do the best I can with it.
[443] And in the meanwhile, try to promote skateboarding on a bigger level.
[444] But I know what you're saying.
[445] And sometimes that is weird.
[446] But at the same time, I'm open to hanging out, having a conversation.
[447] Do you know Bear Grills?
[448] Yes.
[449] So Bear Grills was the one that said to me that when he, he's almost become synonymous with like outdoor activities.
[450] Like if your friends like eating some mud, you'd go, you think you're Bear Grills.
[451] Yeah.
[452] Whatever.
[453] And he said something interesting to me which has always stayed with me he said the the bigger my brand got the more self -doubt i got and that didn't sure well i mean that's kind of the imposter syndrome right where uh you think like why me why is it are you are they sure they got the right guy um and i understand that but at the same time i think i've i've been through enough phases of success and failure to know that whatever is coming my way or whatever it is that I'm putting out there is real and is tangible.
[454] And so the self -doubt is not as is more of a whisper.
[455] Success and failure.
[456] You know, you fail every day in terms of skating.
[457] Some of the big, big failures in your life post the video game coming out.
[458] Because I think we've highlighted your story to appear to be just success, success, success, big break, success, success.
[459] What are some of those big failures that have occurred over the last decade that we might not have been cognizant of?
[460] Well, I definitely have had businesses that fail just because they were either not the right time or they were a little beyond my expertise.
[461] And I thought somehow because I had other success, I probably could do well in other stages or in other spaces.
[462] But I think that failure, yeah, you know, I've had failed relationships.
[463] learned a lot from those and was able to grow and hopefully amend my mistakes and and hurting people.
[464] And I think that it's just a path of evolution.
[465] And so I mean, I've always learned to embrace my mistakes with skateboarding.
[466] And in a sense, I do that with my regular life too.
[467] But they embraced the idea that I grew from them.
[468] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[469] Business, there's a, there's a business behind you.
[470] Even still today, you have a big team.
[471] What is the entrepreneurial side of your life currently?
[472] What are your business ventures?
[473] We have Hawk apparel, which is Tony Hot Clothing.
[474] We have Birdhouse, Skateboards, Birdhouse Apparel, is actually its own subsidiary with a group with a couple guys in Las Vegas that are doing it, which is super cool.
[475] I have the Skate Park Project, which is a foundation for public skate parks in low -income areas.
[476] I'm part of a lot of different investments and ventures, things that I'm interested in.
[477] And it kind of, I can't say that it it ebbs and flows some of them ebbs and flows but for the most part um there's been a crazy trajectory lately i mean honestly it's it's even surprising to me that that um people are still interested in what i do uh personally and also all the all the ventures that i'm involved with we um we have this new tradition on this podcast tony where we have these cards and these cards are based on previous guests' questions that they've left in the book for the next guest.
[478] So basically, every guest writes the question for the next guest without knowing who it is.
[479] And we've turned it into these conversation cards.
[480] And I'm going to be honest, we know, we did this because listeners of this podcast, listen because they like slightly deeper questions and context.
[481] So it allows them to play at home.
[482] I have, I think, eight here.
[483] I'm going to put them in front of you.
[484] And all you've got to do is pick one card.
[485] Okay.
[486] If you're willing to play.
[487] And then answer that question.
[488] Okay.
[489] Do you got QR codes?
[490] Do I have to scan them?
[491] No, it's all good.
[492] The QR code just tells you who answered it, which guest answered it.
[493] Let's see.
[494] What are some words you've never said to anybody?
[495] Why haven't you said them and who should you have sent them to?
[496] I think that I would have told my wife, even though I thought that I was going to kind of turn my life around and change my priorities.
[497] I think that I would have told her that I was really frightened of the path or of trying to make those changes.
[498] And I think she knew it, but it probably would have helped to confirm that with words.
[499] And I think maybe it would have given her a better perspective on my vulnerabilities early on.
[500] Um, because when we first started dating, I was still kind of chaotic with, with what I was doing and, and my approach to my career and my life and everything.
[501] And, and I made, uh, I made a conscious choice to make a positive change.
[502] And she knew I was doing that, but I don't think I let on how, how scary that was for me. Why, why didn't you tell her?
[503] because i wanted her to think that i was so capable of it and so confident with it um but you know what i mean she's too intuitive she knew yeah man women it's funny you say that because recently i've ran the experiment of telling my girlfriend when i'm struggling with something and i literally told like it was it felt like an experiment because i was always like tough guy like could never yeah you know i think i think that was it i was always i was always guarded and also i i managed to get this far with how i was functioning um i can't say it was the smoothest but you know so i i had some sense of control but uh i think it was more to give up that control was probably the the more scary thing that I should have conveyed.
[504] But I feel like, like I said, we've come so far, especially we have a blended family.
[505] And our kids have a blast.
[506] We have a blast.
[507] We cherish our time with them.
[508] We cherish our time alone.
[509] And I think we have a really good, I think we just have great communication.
[510] and intipacy.
[511] So I, you know, she doesn't like me talking about her, so that's as far as I'm going to go with it.
[512] I, I wrote my diary the other day that I used to think vulnerability was deep down inside me, like tough guy who didn't really learn vulnerability from my parents or anything.
[513] I used to think vulnerability was a repellent.
[514] What I came to learn is that it's a magnet.
[515] Yeah.
[516] And that's when I say around the experiment, it's deep in me, I thought people would like, run away, oh, he's weak, he's whatever.
[517] And what happens is the total opposite.
[518] It's like you draw them into you.
[519] Right.
[520] I think what I learned, one of the, one of the things that are early on is that the bravery actually means sharing your feelings.
[521] Yeah.
[522] Which doesn't seem to make sense because one would think bravery was the opposite.
[523] But right.
[524] I'm on that journey now.
[525] The question that was actually left for you.
[526] What have you done recently for someone else?
[527] Nice easy one.
[528] hmm I can't say Nintendo World what's that you can't say Nintendo World yeah I took my Lieutenant Land isn't that enough I well and I guess more materialistic I bought my wife a new car as a surprise I think that what did I do for someone else probably on a bigger scale I bought a skateboard at an auction that was a used skateboard that was hand -painted by Kurt Cobain for a guy he knew and the guy paid him $20 and a bag of weed to paint a skateboard.
[529] This guy had held on to the skateboard through the years because, I think because he was a hoarder and dug it out of his storage not long ago and said, oh, this is that board that Kurt painted.
[530] I should put it up for an auction.
[531] So I got one of it.
[532] I bought it, and through the help of Francis Kirk Cobain's daughter, I verified the authenticity of it and recreated it.
[533] And so I recreated the skateboard exactly photorealistic, same shape and everything, and made 500 of them, and the proceeds from those skateboard sales go to half go to the Jed Foundation for suicide prevention and half go to the skateboard.
[534] project for public skate parks so cool um so i feel like did i what i do i'm hoping that i did something for people to either for those struggling with mental health or for and also for those who want a place to skate and that's so cool at last check uh we've sold 300 of them 300 of the 500 i'm going to buy one i would appreciate that i'm going to buy one i'll buy one today where do i buy And then for you to answer, then that would be your answer.
[535] Would I help people?
[536] I bought a Kirkobane reissue.
[537] How do I buy one?
[538] Tonyhawk .com in the store.
[539] Don't.
[540] Amazing.
[541] Listen, thank you so much for coming here today.
[542] It's surreal to meet you because you were, you know, you still are an icon in my eyes because, you know, it's crazy that I'm from a little countryside village on the other side of the world and I was born in Africa and I was playing you on a game, your game when I was just a young kid.
[543] That's so cool.
[544] You're the reason why, as I said earlier, you're the reason why I thought skateboarding was cool and I had an interest in it.
[545] You're the reason why at 12 years old, I actually got a skateboard.
[546] I was never able to skate.
[547] I fell off a couple of times.
[548] I quit.
[549] I'm going to be honest.
[550] But I bought the board and I had an interest in the sport because of you and your legacy, and it's a legacy you continue to create in many ways through business and through your philanthropic endeavours.
[551] So thank you.
[552] And thank you for your humility.
[553] It's very easy to see how someone like you might be off in the clouds.
[554] But from everything I've seen, all the research I've done, and you're, it seems like you've been seemingly untouched.
[555] And I guess maybe from what you said, your wonderful partner and your family deserve some credit for that because they, oh, for sure.
[556] You know, clearly been a grounding force.
[557] Thank you so much, Tony.
[558] Yeah, thank you.
[559] Thanks for having me.