Casey Neistat (The Untold Story): "I was a homeless dad at 15 & had $200k debt!"...The Crazy Story Of How I Became The World's No.1 Video Creator!

[0] It got scary.

[1] We had to move into a higher security building, and I didn't know what to do.

[2] That's when it got dark.

[3] I think he's a godfather of YouTube, the king of vlogging.

[4] One of the most prolific creators in history.

[5] Throughout your story, there's this objectively delusional persistence towards a goal.

[6] The word I've been using is patience, because patience is so unattractive.

[7] And I think you need to remove this idea of success being this romantic, beautiful thing.

[8] It's not.

[9] When I started my daily vlog, making a video a day, 800 days in a row.

[10] It took eight years ago from zero to a couple hundred thousand subscribers, failing year in and year out.

[11] Now, $200 ,000 in debt.

[12] It's awful.

[13] You're a loser.

[14] But patience will smash into opportunity.

[15] And then it went to 10 million subscribers in like 18 months.

[16] So in life, you can get whatever you want.

[17] But are you willing to do that for 20 years?

[18] If you're not, don't bother, man. You've sold the company.

[19] You've built the channels.

[20] you've made a huge name for yourself at that point.

[21] That's when it got hard because the only goal that anyone should have in life is one of happiness and fulfillment.

[22] And like this idea that you have to win to be happy could not be further from the truth.

[23] I had by every definition achieved success.

[24] But I wasn't running the marathon because I wanted to get across the finish line.

[25] I was running it because I loved the running.

[26] And the fame was insane.

[27] Like we had to move to L .A. And I didn't know what to do until now.

[28] Is this a new, Casey?

[29] What can we expect?

[30] Casey is a legend.

[31] He's a legend to so many people.

[32] He's one of the originals as it relates to creativity, content, video and YouTube.

[33] And although most of us know Casey, what most of us don't know is the underdog story, the true deep, uncovered motivations that drove him to become arguably one of the world's most famous, most acclaimed, most celebrated online creative.

[34] ever.

[35] And it's a story that you'll relate to.

[36] It's a story of a completely normal dude that was down and out that had a very big indistinguishable passion.

[37] And the more interesting, maybe for me as someone that's watched Casey's journey for afar, is what he's doing now.

[38] For the first time ever, he talks about what his life is right now, now that he's not uploading videos every day.

[39] now that he's a little bit further out of the spotlight.

[40] And Casey gives us this blueprint for how we can take that thing that we enjoy doing, that thing we consider a passion or a hobby, and drag it up the mountain and make it an incredibly lucrative job.

[41] How do we turn our passion into a career?

[42] And how do we become number one at the thing we do?

[43] When everything, everything seems to be against us.

[44] That is the story of Casey Nystatt.

[45] And that's the story you're going to enjoy today.

[46] Casey, what do I need to know about your earliest years to understand the man that sits before me today?

[47] I almost think of people's lives, like a set of dominoes that have fallen.

[48] What are those first dominoes that fell to create the man that sits here today?

[49] Oh, man. How much time you got?

[50] Plenty.

[51] So my whole childhood was just completely unsupervised.

[52] Like there was no, did you do your homework tonight?

[53] there was no like dinner at six it was like be home before dark you're going to be in trouble trouble never being defined and like dark never being defined and it was just kind of like a very loose kind of fucked up wandering childhood of exploration you know like I was telling this story recently but we there were railroad tracks behind our house and one of the things we used to do for fun we were little kids is we'd collect pennies and change and we'd lay them on the railroad tracks and the train would go over them and flatten them.

[54] Very cool.

[55] But the train would vibrate the tracks as it approached and the coins would fall off of it.

[56] So the only way to address that is you'd put the coins on the train tracks when the train was really close.

[57] So, you know, I don't know.

[58] I was in grammar school, which is sixth grade.

[59] Like, how old are you then?

[60] I was like 10 years old.

[61] It's a little kid.

[62] And like, you know, train tracks, huge freight train coming and me putting nickels on the train tracks to try to get a flattened point, that's kind of what my childhood was like.

[63] As you look back, what is the power and the gift that that unsupervision gives you?

[64] Because I resonate with that so much.

[65] I think the reason I became an entrepreneur was because I've always said this.

[66] When I was 10 years old, my parents weren't there when I went to bed and they weren't there when I woke up.

[67] And being the youngest before, it was like they'd assumed I'd also been parented already.

[68] So they just gave up or something.

[69] They just got busy.

[70] So in that void of independence, I conducted a lot of experiments.

[71] And I almost hear that in what you're saying as well, that unsupervision allowed for exploration, that allowed for something.

[72] Yeah, I think it's like necessity is the mother of invention.

[73] And I think, you know, if you're 10 and your parents all of a sudden are absent, you're just forced to figure shit out.

[74] It's funny because, like, all I want to do as a parent now is protect my children from the hardships I had when I was little.

[75] But it is those hardships I had that made me who I am.

[76] am and it is like this impossible dichotomy to address it's impossible as a parent like i constantly think i'm fucking up my kids like we send them to a private school because we can like if you can afford it which we can we're fortunate like why would i not send my kids the best school but in the back of my brain i think what's best for them is to be in some new york city public school figuring it out like i think that's what's but i don't do that um because i had a terrible time at public school i hated it So I want to protect them from that.

[77] So I send them to a really fancy school that's lovely and warm and cozy.

[78] And like, am I helping them?

[79] I don't know.

[80] But no, I think that exactly what you were saying, like, I had no choice but to figure it out when I was little.

[81] Like, I worked from, like, when I was super young, I figured out how to make a dollar.

[82] Like, I was a paper boy when I was really, really young delivering newspapers.

[83] And I'd make like 30 bucks a week.

[84] And then, you know, when I got to eighth grade and I started smoking pot and I realized, like, the math.

[85] behind weed sales.

[86] I was like, okay, there's like a, there's a 400 % a 4x return if you buy quarter ounces and break them down and you sell them as dime bags.

[87] But if you buy a quarter pound and you sell them as eighths, you're looking at a 1 ,600 % return.

[88] I was like, okay, so how do I come up with $250 to buy the, to buy the QP, and then let me break that down.

[89] And then like, I haven't hit puberty yet.

[90] I'm a little kid.

[91] These guys are going to beat the shit out of me if I mess with the wrong people.

[92] So I need to befriend the guys that can protect me and like figure out that business.

[93] All of that was because I had, like, I didn't have a choice.

[94] Why were you unsupervised?

[95] Where were your parents?

[96] And this is what I mean by and I say my parents were accidentally great and I do think they tried their best.

[97] You know, like my dad worked a zillion hours a week.

[98] I had no choice.

[99] I think we lived like a very middle class livelihood.

[100] You know, like, my parents had, like, nice cars.

[101] They had volvos, but they always bought, like, five -year -old volvos, never new cars.

[102] And, like, we lived in a house that was, like, comfortable, like, you know, there's never any food in our house.

[103] It was, like, it was fine.

[104] We always made it by, like, we'd go on vacation, but it was always, like, in the back of the station wagon, and we'd go to, like, town two hours away and stay in a shitty motel for two or three nights.

[105] But my dad worked all the time.

[106] And I only understood later that it was very, like, hand to mouth.

[107] You know, he's paycheck to paycheck kind of guy.

[108] And my mother, you know, I don't, I still don't understand my mom.

[109] I think she was one of eight kids.

[110] My mother is the tail end of an aristocracy.

[111] So it's like, I was described her side of the family as like all the privilege and entitlement of an aristocrat with none of the money.

[112] So I, you know, I don't, my mother was just always kind of an enigma.

[113] I'm always kind of absent.

[114] And I think that, that they were just, they tried the best they could, and we were just kind of left wandering as kids.

[115] They divorced at some point?

[116] Yeah, that's when things got really hard.

[117] In what way?

[118] I think that childhood always felt like he was sort of hanging on by a thread.

[119] It was like one of four.

[120] My older brother, Van was the firstborn.

[121] And he's such a, Van is such an incredible guy, and he's so magnetic.

[122] And then there's my sister.

[123] It was the only girl.

[124] And then there's my little baby brother, Dean, who was the baby.

[125] and then I was just kind of this like accident that happened 13 months after my sister and two years before my brother like it was this so it was like I was always the loudest and the squeakiest to get the most attention and you know that was I kind of think that like characterized what my the challenges was were for me as a kid growing up and then it just got you know the the the tumult of living in that house just kind of precipitated until my parents split up, which happened under very, like, auspicious, shitty, fucked -up circumstances and kids being blamed when the kids shouldn't have been blamed.

[126] And I sell that without faulting my parents.

[127] Again, I think they were trying their best.

[128] But looking back at it, it's like, what the fuck, guys?

[129] I heard you say previously that you had to tell your father that your mother had cheated on him.

[130] Yeah, I remember that vividly.

[131] I can picture the table we were sitting at.

[132] his posture.

[133] I remember his response to it.

[134] But yeah, you know, my mother, you know, she's a good woman.

[135] She has faults.

[136] Like all of us, humans have faults.

[137] But I think she let those manifest in a way that were really dark at that time in her life.

[138] And it was apparent to me as a 14 -year -old, exactly what was going on.

[139] Exactly what was going on.

[140] It was so fucking crystal clear.

[141] As a 14 -year -old?

[142] Yeah.

[143] Like abundantly clear.

[144] And I never really understood my own father's perspective on that.

[145] But I understand that his perspective now, it's like, you know, he's working a million hours a week to keep his head above water.

[146] And also, like, you don't want to see that.

[147] You don't, like, the truth sucks.

[148] So just, like, put your head in the sand and ignore it is a very natural response to it.

[149] But I was, like, fighting with my mother at the time about, you know, all kinds of shit that a teenager fights with their parents about getting in trouble at school and all of that.

[150] So I was mad at her.

[151] and I think I you know part of part of me addressing that was just sort of confronting my dad that what are you going to do about this woman at 14 years old you knew your mother was cheating on your father yeah and you told him yeah how does one know that I mean it's it was it was super apparent I mean there's a handful of very specific situations that just made it abundantly clear you know I think that's why I like, you know, at the time, obviously, fault my mom through and through, but looking back at it, it was, you know, it was probably something closer to, like, a cry for help or a cry for attention or just a way of her, you know, her letting the struggle she's facing and the totality of her life manifest.

[152] Like, this is the only way I can express it is by doing this kind of fucked up awful thing.

[153] As you step out of that chapter of your childhood, what are the fingerprints, the character fingerprints that are left on you that still are, with you today?

[154] What did that chapter of your life, those first sort of 15 years?

[155] Oh, I don't think anything has changed.

[156] Like, I don't think it's even fingerprints.

[157] There was so, like, acute the way that I had, that I saw my future when I was that young.

[158] Like, I knew exactly my plan.

[159] Really?

[160] And exactly my plan.

[161] And look, the specifics of how that plan was going to come together were ambiguous at best.

[162] But, like, I knew exactly my plan.

[163] Like, New York City was always the plan.

[164] I remember it was, like, page 41 in my social studies book.

[165] was a two -page spread of the New York City skyline and I wouldn't let myself look at that page because I would have such an emotional response to it.

[166] Like Tom Hanks and the movie Big, I would play that movie on repeat because I was like, that's me. Like, that's me. I'm going to move to New York City and get to be the kid that I wish I could be.

[167] Like, that's me. To this day, like I know every word of that movie.

[168] That movie is like a Bible for me. It is a roadmap for me. But, you know, like I've made 500 YouTube videos about this single idea.

[169] But like the mission of my life, And this was defined then when I was a little kid.

[170] The sole mission of my life is to realize all the promises I made to myself as a kid.

[171] You're like when you're a little kid and you're like, someday I'm going to be an astronaut.

[172] Like your mom yells at you and it's like, well, someday I'm going to have kids and I'm not going to yell at them.

[173] Or like, you're fucking hungry and you're all out of mac and cheese.

[174] And you're like, someday I'm going to have a refrigerator that's always filled up with food.

[175] Like whatever it is.

[176] You know, you have a boss that's an asshole and it's like someday I'm not going to have any boss.

[177] And like all of those promises, like my promises could, you know, they could fill up a phone book.

[178] And my sole mission was always like, no, I have to check every single one of these off.

[179] The how was always gray, but to do it was always vivid.

[180] And there was never even a doubt that it was going to happen.

[181] Like there was never an if, ever.

[182] There was nothing even close to that.

[183] But life throws at you at that age things that you could never have predicted.

[184] And those things don't seem to have deterred your pursuit of that mission.

[185] You have a child that's 16, 17 years.

[186] music.

[187] Yeah.

[188] That was difficult.

[189] Yeah, so I moved out.

[190] Moved out as such a funny way of characterizing.

[191] I say moved out and I pictured like a moving truck pull up.

[192] I got in a fight with my mom at age 15 on a Monday night, school night.

[193] And she gave me this ultimatum.

[194] This is when she and my father were like, you know, really, they were splitting up and getting back together.

[195] It was like a really gnarly time in the family.

[196] But we got into this fight and I just remember thinking like, I was so mad at her at the time.

[197] I was like, you can't tell me what to do.

[198] and she was like, you need to do this, this, and this, or get out of this house.

[199] And I was like, all right, I'm going to go.

[200] And I just, like, left.

[201] Where did you go?

[202] I, like, that night I stayed at a friend's house down the street because his parents were, like, weirdly religious, but also kind of absent.

[203] They were always, like, very warm to me. So I was like, hey, can I sleep here?

[204] And he's like, yeah, sure.

[205] And I slept in another friend's house and then...

[206] So you ran away from home.

[207] Yeah, so as they moved out.

[208] It wasn't like, you know, put the couch over there.

[209] It was like, I just took a backpack.

[210] And it was as close to, like, a stick.

[211] with a red handkerchief on the back.

[212] But I eventually moved in with these two girls.

[213] They were great.

[214] They were super fun.

[215] And, you know, they were like, let's say I was 15.

[216] I think they were 17 or 18.

[217] And then, yeah, I started, you know, one of them, she and I kind of got close.

[218] And then, like, immediately she was pregnant.

[219] And a year later, we had, yeah, we had a kid.

[220] And that was challenging.

[221] But even so, like, I never, I remember one moment where, like, she started freaking out in the car because she was like, you know, know, eight months pregnant, and she's, like, crying and just, like, you know, dealing with it.

[222] And I pulled over, and I was like, what are you upset about?

[223] And she was like, what are we going to do?

[224] We don't have any money.

[225] Like, you don't even have a job.

[226] Like, what are we going to do?

[227] And I was like, it's going to be, what do you mean?

[228] What are we going to do?

[229] It's going to be fine.

[230] We're going to have a kid.

[231] It's going to be great.

[232] It's going to be fine.

[233] Were you not scared?

[234] Then, no. It just, everything made sense.

[235] I was like, oh, this is great.

[236] There's a naivity to.

[237] It's beautiful.

[238] Now I'm scared.

[239] I always say that.

[240] Like, I had nothing to lose then.

[241] I had nothing.

[242] Nothing.

[243] Like, I had no reputation.

[244] You know, like my friend's parents all thought I was a fucking degenerate.

[245] They wouldn't let me hang out on my friends because I was such a bad influence.

[246] So it wasn't like I had like a reputation.

[247] Nobody knew me. I had nothing.

[248] I had no money.

[249] I had no resources.

[250] I knew no one.

[251] And when you have nothing to lose, you're just like a rat that's cornered.

[252] And it was like, oh, I didn't chew my way out of this one.

[253] And now I'm like, I'm so scared at everything I do in life because I'm like, it's so good right now.

[254] I don't want to fuck anything up.

[255] Take it really easy.

[256] Like, I'm really happy right now.

[257] Like, this is I want to protect what I've got.

[258] But no, there was a naivity then that was just that was, it's hard for me to empathize with how bright -eyed bushy -tail naive I was.

[259] I remember when, like, my son, Owen, when his mother, When she and I split up, you know, she dumped me because I was just such a pain in the ass and God bless her for doing so.

[260] But I remember, I was like, then I was like, okay, I've got a plan.

[261] In five years, I'm going to move to New York City, and I'm going to figure this out, and I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do that.

[262] What were you going to do in New York?

[263] I don't know.

[264] I had some cockamamie plan.

[265] There's always a plan.

[266] I don't know what the specifics were, but I knew that, like, up until that point in my life, I'd only ever worked in the back of restaurants, washing dishes, or like being like a prep cook or just being like the lowman and the totem pole takes out the trash and scrubs out the garbage cans and does all the shit work mop is the only job I'd ever done.

[267] My father sold used restaurant supplies like if you need to do oven or walk in fridge so you could always get me jobs and restaurants.

[268] And I remember like moving to New York City my only plan was like I'm just not going to work in a restaurant.

[269] That's my plan.

[270] I'm going to do anything that's not work.

[271] But I had this five year plan to move to New York City and like six months later, I quit my job and moved to New York.

[272] When you look back at that sort of like 19 -year -old kid that quits his job and moves to New York, so up until that point, what do you now know as a guy that's in their 40s about the brilliant accidental decisions you were making at the time?

[273] Like what are the, you know, like the accidental brilliance, that is probably objectively stupidity.

[274] Like that's a stupid decision.

[275] But in hindsight, you go, I was a genius.

[276] You know, I never would say in hindsight I was a genius.

[277] It was raw stupidity and fearlessness.

[278] But it's like all those stupid fucking quotes that everybody posts on Instagram that, like, I hate about like, you know, you only live once, follow your dreams, pursue this.

[279] Like, fuck you.

[280] Fuck you.

[281] I hate that shit.

[282] I hate inspo porn, even though I'm very guilty of fanning the flames of inspo porn.

[283] But like, there's so much truth to all of that.

[284] and the reason why I hate that shit is like if you have to be told that it's too late if you're going to learn that from an Instagram post it means nothing to you it's just masturbation like it's doing nothing for anyone people just put it up there to feel good about themselves but all of it is true and what I mean by that is like I could never do at age 42 what I could do at age 19 which is just say fuck it I've got a 10th grade education no high school diploma, no work experience, no life experience, and a two -year -old, what's the best thing I can do right now?

[285] I know.

[286] Let me move to the most expensive, challenging city in the world with no plan.

[287] If I hadn't done it then, I don't know that you could ever do that.

[288] And I think that like when I say those cheesy quotes are true, it's like you kind of have an obligation in life that if you feel something that is so powerful to you, like follow through with that.

[289] And I'm not naive to that now.

[290] I wasn't naive to it then, but I think now I can articulate it, which is like this idea of privilege.

[291] I feel like born in the United States of America.

[292] If you like get to sit at a table and do this, like, now I wasn't a rich kid.

[293] And like, yeah, I was like on welfare and got free diapers and milk from the state.

[294] Otherwise I wouldn't be able to feed my child.

[295] And like I worked 60 hours a week in a kitchen making $8 an hour.

[296] I think I got $7 .25 an hour was my starting salary.

[297] and, like, that was like, I'm the luckiest person in the world to get to do that.

[298] I'm crazy?

[299] Like, do you know what some kid in South Sudan would do for that opportunity?

[300] And I just walked into it.

[301] I'm like a healthy guy.

[302] I've got two legs that work.

[303] And like, I have a brain.

[304] Like, I'm the lucky.

[305] I won the lotto on life.

[306] So, like, if you start life with this winning lotto ticket and it's like, oh, a little hiccup.

[307] Accidentally had a baby when I was a fucking teenager.

[308] It's like, no big deal.

[309] Like, they'll just push through this.

[310] This is going to be great.

[311] And it's like, I want to live in New York City.

[312] It's like, let's go for it.

[313] Let's do it.

[314] The privilege there sounds like a privilege of mindset.

[315] There's objective privilege, I guess, from being...

[316] Yeah, like, I push back.

[317] And when people say that, my response is like, fuck you, privilege of mindset.

[318] No, that's an objective privilege.

[319] Name one time in the history of humanity, like the Sumerians invented the written word 5 ,000 years ago.

[320] Name one time when people had the kind of opportunity that, like, people like us, born in the West, have.

[321] like there's never existed before never ever maybe it's a little bit easier for our parents you know what I mean like maybe like post -war USA was like a little bit easier than it is now maybe now's a little bit harder than it was for me 20 years ago but like still give me a fucking break like this life is like it's the hardships we face now are so menial compared to what they were 100 years ago objectively 200 years ago you were saying the thing that went viral it was like the reasons why people died in London in the year 1892 and like the fourth most popular cause of death was teeth or like 60 % of the population are dying because their teeth are fucked up like we are pretty easy why don't people so there's going to be another guy right now that's like washing pots in the back room at the seafood restaurant on the $7 an hour and he might be listening to this right now and he hears you say that but why why don't people take action beyond that point and take the big bet when they've objectively potentially nothing to lose?

[322] Well, what's that line from, is it Caddyshack or Fletch?

[323] When he's like, the world needs ditch diggers too.

[324] That's a very cynical take on it.

[325] But I think a very practical take is like, not everybody wants it.

[326] And I think that's okay.

[327] I think that's a wonderful thing.

[328] I never understood that.

[329] I think like in life you can get whatever you want, but you can't want whatever you want.

[330] If you don't want it, there's no creating that.

[331] But do you think sometimes people want to want it, but they don't really want to?

[332] Yeah, of course.

[333] Of course.

[334] And I think that's okay.

[335] I think if you really fucking wanted it, you wouldn't need this, like, inspirational podcast.

[336] They'd make you make that decision.

[337] You'd already be fucking doing it.

[338] And that's not it to be defeatist.

[339] It just means that, like, the only goal that anyone should have in life is one of happiness and fulfillment.

[340] And, like, this idea that you have to win to be happy could not be further from the truth.

[341] Like, why do we hear about rock stars and famous?

[342] actors and these people that we see as sort of like the absolute apex of success in the industry where are they all fucking killing themselves and dying of alcoholism and like all that darkness happening at the highest level it's like because that doesn't equal happiness like what is happiness for you and an example I like to point to is like my best friend in the whole world we grew up together like I ran away from home I stayed with him for a little while like we've been together since we were kids you know like when I moved to New York he stayed in the hometown and like When I quit my job washing dishes, I gave him that job.

[343] He literally took over that job.

[344] And now, you know, here we are 25 years later.

[345] He still lives in that town.

[346] You know, he still has a job very similar to what he had 25 years ago.

[347] He's got three amazing kids.

[348] He lives like a very, what I would say is like very classic archetypal, middle class American life.

[349] And like, I look at him and I'm like, that is the embodiment of like happiness and fulfillment.

[350] He has this amazing relationship with his amazing life.

[351] wife because he's these three brilliant little kids that he gets to, you know, make sure they get to school every single day.

[352] He's got like a cute dog that he goes on runs with.

[353] He has this amazing life and no part of that life was being like, fuck this.

[354] I want to like live on the moon someday.

[355] I need to run away from all this.

[356] Like his his focus in life was something completely different.

[357] And I think that I didn't understand.

[358] I struggled to appreciate that when I was younger.

[359] But now I see like so much to that.

[360] And that's why I think like adjusting.

[361] the pie in the sky is just one of happiness and fulfillment and defining those, it is up to you.

[362] Brony Ware, I meant it was talking about her the other day.

[363] She's that, I think it's called palliative care nurse in Australia who interviewed people with one day left to live.

[364] And she asked them what their biggest regret in their life was.

[365] The number one regret of the dying was not living a life true to myself.

[366] And for those people, those that do have this aspiration to start that business or, I don't know, become a ballet dancer in Europe or whatever, that are held back by potentially some form of fear, you know, is there anything that one can offer them to get them just to take that first initial step, which seems to be the hardest, like getting off the couch or getting out of quitting their job, you might offer to your children if they came to you?

[367] Yeah, I mean, I just think that failure is, I think failure is like the greatest gift.

[368] I think failure is like it hurts so bad.

[369] But failure is like is a part of life.

[370] And if you're not willing to accept that, like failure is part of it.

[371] You've got to keep failing.

[372] Anvil, the story of Anvil, you know this?

[373] I made a whole video about this.

[374] I made a YouTube video about this.

[375] And then the leads, there's a movie called Anvil.

[376] I think it's called The Story of Anvil or something like that.

[377] Anvil was this like big hair rock band in the 80s.

[378] And they opened for like Def Leopard, you know like 50 ,000 people kind of thing.

[379] But they never headlined.

[380] They never broke through.

[381] They were always the opening act.

[382] They were always like the brides made, never the bride.

[383] And the movie opens showing these huge concerts in the 80s and Anvil just rocking out.

[384] And then it cuts and it shows the lead singer.

[385] And he lives in Canada and he drives a little van.

[386] He delivers food to old people making minimum wage, like barely able to keep his head above water.

[387] And he performs still in his leather outfits as like this middle -aged 50 -year -old guy to like six people.

[388] And they'll be just drinking beer.

[389] And he's there giving it as all.

[390] all.

[391] And the movie is about how relentless this guy.

[392] Like, he's just not well.

[393] He borrows money from his sister to record an album.

[394] Nobody buys it.

[395] Can't pay her back.

[396] She's at kids and shit.

[397] Like, it is the most devastating story you've ever seen because he's unwilling to give up that dream.

[398] Like, he just wouldn't let it go.

[399] This is a whole life.

[400] And then this documentary comes out and it's fucking fantastic.

[401] And because of the documentary, Anvil blows up.

[402] And all of a sudden, he is that superstar.

[403] Like on tour, selling out arenas.

[404] in Japan and shit.

[405] Like, he did it.

[406] Had he given up at any point in time, the documentary wouldn't have been interesting.

[407] It would have just been another person who threw in the towel.

[408] But they made this, like a filmmaker saw this story.

[409] It was like, that's crazy.

[410] I need to tell that story.

[411] And it yielded that success.

[412] Had he not been willing to take on 40 years of failure, 30 years of failure, he would have never found success.

[413] And I think that's the most extreme version of that.

[414] The reason why I was interrupting myself, because I made that YouTube video about, that's basically the story I just told you, and like the director reached out and was like whatever the guy's name, the lead singer Vanville, he's like, dude, he loved your YouTube video.

[415] And I was like, yeah, I was like star -struck.

[416] You know what I mean?

[417] Yeah, yeah.

[418] But I think failure is overrated.

[419] I think failure, people are so scared of failure.

[420] And I think the fear of failure is that it's a fear of what other people are going to think about you.

[421] Persistence.

[422] That's what I heard through that story as well, just this almost objectively delusional persistence towards a goal.

[423] And I don't know if those words are correct, because in that situation, I question whether Anvil's success was ever really making it or the journey itself was the success.

[424] But in your story, I see the same level of, like, persistence that a bystander would go, that guy's crazy.

[425] Because there was various stats I saw about how long it took you to get to various success milestones.

[426] Even when you started daily blocking, I think it took you five years.

[427] to get to like 400 ,000 subscribers.

[428] Yeah.

[429] Throughout your story, there's this, there's this persistence where I go, this guy would have carried on doing this because he wasn't doing this for any particular milestone.

[430] What role does persistence play?

[431] It's funny.

[432] His persistence is such a, it's a more accurate word, but the word I've been using lately is patience because I think it's so much less sexy.

[433] I think persistence is like, like under the picture of like a little kitten hanging off the branch, it's like persistence.

[434] you know what I mean but you'll never say patience patience is so unattractive and when people say to me like what's the one piece of advice you give to an aspiring creator and you know patience like patience above every because like if you're not willing to give up if we're willing to stick with it for you will find success or you'll die trying in which case fuck it like whatever you know you're not going to be that person in the palliative care saying I wish I hadn't given up because you didn't give up you just kept going You're going to be that person who's like, I've got one day left.

[435] I can still pull this shit off.

[436] But patience is a really unsexy way of saying it.

[437] I think you need to remove the sexiness.

[438] You need to remove the sensationalism that has, that inspiration has been perverted with is this idea of like it's this romantic, beautiful thing.

[439] It's not.

[440] It's fucking awful.

[441] Like failing year in and year out and having everybody roll their eyes at you.

[442] like, you know, whether you're a musician who's performing at the mall and no one's paying attention to you, or you're that YouTube uploads and you get zero views.

[443] Like, it's fucking awful.

[444] It's embarrassing.

[445] You're a loser.

[446] Like, you talked to Mr. Beast, Jimmy, and it's like his war stories from when he started YouTube and he was using his, like, moms busted compact computer with a built -in webcam, making these videos that no one watched.

[447] They're all deleted scrub from the internet now.

[448] They're terrible.

[449] And just like him going to school, the next day and it's like two of his friends from school saw him and both acknowledged how terrible they were like that kind of like being told your that's failure being told you suck over and over and over and over and over and then seeing how much you suck be quantified by a lack of views or no one showing up to your concert or no one laughing at your jokes because you're a stand -up comedian or no one showing up your restaurant because you're a chef like that sucks starting an online store no one buys your fucking t -shirts that sucks failure sucks so like combine that with patience like that suck are you willing to do that for 20 years if you're not don't fucking bother man don't bother and that's why i like the the plainness of the word patience is because it's it that is what it is there's nothing persistence persistence is like oh you're at mile 22 persist, man, you'll get across the finish line and four short miles.

[450] That's beautiful and fun and hardcore.

[451] That patience that you and Mr. Beast have both shown and many others, where does it come from?

[452] Because objectively any sane person, if everyone's telling them they're a loser and they suck and their parents are saying, you better go get a real job.

[453] Anyone who's acting in line with their apparent incentives in that moment would quit.

[454] I think very simply it comes for me, and I think probably for Jimmy too, we've talked about it.

[455] He and I've talked about it.

[456] But there was no plan B, there was no other option.

[457] You know, like I had no backup plan.

[458] There was nothing else I could do.

[459] It wasn't like I had a college education and there was like a job in an ad agency waiting for me where I could just say, fucking, go make 80K a year and get a nicer apartment and relax and have a nice go of it.

[460] It was like, if this doesn't work, I'm back in the kitchen making $7 .25 an hour.

[461] Like, you know, getting money from the state so I can pay for like groceries on a fucking WIC.

[462] I was on WIC.

[463] Women, infants, and children.

[464] It was a card.

[465] You'd swipe it and you would pay for your diapers and milk, and that's it.

[466] If you tried to buy like a Nintendo with it, it wouldn't work.

[467] Like that, I remember that.

[468] That was the fallback.

[469] That was the alternative.

[470] Every single turn, that was the alternative.

[471] Like, I moved to New York City, and I was here for three months.

[472] I had a three -month sublet that my brother's ex -girlfriend paid for.

[473] She was like, I'll loan you the money.

[474] And I was like, cool.

[475] It was her parents credit card that paid for it and it was like 1800 bucks 600 bucks a month 400 bucks a month for three months I shared in any event that lease was up I had nowhere to live in New York and I was like fuck what what I do now and I moved in with some this this guy was like hey man I need extra money if you want to sleep on my couch my dad pays my rent so you could sleep my couch and just give me like 300 bucks a month and that way money goes to me and I was like deal and I slept on his couch for exactly 11 nights from September 1st to September 11th, 2001, and then the morning of September 11th, the entire apartment blew up with me in it and him in it.

[476] And I remember later that day, like, getting on the phone my dad and, like, the towers are still on fire.

[477] And my dad being like, I think it's time for you to come home now, come back.

[478] And I was like, what are you talking about?

[479] Like, what are you talking?

[480] What do you mean?

[481] Why would I come back?

[482] And he was like, terrorist blew up your apartment, you have no job, you have no prospects, you have no money, and now you have nowhere to sleep.

[483] I'm like, I'll figure that out.

[484] I'll be fine.

[485] Later, dad.

[486] That's patience.

[487] That's delusional patience.

[488] But you ask why, like, what fuels that patient?

[489] The plan B was literally moving back to southeastern Connecticut and getting a job in a restaurant.

[490] I read a study once about this whole idea of plan A thinking, and they take a group of people.

[491] and they tell them to do a puzzle.

[492] And in exchange for doing the puzzle correctly, they'll get a snack.

[493] So they take two groups and they say, okay, do this puzzle.

[494] If you do it correctly, you'll get a snack.

[495] Then they take another group and they say, do the same puzzle.

[496] If you do it correctly, you'll get a snack.

[497] But then they say to the group, you can also get the same snack just down the hall in the vending machine.

[498] And in the second group, where they're given a plan B to get the snack, motivation levels drop.

[499] They spend less time trying to do the puzzle.

[500] and their performance towards doing the puzzle plummets as well, just by being aware that they can get the same reward down the hall, performance drops.

[501] And if there was ever a case for the psychology, and they've done this multiple times and multiple studies, but it is pretty solid evidence that even the presence of a plan B can reduce motivation towards your plan A. Completely.

[502] Completely.

[503] I mean, I wish I knew that study because that's such a beautiful, beautiful illustration of what it is.

[504] also what it means to have a knife at your back.

[505] I remember the thing I used to say back then, when I first started to find success, and I would always be like, my life is like I'm running from a pack of starving rolls.

[506] If I slow down at all, I will be eaten alive.

[507] Like, I have one choice and it's to keep going as fast as I can, or I'll be torn to pieces.

[508] And that's what it felt like, and I love that.

[509] Like, that sounds so negative and dark, but like, I love that.

[510] It was such, like, a motivation.

[511] And I pitied the friends.

[512] Like, I remember I first moved to New York City, my first summer here, I don't know how, but I, like, fell in with this, like, click of, because I thought the girls were pretty, but, like, these rich kids.

[513] And I'd go out with them.

[514] And I just remember, like, the way they would pick up the tab.

[515] And they're my age, for 19, 20 years old, and they're picking up, like, you know, hundreds of dollar bar tabs and, like, always had taxis.

[516] And, like, a taxi to me was, like, you know, it's like a private jet.

[517] They're, like, I got all this money.

[518] I would always kind of look at them with this kind of like jealousy and like it was less of a jealousy and more just fantasized like imagine if I was the same age I am now but I had a credit card with an unlimited amount of money like I went to her apartment she lives in like the 26th floor she has a two -bedroom apartment and she lives alone I'm sharing a 200 square foot studio with strangers I met on Craigslist we have to wait in line to use the bathroom in the morning and I fantasize about what that would be like and then And seeing as they got older and as I got older, them sort of the sort of wandering and not sure where they want to go in life and all of that was for me, it was such a, you know, there was such a defined path because I didn't have any of those luxuries or any of those benefits that I now look at back at that as like being virtuous.

[519] So how do you do that for your kids?

[520] Well, that's the million dollar question because it's like I never want my kids to feel that that bullshit that I had to feel like the shame of like always.

[521] hiding in the bathroom when the bill came.

[522] I would always, you know, like, I always do something.

[523] I wasn't just, like, a total take.

[524] But, like, I just, you know, like, I always kind of felt like a scumbag because I was never able to contribute the way that other people were.

[525] And, like, that's a really shameful thing.

[526] And, like, I can remember so many times, like, when I would meet a young lady and she would like, let me go back to your place and the excuses that I would come up with because I, like, lived in an SRO for a while.

[527] I lived in a halfway house that I bribed my way.

[528] into.

[529] A halfway house for anyone that doesn't know in Europe is a...

[530] It's where you get out of jail and you're not allowed to live normally yet in the public.

[531] So they put you into a building where they can monitor you.

[532] How did you get in there?

[533] I bribed the guy at the door.

[534] There was like a guy behind glass with like a little slot.

[535] And you'd have to check in and check out.

[536] And I went there and I was like, hey, do you have any open rooms?

[537] And he was like, now I'll get out of here.

[538] And I came back with a carton of cigarettes with a $100 bill in it.

[539] And I was like, I need a room.

[540] And he was like, all right, it's like, 531 is yours, right?

[541] Your name there.

[542] And he was like, it's $450 a month cash or whatever it was.

[543] Interestingly, when you tell that story of being in a halfway house and having no money and all these things, objectively someone looks at that situation and goes, oh, man, I feel so sorry for you.

[544] Like, I was so psyched.

[545] But this speaks to how, like, a mindset and a perspective can turn hell into heaven or heaven into hell.

[546] Yeah.

[547] I mean, like, I've, I've, the reason why I learned about that is it was my, I had a friend, her cousin, lived there.

[548] And he was like, here's how I got it.

[549] And I bribed the door guy.

[550] And he's like, it's cool.

[551] It's like, don't talk to anybody in the building.

[552] And he's like, you know, some of the people in here are undocumented immigrants.

[553] And a lot of them are like they just got out of jail.

[554] I was like, okay, that's cool.

[555] And he's like, some of them are homeless people that were given these rooms.

[556] I'm like, okay, I can handle all that.

[557] They like told me the whole thing of how to get in there.

[558] And there's no bathroom and no kitchen.

[559] How did this change, Casey?

[560] I know video had come into your life around...

[561] Video came to my life before I moved to New York City.

[562] That was the catalyst, is my baby mama dumped me. I came into New York to hang around my brother, Van, who I, like, worshipped.

[563] And he had just bought...

[564] He was doing, like, temp work.

[565] Right.

[566] He lived in Brooklyn.

[567] He had bought the first IMac, like, the one that was, like, shaped, like, a big blue TV.

[568] And it came with, like, footage of, like, a dog.

[569] in a plastic like kitty pool of pool for children to play and the dog was getting a bath so you could play edit with the footage that came with it and he and I would just kind of edit that footage over and over so we'd have a camera so I bought a camera and he had a computer and I came in and we'd like film stuff and then edit videos of it and I was like I can figure this out and I like maxed out a credit card and started making terrible videos and then I was like that's it I'll become a filmmaker and then I moved to New York like it was one of the three things I brought to New York when I moved here was this huge iMac and like a backpack full of clothes and then like my BMX bike which was stolen the next day and you're like 19 yeah yeah what was it do you ever think about the psychological reasons why you were so drawn to video and storytelling generally i don't know i i have an answer to that but i don't know if this is the why i was drawn to it or maybe i've just said this so many times it's become my default response but i definitely felt like i never had a voice you know I think it's because I was like that third out of four kids or like I never did well in school.

[570] I was always in trouble so the teachers never listened to me. I was always in trouble in getting in fights and stuff.

[571] So my friend's parents never liked me. And I just felt like I was never heard.

[572] And then I started to make videos.

[573] I was able to kind of articulate my thoughts or an idea in the form of a video and people would respond to that.

[574] So I think that was part of it.

[575] But I don't know.

[576] I think I also just liked it.

[577] There was something about it that felt so fun, and there was something in the end that you would have that was like this finished done thing.

[578] Did you like movies?

[579] Yeah, but I was never like a cinephile as a kid.

[580] You know, like I had my favorites.

[581] You know, like I loved the movie big.

[582] And I do remember in seventh grade we got to do this program where you could like choose a profession and then you got to go do that job.

[583] And like there's a Pfizer pharmaceutical had like its headquarters.

[584] in nearby town.

[585] A lot of the kids went there to be chemists or scientists and they got to go spend like two hours at Pfizer.

[586] There's a submarine military base.

[587] A lot of kids got to go on to the base and see what it's like to be in the Navy.

[588] And mine was, I want to work at a video rental store because I want to get paid just sit and watch movies all day.

[589] And I'm like, all right, I guess we could organize that for you.

[590] And I remember going there and it was like this kid and he was like, yeah, I worked a day shift.

[591] Nobody ever comes by.

[592] And I was like, what do we do?

[593] And he's like, we have to put away those movies.

[594] took like three minutes.

[595] And I was like, now what are we doing?

[596] He's like, just wait for customers.

[597] So we just sat there and watched TV for like eight hours.

[598] I was like, this is a job I could get into.

[599] But I don't think it was like the, you know, like the Quentin Tarantino where he worked in a video store and studied film.

[600] I never had that.

[601] Do you think that's part of the reason you were successful at it, though?

[602] Because your style has always been so clearly original in so many ways.

[603] That's how it feels.

[604] It feels like you are, in fact, someone that didn't go to movie school.

[605] And that's why people resonate with it.

[606] Yeah, I always say that my filmmaking style is because I was never taught the right way to do it.

[607] So I was forced to find my own way to do it.

[608] And I think that kind of thinking is at the same time as sort of like consumer -grade video creation became this ubiquitous thing with computers and editing software and cameras for the first time ever in the history of humanity.

[609] In the early 2000s, you could buy like a DV digital video camera and you could buy a computer and plug it in.

[610] You could edit your own videos.

[611] So my aspiration to make videos and this machine that let you do it those happened at the exact same time and because of that I was forced to create my own style like my hard drive was 10 gigabytes so I could edit like 12 or 16 minutes of video before the hard drive was full so no I made really short videos and that's why I was like I didn't have a choice I had to be a short video but I do think yeah like the lack of formal education in that capacity forced me to be a different kind of filmmaker or approach it differently anyway.

[612] Do you look back, I'm so compelled by originality as like a subject and the power of originality because when you, when a couple of people in society or the world or business or creativity or movies take the risk of being original, the issue is they draw in a, and that originality is resonant.

[613] They draw in a big audience who then look up to them and almost confuse their admiration for that person with their aspirations for themselves and go, I will create like Casey.

[614] And that is the way to be successful.

[615] It's a very logical deduction, but it's clearly flawed because there can be no other Casey.

[616] It's tremendously flawed.

[617] It's what I fucking hate about YouTube.

[618] I call this like the Mr. Beastification of YouTube.

[619] And I have to be very careful here.

[620] Jimmy's a genius.

[621] What Mr. Beast has done on YouTube is brilliant.

[622] And it's because of his brilliant.

[623] So this is not to take away from him at all.

[624] I think he is incredible what he's done.

[625] And he has no control over the fact that millions of people are trying to copy him.

[626] But the fact that millions of people are trying to emulate what he's doing, that is the Mr. Beastification of the platform that I hate.

[627] Because Jimmy's always been very honest.

[628] His goal has never been like, ask me my goal.

[629] And now in the most sort of intellectual of terms, I'll look back at it.

[630] And I'll be like, video for me has always been a way of, a refined self -expression for me to take my thoughts and force them into this sort of articulate six, eight -minute compartmentalized little video and share it with the world.

[631] That's been my motivation.

[632] Jimmy's from day one has just to have been to find success.

[633] He was a kid who had no money, he had no resource, he had no friends, he had nothing.

[634] And he's like, this is a tool I can use to take me to the highest planes of business and all of that.

[635] Jimmy is just as passionate about his chocolate company, Feastables, as he is about his video creation company, Mr. Beast Enterprise.

[636] He's just as passionate about his philanthropy being successful and helping as many people as possible as he is about making a video about what it means to live in a million -dollar house.

[637] His passion is about that winning.

[638] So for him, it's beautiful.

[639] But in the most reductive sense, when people look at that, they're like, hey, that's what it means to be a YouTuber.

[640] All that matters is views.

[641] And I put next to no value on that.

[642] No. Again, this isn't the takeaway from Jimmy because what he's done is incredible.

[643] but when people aspire just to get that view count up, to me it's a race to the bottom.

[644] I fucking hate it.

[645] I hate it.

[646] And I do think it's because of people not knowing what to do.

[647] So they look to see, well, who's successful?

[648] That's how I'm successful.

[649] Let me be that.

[650] And it will never work.

[651] It will never work.

[652] It requires sort of an introspection of like, no, why do I want to do this?

[653] What is true to me?

[654] And then you go and do that.

[655] And maybe you'll find success.

[656] Maybe you won't.

[657] or at least it'll be true.

[658] Why does truth end up mattering more in that case than view?

[659] So if there's one path here and I can get a million subscribers by just doing a Jimmy or Casey knockoff channel or there's this other path which I go, there's no blueprint here and it's never been done before and I don't think anyone's going to like this stuff and it's probably not going to pay my bills.

[660] What's the case for pursuing the latter, the true path?

[661] I think that truth lasts, truth matters.

[662] Like there's a direct, there's no correlation, rather, between the movies that have won Best Picture, the Academy Award for Best Picture over the last 80 years, and the highest grossing movies.

[663] Those two things have been the same like three times, four times.

[664] Like one of them, I think, was gone with the wind, meaning that the movies that the world determines are the most quality, most important, greatest films, the greatest contribution to culture and humanity are almost never the same movies that make the most money.

[665] Transformers 9 was a really cool movie.

[666] I don't fucking remember what happened.

[667] I think there's a dinosaur in it.

[668] But like you see a movie that affects you.

[669] You see a movie that matters to you.

[670] You see Little Dieter Needs to Fly, this documentary by Werner Herzog.

[671] You see the Anvil story and you're thinking about it.

[672] I haven't seen that Anvil story in five years.

[673] I think about that movie every day.

[674] That lasts.

[675] So that matters.

[676] And me as a 42 -year -old grown adult, like, I know in life that's what matters.

[677] There's always going to be junk food.

[678] They'll always be an appetite for it.

[679] They'll always be an appetite for fucking reality TV and bullshit.

[680] And, you know, like whatever pop stars are popular this week and will disappear next week.

[681] But the musicians that, like, change you, the ones that write that song that, like, makes you cry.

[682] Like, you'll never forget that.

[683] So for me, like, if you want to be an artist or you say you want to be an artist, how could there be any other goal but that?

[684] And just to bring this full circle, I think the magic of Mr. Bees or Jimmy in particular, I don't think he's ever wanted to be an artist.

[685] And that honesty is why I have so much respect for him.

[686] He's an empire builder.

[687] And that's what he's wanted to do.

[688] And he's done that through video creation.

[689] But, again, neither here nor there not to digress.

[690] for me it's like great work matters and it does it changes people changes me look at the work that like spike jones did not his oscar award -winning movies but like i look at his little weirdo music videos that i used to watch when i was a kid and i watched those music videos over and over what's up fat lip the music video that he made with fat lip who was like the kind of a popular hip -hop artist who didn't have any money and he was like i got this new song spike but i don't have any money to make the video So they went out and they put Fat Lipp in a clown costume and they filmed it on a VHS camera.

[691] It's like one of my favorite music videos ever.

[692] But I saw that and I was like, I can be a filmmaker.

[693] Now, if he had made a video just trying to get the most views or whatever it was, instead of just him and his friend Fat Lipp trying to make something great, it might not have done that for me. And that changed my world.

[694] So like, if you're going to share your fucking inspirational quotes on Instagram and step up, like make the thing that could change.

[695] the world, make the thing that could affect someone.

[696] Don't just give me Mickey Mouse bullshit.

[697] That's going to get views.

[698] I look at both you and Jimmy as pioneers, but for very different reasons and seemingly with very different motivations.

[699] You strike me as someone that was really inspired by the art form and the storytelling side of like the creative production process.

[700] And Jimmy took this, it seems like he took this other approach where it was much more about what the data was telling him to make.

[701] Yeah.

[702] Both of them created originality.

[703] know.

[704] You know?

[705] I think Jimmy is in the history of you.

[706] I think Jimmy is the most important YouTuber in the history of YouTube.

[707] And I think that arguably, I think he's one of the most important people in the history of entertainment, full stop.

[708] I don't know that anyone has built an empire that reaches as many people as what he's doing.

[709] I think like there will be case studies taught about him at Harvard.

[710] I think what he, he is a true pioneer.

[711] every sense of the word.

[712] Do you care about the views?

[713] No, but that's easy to say.

[714] I'm like, you know, I don't worry about paying rent anymore.

[715] And I kind of usually don't check the prices at restaurants before I order dinner.

[716] So it's easy for me to say.

[717] Obviously, like, it's, there was a time when that really mattered to me and it was super, super important to me. But I've grown up and I've, you know, a level of financial security, which is super real.

[718] So it's less about that and more about doing good work.

[719] If one of your kids came to you and they said, Dad, I want to be a YouTuber?

[720] And what would be your response to just that first surface level question?

[721] I mean, it's happened.

[722] Little Francine is like, she's so good too.

[723] But Candace always gets not mad, but she's always like, take it easy Casey, because I have a tendency to over -intellectualize it.

[724] But I'm like, Franny, you can make whatever you want, but you're not allowed to share.

[725] And she's like, why?

[726] I want to get subscribers and views.

[727] And I'm like, well, if you make it, like, I just want to make sure you're making it for you because you want to make something.

[728] Not because you're looking for that.

[729] I don't know words I use with her, but like that validation.

[730] I don't know that she would know that word.

[731] But that's when Candace is like, take it easy, Casey.

[732] She's eight.

[733] And I'm like, okay, all right, just do your thing, kiddo.

[734] But, yeah, I think like the concern.

[735] What is the concern?

[736] Is why?

[737] Like, if she wants to do it because she wants to be an artist, fuck yes.

[738] I will drop everything to help you on this mission.

[739] If you want to do it because your little girlfriend at school did it and she got 35 likes and you want to get more likes than her, then like pump the brakes, kid.

[740] Like, that's, you know, like, that's...

[741] What if she says I want to be bigger than Mr. Beast?

[742] The same thing.

[743] Then, you know, it's like, why?

[744] Like, why do you want to do that?

[745] You know, and also, like, I have...

[746] Fame is a very weird, very strange thing.

[747] And I think the most strange thing about fame is it's not what you think.

[748] Like, there are people who have achieved and felt some degree of fame, and there are people who haven't.

[749] And if you're in the haven't camp, there's no way to understand the have camp.

[750] There's no way.

[751] There's no way.

[752] And having been over here, you know, like to see someone aspire for that is like, you know, like, no way.

[753] What's the warning?

[754] The warning is just like if fame is a byproduct of what you're doing, then it is what it is.

[755] But if fame is the end game, then you're just like one of those fucking reality stars of the fucked up faces because you've had so much plastic surgery and like, what are you doing?

[756] What are you offering the world?

[757] Like, why are you here?

[758] Like, you're benefiting the world in no way whatsoever.

[759] You're elevating the world zero.

[760] This is pure, like, narcissism.

[761] This is just, just for some weird ego journey that you're on.

[762] Again, this is one of those moments my wife would be like, back off, Casey.

[763] She's eight.

[764] Let her finish her mac and cheese.

[765] I wouldn't say it's a kid, but like, yeah, if she says I want to be bigger than Mr. Beast, then, yeah, I get nervous.

[766] What if she says, okay, I want to do, I want to make YouTube videos because I love creating videos, but I would like some advice, dad, on how to be a successful YouTuber.

[767] Yeah, you should see her.

[768] She has a whole channel that is stop frame animations of her stuffed animals.

[769] She's not allowed to have her voice in it or her hands in it.

[770] You're not allowed to identify that it's in our apartment.

[771] But she makes those, and they're fucking great, and they're funny, and they're really good.

[772] So that, like, yeah, we support her so much.

[773] We buy her the equipment.

[774] We help her make it.

[775] We're part of the audience.

[776] We have like a family iMessage thread that we distribute the videos on.

[777] She even has her own Instagram handle that has zero followers.

[778] Candice and I don't follow it.

[779] We pass the phone around to watch her Instagrams because we don't want her to even associate one like with why she's doing it.

[780] Even if that likes is from us.

[781] My sister texted and was like, hey, you sent me a screen capture of Francine's TikTok or whatever.

[782] can you send me her account?

[783] We're like, no. This is clearly coming from your experiences, right?

[784] Protect them as long as you can, man. Keep the kids so far away from that.

[785] Keep them far away from views and likes?

[786] Yeah, from seeking validation.

[787] Did you ever fall prey to that?

[788] Did I ever fall prey to that?

[789] Yeah, but I'm different because I was old.

[790] Like, I was literally your age that you are right now sitting.

[791] across from me before I had an Instagram account.

[792] Think about how much more you know than an eight -year -old.

[793] Like for an eight -year -old, that's the world that she's growing up.

[794] There's a really scary place.

[795] Like social media, we're seeing how much it fucks kids up.

[796] We're seeing the mental health crisis.

[797] We're seeing how it's manifesting.

[798] We're seeing eating disorders because of Instagram.

[799] We're seeing like all of these social issues because of social media.

[800] And I think wanting to protect your kids from that is sort of a universal thing, not just someone who has lived in that space.

[801] You know, I think I've had a unique experience with it because I had achieved some level of success outside of social media in the world of regular old media.

[802] And then it was on social media that I found real success.

[803] But I was able to do that with that kind of hindsight and with that kind of clarity of being an adult, being pursuing this career for 15 years before.

[804] On social media, you found real success.

[805] Yeah.

[806] Was that due to your daily vlog predominantly?

[807] Was that the real catalyst moment in terms of growth?

[808] 100%.

[809] You know, like I, Van and I, my brother, Van and I had a television show on HBO that we sold to HBO in 2008.

[810] And that television show was exactly my daily blog, full stop.

[811] Only eight episodes or something, was it?

[812] Eight episodes, 22 minutes, 22 to 24 minute episodes.

[813] But if you watch that daily show, it looks like an early version of my vlog.

[814] It's identical.

[815] It's the same exact show.

[816] shit.

[817] But that was before YouTube was really a thing.

[818] YouTube was invented in 2000 or launched in 2006 and it was really just a place for watching like basketball highlight reels and like Charlie bit my finger.

[819] So, you know, we put that show on HBO very highly reviewed but nobody watched it.

[820] It was on it midnight on Friday nights.

[821] Like it wasn't a breakout success.

[822] And then Van moved to California so I was kind of on my own and I was like, I just want to do that.

[823] So I tried to sell it to MTV and they didn't get it.

[824] They're like, we know this is great.

[825] Like, I showed it to someone there and they brought me in and I met with the heads of MTV, like, met with some really powerful people.

[826] And they're like, this is not like anything we've ever seen.

[827] This is fantastic.

[828] But we're not sure this works on TV.

[829] I was like, okay, cool.

[830] And then, yeah, and then I put it on YouTube.

[831] And how did that go?

[832] Well, you know, you talked about the numbers before.

[833] So before my daily vlog, I was considered like a successful YouTuber, like a celebrated YouTuber.

[834] I had I think it was 280 ,000 subscribers.

[835] And it had taken me almost a decade to get there.

[836] I started my YouTube channel in 2007, maybe.

[837] And by 2014, 2015, I had 280 ,000 subscribers.

[838] I had a couple of movies that went truly viral that had like 5, 10 million views.

[839] All of my movies did more than like 50, 60 ,000 views, which is amazing.

[840] And people liked my videos.

[841] The New York Times saw my YouTube videos.

[842] and make videos for us.

[843] I was doing that back then.

[844] So by all definition, very successful on YouTube.

[845] But then I started my daily vlog.

[846] And it took whatever that was, eight years ago from zero to a couple hundred thousand subscribers.

[847] And my daily vlog went from a couple hundred thousand subscribers to 10 million subscribers in like 18 months.

[848] It was a kind of like explosion that I had never felt in any other capacity in my career, my life.

[849] What's the lesson that you told?

[850] take away from that about consistency or compounding or, you know.

[851] That's that thing, patience.

[852] I wasn't really doing anything different.

[853] I mean, certainly I was working much harder to create a video every day.

[854] It was hard work.

[855] But really, it was just like I had this square peg and I tried to knock it through thousands of round holes for 15 years.

[856] And like sometimes I was able to jam it through and sometimes it would kind of fall through.

[857] but I wasn't able to duplicate it.

[858] And then all of a sudden, like the moon's align.

[859] Like the fucking planets align.

[860] Pluto was lined up.

[861] The sun, the sunshine through.

[862] Like, right as of the locked arc, the light came through.

[863] The city illuminated.

[864] And, like, 2015, YouTube was just becoming something more.

[865] It was the first generation that grew up on YouTube.

[866] Like, it had been around for, you know, nine years.

[867] And people had a relationship with this platform.

[868] And no one was doing anything of any significant production quality.

[869] And I had 15 years of experience in making short videos.

[870] And I brought all of that to YouTube.

[871] And then just the episodic aspect of it.

[872] So it was like, you know, make one video of me running around New York City, hanging around my wife, having lunch, doing something else.

[873] And then the video's over.

[874] And it's like, oh, who's this funny looking guy in New York?

[875] Whatever.

[876] Do that seven days in a row.

[877] And you're like, oh, this is kind of fun.

[878] I get to hang out with this guy.

[879] Do it 300 days in a row.

[880] And it's like, I've become part of your life.

[881] And that just snowballs.

[882] Like it snowballs in every way.

[883] It snowballs algorithmically.

[884] And that's what those, that quantitative explosion was.

[885] It snowballs financially because you get paid, whatever.

[886] Call it a tenth of a cent per view.

[887] And that doesn't mean much if you're getting 10 views.

[888] But if you're getting 100 million views, the money starts to become substantive brands, the kinds of companies you always wanted to work with.

[889] Maybe one out of every hundred creative directors at an agency has seen your videos, but all of a sudden you go from getting 100 ,000 a month to 100 million a month.

[890] And now every creative director has seen your videos.

[891] They're like, we want to work with that guy.

[892] And it just was, you know, just it happened so quick and was so explosive and so exciting and so fun.

[893] Sounds like that was your Anvil moment in some respects.

[894] Like the, you'd put in 15 years of work and then your craft and patience had met opportunity in a way.

[895] And people might look at those moments and go, oh, that was, you know, that's luck because, you know, you just, but what is the rebuttal to that?

[896] What's the life?

[897] They're right.

[898] It was luck.

[899] But like luck is, what is it?

[900] Luck is where preparation meets opportunity.

[901] I had just been preparing myself for that moment for 15 years, you know, and then the opportunity opened up, and I was right there.

[902] And the truth is, like, most of us see opportunity just flies by us all day every day when I'm ready for it.

[903] I was seeking it for that long.

[904] And, you know, there's some other circumstances, too.

[905] My friend Max pointed this out to me when he and I were having a meeting last week, which was like, when I launched that YouTube channel, the daily vlog, rather, when I launched that in 2015, I had had a show in HBO that they bought for $2 million.

[906] I had movies that I produced two of them in the Cannes Film Festival.

[907] I won the Cassavetes Award at the Independent Spirit Awards, which was like the Academy Awards for indie films.

[908] I had, I worked in New York Times.

[909] I made movies for Nike.

[910] I had by every, I had worked for myself at that point in time for 12 years in my own studio.

[911] I had by every definition achieved success.

[912] But the exact time I launched that YouTube channel, I was $200 ,000 in debt.

[913] Meaning I was more broke then than when I was on welfare getting checks for my kid because I was so deep in debt because, you know, the year preceding that I was invited to MIT.

[914] as a fellow.

[915] And as a high school dropout, it was like no greater honor than to get to go to one of the most prestigious academic institutions on the planet and be invited there.

[916] And I remember going there being like, whatever I do on the other side of this is going to be different for what I'm doing now.

[917] And what I was doing that was making TV commercials and doing fun stuff like that, a good career.

[918] Around that time, you read this book.

[919] Yeah.

[920] What was so inspiring or perspective shifting about that book, hatching Twitter?

[921] It wasn't around that time.

[922] So I went to MIT as a fellow.

[923] I worked out of the MIT Media Lab.

[924] And my lab group was called the Social Computing Group.

[925] And it was, you know, eight or ten technologists.

[926] One artist was a painter.

[927] And then me. And to this day, I don't know what I was doing there.

[928] I'm incredibly close to the professor.

[929] I talk to him all the time.

[930] He's since left there.

[931] And he is a mentor of minding somebody to speak to, regularly.

[932] I still don't know what I was doing there.

[933] So mostly I just observed.

[934] I was given no assignment.

[935] I just observed.

[936] And I didn't have many friends.

[937] I was living in Boston.

[938] My pregnant wife was alone in New York City hating me because I abandoned her.

[939] And I read this book.

[940] And all I knew is that when I was there, I wanted to figure out what to do next.

[941] And the magic of hatching Twitter, by the way, Nick Bilton has since become a good friend.

[942] But the magic of this amazing book is it reveals the madness that was a technology startup, like the chaos.

[943] Like, you know, these guys are all very smart, all the guys that started Twitter.

[944] But like, I don't think they're smarter than me. Like, I think that like there's like, you have like regular people and like smart people and then like these geniuses that you just can't relate to.

[945] And I think that like I live somewhere between like regular and close to smart but not fully smart.

[946] And I think these guys were like, they're just smart, persistent people that wanted to do something.

[947] I was like, I can do what they did.

[948] I can do that.

[949] And when I left MIT, I was like, I'm going to start a technology company.

[950] And I didn't know what that meant, but it just sounded like a great idea.

[951] But the whole time I was at MIT, I wasn't making any money.

[952] So I was living off my credit cards and off my debt.

[953] My business had a revolving line of credit at Chase Bank that was maxed out.

[954] And then I started this company, which was basically just meeting with people telling them I wanted to start a company and yeah and so six months later I was $200 ,000 in debt I couldn't afford my half of rent that I owed to my wife who was pregnant and that's when I started a daily vlog and started a technology company and it made sense but the reason why I give that long preface about like I found all this success is it was like I found all that success I knew there was snack down the hall if I didn't want to do the puzzle and I was like fuck that let me burn it to the ground.

[955] Like, let me go $200 ,000 in debt and do something that I have no idea.

[956] I've never written a line of code in my life.

[957] Let me start a technology company.

[958] Let me start a software development company.

[959] I've still never written a line of code in my life.

[960] But let me do that.

[961] That's a good pursuit for me. And that's what I did.

[962] I don't know.

[963] I'm not sure what I was thinking.

[964] What were you thinking?

[965] I don't know.

[966] It felt like a great idea.

[967] It also like...

[968] How old were you at this point?

[969] You're, what, 35?

[970] 35.

[971] Yeah, and I also like, those guys were such superstars to me like Mark Zuckerberg like that in the social network the movie the social network that scene that juxtaposes him just sitting in his dorm room writing code with all the cool kids getting on that bus going to the party with all the hot girls and he's just I was like I want to be that guy and also like I didn't think of anything more explosive it was like I was still you know I had financial success but like the two million bucks from the HBO thing didn't make me a millionaire it's like cut it in half from taxes you're out a million payback our investor you're a 400 ,000 left over.

[972] There's two of us.

[973] Give half that to van.

[974] It's $200 ,000.

[975] And then three years goes by.

[976] And it's like, you're making like middle class income for three years.

[977] We're not rich.

[978] And I was like, I want to be rich.

[979] Like, I want to be a billionaire.

[980] Let me start a tech company.

[981] That's how I'll get there.

[982] Unqualified.

[983] I mean, when I look through your story, I see someone who was seemingly unqualified to pursue the things that he pursued over and over again.

[984] You weren't qualified to get into movies.

[985] There was no formal education by any objective standpoint.

[986] You weren't qualified to be starting a tech company.

[987] What was I thinking?

[988] What is unqualified?

[989] Because I think most people would say, well, I'm not a tech entrepreneur.

[990] They would like self -label and then disqualify themselves from doing that.

[991] And I think in most people's lives, they're actually spending more time disqualifying themselves psychologically.

[992] But you seem to be taking the opposite approach, which is you seem to be qualifying yourself for things that you're objectively unqualified to be pursuing.

[993] I had this conversation with Candace, my wife, last night, because it was like, What do we do with these little girls, our daughters, to show them they can do anything?

[994] And if they were boys, I knew what to do.

[995] If they were boys, force them to work with their hands.

[996] It's one of my regrets with my son.

[997] My son is 25 now, and he's a superstar.

[998] He's fantastic.

[999] But, you know, he loved academia, and I indulged him in that.

[1000] And I wish I had been more forceful in encouraging him to learn to work with his hands.

[1001] Why?

[1002] Because I think you learn something about life by learning how to build and do things.

[1003] There's this great South Park special that's on TV right now.

[1004] And like the handymen who like fix your broken toilet become the billionaires.

[1005] And all the intellects are standing outside of Home Depot, like holding up signs that are like, I'm a biologist.

[1006] Please hire me. Like we'll trade for because it's like, and they're sitting around.

[1007] They're like, I wish I'd just learn to work with my hands.

[1008] Why didn't anybody tell me?

[1009] And I think what they're saying with that or what I feel, what I was able to deduce from that is it's just like there are universal aspects of life and humanity and the world that you learn from working with your hands.

[1010] And like this rule of mine, which is that if you don't know what you want to do in life, do something you hate.

[1011] And through that process, you'll figure out what it is that you love.

[1012] Like I learned that I wanted to be a filmmaker by scrubbing out chatterpots in that fucking seafood restaurant in Connecticut.

[1013] 40, 50 hours, we're just hating it.

[1014] 90 degrees back there in the summer.

[1015] Stinks.

[1016] Scrubbing that pot.

[1017] Hated it.

[1018] It's a lot of time thinking about what do I wish I was doing.

[1019] So for like kids, it's like, yeah, no, no, no, you don't get to go to college.

[1020] Instead, I'm sending you to this school where you're going to learn how to rebuild diesel engines.

[1021] Enjoy it.

[1022] I don't know that I can do that to my little blonde -haired blue -eyed daughters.

[1023] So you asked me about what it means to be unqualified.

[1024] I don't know, but I think like, you know, when my bicycle was broken at home and I was a little kid, like, I didn't have the tool to fix it.

[1025] I first had to build the tool that I could then fix my bike with.

[1026] Like, it wasn't qualified, but I had to find that qualification.

[1027] And in everything that I did, it was the same kind of thing.

[1028] So why wouldn't I think that I'm qualified to do anything?

[1029] Is part of that, as I hear you say that and thinking about this idea of doing stuff with your hands, is part of that because like what it teaches you, and I'm thinking about your bike example there, is that when something is broken or when there is a challenge, you're learning, you learn at that very young age that Casey can solve that problem himself.

[1030] And that lesson of I can close the gap between what I want and where I am is like an overarching superpower for the rest of your life where it's, you know, the gap.

[1031] The gap between where you are and where you want to be.

[1032] The gap between Casey being a guy that's, you know, making videos to the tech entrepreneur.

[1033] You learned very early on your life that Casey can close the gap.

[1034] And a lot of people never learn that.

[1035] They think, oh, I'm unqualified to close the gap, or I don't have the skills to close the gap, or the money, or I'm scrubbing pots in a back room.

[1036] I can't close the gap.

[1037] But that's evidence.

[1038] And evidence comes from, you know, closing the gap a couple of times with a bike.

[1039] I had a friend DM me this week, and it was something like, I don't know what it was, but it was this thing that was like, how to figure out who high agency individuals are or something like that.

[1040] It was like five bullet points.

[1041] And number five was like the goal's in question.

[1042] Who would you call?

[1043] From George Mack's friend of mine, former year.

[1044] Is that what it was?

[1045] It was like, who would you call if you're stuck in a Thai prison to break you out?

[1046] Yeah.

[1047] So that's George Mack who's a former employee in one of my former companies.

[1048] He's a superstar.

[1049] He's an incredible guy.

[1050] He does tweet threads and he did one like last week, which is how to spot a high agency individual.

[1051] And I think about that a lot because someone very close to me couldn't find his partner.

[1052] He couldn't find his wife.

[1053] and in a moment of panic, he thought she had been kidnapped.

[1054] And he's thousands of miles away from me. And he didn't know what to do.

[1055] And he called me in that moment.

[1056] He was like, what do I do?

[1057] And I was like, give me all of the information.

[1058] And he gave me all the information.

[1059] And I was like, I need more.

[1060] And I'm like asking him all these questions.

[1061] I'm writing it all down.

[1062] And then I'm like, what are you doing right now?

[1063] He's like, I'm going to go to the police station.

[1064] I was like, do not go to the police station.

[1065] And here's what they're going to do.

[1066] And I was like, this is why you don't do that.

[1067] Here are the things you can do to be effective.

[1068] Call the bank, find out when her last transaction was, figure out what her password is on her ICloud account.

[1069] And like going through all these facts.

[1070] Like, do all that and call me back.

[1071] And then I hung up with him and I'm like, how do I solve this problem?

[1072] And it wasn't, there was never a moment of, is there someone that can solve this problem that's not me?

[1073] It was that thing that's like says, either in Lockheed Martin or at NASA, where it says in like 100 foot letters, it won't fail because of me. Like that's what that moment was.

[1074] It was like, no, I'm the only person who can solve this right now.

[1075] And like, sure enough, the next phone call, I called them, it was very Jason Bourne, but I called them like 11 minutes later.

[1076] And I was like, she's at the tennis club.

[1077] She's asleep on the couch.

[1078] And, like, it was much credit to my younger brother, Dean, who is an actual, like, jet pilot in the Air Force for helping me figure that.

[1079] that out but like it was interesting like there was something about the fact that he called me there's something about the fact that I could hear in his voice a total uncertainty and his instinct was there has to be a higher authority that can solve this problem and how antithetical that was to my own thinking which is there's no higher authority there's no one that can solve this better than I can solve this right now and I think I applied that to most of what I've done throughout my whole life I remember like I was really broke way back in the day I had a 1986 I think Volvo 240 whatever the one that had the dual halogen headlight was great year and somebody crashed into the front of the car and the estimate to fix it was like $2 ,200 and the insurance company just gave me that money and I was like fuck this I was like I can fix this car myself I remember like my baby me mom and being like, what do you know about fixing cars?

[1080] I'm like, how hard could it possibly be?

[1081] And like in that moment, like took the whole front of the car apart.

[1082] I did not do a good job.

[1083] I did a good enough job.

[1084] And I pocketed like all of it like 150 bucks to replace those halogen headlights, like screw it all back together.

[1085] I mean, before we started this podcast, you're like, Casey, what are you doing at your time?

[1086] I'm like, just building out my studio.

[1087] I wanted to build my girls a tree fort in there.

[1088] There was never of like, what carpenter do I hire to build a tree for it?

[1089] It was like, no, no, no, I'm going to do this.

[1090] How hard can it be?

[1091] How hard can, yeah, how hard can any of it be?

[1092] Like, give me a big enough pile of balsa wood and enough time.

[1093] I will build you a spaceship.

[1094] As a mantra for life, how hard can it be?

[1095] There's an air of naivety.

[1096] Once you realize how hard it can be, it's like, I will never do a software development company again.

[1097] If I knew now, if I knew then what I know now about building that company, no fucking way.

[1098] No chance.

[1099] There's no chance.

[1100] It sold for, what, $36 million, though, which is a success.

[1101] Yeah, it's a success.

[1102] A million failures, though, for that one success.

[1103] And the failures keep me up way more than the success puts me to sleep.

[1104] What are those failures?

[1105] You know, like some of the really key failures were, like, the naivety that an exit is the Holy Grail.

[1106] Like, for me, like, we were all out of money.

[1107] like my partner Matt and I cut our salaries and for the last year and I think the last couple of paychecks was paying out of my pocket.

[1108] So when we sold the company and everybody got to have a job and everybody got paid out and one of the aspects of the sale was that every employee that had equity would get a full cash payout immediately upon the sale.

[1109] I thought it would be psyched but when he told everybody they weren't because for them it was like, no, no, we signed up to build this company with you, this is fun this is a startup this is why we didn't take twice a salary from facebook who wanted to do something novel with you and now we just get to go work for a big company in that moment of feeling like i was letting down all of these people that helped me get there it was like yeah i got to get this fat check i made me a millionaire i was like i got to be a millionaire but i feel like i disappointed the people who got me there like the people who like held me up so i could reach the top i let all of them down.

[1110] And maybe that's unfair, but that's how it felt.

[1111] That's how it still feels.

[1112] It feels weird.

[1113] I have zero employees right now.

[1114] I don't have an assistant.

[1115] Your producer had to call a friend of ours last night to be like, I haven't heard from Casey in three weeks.

[1116] Is he going to show up tomorrow?

[1117] Because I don't check my email.

[1118] I don't have any assistant.

[1119] I don't have a schedule.

[1120] I have no one.

[1121] I mopped my own floors.

[1122] And I think a lot of that is like the post -traumatic stress of having 35 employees at my tech company and feeling like I let a lot of them down and never wanted to feel that way again.

[1123] So I'm just like, fuck it, I'll just mop my own floors.

[1124] I might miss an appointment.

[1125] But there's a million failures that fall underneath that umbrella of being a manager, being a terrible manager, that I think about way more than the moments of elation that were selling that company.

[1126] What was that moment like there?

[1127] If I zoom in on your psychology throughout that period.

[1128] You go on this incredible journey to build this business, twist turns, and I mean, that's the story of most tech startups.

[1129] Most of them fail.

[1130] Most of them run out of cash.

[1131] And then you get this exit.

[1132] Objectively, people look at that, go, oh, congratulations, amazing.

[1133] You smashed it.

[1134] You're rich.

[1135] You know, you've got money now.

[1136] What's going on in your psychology?

[1137] The day you get the call your investors, one of your investors, I think is a good friend of mine and an investor in one of my companies, Gary Vaynerchuk.

[1138] And then it's done.

[1139] How are you feeling?

[1140] if I was a fly inside your head.

[1141] I mean, good.

[1142] It was like super thrilling to get across that finish line.

[1143] A month after then.

[1144] So a month after that, you know, like, if it gets specific, like the company, CNN, Turner bought our company.

[1145] And, you know, Matt, my business partner and I signed a three -year deal with them to stand and work with them for three years.

[1146] And just to tell the finish line, they fired us 11 months later, 11 months later.

[1147] So for the month into that, it was about how do we build this business into a success underneath this bigger company.

[1148] And it was exciting, but I also think there was a huge amount of naivety on my part about what the realities of that look like.

[1149] The, what I interpreted as ambiguity from CNN about what to do wasn't at all ambiguity.

[1150] It was them looking to me to lead.

[1151] And my lack of awareness of that.

[1152] is something I look back at now and just sort of shake my head.

[1153] Like, this is what I mean by like a thousand failures.

[1154] Like, I can tell you, and I don't think this is an unfair characterization that, like, I think they bought my company because they're like, this kid is a star and we want to, we want his reach alone is worth this amount of money.

[1155] And as a bonus, we're getting all of this technical know -how and skill and we're getting the brilliance of his partner.

[1156] And like, this is a great deal for us.

[1157] But we want that influence.

[1158] And then he'll use all of these brilliant people that he has around him to help.

[1159] promote that influence.

[1160] Like that's what they wanted.

[1161] I can say that.

[1162] They also wanted to exploit my reach doing stupid Mickey Mouse shit.

[1163] Like they had some million dollar deal for me to like do commercials for a watch company.

[1164] I was like, guys, this isn't why I want to work with you.

[1165] I said no to that.

[1166] And there's a huge, I can point to all these things like them being a big corporation and us being a nimble startup and them wrecking that culture.

[1167] But the reality is the reason why we didn't succeed under CNN is because of me and only because of me. And only because of It was my failure to recognize the opportunity and build within that.

[1168] And I attribute that to ego.

[1169] I attribute that to naevity.

[1170] Someone like you doesn't belong at CNN, no. Sure, easy to say now.

[1171] But like, fuck you, man. I can build a spaceship.

[1172] I can do whatever I want.

[1173] I'll fix that Volvo.

[1174] I can build a fucking company for CNN.

[1175] You never incentivized I was?

[1176] Like, if I built that company to be a success, like the incentive that they gave me were out of this world.

[1177] The people I was working with at CNN were incredible.

[1178] They're brilliant people.

[1179] That the only reason it didn't succeed was because of me. And I don't know.

[1180] You asked how I felt a month later, when I look back at it, it's like a month later was when I was probably at, like, peak hubris.

[1181] Like, I know it all.

[1182] Look what I did.

[1183] I know everything.

[1184] What about 11 months later?

[1185] 11 months later, it was just exhaustion and wanted to get out.

[1186] Just let me, let me, like, when they said we're shutting down the company, I remember it was like super weird.

[1187] I was in South Africa with my family and they're like we're going to let you know for the end of the year and like December 31st I like call my kind of boss at CNN I'm like what's going on with the company are you going to shutting us down or are we going to keep going?

[1188] They're like we're going to talk and we can get back and we're like we're going to meet here and I'm like why don't we just meet at our offices or your offices?

[1189] They want to meet in like a neutral location and there's like a head of HR or something in the meeting and they're like we want to let you both know we've decided to shut down the company and release you from your car or whatever they said.

[1190] And I was kind of like, okay, cool.

[1191] Like, it was not a big thing.

[1192] It was kind of what I expected.

[1193] But it was like a sigh of relief, weirdly.

[1194] What does your plan become for your life?

[1195] After that.

[1196] Yeah.

[1197] You know, you're this guy that's checking off your bucket list, the bucket list you had as a child.

[1198] You've sold the company.

[1199] You've built the channels.

[1200] You've made a huge name for yourself in movie making.

[1201] At that point, 11 months later, after leaving the HR meeting at the neutral location, What's the future?

[1202] That's when it got hard.

[1203] Dark.

[1204] That was like a moment of real darkness in my life not because of those external factors, but just internally.

[1205] The fame then was something that I just did not understand.

[1206] Like the only way to quantify it was I had done like three billion views in two years, something like that.

[1207] And the content was all me. It was the real version of me. playing a character.

[1208] I wasn't acting.

[1209] I didn't have on a Superman costume.

[1210] I wasn't like, I'd always say like, I love Tyler Durden, Brad Pitt's character in Fight Club.

[1211] But if I met Brad Pitt, he's not that person.

[1212] You meet me. I am the person.

[1213] You think you know.

[1214] And the fame was fucking insane.

[1215] Like, we had to move into a higher security building in New York City.

[1216] Like, it was, it got scary, that kind of fame.

[1217] And when I was winning, like putting a video out every day and I had this company I was cool shit to talk about it was it was like you know you're like coasting on that but I felt like I wasn't winning like I didn't want to do my daily show anymore I was exhausted from it CNN had just kind of fired me so I wasn't building anything with them I wasn't sure what to do but I still couldn't step outside without like being like Justin Bieber kind of swarmed and I didn't know what to do and I kind of like started this other company called 368 with my partner at the time Paul that was a cool project.

[1218] I started up a new daily show with my other friend Dan.

[1219] That was kind of exciting.

[1220] But basically it just felt like a bunch of sort of slow starts.

[1221] Why did you say dark?

[1222] It's a very interesting way.

[1223] It was because it was the first time like it was that thing that I referred to before, which is like you attribute happiness and fulfillment with winning.

[1224] And I had won.

[1225] Like this was the first time my life where I achieved like a level of financial security that you know, like if I played my card rights, could have meant financial security for the rest of my life.

[1226] Like, for a guy who couldn't afford diapers, that's a fucking journey.

[1227] That is a big box on the list to check off.

[1228] You know, like for a guy who like made, would drive around in my car giving people VHS copies of my videos, I had three billion views in two years.

[1229] Like, that's a big box to check off.

[1230] Like, I had done those things.

[1231] And instead of feeling like I was like, you know, I had done it, I'd earned it.

[1232] Instead of feeling like I was standing on top of the mountain, I'd just.

[1233] kind of was like, well, what, what now?

[1234] Like, this isn't, this isn't it.

[1235] It wasn't like, I wasn't running the marathon because I wanted to get across the finish line.

[1236] Like, I don't know where, I've run 24 marathons.

[1237] I don't know where any of my medals are.

[1238] I was running it because I loved the running.

[1239] Like, I loved it.

[1240] And it kind of felt like that was over and I didn't know what to do.

[1241] And it kind of, yeah, it got weird.

[1242] Got dark for a little bit.

[1243] And that's when we decided to, like, leave New York and move to L .A. and.

[1244] If I was a flaw in the wall then in that moment in your life where it's dark and weird.

[1245] What do I see in the walls of your home?

[1246] Well, first of all, the house was really nice because, you know, it just bought my company.

[1247] It was a really nice house.

[1248] Candice bought the fancy wallpaper.

[1249] But no, it was mostly like I had a little baby at the time and then a, like a three -year -old.

[1250] So it was kind of at home, chilling, hiding.

[1251] I didn't want to go to my studios.

[1252] There should be too many people outside.

[1253] And yeah, just unsure, uncertain.

[1254] Like, I think so much of our decision to move, we moved to L .A. for like three years, it was a disaster to move back to New York.

[1255] But so much of my enthusiasm to leave New York because it was just like, I need to get away from all of this.

[1256] And I pictured, like, L .A., like I was moving to the moon.

[1257] Like, nobody would know me there, and I could just go to the beach every day and chill out.

[1258] Couldn't have been further from the truth.

[1259] But that's, so there was, like, we decided to move to L .A., and we didn't move for another seven months or whatever.

[1260] And those seven months were just kind of me hiding and waiting.

[1261] And Candice, you've kind of indirectly made her famous as well because of that whole, you know, everything that happened in that chapter of your life, which means that both of you can't just, like, live a normal life, can't just walk down the street together.

[1262] How is she feeling in that moment?

[1263] And does that add strain to the relationship?

[1264] Yeah.

[1265] I mean, it was always, the whole, that's a whole other podcast.

[1266] But like, you know, my daily show was effectively, I was just pulling stories from my.

[1267] life.

[1268] My own real life experiences.

[1269] Let me figure out how to turn that into a narrative.

[1270] I'm coming on your podcast.

[1271] Let me film my journey here and then talk about what this is about and then my journey home and let me make that today's video.

[1272] And so it was just this vacuum and whatever was closest would get sucked in.

[1273] So she's my wife.

[1274] She's my partner to my best friend.

[1275] So she would get sucked into the content all the time.

[1276] Mostly she's willing and supportive, but not all the time.

[1277] But I still had to make my videos.

[1278] So it had this, you know, this burden on her, the stress on her.

[1279] Some of it was positive.

[1280] You know, she's building your own company then, and it brought enough exposure to her that people were like, oh, I love what she's doing.

[1281] And it yielded a kind of, it shined a light on her brilliance as a designer and a jewelry designer and that entrepreneur herself.

[1282] And she embraced all that.

[1283] But ultimately, yeah, it was a big stress on our relationship.

[1284] If this next 10 years of your life is a movie, what is the narrative of this this movie I don't know you've ever seen Kiyona Skatsi no it's this amazing movie there's no story at all it's just beautiful establishing shots of cities with weird music and nothing happens like that's what that's what I feel like my life is right now it's just like it's so beautiful and wonderful I'm doing fuck all right now I'm doing nothing and I feel guilty because I still like I get paid jobs And I take those paid jobs.

[1285] I do them as best as I can.

[1286] I think I do a good job with them.

[1287] But I feel a little bit like a little bit like I'm selling out or something because I still need to make a living.

[1288] I still can.

[1289] But I'm mostly just riding the momentum that I created years ago.

[1290] And then just like, I race home from work every day at like 4 .30 in the afternoon.

[1291] So I can be home and my kids get home.

[1292] And I just like sit around.

[1293] Like, you can ask me out to dinner.

[1294] You can invite me to go to the Met Gala.

[1295] I'm like, I can't, man. I just go home.

[1296] my kids every day it's my favorite thing like kids go to bed at 738 whatever go to the gym for like an hour come home like bother kandis for an hour watch tv go to bed like that's my life and it's and then during the day like go hang out in my studio it's just this clubhouse like fun shit in it like build stuff make things out of wood go home tell kansas i worked a lot today play with the kids i just do that over and over and over and then it's like christmas and we go visit her family or it's like summertime when I go to the beach.

[1297] I'm just coasting through life right now.

[1298] It's fantastic.

[1299] Is this a new Casey?

[1300] Because the other Casey seemed really like as if they were striving towards some bucket list thing that they'd written when they were a kid.

[1301] This Casey seems to be...

[1302] Yeah, I mean, look, I'm at peace right now, but this is not as sustainable.

[1303] I'm at peace right now, but I'm hypercognizant that this is not sustainable.

[1304] Why?

[1305] I mean, because I'll just be broke in like three years, but But moreover, like, the only thing that brings me a sense of true, like, fulfillment in what is a big part of my life is when I make something that I think is good, creatively.

[1306] So, like, I think I'm a good dad.

[1307] That's that part of my life.

[1308] And I think I'm a good husband.

[1309] That's that part of the life.

[1310] And I'm super fitness focused.

[1311] And I care a lot about my physical existence.

[1312] It's a part of my life.

[1313] But then there's, the majority of the pie chart is like my professional life.

[1314] And if I'm not making something, even if I make something that's good and I don't share it or post it, that checks that.

[1315] That does that.

[1316] I made something great.

[1317] What did I do?

[1318] Like, I made my mother -in -law for 70th birthday.

[1319] And she was like, well, you make me one of those slideshows.

[1320] And I know she was picturing like, you know, you drop all the photos into like Windows slideshow maker and push a button.

[1321] I made it like this great video.

[1322] We like played it at her 70th birthday to all of her old lady friends.

[1323] Nobody saw that.

[1324] Like that did it for me. And I don't feel like I'm like cashing that check right now.

[1325] I don't feel like if I'm looking at that as like staying healthy, it's like instead of going to the gym, I'm like eating junk food.

[1326] Instead of going for a jog, I'm like sitting on the couch.

[1327] Like when I get to the office instead of like putting my head down and just making something great, which I can do, I just kind of putts around and, like reorganize my tools every day.

[1328] Do you know I said earlier this before we started recording about this word boredom?

[1329] I use the word boredom, not because I'm implying that nothing is happening, but so many of the creatives I've spoken to tell me that you need to have chapters and seasons in your life of like basically where you're just chilling because those, they kind of cultivate an energy towards the new thing.

[1330] Maybe it gives you enough time and space to stand back from the picture to see the whole painting or to, I don't know, get some inspiration from something your kids.

[1331] to you one day or?

[1332] Yeah, yes.

[1333] Look, absolutely.

[1334] Like, there's a pendulum and my pendulum swung so far when I'm making a video a day, 800 days in a row while running a company with 38 employees, while having a wife and a brand new baby at home.

[1335] Like, you know, I didn't sleep for three years.

[1336] Like, I was running at full speed.

[1337] Millions of people with their eyes on me every day.

[1338] And, like, you could definitely justify it as a pendulum slowing in the other direction.

[1339] Now, like, I just need this time to decompress.

[1340] But I don't accept that.

[1341] Because to accept that is to sort of justify my current laziness, in general, sort of laissez -on -faire attitude towards life.

[1342] Like, I recognize how indulgent it is right now.

[1343] And I'm not doing this because I need it.

[1344] I'm doing this because I can.

[1345] If I was broke right now, I'd be fucking busting my ass every day.

[1346] If my kids were hungry right now, I'd be busting my ass.

[1347] I'm doing this because I can.

[1348] I'm not solving the puzzle because right down the hallway are all the snacks I could ever want.

[1349] And I'm very aware of that.

[1350] So I hear you, but I do not accept that justification.

[1351] This is just pure indulgence.

[1352] And that's all it is.

[1353] It's great.

[1354] Can we go have some snacks and build a shelf this afternoon?

[1355] It's very honest of you.

[1356] I don't think anyone's ever said that to me because people do justify their indulgence.

[1357] It's very interesting.

[1358] What can we expect from you?

[1359] Can we expect anything?

[1360] Do you know the answer to that?

[1361] Because so many people are like ultra fans of you I think there's an anticipation of what's Casey what's the next big thing Casey's going to do?

[1362] You know, I don't, the short answer but I've been saying this for a while and I haven't done it is like this version of my life right now that I do love and I really just, I have all these movies written when I say movies I mean YouTube videos written they're like really meaningful and awesome and some are deep and some are shallow and some are one day shoots and some are three weeks of of, of writing.

[1363] I just want to make those.

[1364] I just want to go to my office every day alone and make these videos and put them out on YouTube.

[1365] And like I deleted the YouTube studio app from my phone.

[1366] I don't look at comments or views anymore.

[1367] I don't check adsense.

[1368] I don't do it.

[1369] Just click upload and then go back to work.

[1370] That's what I want to do right now.

[1371] And when I'm beating myself up about my laziness is because there's no, there's nothing stopping me from doing that.

[1372] I just, I keep kicking the can.

[1373] But like, that's what I want to do right now.

[1374] That's what I want to do right now.

[1375] Like, that's it.

[1376] I just want to put my head down and make the things that I think are great.

[1377] I give a shit if anybody watches them.

[1378] You talked about privilege earlier and acting on your privilege.

[1379] Yeah.

[1380] To do that is the ultimate privilege.

[1381] Like, there's nothing more.

[1382] There's nothing more.

[1383] That's like the most privileged existence.

[1384] So why aren't you acting on your privilege?

[1385] You've got the lottery ticket.

[1386] You know, I think of like just to go back and be as honest is because I don't, I don't, I don't have to.

[1387] And I'm embarrassed to say that, but that's the truth.

[1388] Jack over there, Jack Sylvester, he's a producer's podcast and directed it with me since the very beginning.

[1389] And you're the reason why he got into video.

[1390] He told me many years ago, I think he told me two years ago when we first started this.

[1391] He says, he said, Casey is his dream guest.

[1392] Jack, I'm glad I didn't cancel today.

[1393] I thought about it.

[1394] It's like, you know, instead I do that podcast, sure would be cool just to sit in my office.

[1395] I said, do nothing again.

[1396] I'm glad of here.

[1397] But my question really is about 19 -year -old Casey when he first arrived into New York City.

[1398] What is the advice that Casey needed to hear at that point that he just didn't get?

[1399] And I'm speaking to all the Jacks out there that are 90.

[1400] Fuck, that's tough.

[1401] A quick digression.

[1402] Like, hearing that and then knowing that on, like, my notes app, I have 25 great movies that.

[1403] I wrote that I really care about, it makes me feel like Spike Jones has this great idea for a music video to make with Fat Lip.

[1404] And if he just decided to go make shelves and have lunch and not make that video, it might not have made me get off my...

[1405] Like, that's a fucking motivator.

[1406] Like, that makes me want to create stuff.

[1407] But what's the one piece of advice?

[1408] I think that, like, nobody cares about you is something that was never made clear to me. And I mean that in the most positive, optimistic.

[1409] inspiring, motivating way.

[1410] I think that, especially if you see yourself as a creative or you want to exist on YouTube or as a filmmaker or a musician or as an artist or a painter, or any of those things, like you think that everybody's paying attention.

[1411] And because of that, it kind of controls how you think.

[1412] And even when I was young and fearless and nothing to lose, I was still so cognizant of like, how are people going to react to this and what's the best way to do?

[1413] Like, I was so aware.

[1414] And the reality is nobody gives a shit.

[1415] everybody is so focused on themselves in this world, nobody has time for you.

[1416] And the sooner you accept that as a creative person, the sooner you're free.

[1417] Like, you're totally free.

[1418] I do exactly what feels right to you.

[1419] And if you can get yourself on that trajectory, then it goes back to what we were talking about before, about being novel, about being an original, about not being a photocopy of somebody who did something.

[1420] If you're that photocopy, you will never be the original.

[1421] but the moment you accept the fact that nobody cares do your thing nobody cares and then you start to go down that path you will just get better and better and better then you sprinkle on that patience i was talking about you just keep going you keep going and eventually like that persistence will just smash into like opportunity was it preparation will smash into opportunity persistence will smash into opportunity and like your moment of explosion your detonation why happen.

[1422] I was verbose, but you asked a big question.

[1423] Thank you so much, Casey.

[1424] We have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question for the next guest, not knowing who they're going to be leaving it for.

[1425] But I did have a question because you are, I mean, many people consider you to be the very king of vlogging.

[1426] And we've started a weekly vlog where, which is going really well.

[1427] We've uploaded, I don't know, eight or so videos.

[1428] And we've got a engaged engaged audience.

[1429] Great.

[1430] Because you are the king of vlogging in my eyes.

[1431] The question I wanted to ask you selfishly is, what do you make of that whole medium?

[1432] It's been on a journey.

[1433] There was a lot of daily vloggers back in the day.

[1434] I used to watch the shatards and I used to watch you and then, you know, doing these daily vlogs.

[1435] And as you said, I felt like I was your friend living your life with you.

[1436] The algorithms change, things change.

[1437] It doesn't seem to be the case that there's daily vloggers anymore.

[1438] Even like vlogging on the platform seems to have kind of fallen down a little but what do you think of?

[1439] I mean, at the time, like when I was doing my daily vlog, I really thought that it was like the ultimate, like, maturation, if that's a word, like, of reality television.

[1440] Because you've got Kim Kardashian, and then you have her TV show, and in between those two things, there are all these producers and directors and writers and all of this fabrication.

[1441] So what happens if you remove the middle part, and it's just sharing your world.

[1442] Like that was the most sort of optimistic, whimsical trajectory that I saw the genre taking.

[1443] And I think it just never happened.

[1444] It never manifested that way.

[1445] Instead, it was a pursuit of sensationalism and views.

[1446] I think it was corrupted by the view count.

[1447] I don't fall to anyone.

[1448] I was susceptible to that, too.

[1449] It was corrupted by the view count.

[1450] So it could have been something virtuous, turned into something, I think, much, less interesting and that crashed and burned and now in the ashes of that I think we're seeing really really interesting things I think we're seeing niche succeed which is so fucking wonderful to see you had to be a YouTuber to succeed back in the day like one of those you're to fit in to you have to be one of those and now it's like we have these micro creators that are finding their audiences like friend of mine and all he's into is like fish tanks it's all he does is fish tanks his channel's huge he's so good like these guys retro Dodo they're friends of mine like I was on they came to New York to film with me their whole channel is just retro video gaming devices they're wildly successful they've released books and that is so amazing like you have eight episodes of your vlog out now I haven't seen any but like I'm sure they're much more about this than they are the intimacies of your life and how you get, you know, like, you're able to lean into that niche.

[1451] So I think, like, this thing had all this potential and it crashed and burned.

[1452] And now out of those ashes, we're seeing these sort of beautiful little things sprout up.

[1453] And I hope that that's the trajectory.

[1454] It continues.

[1455] And you're not tempted to vlog again on a daily basis?

[1456] If I could do it without having any notoriety or attention from it, I would do it.

[1457] That's the only reason you don't do it?

[1458] It's a big part of the reason.

[1459] So interesting.

[1460] The thing that I fantasize is about is, like, Quentin Tarantino just disappears off the face of the earth for like six years.

[1461] And then it's like, hey, guys, I had a new movie coming out in six months.

[1462] And he is the only thing anyone talks about is that movie.

[1463] And then he goes and disappears, crawls back into his cave.

[1464] And it's like, that is the ultimate.

[1465] I don't fucking know anything about that guy.

[1466] Is he married?

[1467] I don't know.

[1468] Like, where does he live?

[1469] I don't know.

[1470] What is he doing right now?

[1471] I have no idea.

[1472] What kind of cars do you drive?

[1473] Don't know.

[1474] What are his hobbies?

[1475] No idea.

[1476] I know nothing about him.

[1477] But his work?

[1478] I know every word to every movie he has ever made.

[1479] I appreciate that man for one reason.

[1480] That is his artistic contribution to the world.

[1481] Like that is the ultimate.

[1482] So for me, like daily vlogging, it's like, I don't know how to separate the like selling of me and my personality with the art and that conflation starts to fuck with my head.

[1483] And then when people in the street come up to me engagement.

[1484] Yeah, it's that turning into something in the real world that just freaks me out.

[1485] How long have we been talking?

[1486] We've been done a while.

[1487] The question left for you is, what is one piece of feedback you want to give to me?

[1488] Oh gosh, shit.

[1489] What is one piece of feedback you want to give to me?

[1490] Yes, me, Stephen, but might be nervous to tell me. when you set up a studio in New York City don't do it 40 minutes out into fucking Brooklyn you figure out how to build this studio in downtown Manhattan so all of your guests are five minutes away instead of 40 minutes away you were really busy today no putting up sales and watching TV our studio was in low Manhattan until this was the first time we've ever done it here but that is great feedback Did you come here on your skateboard?

[1491] I thought about it, but it doesn't have the range.

[1492] Oh, shit.

[1493] I appreciate that.

[1494] Casey, thank you so much for the inspiration.

[1495] Yeah, this is fantastic.

[1496] I've talked about you for many, many years.

[1497] It's really about the principles of towards life, but also creation and the artistic side of your work that have inspired me so profoundly.

[1498] And even hearing you speak so clearly on the importance of truth and authenticity in what you produce has made me rethink a lot of things that I do.

[1499] And I think in a really important way.

[1500] And you're someone that is further up the ladder that I think creators like myself are climbing.

[1501] So if you to shout down these messages mean that I don't have to go through the darkness or the confusion or all of those things that you've been through.

[1502] So I thank you for that.

[1503] And I'm very excited to see what you do because you're a pioneer.

[1504] And people that are creating for their own authentic reasons always make the most interesting shit.

[1505] And so that's going to be a source of inspiration for me. if you do make those 25 videos in the notes of your phone.

[1506] So please do.

[1507] I appreciate that.

[1508] I will.

[1509] I'll do it for you.

[1510] Thank you, Casey.

[1511] Thanks for having me. Do you need a podcast to listen to next?

[1512] We've discovered that people who liked this episode also tend to absolutely love another recent episode we've done.

[1513] So I've linked that episode in the description below.

[1514] I know you'll enjoy it.