How I Turned $5M Winnings Into a Mission | Jeffrey Allen DSH #1347

Jeremy after that one, right? Oh my gosh. It was crazy.
Crazy. And it's just, I mean, it's just, it's crazy how an episode before lauding him because he turned down a million dollars.
Yeah. And there was, I mean, it could have gone up to 2 million, 3 million.
Jeremy wouldn't have taken it. Wow.
Because he's just the kind of guy that if you put your trust in him and you ask him to do something, he's not going to screw you over. Okay, guys.
Beast Games winner here today in Las Vegas. Jeffrey, about to be a fun week for you, man.
Thanks for coming. I know.
Glad to be here. Yeah, you got a lot of fun stuff planned.
WrestleMania, right? Yeah, a little bit of WrestleMania. Then David Blaine.
And then heading down south to go to, or heading over west to go to Disney. How fast has your life been changing lately? Yeah, a lot.
A lot different. I mean, sitting here with you is super cool.
A lot's still the same, you know, still coaching my son's baseball team, taking the kids to school. But yeah, just I, every few days, I kind of have these sprints where a podcast recording, sitting down with a TV station, whatever it may be.
But life is good, man. I love it.
Does it feel kind of unreal? Yeah, I know I was sitting last night with my son in the hotel and it's just like So much to be grateful for it's I mean, it truly is almost a miracle that I won And then I actually we we get to do other things my wife and I wanted to do for our family Yeah, and you got a great head on your shoulders because when you look at the stats on lottery winners A lot of them end up broke again or they blow the money. But it sounds like you're still doing what you're doing.
I'm not spending a thing. We've spent a little bit.
Family vacation, got my wife something nice for her birthday. But other than that, it's kind of going, how do we make this work to ultimately achieve our goals? Yeah.
And your goal, your son is a big part of your goals, right? Huge part. Yeah.
With's with a rare disease, it's that doesn't have a treatment, doesn't have a cure. Just trying to figure out ways.
And, you know, and part of me is like, how do I, how do I look at this fresh? You know, forever you want to throw money to academia to do academic research. But I do think there's other ways to try to help get creating to his brain.
And I think I got to to do it. Yeah.
I'm sure a ton of different people reached out to you with their opinions. Was there anything interesting that caught your eye for that? I mean, yeah, you get everything.
And again, I'm probably open to too much. But like everything from, hey, I've been studying plant medicine my whole life to I am a prayer specialist who knows how to connect with people telepathically, to a protein researcher at a prestigious academic institution who's like, hey, I think I can help implant certain cells into the brain to be able to accept creatine.
So like, wow, part of me is like, I need someone to help kind of make sense of what's reasonable what's reasonable what's not yeah but either way people want to help and that's like the biggest uh one of the biggest takeaways from beast games is I don't have a ton of people saying hey can I have some money can I do this of course I get that in my dms but these are perfect strangers I have more people saying how can I help or I'd love to help or I'd love to pray or I'd love to support that's beautiful beautiful. I think Jimmy did a good job painting your story on the show.
Yeah. It's Jimmy, Mac, the entire team.
Yeah. I mean, I couldn't be more satisfied with the edit.
Yeah. Your character arc was, was brilliant, man.
It worked out well. Yeah.
Cause they waited about halfway to start telling your story. And then I, it really grew on people, I think.
But, but, and that's probably by design, but also like, i didn't get to tell my story until you get deeper into the games because that that was my my whole aim was i want to go on the show to tell lucas's story yeah um but to do that like i need to have a camera in my face and have these questions being asked but it really didn't happen until till we got to the island episode five six yeah and so like i just i'm like i just got to keep going i have to keep going through each challenge to actually make it far enough to to share the story how tempting was the island did you want to be one of the 10 on that one um not at the time but once like once we saw the helicopter go by with the navy seals and we were watching it on a big giant screen like hunger game style yeah um i'm like oh my gosh i would love to be hiding from navy seals but in retrospect um obviously i wouldn't change a thing yeah statistically it didn't seem like the right decision it didn't um especially when you look at the people who went for the island like they were absolute studs athletes right yeah and like mia who won it is just unbelievable like she is so tough so resilient uh and just knows how to get stuff So like it was just, wouldn't have been worth it for me. Yeah, shout out to her for winning that.
I did not think she would when I first saw the 10 laid out. She was the only girl, right? She was the only girl.
And they're like, there's just some really amazing athletes. And again, with Mr.
Beast, you just don't know like what you're getting into. Like when I trained for Beast Games, like I was lifting weights sprinting like i thought it was gonna be super physical yeah um and the only physical challenge in uh the amazon prime games was episode six pulling the monster truck and doing the sprints but you had to choose into it everything else was mental chance psychological emotional yeah yeah shout out to kinsta today's sponsor you know when we first started building our brand, I had to teach myself everything from marketing to monetization.
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I had to pick, I think I would have picked the mental one. Yeah.
There's chances to, I don't want to lose on on chance i want to lose on a skill-based game but like going into that game like you just you it's like a you get sucked into these narratives that people plant and people are planning hey i think chance is going to be like we're going to get rewarded if we choose chance and so people start buying into that um granted they could have they spun that wheel and it could have been hey we're gonna save 16 of you guys but instead um i think 12 out of 16 had to go home i know that was rough super rough like i i would have i'm so glad i didn't choose chance and there was like a small part of me that was kind of like is this my time to let chance take me and i'm so glad it did yeah was there any part of the show where you thought you were gonna get out get out a hundred percent um episode two when i mean we literally got eliminated for an hour um on the ball drop oh yeah i remember that yeah and so like i was processing what am i gonna do uh what is today i'll fly home tomorrow i'll hang out the family for a day then i'll be back to the grind um episode three and the cubes i thought I was going to get out after episode four in the helicopter like I didn't realize how much of a um kind of a ruckus Jeremy caused with his handing out the tickets right um so like I had to like earn trust back with people like so I there was like three episodes in a row or you know three challenges in a in a row where I go, oh my gosh, my back's up against the wall. After the monster truck, I felt like super confident and kind of, uh, I don't want to say I sailed, but I was remarkably calm kind of after that.
You saw that on the show too, just with your demeanor. Yeah.
It just, you kind of get into the zone and then you realize, gosh, like I looked around and I think part of it, part of the thing that helped me win was the people. Yeah.
And there was just, you know, out of the people who were on the island, there were 60 of us. I'd say 90% were really good people who didn't want to screw people over.
And that helped. Yeah.
I think that surprised Jamie. I saw him talking about it on an interview.
He thought there'd be more backstabbing, right? And I think season two is going to have it. I mean, I think season two, I think people are going to know what kind of game they want to play.
Yeah. And I think season one, like this was so brand new to everybody that it was like, I don't want it to end.
And if you don't want it to end, guess what? Like you don't step in the shit. Right.
Like you don't backstab people. So I think season two people will know what kind of game they want to play from the get.
I think it's going to get nasty. I can see that.
Yeah, because on season one, when someone backstabbed, they were a target for everyone else. Like right away.
Like the brothers. Yeah, and even like the slightest backstab, like people would like get really offended by.
Yeah. So it's, but I think going into season two, it's going to be cool.
Yeah. How many of the final 10 contestants were you on good terms with? I'd say all of them.
Really? Yeah. You know, there was a couple I did, like going into the final 10, there's a few I didn't know very well, but I'd say eight out of 10, I was, there was four of us who were part of an alliance that were on good terms with.
The other four, I knew really, really well. And the other two, I would say I'm neutral with.
So for me when I look at relationships you're either negative neutral or positive right and I don't think I was negative with anybody in the top 10 and I don't think there was really anybody who was super negative with each other that probably helped you in the phone game right being on good terms with everyone totally yeah and uh you know I think being interested in others like truly interested in others and getting to know them it's you know people want to help people they know. Yeah.
And, you know, I think being interested in others, like truly interested in others and getting to know them, it's, you know, people want to help people they know.

Yeah.

And when you are interested in others, you know, they reciprocate and become interested

in you and you kind of form this bond.

And the phone game really, really helped me.

I think that was my favorite game to watch.

It was all mental, psychological game.

And you have to, you eventually have to make a move you know and like i was obviously i was there but after i get out like i have no clue what's going on with the phones and so when i watched that and i saw yessie uh 947 make her move which was awesome so she planted a seed i think in round three to get voted in round four right um and thenage made his move, I think, in round five. I'm like, oh my gosh.
These are two people I knew pretty well who made moves that I did not expect them to make. Gage's move was, no one expected that one.
The way they edited it too. I mean, that edit was awesome.
I have goosebumps thinking about it. It was just brilliant.
And Gage is like the sweetest guy, a really talented musician, and he would never harm a fly.

And then he makes this move.

No one expected it.

Oh, and just him giving a throwaway vote for Mikey, 453.

I'm like, that was brilliant.

Yeah, that was an iconic move and it helped you win another 5 million.

I know.

I mean, again, like Gage will become a legend in the creatine transporter deficiency because he, you know, in essence, gifted me more money to invest into a cure. It's like he's going, our next conference we have, I'm going to make sure Gage is there to meet the kids.
Oh, I love it. Yeah, he's an absolute stud.
I love the guy. So you have conferences for this? Yeah.
So every couple of years we have conferences where we bring together families and scientists.

Because it's one thing for scientists to be in a lab,

you know, working in Petri dishes under a microscope.

But when they can see the families and the kids

that they're trying to help,

it transforms everything

because it actually puts a human being behind the science.

Yeah, that's so cool.

How long has this disease been around?

Is it a new thing?

It's been around for, for probably forever.

Um,

or,

but like it hasn't been discovered.

It was discovered in the year 2000 at,

uh,

University of Cincinnati.

But,

um,

but we have people who were in their sixties who got diagnosed recently.

So meaning they had it in the fifties or sixties or seventies.

So,

um,

I,

I think it just, it's, it got misdiagnosed forever and it takes, it took us with, we put every ounce of energy into trying to find a diagnosis. It took us almost two years.
Whoa. Yeah.
Yeah. You probably went to tons of doctors and tons of specialists, you know, one doctor would say one thing, another doctor would say another.
And usually they just say that, you know, he's developmentally behind, he's developmentally delayed. Yeah.
Like autism or something. yeah like autism or something yeah and eventually like i think a lot of people just kind of throw up their hands kind of go okay it is what it is but for us we really wanted to see what it was so we could try to try to help yeah um and then once we got diagnosed it's kind of bittersweet like oh my gosh we have a diagnosis quick google search oh Oh no, there's no treatment.
There's no cure. So, you know, fortunately there's an association that funds a ton of research, but they also provide resources to families and just kind of support.
And my wife and I are a good balance. I'm like the eternal optimist.
She's so pragmatic. So like, I'm like, hey, everything's going to be okay.
And she's kind of going, okay, this is what we need to do to make sure our family can move forward i love that it's a good duo though right you need both it is and it's like it's one of these things where like you don't know why you find the partner you have and you know clearly you know jen and i you know have an awesome relationship together but we were meant to be lucas and jack's parents together. Beautiful.
Have you always been optimistic? Like, did you have that growing up? Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, I, I grew up a great childhood and, you know, obviously most people say, you know, grew up at the best time, but a product of the eighties and nineties where I had an analog childhood. So you think about summer when you're 12 years old, like I get on a bike, I go away with my friends and my mom has no clue where I'm at.
I come home for dinner, so they can't get ahold of me. There's no phones, there's no pagers, there's nothing.
And then once I get in the high school, we start getting internet, you know, it's like, okay, now I can get online and have an email and then you get to college and obviously it's full blown. so it was just a neat way to to have a to have a childhood

yeah okay, now I can get online and have an email and then you get to college and obviously it's full blown. So it was just a neat way to have a childhood.
Yeah, last generation with growing up without tech, I feel like now. It's good.
It's analog and digital. So I'm not too old or I'm like, how does this thing work? But I'm not too young to not have experienced what life was like without a phone.
Yeah, and now you're having to step into the digital world more and more, right? It's weird. Yeah, it's, you know, I used to post like twice a year for fundraisers and now I'm like, oh, I'm creating content.
Okay, how's this work? And it is so much more challenging than I ever thought it would be. It's a lot of work.
It's a lot of work. And it's like, you can literally not turn it off and you have to like force yourself to turn it off or at least kind of set boundaries.
Yeah. It's definitely addicting.
Yeah. It's crazy.
They call it TikTok brain now. I don't know if you're addicted to TikTok, but just not stop scrolling.
Yeah. And it's like, if something doesn't catch your attention literally in a second and a half, you move on.
Yeah. For real.
Wow. So have you always been interested in kind of social media and tech? So I grew up not similar to you.
I didn't really care about it in high school and college. But then once I started making money off it, that shifted my perspective.
When was that? That was probably right when I dropped out of college. So I went to, I grew up in Jersey.
I went to Rutgers. Yeah.
And then I figured out how to make some money off Instagram. Sweet.
And that to me was like a switch. Yeah.
It's like, well, there's no turning back. Yeah.
Cause then I felt like I wasn't wasting my time. I was being productive with it.
And I'm sure you've shared this with people, but like, what is your advice for people who have this kind of entrepreneur spirit who are junior, senior in high school? Like how do you assess whether to go to college or not? Oh, that's tough. Yeah.
For me, it's, it's passion based, you know know? Like if they, if they really feel like college isn't the answer, like test some stuff out

beforehand too.

Don't just drop out or like not go with no plan.

Exactly.

Like I, at least when I dropped out, I had some money that was coming in.

Yeah.

I could show my mother who was pissed obviously at the time, but I showed her I had like this

amount of money coming in and I was really passionate about it.

Let me take a break.

What's your mother say now?

She loves it.

She watches every episode.

No way.

Shout out to my mom.

Hey mom.

Thank you. But I showed her I had like this amount of money coming in and I was really passionate about it.
Let me take a break. What's your mother say now? She loves it.
She watches every episode. No way.
Shout out to my mom. Hey, mom.
Yeah, she's great. Still back in New Jersey? Yeah, she's in Pennsylvania now.
Okay. You've been out to Jersey ever? Yeah, I grew up in Ohio.
Oh, nice. Yeah, I grew up in Ohio.
So just spent time all over. It's just a nice, I mean, it's an hour, 15 minute flight from the city.
Yeah. And then I lived a little bit in pennsylvania too where was beast games filmed at um originally the the episode zero was in vegas oh yeah at allegiant stadium so the one on youtube um and that was that was a trip that was a ton of fun that was 2 000 people or 4 000 people and i had no clue like i like when i signed up i thought it was this was beast games like i'm gonna be gone and then a video jimmy us a video like an hour before we turn our phones.
Like, Hey, by the way, this is 2000 people. We're going to cut it down to a thousand.
And then you'll go to the Amazon beast games. I'm like, apparently most people knew, but I just wasn't in the loop.
Yeah. And then the remainder was Amazon prime show was on filmed in Toronto, aside from the island,

which was in Panama.

Wow, that's cool.

I didn't know that.

Yeah, and we had all these ideas of,

oh, because in the contract,

it shares a few countries that you might go to.

Just make sure that you have

kind of proper credentials to get in.

Yeah, and it's like,

it said France and Germany and Italy.

So we're like,

oh, we're going to leave here

and then we're going to go to a chateau

in Italy.

And no, we were just in Toronto the whole time. I love it.
The first few games were a lot of luck-based stuff, right? Chance. Yeah.
I mean, I think when you watch it, you think it's chance. But, you know, there's this wild cascading effect to beast games where things that happen in this challenge impact the next challenge.
So, for example, like people ask me like, oh, were you just randomly assigned number 831? No, that was the flag I got in the challenge number three in the YouTube episode. So if you look at challenge number three in the YouTube episode, we had to capture these flags and there's 1100 flags and there's 1400 contestants left.
You can either try to go like a free for all. I'm going to go after my flag, you know everybody else or you can try to work together and kind of go who's getting what flag we help each other out right i was kind of the part of the crew that was helping each other out so the people who were kind of in the first couple hundred were like hey i need to go get this flag i'm a go-getter i'm gonna get that number one flag um those were the first two rows that got eliminated in in the first challenge on these games oh i didn't know that and guess what because like you had to like in in that challenge is like you have to someone in your row and the row is like 80 some deep has to eliminate themselves and on in order for the rest of the row to move on yeah and if you're thinking about your how you're a type a charger like are you really going to eliminate yourself no so like the rows that were safe were the ones at the end which were either the helpers or the more altruistic folks who needed help so it's like i think on paper it looks like chance but actually it's it's the makeup of those rows that is really cool that you chose Yeah.
And look how the final two players were similar numbers. Crazy.
Right. We were right next to each other for two and a half days on the first episode.
That's nuts. Did you see her at the stadium too? Yeah.
She was kind of a prominent leader at the stadium. Okay.
Like for me, like at the stadium, I was like, what am I doing here? Like, I'm such an old man. And obviously I'm not a bit like, I was probably in the, you know, the top 10% of age.
Yeah. On the show, there's a lot of young people.
A lot of young people. But like the cool thing is like age and everything else, age, color, sex, gender, all disappears.
Like you just connect with people if you want to. And so I became great friends with

people who literally could be my daughter or son based on age. But yeah, in episode zero, she was, she was a leader.
She was a force. It seemed like throughout the show, she sort of had a group she was leading, right? It's, it's interesting.
She didn't have like an alliance per se. She didn't have a group.
Just she led everybody. Like if people called on her to lead she would step up she was um she's awesome she's an absolute force like she's super talented big heart played hard um but that's that's who i wanted to like i literally wanted to go against her at the end episode one i told her like i want to go against you at the end yeah it's crazy how it happened wow you manifested that because she turned down right? A couple of times for other people.
So she turned on a million for 60 people in episode two, episode three. She turned on a million when she could have taken it in the money grab in episode eight and nobody would have got eliminated.
And at the end when it was three of us, me, Gage, 974 and Tawana 830, she could have taken a million dollars to eliminate herself. Oh yeah.
And she got written down on that one too. Surprisingly.
Crazy. I was surprised.
I was shocked. Yeah.
I was shocked. Yeah.
I was, I was watching it with my fiance and I told her there's no way it's her. It's one of the other three.
I, and I don't know. Like, cause like for me, I just figured everybody viewed her like me.
Like I had a ton of respect for her. She always put herself, um, behind others, um, super integrity, integrous.
So, um, when I saw that, I was like, I was shocked. And I, and obviously I think that helped me too.
I think that kind of shook her a little bit. It definitely did.
You know? And so like, uh, going into the final episode, I think her, her mindset might've been, um, kind of a little shaken. You felt like you could have read her a little easier.
Um, yeah. Or I, I feel like, I feel like she was not expecting that.
And kind of like when you, when you get news that you're not expecting is directly assigned to you, it's like you start questioning things. Yeah.
Were there any decisions you regretted on the show? you know I mean I wouldn't

I'm not. Regrets is a strong word.
Maybe like felt bad about. Yeah.
So because like, again, I don't like to have regrets and obviously I was the winner. So like, I have to thank everything that happened.
Episode four on the helicopter. I wish, like I didn't, I didn't, I wasn't privy.
I didn't realize how much of kind of a hubbub there was about Jeremy and taking girls. Right.
Like I wish he would have whispered my ear like, Hey, I really, I really hope he takes some of you. And I would have taken from my friend, Maddie 852.
It was just amazing. Um, she ended up making it to the Island anyway, but that was one of the, that was one of the instances where it's like, ah, maybe I would have done something different.
But I, I picked my friend 930, Patrick, who made it to the top 10. Yeah.
So I mean, like I don't have any regrets, but that's something that like, I don't say I lost sleep on it, but I thought about it a lot. I could see that.
You never know with the way they edit it. So was it really that bad with the girls? Like they were pissed that.
I didn't realize it. Like again, this is, is i was naive so like when people were going around kind of saying hey we give jeremy your coin i was going around telling people the math and kind of going like it doesn't matter who you give the coin to but it does you no good to keep your coin because if someone doesn't get 100 coins this helicopter goes off empty and our chance your chances my chances of getting to the island are less right it's just simple math it's like i didn't hear all the all the conversations until i mean i heard about it afterward but when we got to the hotel while we were staging to go to panama like there was definitely some evil eye looking at me and jeremy like and i'm like oh my gosh like what happened yeah so it was um i didn't i didn't realize how bad it was until after there was a lot of people after jeremy after that one right oh my gosh it's crazy crazy and it's just i mean it's just it's crazy how an episode before lauding him because he turned down a million dollars and there was i mean it could have gone up to two million three million jeremy wouldn't have taken it wow because he's just the kind of guy that if you put your trust in him and you ask him to do something,

he's not going to screw you over.

How shocked were you when all four

turned down the million?

I don't want to,

because I knew Harrison 251.

I sat next to him on a bus for four hours.

Awesome guy.

Like super talented content creator.

Tawana got to know. And Jeremy, I knew really, really well.
Only person I didn't know was Dino380. And kind of once I asked around, I'm like, oh wait, so no one's going to take this.
This is crazy. Who was the most shocked was Mac and Jimmy.
Like they were blown away. And this is the crazy thing about beast games is if somebody took the money, having 60 people get eliminated.
That changes every episode after that. Because like now you have 25% less people and it's just, it's weird how they have to have all these plan A, plan B, plan Cs.
Yeah. It's like they were shocked.
Nothing happened. They probably planned for someone to take it, I'd imagine.
Of course. But they also kind of went, okay, in the crazy event that no one takes it, what do we do? Yeah, that's smart.
How did you feel about the hate on Dino? Because that was interesting to me. It was interesting.
The experience in the game is very different from what people thought we were experiencing so like in the game um you go through these challenges and you bond to people so like for example the most bonding i had was the physical challenge so the monster truck the sprint and the dead hang so we had eight of us on our team it was me eric 990 gauge 974 patrick 930 dino 380 mike 453 monice 182 and jazz 697 i didn't know jazz or monice until that i got so close to them like jazz is one of my favorite players in the game and so we have this strong bond that we just went through and then so for dino to choose jazz was just like what are you doing like we just went through this and jazz and Tawana weren't great friends so like we knew that they weren't great friends and it wasn't like they didn't like each other but it was just neutral yeah we're like man like I so it I think in retrospect what pop Dino was his social game kind of kind of got turned off on the island he kind of went dark and so like he didn't know who to wanna was close with like he would have been better off choosing you know me or patrick 930 who were kind of close with to wanna wow um but at the end of the day i don't think it mattered he was um to wanna was going to choose him and no matter who he chose you think so that was the that was the that was. Yeah, because the other choice was her best friend, right? On the show.
Well, the thing about Tawana is you don't know who, like she kept her card so close to her chest. Like you don't know who her best friends were.
Interesting. Because, you know, if that was her best friend, why didn't she choose her when she gave out the second key in episode eight? True.
There's a lot of questions. I mean, Tawana would be a great guest.
Yeah. Like I think she has so much to share.
Yeah. I'd love to dive into her mindset.
Yeah. I'm also curious with the people that turned down the money, like if they regret it, you know? I'm sure.
I mean. Like a million dollars.
A million dollars. Or even like you look at the first episode, like you literally could have pressed a button, eliminated six or seven people and taken home a hundred thousand crazy like a hundred thousand is not chump change yeah you know it's just it but you get into this fomo like oh my gosh in the first episode your whole goal is i want to get to the city now you're in the city oh my gosh i want to get to the island once you get to the island you're like oh i want to make it to the top 10 yeah so you have these things that just kind of override money yeah which is um it's an it's like an amazing psychological experiment like i would like i would love to see what psychologists who analyze this say about it they had one on set right they had a couple on sets they had one on set 24 7 so there's multiple psychologists so if you ever needed to speak with someone could.
Did you ever get to that point where you had to talk to someone? No. I mean, I talked to one at the end because I think when you get down to the final 10 or final 20, when you get eliminated, it's part of your kind of deprocessing or out-processing.
So I sat with one about a half an hour after I won. Yeah.
Yeah, I bet when you're that late in the game, it's a lot of mental trauma if you don't make it. It is.
And just even kind of orienting back at home, like I remember my wife was like, I was like, she was super kind, but like, I didn't know what to do. Like you're so used to being told where to go.
You don't have any technology at all. When to eat.
Literally you wear the same thing. What you see on the episodes, what we wear in between the episodes.
It's not like we're wearing street clothes during the day. Yeah.
It was a month, right? Yeah. It was about five weeks.
Holy crap. You're away from your family.
Yeah. Was that the longest you've been away from them? Oh yeah.
I mean, it's the longest I haven't talked to my wife since I've known her. Yeah.
Cause you don't even have your phone or anything. Yeah.
No phone, no internet. You don't even know what day it is.
That's insane. A lot of times you don't even know what time it is.
Wow, no clocks anywhere? I mean, people have them, but no one is wearing a watch. They're not on the walls.
Crazy. So you had a lot of time to just reflect about your life of that.
A lot of time to reflect, a lot of time to chat with others. I mean, it felt like you're in the 90s again, early 90s where you go hang out versus you go hang out with your phone.
I saw you on Bradley Martin's show say you applied to the Amazing Race a few years ago, right? It was like, it was, I think it was before my wife and I were married. So it had to have been 2012 or so.
And we weren't fully committed. So I think we submitted a video and that was it.
So like we never moved any more forward,

but we would crush.

That show was fun.

It'd be so fun.

I think you'd do well.

It'd be a lot of fun.

It'd be great to do with my wife.

It'd be great to do with my oldest sister, Stacy.

I love it.

It'd be a ton of fun.

Have you ever done a show like this?

No, I want to get on one.

Survivor interests me.

There's one called The Traitors.

Yeah.

Have you seen that one?

Yeah.

That one's very interesting to me. Yeah, that one would be a ton of fun yeah i mean so what about season two i might have to apply but it might be closed by now right no oh it's not not yet okay i'll apply man you should i'm telling you it it even obviously i'm biased because i won yeah but even if i didn't like it was life-changing.
It was, it was just good to step away for that long and connect with people. And obviously, you know, I'm a 44 year old man.
Like to do, it's like to do these challenges to be competitive again was awesome. Yeah.
What a turn for you. Cause I saw you say on Brad's show also that you recently got laid off, right? Yeah.
So, you know, I, I've been kind of healthcare sales and sales leadership for my whole life. And last April, I got laid off from a sales leadership role.
And I was kind of like, oh gosh, what am I going to do? Right. So I was going to, I was exploring some kind of entrepreneurial stuff.
And God bless my wife for being patient with me. And, uh, I applied for this.

It just kind of as, uh, it wasn't desperation was kind of like, I got the time.

Why not?

And, um, here we are.

Crazy how cyclical life can be.

Cause that was probably one of your bottom moments.

And then.

Yeah, it's, um, I mean, I think one of the things about Lucas is just giving me a ton

of perspective.

You know, I think there's a handful of parents who might go, you have child who's a rare disease special needs and kind of go f this i didn't sign up for this why did you do this to me but really looking at it lucas has helped me find the beauty and the bumps and seeing that you know things were either blessings or curses and you can decide which one it is um and so for me i remember when i got laid off and like I literally was emailing who I reported into, emailed the CEO, like, hey, thanks for the opportunity. It was great.
However, I can help you guys because I just realized it was business. Like they didn't have the funding.
I was an expensive kind of price tag. You know, they have to move on.
So it's not like screw them, but some people could say screw them. Yeah.
Wow, you're good at controlling your emotions. That's impressive.
It's help. I mean, Lucas, and this is one of the gifts, you can choose what you get upset about.
And I'd rather choose the things that really, really matter. Yeah.
A lot of people, their emotions control them. See it all the time.
Yeah. yeah i mean you seem pretty calm like what kind of work do you do uh just been through some stuff man yeah you know had to address it and instead of like running away from the trauma i actually addressed it and then from there that acknowledgement and that awareness is huge and being a serial founder it's like yeah entrepreneurship will test you oh my my gosh.
Even now, like I'm going through some struggles, no matter what level you get to. But, but that's where, that's where the light is.
I mean, that's where, that's where you, you know, get a bigger vessel to be able to do bigger things. Yeah.
And it's a very lonely road at first. Yeah.
Well, I mean, cause you got people who, you know, you were hanging out with doing whatever before who kind of want to bring you down. Yeah.
Yeah, people typically want to cheer you on when you've made it or when you have nothing. But when you're actually doing it, people are kind of like- Yeah, 100%.
Yeah, it's weird. Yeah, it is weird.
Did you have a lot of long lost friends hit you up once you won the money and family? Yeah, I mean, in a good way. You know,'ve been, I've been blessed to have amazing friends since I was a kid and just good colleagues.
I mean, I've, I've worked with some cool companies who have met some amazing people. So just, you know, and there's people who I'm texting with who their numbers aren't in there.
I have no clue who it is, but it's a, a lot of people send a ton of well wishes. They know, they know our story and they know that we'll do good with, with the prize and with the platform.
That's beautiful. How tough was it not telling people when you won? Cause you had to wait months, right? Yeah.
Before you could start telling people. It, it, it wasn't as hard as you'd think.
I mean, obviously like I wanted to tell my mom so bad. Yeah.
Like, just cause like my mom, her, my mom and I talk multiple times a week and she's great. She's always been a huge supporter of mine.
And like, I wanted to like, I wanted to watch the show with her too. She lives in Ohio and I'm living in California.
So like, that was the one who I wanted to tell the most. But other than that, like I, like the power, like the concept of restriction, like I used to drink.
I don't drink anymore. Nice.
Used to gamble. Really? I don't gamble anymore.
And like restricting these kind of selfish desires in order to kind of do something that's more sharing is something that like a concept that I believe in. And I've seen my life transformed through it.
So it's like always knowing that, hey, if I restrict and don't tell anybody, there's going to be greater light that's shared through it. And if you see my family's reaction video, It's like always knowing that hey if i if i restrict and don't tell anybody there's going to be greater light that's shared through it and if you see my family's reaction video it's like it's unbelievable because they had no clue and i just told them hey it's the final episode there's six left like everybody's going to come out a winner in some way i encourage you guys to watch it early like treat it like a football tailgate and like set up videos because you'll get to see how my journey ends and the the like the the videos of them watching it are awesome i love that that's so cool when did you cut the gambling and the drinking was it recent or yeah it was a long time ago um last bet was here in the city um 2014 wow 10 years yeah 11 years well done yeah it was cool no and it was And for me, it's just wild how the world works.
Literally. 10 years.
Yeah. 11 years.
Well done. Yeah.
It was cool. No.
And it was like, and for me, like, it's just wild how the world works. Like literally within a year of me not gambling, money just starts flowing.
You know, so a company I was at had an exit. I got a nice distribution, was able to put that as a down payment on a home.
And I quit drinking nine years ago. I just took a break and it was awesome.
kind of go oh gosh you know i don't need to drink to socialize and i feel so much better and this is at the same time where i had my oldest son that's like i want to be able to wake up and be able to roll around and play versus like try to struggle through a hangover yeah yeah a lot of people drink to they feel like they need to fit in yeah Yeah. But it's, you really don't.
Yeah. Once you, like once you realize you don't, like it's like, if we're talking about regrets, like I wish I would have kind of trimmed my drinking or quit drinking earlier.
Like it would have been so fun to be in my twenties and actually go meet people versus just drink. Yeah.
And hang out at bars. Were you a big partier back in the day in the twenties? Yeah, I'd say so.
Yeah. In Cali? I was living in Ohio.
Ohio. Yeah.
Yeah. And hang out at bars.
Were you a big part of your back in the day? Yeah, I'd say so.

Yeah.

In Cali.

I was living in Ohio.

Ohio.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You don't know about it,

right?

Yeah.

And it just,

the rear,

when you grow up,

it's like,

Hey,

like college football Saturday,

you drink until you pass out.

And don't get me wrong.

I mean,

I had some great times and I'm not,

I was just one of those ones who I couldn't just have one drink. If I had one, I was going to have 12.
Were you an angry drunk? No, I wasn't. I was just, I would smile and I typically fall asleep.
Oh, you were the ones that shut down in the corner. Oh yeah.
That's me too. Yeah.
I stopped talking. Yeah.
That's how I was. I was like, it's good that I wasn't angry or picked fights, but yeah, I just, it was one of these I'd wake up in the morning, kind of go, wait, who did I talk to? Who did I lie to? Who did I maybe overshare with that I shouldn't have? It was just one of those things.
My physical hangovers weren't too bad. It's the emotional and psychological that I was like, hey, I gotta be done with this.
Yeah, it's not worth it. You still watching sports? A little bit, yeah.
NBA? I'll watch the playoffs. Yeah, same.
Who's your team? Lakers. Okay.
You too? I'll root for them. Oh, I grew up being a Cavs fan.
Okay. Yeah, and so, I mean, I really don't, you know, and I live in the Bay Area, so Golden State is the team.
I really don't have a team, but typically in the NBA, I'll root for like an underdog. Yeah.
Whoever's not supposed to win is who I want to win. Well, this year, there's a good chance of that, you know.
Is Golden State still in? Yeah, they're the sixth or seventh seed, but they're looking good. Sweet.
They got Jimmy Butler now. Well, and it's just like, you just can't count out Curry.
Yeah. He's so good.
How's it down there? I hear mixed things about living in San Francisco. It's getting better.
That's good. Yes, I mean, I don't live in the city, but I mean, it's so damn beautiful.
It it's like one of the prettiest cities in the world. So like, I don't think it's ever going to go away.
Like you can't recreate that scenery. But I think the, I think some policies could change where it could encourage, you know, more business owners and kind of be a friendly environment on business and tourist.
It's just, I think they've made some decisions that kind of come back to bite them. And it's, I think we've hit rock bottom and it's starting to bounce back up.
That's exciting. Yeah.
It is beautiful. You can't knock that.
Yeah. But like, but a place like Vegas is like, I love Vegas.
My wife grew up here and, um, it's just people out here are hustling. People out here know how to like survive and get through stuff.
If you want to get something done, guess what? There's people around you who want to help you um i don't want to say the bay is not like that the bay is just a little bit more kind of cerebral a little bit more kind of head focused i mean that's where all the ideas are coming from with social media and tech um but yeah i i where i live it's just a great community of um you know head and heart so I like where I'm at that's cool it is hard to be Vegas though it's cool I mean it's like one of these things where growing up you just think of Vegas as you go through your phases I'm gonna go there to gamble I'm gonna go there to party yeah I'm gonna go there for girls whatever it may be and then like at my age I'm like you can go there for shows for food for hiking um I love it love it, man. For podcasts.
For podcasts, exactly. For conferences too.
Two of the podcasts I've been on, yeah. Yeah, I saw you on Ice Coffee Hour.
Yeah. That was a great episode too.
Shout out to those guys. They were great.
What's the next show you're on or next project? This is it for now. I have some kind of unique opportunities ahead from like kind of a branding perspective that I'm looking at, but like, ultimately I just want to share Lucas's story.
Yeah. And, um, the more I can kind of share his story, I just, I've had people reach out to me and I've made some amazing connections, facilitated some awesome meetings with researchers, philanthropists, and people who are doing some cool stuff and startups around tech because of these podcasts.
and so for me, it's like, I never know who's going to listen to this, who's going to go, Hey, I want to help Jeff. I want to help Lucas.
I want to help their family. So I'm going to keep doing it as long as people have me.
I love that, man. I know you're starting a foundation.
We'll link that below when it's right, if it's up yet. Cool.
Awesome. And your conferences as well.
Sweet. Yeah.
Anything else you want to close off with?

No, I think we're good.

Anything we're missing?

No, I think we covered it all, man.

Thanks so much for inspiring

and I hope we find a cure one day for this thing.

Yeah, and once we do,

I'd love to come back and chat about it.

Absolutely.

Check them out, guys, in the links below.

I'll see you next time.