From Rock Bottom to Millions: Khalil Rafati’s Journey | Khalil Rafati DSH #1318

do anything. That little spark, that thing that, you know, when I got on my knees and I prayed to

God and I reached towards my divinity. I mean, at the end of the day, I mean, there's darkness, which is the absence of God.
And then there's light. And if we reach towards that light and we try to align ourselves with that light, we're going to grow.
I mean, we're going to prosper. That'd be amazing.
All right, guys, got Khalil here with our Sun Life drinks, my man. Cheers.
Cheers. Man, these are so good.
Thank you, buddy. I'm a big matcha guy.
It's grown on me the past couple of years. I love matcha.
I used to be coffee, but I love matcha now. When I first tried it, I hated it.
I didn't get it. The guy from the chili peppers,

the red hot chili peppers, when we first opened, he was like, you have to have matcha. And I'm like,

matcha? What is that? I didn't even know what it was. Ordered a couple kilos of it,

put it on the menu, created a smoothie. Nobody wanted it.
This is 13 years ago, 14 years ago.

And then I was in New York eight years ago, right when the matcha craze started to happen. And I saw cha-cha matcha and matcha bar and I flew back home and then flew my crew out.
And I was like, guys, this is going to be a huge trend. We need to study this.
We need to find the best of the best of the best. We need to capitalize on this opportunity.
And so they went home. I went to Japan twice in search of like this mythical, like the best matcha on the planet.
And I was in this region called Kagoshima and nobody spoke English. And it wasn't like you can just roll up and like buy shit.
You have to win over the team master before you can even go to the factory. Yes.
Wow. And it's very formal.
And they had to train me to like, when he goes to hand me his business cards, because people still use business cards there, you have to take it with both hands and you have to grab both corners like that. You can't go like that.
You can't go like, it was so weird.

And the interview was going terrible.

And my outfit was, I think, a bit obnoxious

and he wasn't liking me.

And at a certain point, I'm just like,

fuck it, I'm going to throw a Hail Mary.

And I'm like, what does he like better?

Because he kept talking about the matcha bushes,

the leaves and all that.

And I was like, what does he like better,

the matcha bushes, the, the, you know, the leaves and all that. And I was like, what does he like better? The, the, the matcha bushes or his, or his, uh, or his wife, which was like, you know, the, the interpreter is like, no, no, no, no, no.
I'm like, ask him. And he asked him and there was like a pregnant pause.
And the guy just fucking busts out laughing, gets up, puts his arm around me, literally walks me over to his home, which I didn't even realize we were at his home, introduces me to his family, keeps talking in Japanese. I have no fucking idea what's going on.
And the interpreter is just like nodding his head. He's like, you're in.
Oh my God. That's legendary.
Yeah. So we got this matcha.
It's from Kagoshima, Japan. It's the region where the last samurai ruled.
Wow. Yeah.
That's historic. Why is Japan known for macho? What's so special about their environment? I think it's just the growing conditions, certain elevation and the humidity, and it just rains a lot.
When I was there, it pretty much rained every day. Wow.
There were waterfalls everywhere in Kagoshima, which was bizarre because like, you know, here you'd go and there'd be 500 people lined up to take a selfie in front of a waterfall there. Like every time you turn a corner, there's a waterfall.
No one cares. So I was like swimming in these waterfalls and like hot springs coming up out of the ground.
There's an active volcano in Kagoshima. Um, but the thing that was the most fascinating was, was the samurai and the fact that that was where the last samurai actually ruled.
Yeah, I love samurais, man. Yeah.
Something so exciting about just watching them fight. Yes.
Yeah, I actually want to start collecting samurai swords. I don't blame you.
They cracked the code of life. They did everything in their culture.
They did everything to perfection. Like everything, every movement they did, every, every job you have.
And that's, and that's kind of like a Japanese thing also. Cause when I was there, I remember going, I had horrible jet lag and I remember going down to the lobby to get coffee and then having to use the bathroom.
And when I went into the bathroom, there was a guy like underneath the sink, like cleaning, which was weird. Never seen a guy in a bathroom on the ground cleaning.
And when I walked in, he looked up and he was happy and he was smiling. And it was like three o'clock in the morning.
And I was like, wow, there is intention here. Wow.
People are present. Pretty, pretty cool.
They're so at peace. Yeah.
You don't see much of that in America, huh? No, no. We're so scattered and fragmented.
Yeah. Cause you look at the correlation between wealth and happiness and it's not, it doesn't add up, right? The more you make doesn't mean the happier you are.
No, it does not. And, um, you know, I left Ohio.
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As a young man in search of fortune and fame and went to California and did a pretty good job initially. Got my sad car, got into a rock and roll band, blah, blah, blah.
But unfortunately, took a left turn and uh and and wound up you know just losing everything and and and wound up on the streets addicted to heroin addicted to um cocaine crack and lost everything in the process of trying to find that happiness through money fame success whatever and um yeah it was fucking horrible that sounds crazy yeah it was was it a gradual build-up or was it all it was i mean it you know drug addiction is it's like uh there's a honeymoon period where you're just partying and you're dating models and actresses and you're hanging out at clubs and, and you're doing drugs and everything seems great. And, and there's definitely a honeymoon period.
It's about a three-year honeymoon period. And then, um, and then as the drugs got heavier and more consistent and the darkness began to enter, and then all of a, it's just like having a rug pulled out from under you.

Like addiction will rob you of your soul

without your consent.

And that's what happened.

So I went from a young, ambitious man,

super insecure,

embarrassed of who I was. Parents were immigrants, both from different countries, different languages, different religions.
If that wasn't bad enough, having immigrant parents in rural Ohio where everyone was fucking blonde hair, blue eyes, good looking. You got bullied a lot growing up.
I did. Yeah, I did.
I fit in i didn't have any i didn't have any skills like i didn't have any like i was terrible at sports terrible and as a man that's yeah you'll get ridiculed for that yeah um i was shaped weird like very like long torso short legs large skull so kids mercilessly fun of me, called me names, called me Charlie Brown or Pumpkinhead or yeah, it was fucking brutal. I mean, it's funny now, but like at the time, like it was, it was brutal.
I hated myself. I developed such immense body dysmorphia.
Um, and, uh, I was terrible at school. Um.
I wasn't tough, but I fought a lot. And I just didn't fit in anywhere.
So that was sort of like the beginnings of what I think set me up for that addiction was that, the pain, the immigrant parents. there was also, there was unfortunately some bad shit happened to me.
There was some abuse, neglect, sexual abuse. Um, I had a older sibling that was eight years older than me, um, that started doing stuff to me that I didn't want him to do, but he was much older, much bigger.
and that made me feel dirty. That made me feel shame.

And then that, that became sort of a, a self-fulfilling prophecy because then I learned that if, Oh, if you want attention, you have to let people like take advantage of you. And so, especially in Hollywood, that's kind of a mindset, right? With acting.
Fuck. So true.
So yeah, I never even thought about the correlation, like as a child learning that that's kind of a mindset right with acting fuck so true so yeah i never even thought about the correlation like as a child learning that that's how you maybe you were subconsciously attracted to that right interesting yeah well i'm just thinking about like when i eventually did become a drug addict and was living on the streets that that was my go-to was just sell my body for sex because it it you know it's easy yeah, it's easy and I don't have to hurt anybody. Um, but, uh, yeah, so brutal, brutal upbringing, um, very awkward Khalil, you know, people didn't even know how to say my name.
Um, and, uh, father was a Muslim mother was born a but raised Catholic. I went to Catholic school.
That's interesting. Yeah.
Yeah. Um, I went to Catholic school because the only private schools at that time were Jesuit Catholic schools, which Jesuit is like the strictest form of Catholicism.
So again, another level of shame and weirdness and not fitting in. Um, I was just a fucking mess.
It was a mess. Yeah.
I can see why you were insecure now because you were just getting judged from so many different angles, your own family, your friends, your brother. Yeah.
Damn. Yeah.
There was a lot of pain there and a lot of confusion. And I didn't understand other people seem to have these good families and they play catch in the yard or they would like, you know, Boy Scouts or camping or whatever.
Like nothing could be further from the reality that I was living, the violence and the neglect and the abuse. And I just felt like a real piece of shit.
So running to Hollywood to become famous because that's going to fix me and I'm going to become rich and famous and that's going to fix me, which is interesting because you think about how many people we hear about that actually do become famous and kill themselves or they become drug addicts or, or both. Yeah.
Um, and, uh, when I was, I'll jump forward for, for, for a moment, but when I was, I think I was 45 years old. Do you know who Rick Rubin is? Yes.
The podcaster. Yeah.
I know him as a podcaster. Yeah.
He's a music producer and he was a customer and a friend and a bit of a mentor. And I had just sold a piece of my company for...
Of life yeah for me for all fucking like I was rich you know for me it was a multi-million dollar amount and I was like so like blown away that I didn't even want to deposit the check because I wanted to just like hold it and keep looking at it. It like symbolized something.
And, uh, I kept taking pictures of it and eventually I deposited it, deposited the check. And then a couple of days later, I sunk into one of the worst depressions I've ever had.
Wow, that fast? Yeah. Yeah.
And I was in Pasadena with Rick and we were going to Dave Asprey's conference or whatever. We were with Wim Hof and we were going to introduce Wim Hof to Dave Asprey.
And I was walking behind Rick and I said, Rick, I'm really depressed. And he just, he's a man of few words.
And I said, like, I'm like really fucking depressed, like suicidally depressed. And he stops and he looks at me and he goes, you just got a lot of money, right? And I go, yeah.
He goes, are you duly single? I go, yeah. And he said, so you got to experience and realize what very few people will ever realize.
And I'm like, which is? And he said, success doesn't equal happiness. And he just kept walking.
Wow. And I'm like, it doesn't? And he didn't even respond back.
He just kept walking. We went, we had some burgers and whatever.
But yeah, success doesn't equal happiness. Money doesn't equal happiness.
Money is going to amplify who you are. Money is going to make whatever you got going on become bigger.
That's why when you see people win the lottery, it often ends so tragically bigger that's why when you see people win the lottery

it it often ends so tragically that's why when you see people become very famous very quickly and become very wealthy very quickly or both you see it end very tragically because it's just an amplification. And yeah, I'm by the grace of God, I was able to get past the childhood, get past the addiction, which most people don't.
I was 33 years old when I finally just literally got on my knees and asked God for help. And I don't even know what that means.
Like I didn't, I didn't even know who I was praying to or what I was praying to, but at 33 years old, um, I asked God for help and, um, and I was fucked. High school dropout, convicted felon.
Um, was that for drugs? Yeah. Yeah.
95. I picked up a felony and actually in the state of Texas.
High school dropout, convicted felon. No talent, no skills.
Life had passed me by. And I was fucked.
But I got on my knees just because that's what they told us to do when we were in school. So I got on my knees and I folded my hands and I asked God for help.
And I will tell you, there was something there. Something happened in that moment.
There was no burning bush or anything like that. The cravings didn't go away.
The withdrawal didn't go away. I was in rehab at the time.
But there was something there. There was a levity to my spirit.
I knew that I somehow knew that I was going to be okay. It was just a little spark.
And, and I grabbed onto that spark and, um, you know, I stayed in rehab, then went to a halfway house, et cetera, et cetera. At that time, things were very grim.
I mean, again, life had passed me by. I thought I was old at that point, you know I going to do? Everybody has this.
Everybody has that. People had good parents.
People went to college. I had to start over.
And in the midst of losing everything and in the midst of being in so much pain, there was a clarity that came with that. And the clarity was, wait a second, you did this to yourself.
A lot of people get molested. A lot of people experience violence in their childhood.
A lot of people go through bad shit. Oprah went through bad shit.
How come she wasn't shooting dope? No. She ended up helping a bunch of people.
Going through trauma as a child is not an excuse as an adult decades later to continue putting poison into your body. And that clarity came to me.
I was like, oh, fuck, I did this. I did this.
I was the one that fucked my life up. And that was a harsh realization.
Wow. Not a lot of people ever get to that realization though.
They won't take accountability. Most people don't.
Having sovereignty over yourself and taking responsibility over yourself, I think that paradigm shift is one of the most underrated superpowers there is yeah and hate him or love him I actually learned that shift partially from Andrew Tate did you really yeah because he always talks about taking accountability for your own actions yeah and he's very open about all the attacks on him you know he's somewhat accountable for that yeah because of what he's doing on social media. Yeah.
I don't know him well.

I've seen clips here and there. Some of them I actually do find quite inspiring.
But I will say, number one, if he wasn't successful and he wasn't really good looking and really fit, because he is, nobody would be talking shit about him. Facts.
Yeah. Yeah.
So Andrew Chate, love him or hate him, is a very, very intelligent, very, very attractive, very fit man. Not really my cup of tea, but if I think there's something wrong with him, then there's something wrong with me.
Projection, right? Yeah. I mean, I was the classic as a kid growing up.

If a guy was better looking than me, oh, he's gay. If a guy's in better shape than me, he's on steroids.
Yeah. You know, I had to create a story as to why somebody else had something that I didn't have.
I played victim and engaged and learned helplessness my entire life up until I was 33, 34 years old. Yeah, I did it to about 25.
Yeah. Yeah.
It's not a good strategy for growth. No.
And what's amazing, and you're more proof of it than I am, is that we can literally do anything. We can fucking do anything.
That little spark, that thing that, you know, when I got on my knees and I prayed to God and I, I, I reached towards my divinity. I mean, at the end of the day, I mean, there's darkness, which is the absence of God.
And then there's, and there's, and there's light. And if we reach towards that light and we tried to align ourselves with that light, we're going to grow and we're going to prosper and we're going to do good.
Whatever that is, I don't even know what that means. And I don't consider myself a religious man.
I don't consider myself a spiritual man, but I pray a lot and I ask God for help. And I start out each day with gratitude.
I literally just walk. I get up in the morning, it's 5 a.m.
and I just go outside and I say, God, thank you. Thank you for the roof over my head.
Thank you for the clean water that I get to bathe in. Thank you for my amazing friends.
Thank you. You know, I start out with the basic stuff and I begin to develop an attitude of gratitude.
And then, you know, thank you for my cats and thank you for my girlfriend. And then eventually I get to the point where I will finish with, thank you for this perfect health, perfect wealth, and perfect love.
And when I speak life onto myself like that, I'm opening myself up. I'm becoming expansive and I'm welcoming things in.
If I'm hating on Andrew Tate, oh, that guy's a piece of shit. Oh, that guy did that.
Fuck that guy. That guy heard this.
I heard that. Making myself small and I'm shutting myself off from that light, from that source.
100% agree here. I'm going to call it God, but we can call it source.
We can call it whatever. When I'm judging other people and hating on other people, I'm shutting down my ability to bring in abundance and prosperity.
When I open myself up and I stay out of judgment and I get into an attitude of gratitude, doors begin to open and things happen that, I mean, I was just outside waiting for you to finish your previous podcast. There was a kid out there, he was standing, he's watching, I think his boss, you were interviewing his boss.
And we were talking about Sun Life and he was talking about, oh yeah, man, I go there all the time. It's great, whatever.
I'm like, yeah, you know, when we first opened, it was the biggest failure we've ever had. He's like, it was? I'm like, yeah.
Like the worst. It's that that location fucking sucks.
Was this in Austin? Yeah. There's no parking.
If you don't have parking, you don't have a business. Yeah.
People that pay 25 bucks for a smoothie, they want to pull up in their fancy car and their aloe leggings on or their Lululemon or whatever. And they want to go in and they want to get their shit and they want to get in their car and they want to leave if you don't have that you don't have a business there is no parking so we were fucked and okay well i don't have talent i don't have skills but i do have the ability to run through walls we were doing 200 a day at that store and i explained that to this kid that was watching his boss you're only selling like A to D through walls.
We were doing $200 a day at that store. And I explained that to this kid that was watching his boss.
So you're only selling like A to Duh. Yes.
It was an abysmal failure. Even if people would walk in, they would walk in and go, $18 for a smoothie, fuck this place and walk out.
Not knowing that I was the owner sitting there going, fuck man, I'm just trying to feed people and do some good for the world yeah and um we moved into the line hotel and we joined on it lifetime fitness equinox collective stretch lab every yoga studio every we made up gift cards we printed up menus and we went to every single place in town and we just kept going and going.

And for about three months, there was no ROI.

There was nothing.

I mean, I'm walking up to strangers at Lifetime Fitness going, hey, man, here's a $25 gift

card to suddenly forget, you know, and these people were like, fuck's this dude talking

to me?

Who's this weird old guy?

You know, like, and I felt it.

I could feel that that was their, that was their, you know, know feeling and then after about three months people started to show up and then when people started to show up i eventually got invited to uh like a like a an event like a daytime event at this guy's house cal callahan and i went there and it was all these founders and all these entrepreneurs

and all these people like myself

who were self-made, who came from nothing.

I met John Durant there.

I met Kyle Kingsbury there.

I met a bunch of just really,

Kyle's an MMA fighter,

but I met a bunch of really amazing people there

and I brought smoothies with me.

Those people took two sips and they were like,

this is the best shit ever. You got a shop? I'm like, yeah, it's on South Congress.
They started coming. Then they went and told 10 people.
Then they went and told 10 people. They went and told 10 people.
Saturday, we did over $11,000 in business. Holy crap.
In one day. That's insane.
Yeah. At one location? At one location.
We'll do close to $2 million a year in sales there. And again, it's a fucking terrible location.
No parking. No parking.
But if you are willing to do the work, if you are willing to stay out of judgment, if you are willing to... When you walk into my stores, you'll see Psalm 103, one through five.
I'm not a Christian. I just saw that shit in the Bible and I read it.
I fucking loved it. And it said, if you seek God with all your heart, he will crown your head with love.
He will make you new again. Love it.
I'm like, that's amazing. Yes, that's true.
That's my truth. Like, so I don't want to falsely represent any religion here because I don't belong to any religion, but that is the truth.
I got up every morning. I developed an attitude of gratitude.
I went out. I handed out my gift cards.
I did my shit. I kept myself in decent shape.
I was kind to people. If I saw trash on the street, I picked it up.
I put it away. If I went to Whole Foods and it was raining outside and I finished putting the shit in my car, I was taught 12-step programs like put that fucking cart back.
Don't look around to see if anybody's watching. Don't have that attitude of like, oh, you're taking away someone's job because it's someone's job to collect all the cards.
No, shut the fuck up. When you finish with your card,

regardless of what's going on with the weather,

put your cart back at the thing.

When you see trash on the ground, pick it up.

If you got some dough in your pocket,

which I always do,

I always carry a lot of cash with me,

but if you have some cash in your pocket

and you see somebody that's less fortunate than you,

share that with them.

Share that.

Don't worry about,

oh, what if they go do drugs with it? Good for them. Drugs are fucking awesome.
Drugs feel great. Why wouldn't you want them to go have some relief and some comfort? I mean, I'm not promoting drugs here, but I'm just saying like, if some poor bastard is living on the street and he wants to go buy some booze or he wants to go buy some drugs to alleviate some of the pain that he's going through.
It's none of your fucking business. That money, that abundance, that prosperity comes from that source.
And since you have found a way to tap into that source, and now you've got some of that, share it. It feels good.
Don't worry about if they fucking get high with it. Don't worry.
It's none of your business. I know that hits deep for you because you spend some time homeless, right? I did.
Yeah, I did. Yeah, I at least try to get food or water, but I know some people are fans of giving money, but I at least think you should give some food, water, you know.
I think you should give to whatever your comfort level is. Yeah.
Right? If you think food or water, I mean, God, in Vegas, definitely water.

Yeah.

I think that's a great idea.

But I just think in general,

getting out of the victim mentality,

getting out of the self-righteous indignation

and just putting your nose to the grindstone

and working hard

is going to bring you anything

and everything you've ever wanted.

Man, I love that story. $200 a day to 11K.
And that's in two years, you said? Four years. Oh, four years.
Still insane. All from good old word of mouth too.
Word of mouth, yeah. Networking, just getting up every day and you just keep going.
You get up every day. I think the thing with, I see so many people that are taller than me, smarter than me, you know, more educated than me and like sort of stuck in life because they come up to a problem and they just accept no as an answer.
They don't keep going. You got to keep going.
You know, I mean, when you were starting your thing, did you ever imagine that it was going to be like this? Not this quickly. Yeah.
Yeah. And it was

tough at first. I lost money for six months and was almost quit a few times, you know? Yeah.
But I didn't. Yeah.
We lost money for 10 years. Jeez.
10 years. Yeah, I'm complaining about six months.
10 years. Wow.
The last year of losses was 2019, ironically enough, right before COVID. we lost 1.6 million dollars.

Holy crap.

If you want to start a food business

and you want to do 100% certified organic and only have the best of the best of the best ingredients, you're not going to make a lot of money. You might not make any money at all.
I mean, we operated an 8% profit margin. Wow.
Now we'll do 23 million in sales.

So 8% of 23 million, I can't do math,

but it's pretty good, right?

And the company has been profitable since 2021.

Nice.

Yeah.

But for 10 years, I just kept going.

And I think if you're willing to put a decade into something

and you just keep going, I think you're going to find success no matter what. I really believe that.
I agree. Yeah.
10,000 hours is so cliche, but I think it's true. Yeah, I know.
He got some shit for saying that. And I love it.
I think if the Beatles never would have went to that club in Germany and played, you know, I think they were playing 14 hours a day or whatever it was, seven days a week. And I don't think they would have become the Beatles.
I think they became the Beatles in the midst of that chaos. And even though it probably sucked and they didn't sleep much and they were dirty and they kept going.
I mean, I think about the early days of Sun Life Organics when I was living on the Halverson's property in a 400 square foot,

basically shed,

you know,

with no air conditioning and no heat,

just grinding it out,

grinding it out,

grinding it out.

Every single day I'd be at the shop

and people would come in like,

oh man,

just catching any of those waves.

See that swell that came in?

And I'm like,

no man,

I'm fucking working.

You're grinding.

Yeah, I'm grinding. Uh, but that grinding got, got me to where I am now, to where my friend called me yesterday.
He's like, what are you doing end of this month? I'm like, I don't know, not a whole lot. Opening some new stores.
Do you want to come to Abu Dhabi, go surf Kelly's wave pool? I'm like, fuck yeah. Cool.
I have a, you know, jet come pick us up, LAX, if you can be there on the 22nd or 24th. So I get to surf now.
I love it. I get to surf now.
And I get to surf at one of the coolest, probably the best wave in the world. It's a thousand yard ride.
Holy crap. Thousand yard in the middle of Abu Dhabi, in the middle of the desert.
And it's just fucking magnificent. I was there two months ago and it's magnificent.
And the life I get to live today where I do all these incredible things. I mean, it makes me sad for the little boy,

but it makes me encouraged to the people out there.

It makes me sad for the little boy,

the little boy version of me,

but it makes me excited for the people out there.

Hopefully somebody is listening to this and they're going through a tough time

or they feel awkward.

They feel like they don't fit in.

And it makes me excited for them

because hopefully they can look at me and go, fuck, man,

if that guy can do it, I can do it. If that guy can do it, anybody can do it.
And that's the truth. Yeah.
And I love that. There's really no shortcuts.
It's a matter of when you want to put in the work, right? Yeah. Like, do you want to put it in when you're younger? You could take more risks.
Like some people wait a little too long, I think. They got kids to worry about.
They got other people. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, I, I mean, my whole thing is like, I tell anybody that works for me,

just. a little too long, I think.
They got kids to worry about. They got other people.
Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, my whole thing is like, I tell anybody that works for me, you just fucking grind and spend less than you make, invest your money, keep putting it away. Even if you worked a minimum wage job and you just consistently put money, there's some crazy statistic.
You might even know it. I've seen it.
Yeah. The compound.
The compounding thing. Yeah.
It's fucking insane. Right.
Retire a millionaire if you save. Right.
But how about there's that? How about the statistic of what if you, instead of buying a new iPhone every time it came out, what if you took the same amount of money and you bought Apple stock? I've seen that one too. Dude, it doesn't even seem real.
It's fucking insane how much money you would have if you simply invested your money. Like when we first opened, I would tell people like, stop buying Lululemon pants and start buying Lululemon stock.
Lululemon stock was $40 a share. It's $400 a share now.
10X. Yeah.
I've had quite a few young employees come to work for me that were making shit. They were making minimum wage plus tips that ended up taking my advice and 10 years went by and now they fucking do whatever they want to do.
That's awesome. It's pretty amazing.
That's super cool. Yeah.
Yeah. You must have had a tough challenge because mentally people were accustomed to paying five, 10 bucks for smoothies, right? Yeah.
But that was obviously poor quality ingredients. Yeah.
I mean, there's like a smoothie and then there's like a meal in a cup. I mean, like the holy cow smoothie, which has the noble protein powder in it, it's got 50 grams of protein.
So now that protein is like the thing, we're all trying to get like, you know, one pound per body weight, like getting a smoothie that's got 50 grams of protein in it and it's organic and it's amazing. And it's, it, it, it's, it's a meal in a cup and it's already chewed up.
So imagine if you and I, we just worked out and we had to go get 50 grams of protein at a typical place. It's a lot of fucking chewing.
That's a lot of shoveling into our fucking, into our mouth, right? And a lot of money. A lot of money and a lot of stress on the system to break that stuff down to be able to digest it.
When you're getting it in a cup, it's pre-masticated, right? It's already blended up. So it's already chewed up and you're able to absorb all of that into your body much, much better.
Wow, I didn't know that. Yeah.
That is good to know. Cause yeah, I got to up my protein intake.
So maybe I should start looking into liquid forms for sure. I mean, I, I mean, I I'm there every day.
Like I can eat wherever I want. I can go to whatever restaurant I want.
I've done, I've done well. Um, but I go there every day.
I go there every single day and I, I will typically get a smoothie or I'll get an acai bowl. I love the holy cow.
I substitute the noble protein, which is a beef based protein. And I want all the organs and all that stuff in it because I can't stand taking vitamins.
I do take vitamins a couple of days a week just to make sure I'm not missing out on any vitamin D or magnesium or whatever. But yeah, it was a challenge in the beginning.
People definitely were horrified by the prices and people still talk shit about the prices. But having said that, you know, I was working out this morning and I'm looking at the kid who's cleaning the gym that I'm working out in.
He's, I know he's making minimum wage, right? And he's wearing a Chrome Hearts t-shirt. So this kid's going to go spend, I don't know what a Chrome Hearts t-shirt costs, but I'm going to imagine 150 bucks.
Yeah, it's not cheap. Yeah, it's not cheap.
So you see people wearing these stupid Golden Goose tennis shoes, you know, and buying these Chrome Hearts t-shirts or these girls walking around in these $3, these $3,000, um, uh,

what's that?

Working bags.

No,

no,

no,

no.

Those are,

those are the price of a house.

That,

that,

that's like next level.

Goyard,

Goyard.

Yeah.

You see every basic girl that drives a white jet is walking around the Goyard tote that costs,

you know,

three grand,

but she can barely pay her rent.

How much sense does that make?

Like they,

they've got us by the balls where we think we need to have all this fancy shit to

Thank you. pay her rent.
How much sense does that make? They've got us by the balls where we think we need to have all this fancy shit to feel complete and to feel whole. Nothing, nothing will ever make you feel more whole and complete than a relationship with God, your creator, a person who you get to share your life with, a mate, and escaping Maslow's hierarchy.
You cannot, I shouldn't say you cannot, it will be very difficult for someone to self-actualize, to become the highest version of themselves. I'm not talking about the girl on Instagram that's living her best life.
I'm talking about the person who literally becomes the hero in their own journey, right? You're experiencing that now. I am, yeah.
When we get to take care of our parents, when we get to take care of our friends, when we get to become the hero in our own journey, it's very difficult, if not impossible, to self-actualize until you can escape Maslow's hierarchy. So, you know, most people are down here in Maslow's hierarchy, right? And then some people are lucky enough to get here on that pyramid.
but to get up to the top, to escape, to get to the point where, let's say you got a couple rental properties and now you have no debt and now the income coming in is yours. You're free.
You escape the matrix. You escape the matrix.
Yeah. Yeah.
I agree. I love, I love that you use that terminology.
That's one of my favorite movies. It's a documentary.
Pretty much at this point, yeah. It really is.
It's a documentary. And do you know about the allegory of the cave? No.
Okay, so Plato, thousands of years ago, basically said that life is like this. You got a bunch of people huddled in a cave and these people are sitting in this cave huddled up

and they're looking at these images on the wall

and they're being controlled by these images on the wall.

Well, the images on the wall

are actually coming from the fire

and the people behind the fire,

the people that run shit, Vanguard, State Street, Black Rock, governments, Catholic Church, the people behind the fire are projecting these images onto the wall. And most of what they're projecting is fear.
Fear controls the people that are huddled in the cave but in plato's allegory of the cave one of the people escapes and he climbs up out of the cave and he goes up top and there's a sun and there's forests and there's rivers and there's streams and there's waterfalls and And he's like, oh my God, wait, this is really life. Oh my God, this is amazing.
And he goes back down to tell the people and they attack him. Whoa.
Yeah. History repeats itself, huh? They attack him.
Because this is going on right now. What's going on right now? Wow.
What's going on right now? did not know that we are all controlled by the images the images on the cave right this phone or that screen or that television that's the cave wall and the people that control shit people that own shit they're projecting images on there and most people more than half of this country for sure, just watches whatever they see on those screens, on those screens, and they believe it to be real. And they think that that's real life because they're struggling to pay the rent.
I think the statistics is 70% of the people living in this country have less than a thousand dollars000 in savings. I've seen that.
And a large percent live paycheck to paycheck. Yes.
And 70% of the people live in this country are overweight or obese, right? How many people are on psychiatric meds? Half the fucking country. So we have become a society of domesticated animals bred for taxation.
Most people out there can't fuck without a pill, can't sleep without a pill, can't go to work without a pill, can't digest their food without a pill, can't make it through the day. Now they're fucking injecting themselves with shit to stop them from gorging on food.
Like what the fuck happened to us? So what happened to us? If you look at images of people at the beach in the thirties, forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, even everybody's skinny. Yep.
Everybody I've seen them. And then you go to the beach now and what you see is just, it's horrifying.
So, but you guys with your power tapping into that source, which I'm going to call God, you don't have to, but tapping into that power, you guys are going to make the people that are huddled in the cave realize that that's not real life. Sitting around talking shit about whether Leo got a facelift or not, or why is he dating? Why is Anthony Kiedis dating a 20-year-old girl? He's 62 years old.
And why did Kim Kardashian get another nose job? What the fuck does that have to do with your ability to create a life that is so wonderful that you don't feel compelled to escape from it it has nothing to do with that the reason sports are so prevalent and so successful is to keep people distracted the reason that religion which is not so prevalent anymore was the great opiate of the masses, right? Religion used to be the opiate of the masses. But the other day, I was scrolling through my television.
I was trying to get onto Apple TV, and I was scrolling through, I don't know what TV it was. And I'm just looking at show after show after show of just gross people, hoarders, 600-pound people, murderers, all of this gross stuff.
It's like Hollywood just continues to pump out this darkness, this sickness, and everybody's just lapping it up and consuming it and staying glued to their little parasitic devices. And the moment they stop and they start putting some good stuff into their body and their ears start to perk up because they're listening to Sean's podcast or listening to Rogan's podcast or listening to whatever, which thank God is beginning to wake people up.
They start to understand that maybe what they've been told and what they've been taught is not reality. Yeah.
You're starting to see that movement for sure. Actually in the health scene.
Yes. You know, I know you've had your health battles, which is a big reason why you started this company, right? And I can see it when you talk.
This means a lot to you. Yeah.
Well, because I went from 109 pound walking corpse with my fucking teeth falling out of my head to 173 pound athlete at 55 years old. I'm in the greatest fucking shape of my life.
Wow. I feel amazing and I have boundless energy and I'm at the point in my life where I realized like, fuck man, I can, anything.
I'm just barely scratching the surface. I can literally do anything.
Sean, I'm going to build a global billion dollar brand. I'm going to take this little mom and pop juice bar that I started in Point Doom, Malibu, California in 2011.
And I'm going to open all over the country and all over the world. And if I can do that, anybody can do anything.
Anybody can do anything. I love that.
How many locations do you have now? We have 18, 18 locations. We operate in eight different states.
We have three more coming, another one in Nashville, a new one in Boulder, Colorado, and finally New York City is coming in April. I love it.
And Aria, right? In Vegas. Aria, Vegas.
That's coming this summer. Talking to some people about licensing deals in South Africa, talking to some people about licensing deals in the Middle East.
I'm going to build a billion-dollar brand. I'm going to make a bunch of dough and I'm going to do a lot of good with it.
And I'm going to help a lot of people because it's fucking fun. And because it's the right thing to do.
I love that. I want to inspire people.
I want to get people healthy. I want to get people off their fucking phones and jumping into a river or a lake or an ocean, climbing a mountain, building a business, or just attracting a mate into their life who they love so they can experience real true intimacy.
Not what they see in pornography, but like real true intimacy. And that's my purpose.
That's my passion. That's my mission.
That's beautiful, man. I know you said you weren't spiritual earlier, but I do believe in energy.
Yeah. And I think you're just putting out so much good energy with your products.
This stuff is super healthy, all organic. Thank you.
You're helping so many people. I think that's going to come back to you, man.
I mean, I appreciate that. I think in many ways that it has.
To go from where I was to whether it's surfing a thousand-yard wave in the middle of the desert or being in the Oval Office last month, which was a surreal experience. Was that a Maha event? No, my friend Tulsi was getting sworn in.
Oh, nice. She's been on the show.
Really? Yeah. Oh, amazing.
Small world. Small world.
Yeah. She's one of my dearest friends.
I love her. She's absolutely incredible.
She is absolutely, like all the women in my life, she's even more beautiful on the inside than she is on the outside, which is, that's an awesome quality to have. But being there in the white house, um, watching her get sworn in.
I mean, I just stood there like frozen going like, this is crazy. I could actually fucking reach out and touch him.
Like he was in there, like, you know, doing his thing, like being Donald Trump. And, um, I liked him.
I liked him in 2016. Like I liked big time wrestling when I was a kid.
Yeah. You know, um, I didn't, you know, I didn't think like, oh God, this is a really moral good and, but I liked him.
I liked how he decimated everybody on stage. I, I, I hated Republicans.
I always hated Republicans. I always considered myself a liberal and a Democrat and I hated Republicans.
So I loved how he got up there and he just fucking assassinated every one of them, came up with nicknames for them and just destroyed fucking Clinton, that cackling cow and destroyed everybody. And so I liked him for that.
But then he became president and I won. I bet five grand, three to one odds.
I won. So I was happy about that, but it still wasn't like, Oh, I love the guy.
I'm a MAGA, but then he did a pretty good job. I mean, you know, he, he definitely made some mistakes and he definitely said some really stupid shit.
And, you know, January 6th was certainly an embarrassment for this country. Was it an insurrection? I don't know.
I mean, I thought so when I first saw the footage. But then a year later, when all of the footage was released and I saw them literally, the Capitol Police letting people in, letting the fucking shaman bro with the weird hat, like letting that guy in and escorting him through the Capitol.
Like, I'm like, wait, that doesn't look like an insurrection. Why do they keep saying insurrection? And, um, and then he lost.
And I thought, God, that's weird. Doesn't seem like that many people actually voted.
Maybe there is some legitimacy to cheating because cheating has always gone on in, in elections. I mean, I, I remember when Bush stole the election from Al Gore.
I mean, straight up stole it. Florida was the state and they just fucking stole it from him.
Everybody knows that. So cheating happens in every election.
So I started to wonder like, God, did they really cheat? I mean, it was COVID. There was a lot of mail-in ballots.
They're starting to say that people shouldn't have to have ID to vote because that's racist. Wait, what the fuck did you just say? You already had me baffled with all the pronoun stuff, right? But now you're saying that people shouldn't have to have an ID to vote.
No, you have to have a fucking ID to vote and no,

that's not racist.

And,

and people of color and,

and minorities and,

and impoverished people have the ability to get a fucking ID.

I,

I had to do it.

I had to go from living on the streets to eventually resurfacing and

eventually,

you know,

building myself back up again without, type of, you know, real help. I did it.
So that freaked me out. And then when he said he was going to run again after he lost, at that point, I was like, man, he should pick Tulsi.
That would be fucking amazing if she was his vice president. I don't talk politics with her, just out of respect.
Kind of like in the same way,

I don't talk surfing with Kelly Slater. I don't talk music.
Well, I talk music with Anthony

Kiedis, but I don't talk red hot chili peppers with him. I don't talk science with Andrew

Huberman. Andrew came over last night for dinner.
We ate some steaks. We played with my cats.
We took a long walk. We teased each other a lot.
I didn't ask him one question about science. Well, it must be so refreshing for him.
Yeah. I mean, and I think that that's probably why these people allow

me into their lives because I really just want to feed people and, and like inspire people. I'm pretty self-centered and self-engrossed.
So they probably like being around someone that's not asking them a million questions about themselves.

Yeah, I didn't, I didn't, I didn't talk science with him, but back to the Trump thing, he didn't end up picking Tulsi, but, uh, um, he picked Vance, which at first I was like, man, fuck that guy. That, that dude would have beat me up in high school.
You know, a hundred percent high school. 100%.
Yeah. That guy, I didn't like him.
He scared me. And then somebody said, have you watched Hillbilly eulogy or whatever? I'm like, no.
And they're like, you should watch it. So I watched it.
I'm like, oh, fuck. He's from Ohio.
And then his mom and me got a lot in common. We were shooting heroin.

Wow.

Yeah.

And me and him have a lot in common because he had a fucked up childhood.

I had a fucked up childhood

that I alluded to a little bit earlier.

Yeah.

And I'm like, oh man, wait,

this motherfucker went through that shit

and then he somehow made it into,

I don't know if it was Yale

or whatever he made it into.

Like that's some impressive shit. So all of a sudden I'm like, okay, maybe he's not such a bad guy, right? I was threatened by him because he really did look like the guys that wanted to beat me up in school.
And then I saw him on Rogan. And I was like, holy shit.
He is articulate. He is brilliant.
He's passionate. He cares about this fucking country.
I think they're going to win. I think they're going to fucking win.
And then Tulsi and I were hanging out whenever this was, this is before the election night. And she said, are you going to come down? Are you going to come down to Palm Beach for the election night? I was like, I don't know, I wasn't planning on it.
And she's like, well it she's like well come it'll be fun i'm like okay and so i flew down there and it was amazing you know to spend time with her as always but we were we were sitting all together and i'm sitting there going i don't know if they cheated before they're gonna cheat again yeah you know skeptical too. Yeah.
Like this is feeling pretty weird. And at a certain point she just goes, I got to go upstairs and freshen up.
I'll be right back. Don't move.
Stay here. They're going to shut down all the streets.
His motorcade is coming. I'm like, what do you mean? At this point, nothing's announced.
Yeah. At this point, like they still hadn't announced Pennsylvania.
And I'm'm just like what what's happening and she just looks at me and she goes it's happening i'm like it is she says i'll be right back i love it she went upstairs she came down and her outfit we walked into the room she like had some section where i was gonna stand and we're sitting there watching c CNN on the giant jumbo screen and everyone's nervous. Everyone's like, and it was weird.
There was like Mexican bikers and Hasidic and Muslims. And I'm thinking where are all the white supremacists? Like there's a lot of fucking minorities here.
To be fair, there were definitely some, some, you know, shit kicker Republicans and cowboy boots and whatever. But there was a lot of minorities there.
There was a lot of different types of people there. And all of a sudden on the jumbo screen, they announced Pennsylvania.
And I fucking look and you see Arabs and hugging. You see bikers and businessmen.
The fucking MyPillow guy was right there. Tucker Carlson goes walking by.
It was insane. Everybody's crying.
People started singing gospel hymns or whatever. Yeah, it was so surreal.
So what an incredible moment. Sorry, I went off on a tangent, but what an incredible, and I'm not supposed to talk politics.
I'm going to get canceled. Uh, what an incredible moment it was to experience that.
And, and, you know, that, and the trips around the world and all the exciting things I get to do, that all came from me getting on my knees and asking God for help. And that all came from me

realizing that everything going on in my life, it's on me. It's got nothing to do with someone

touched my naughty spot or, oh, my parents didn't speak English good or whatever. Do you know Wild

Wonder? No. Rosalie, the Wild Wonder drinks.
Rosalie, I haven't seen no one. Immigrated here from china when she was 12 didn't speak the language english is actually her third language she learned english from 12 on she managed to get a scholarship to stanford she graduated stanford and like sold her first business at 23 this is a little chinese immigrant girl with a mexican name rosalie i I don't know why her name is Rosalie.
I should ask her. And then sold that business and started this incredible brand called Wild Wonder where she took her Chinese grandmother's recipe and created these prebiotic probiotic drinks that only have like eight grams of sugar, but tastes fucking amazing.
I saw her on Instagram and I basically stalked her. And one day she hit me back and she's like, hey, I'm in Austin.
We'd love to meet up with you. And ended up meeting her.
We ended up becoming friends. But forget about my sad, stupid little Cinderella story.
What about girls like Rosalie, right? What about like all the people out there that have built something amazing against all odds, like yourself included? Like this is the time now, this is the time where your generation is going to learn from our generation and we're all going to come together and we're going to change the world. Sean, we have to change the world.
There can't be war anymore. The fact that there's war going on right now, the fact that children are being trafficked for sex slaves, the fact that there are people lying in the streets, many of them veterans who fought for this country, that shit's got to end.
You guys are going to change that. I will do whatever the fuck I can.

I'll use my connections. I'll use my voice.
I'll use my silly little story. I'll fuel people with the products that I create.
But we have to change the world. And by we, I mean you.
Because we're getting older, but you guys are young and you're vibrant and you've tapped into that source. And so now is the time for celebrities to come together, influencers to come together, podcasters to come together, where we've got to stop whatever evil fucking forces have taken over this planet.
And we have to just push them aside. We don't have to throw them in prison.
We don't have to kill them. It doesn't have to be violent.
It doesn't have to be an insurrection. But you guys need to rise up.
Women need to rise up and reclaim their power. God needs to not be a dirty word anymore.
We've gotten so far away from God. We've got to go back to God.
And through the power and grace of a living, loving God and the power that you've tapped into and so many others like you have tapped into and I've tapped into in a small way as well, we have to come together and change the world for the better. I love it.
I'm with you on that mission, man. I'll be right by your side.
I'm ready. I'm ready to go.
I don't know how a smoothie maker is going to push that forward, but it seems like I'm exposed to a lot of incredible people and I've become friends with a lot of incredible people like yourself. And listen, I love fancy shit.
I love shiny things. Clearly, I'm still insecure.
I'm still shallow. I still want people to like me.
That little boy is still inside there somewhere that wants to be noticed. I say a lot of stupid shit.
I don't have a filter. I don't mean that in a proud way.
I mean, I literally don't have a filter. I don't have Asperger's, but I will say the most inappropriate shit at the most inappropriate moment.
I cannot fucking help myself. Humor, because I suffered with suicidal ideation much of my life, gallows humor, aka inappropriate humor, aka the type of shit that you get canceled over.
It saved my life. It saved my life.
When I was in that fucking halfway house and it was 117 degrees outside and I'm looking at my life and the fucking mess that I've created and I'm like, wait, I'm on welfare. I'm in a fucking halfway house.
I'm about to turn 34 years old. I'm a couple hundred thousand dollars in debt from all the hospital bills and ambulance rides I had from overdosing and flatlining and all that shit.
My credit's fucked. I don't even have a high school diploma.
Like, what the fuck am I going to do? I'd crack a joke. And I'd feel a little better.
And then somebody else would crack a joke. Somebody would make fun of me.
It was a bunch of minorities in this place called New Perceptions. It was a black-owned, black-operated halfway house in the valley on Roscoe and White Oak.
There was a couple of Mexican dudes, guy, Palestinian guy, Palestinian Polish guy, white guy, black guy. We would all just make the most wildly inappropriate, what people would consider racist jokes.
But we did it for fun. Sometimes we'd go too far and then we'd have to go, hey, you know what? Let's pump the brakes a little bit.
But like, you know, stereotypes are stereotypes. There's some funny shit in there, right?

There's nothing funnier,

like watching Sarah Silverman make fun of people

is one of the funniest fucking shit

you've ever seen in your life, right?

Because there's some truths to those stereotypes.

Watching Chris Rock make fun of black people

is some of the funniest shit

we've ever seen in our lives.

We need to fucking laugh.

We need to stop with this cancel culture bullshit. We need to stop.
All of us are flawed. All of us.
All of us have made mistakes. I lived the first 33 years of my life without a moral compass.
And I'm not proud to say that. I don't have a filter.
I'm not bragging. It's just like, God forgot to put a fucking filter in there so he don't say shit.
Like I'm thinking of like, I became friends with this guy, Charles. He's a lineman for the Kansas City Chiefs.
And went to the Super Bowl twice. Fucking amazing guy.
And I met him at the gym. He liked my shoes.
I invited him over for a smoothie. He tried to order a strawberry banana smoothie.

And I was like, this isn't fucking Jamba Juice, dude. I'm like, you're going to get a billion dollar bowl.
He said, what's that? I'm like, don't worry about it. Got to have a billion dollar bowl.
And he's eating the bowl. He fucking loves it.
He goes, man, this shit's good. Can I get another one? I go, yeah.
I go, but we're friends now, right? He goes, yeah, man, we cool. we're friends.
I go, okay, so I can use the N-word, right?

He fucking laughed so hard.

And it was beautiful because in that moment,

I used humor to break the ice.

I don't want to call black people a derogatory term, right?

I don't want to call Italians a derogatory term, but when a comic

does it or we're using humor, it's okay. People need to lighten the fuck up.
I agree. Khalil, it's been so fun, man.
I can't wait to film with you again. Where could people find you and where could people find Sun Life? Sunlifeorganics.com.
There's a bunch of them in LA, one opening in New York, two in Nashville, Miami, South Beach, Chicago, in Fulton Market, Vegas, Aria coming soon this summer. I'm just at Khalil Rafati.
I'm just on Instagram. I tried the TikTok.
I'm not sophisticated enough to maneuver it. It's too confusing for me.
And I don't want to get fucking, I don't want to go down that rabbit hole. But yeah, just at Khalil Rafati on Instagram.
And I hope, I know I babbled a lot. That's what I do.
But I sincerely hope there's somebody out there that is in pain and suffering that sees me and sees my story and, and derive some sort of hope for it and, and, uh, and makes a necessary change in their life where they can begin walking towards their dreams. I get 1% better every day.
I didn't come up with that shit. I was introduced to it by Tim Ferriss in his book, For Our Work Week, Kaizen.

Just get a little bit better every day, no matter what.

Every day, a little bit better.

I've been doing that for 21 and a half years.

My life is like 17,000% better because I got 1% better every day for the last 21 years.

I love that.

Yeah, so that's my message and I hope it helps somebody.

Nice 6M guys, message me.

We're here for you.

Thanks for coming on, man. Thank you, brother.

Beautiful. Cut him out, guys.
See you next time.