Damon West: Transforming Rock Bottom into Maximum Impact

Back in the courtroom and they read my sentence out loud.

Damon Joseph West, you are hereby sentenced to 65 years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Mick, 65 years in the state of Texas is a life sentence in the state of Texas.

Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement, leadership, and relentless growth.

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Let's go.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another exciting episode of Mick Unplugged.

And today, we've got a story that is going to change your life.

He went from maximum security to maximum impact.

Once a felon, now he's a force of good.

His message is transformational.

It electrifies NFL locker rooms, corporate boardrooms, and universities across the globe.

He's the proof that rock bottom can be a solid foundation for greatness.

Ladies and gentlemen, please help me in joining the resilient, the visionary, the unstoppable, Mr.

Damon West.

How are you doing today, brother?

Mick, I appreciate you, brother.

Thanks for your time today.

I love that introduction.

We got to go on the road together, brother.

That was good.

Literally, everyone says that, man.

Like, we just make sure that our platform, we celebrate our guests, man.

This isn't about controversy.

This isn't about bringing people down.

Everything we do is about uplifting.

And of many of the stories that I've sat behind the mic on, your story, man, might be the most transformative that I've ever been a part of, brother.

So one, I just wanted to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule.

And number two, man, like just the admiration that I have for you.

I wanted to tell you that to your face, brother.

I love you so much, man.

Brother, I appreciate you.

I love you too, man.

I appreciate that.

Yeah, I've got,

I think that human beings are capable of way more than they think they are.

And I think a lot of times we allow overthinking to get in the way of overcoming.

But as we're going to hear from this story, I put myself in a situation because I did.

I put myself in the situation I was in where I had my back against the wall and the pressure was so high on me and I had to figure it out.

There's a question I ran across recently, and that's actually the first question.

It's actually the first sentence in my new book.

The question is this, if someone took control of your life tomorrow, what's the first thing they would change?

Now, the reason why that question struck a chord with me.

Yeah, if someone took control of your life tomorrow, what's the first thing they would change?

The trick is, you know, you already know the answer to the question, right?

And then the question becomes, why have you not already made the change yourself?

And I think the answer lies somewhere in the

fear, because we fear the unknown.

Change is hard.

Change takes us outside of our comfort zone.

Yeah.

But Mick, like we're going to hear today, that's a great place to navigate towards outside your comfort zone because brother, that is where growth takes place.

Always, every single day.

And you and I wholeheartedly on the same page there because that's what I tell leaders, I tell salespeople, I tell managers all across the board, man.

Like you only get better outside of your comfort zone.

That's what we're intended to do as humans.

Correct.

Absolutely.

And I mean, and we know that too.

Yep.

But it's fear, you know, I think fear is what holds a lot of people back.

I put myself in a situation in life where

because of the choices I made, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice did take control of my life.

May 18th, 2009 is a good place to start.

this thing because on May 18th, 2009, I stood in front of a jury in Dallas and the jury, these 12 men and women from Dallas, they set through a six-day criminal trial.

And the crime that I'm standing on trial for is engaging in organized criminal activity.

It's a RICO case.

I'm the boss of the entire RICO ring.

Bunch of meth addicts breaking into houses.

I was a meth addict myself.

But the jury heard the story of a guy named Damon West, this guy that had it all.

Mick, I came from this wonderful town called Port Arthur, Texas.

I had two parents in my home.

My parents were married 55 years, you know.

Great high school quarterback, Division I starting quarterback in North Texas, got injured, career got cut short, got into drugs, but I had some of the best jobs you can imagine.

I was, I worked in the United States Congress.

I worked for a guy running for president.

Then I became a Wall Street stockbroker.

And it was at that job as a broker in Dallas in 2004 that I was introduced to meth.

And once I was introduced to meth, the wheels came off.

I was homeless after 18 months living on the streets.

And I put together a burglary crew and we started breaking into homes all over Dallas.

And Mick, when I broke into people's homes, I didn't just steal their property.

I stole their sense of security.

And I know I took it from them.

They can't get that back.

But on July 30th, 2008, the Dallas SWAT team takes me down.

Dramatic SWAT team raid.

They arrest me that day.

Or as I tell people all the time, Dallas SWAT didn't just arrest me in 2008.

They rescued me, Mick.

They pulled me out of a situation I couldn't get myself out of.

The angels in my story don't have wings.

They have assault rifles and shields and helmets.

And they're coming coming through the doors.

They bust the windows.

They bust the door off the hinges.

But Dallas Swatt saves my life that day.

I don't see it as that at the time.

Less than a year later, we're standing in that courtroom on May 18th, 2009.

The case is over.

Six days of trial.

They're property crimes.

So no one ever got physically hurt.

The jury goes to deliberate for 10 minutes.

And man, that's a terrible sign.

Because if a jury's gone for 10 minutes, it means they smoked you.

They brought me back in the courtroom and they read my sentence sentence out loud.

Damon Joseph West, you are hereby sentenced to 65 years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Mick, 65 years in the state of Texas is a life sentence in the state of Texas.

The jury gave me life that day, or as they say in prison terms, six dimes and a nickel.

So that's a good place to start this story, though, Mick.

Man, so I want to unpack and unplug a lot in that story, man.

So you are a stockbroker, right?

and a lot of people around the country around the world assume that you know meth is a is a low-class type of drug right and it can't find its way to a stockbroker yeah

right so

and and i hate almost asking this question of like why but like What were you missing that you felt like meth was going to give you?

Yeah, here's where I would say what the answer to that that question was.

At this point in my life, I'm an addict in my addiction.

All right.

So, and I believe,

you know, I believe I'll always be an addict.

I think that because I have a program recovery now, I know how to live with my addictions.

And that helps me keep control of this addiction thing.

I've been sober since SWAT got me, but I couldn't live life on life's terms, mate.

That's the definition of being an addict.

And when you can't live life on life's terms, you put in chemicals to change the way you feel.

The chemicals were what I always turned to.

First, it was alcohol when I was younger.

Then it was drugs.

It was, you know, cocaine and ecstasy.

But when I was introduced to meth for the first time, meth took a hold of me like nothing else did.

And look, you hit the nail on the head.

The other stockbroker that gives me meth for the first time, I look at him like, man, what is that white trash stuff you're trying to give me?

And he kind of laughed at me.

He said, yeah, he said, you try this one time.

You won't be doing that cocaine anymore.

And he was right, babe.

I had a cocaine problem in 2004, but that was fixed whenever I tried meth for the first time because I never touched cocaine again.

Meth is the most evil, most destructive, most addictive drug.

And addiction, addiction doesn't care who you are or where you come from.

Addiction does not discriminate because addiction doesn't care who you are, where you come from, who your parents are.

When addiction's got a hold of you, it's got you.

And I believe, Mick, wholeheartedly, every person in America is affected by addiction, whether you're you're an addict, the victim of an addict, the friend of an addict, the family member of an addict, or you're just a taxpayer.

You're paying into an overburdened criminal justice system that has no idea how to handle the disease of addiction.

Addiction touches every one of us, Meg.

Yep.

Yep.

And, you know, hearing this story and knowing what I know about you, man, talk about

when you had to look people in the eye, right?

Like you have loving parents, right?

You've got friends.

You have other people that not only depend on you, but look up to you, right?

Colleagues as well.

What was that moment like of having to look people in the eye and saying, this is who I really am?

Yeah,

it was humbling.

I mean, and I think humility is when we are right sized because humility removes the ego and everything else or what our imaginations make the giants of our dreams.

It was extremely humbling.

And look, let's, I'll be honest with you.

Until that day in court, I wasn't ready to accept the responsibility for my behaviors.

I wasn't just this guy that came into the trial and said, hey, I did it all.

I pled not guilty.

I didn't take the stand.

I was a very cocky, arrogant person.

And that's one of the reasons I think the jury hated me so much, because I was, you know, I didn't have any remorse.

I didn't show any humility, but humility found me.

And it found me on that day in my trial.

And I tell you this, when you go through some big situation like that in life, and you don't have to go get sentenced to life in prison to have an upside down situation in life or a life altering event.

But when you go through a life altering event, you will find out who is in your corner and who is not.

And you will probably find out, if you were like a guy, a guy like me, that you ran a lot of good people off.

And getting some of those people to believe in you again, that is a long process, Mick.

That takes a lot of time.

My dad would tell me things like, you know, you earn trust by the spoonful and you lose it by the bucket full.

And on May 18, 2009, I dumped the whole bucket of trust out, man.

It was out there.

Damon West was a fraud.

He was a criminal.

He's a drug addict.

And Damon West got sentenced to life in prison.

Man.

So let's talk about that part now.

So let's unplug that.

You were sentenced to 65 years.

It's 2025 right now.

So that tells me, obviously, the 65 years you didn't do, right?

What was that first initial mindset shift for you while you were behind bars, right?

Because the person that you were then obviously is not the person that you are now, thank God, right?

Correct.

What was that?

What was that mindset shift like?

And then I'm going to ask you about coffee beans in a second.

Yeah.

And so, but just to answer the audience's like question that's on their mind right now, they're like, how is this guy sitting there?

I mean, is he in his prison cell?

Did he escape?

No, they actually walked me out the gate one day in 2015.

I made parole, Mick.

And so what that means when you make parole is that you're not done with your sentence.

You're just done with doing your sentence inside of a prison.

And my parole expiration date is July 30th, 2073.

So I got a little more time for 2025.

I got 48 more years.

I'll do the math for everybody.

But I'm not worried about being a parole because I'm a coffee bean.

We'll get to the coffee bean in a little bit.

So the mindset shift happens like this.

And May 18th, 2009 is a very big day because right after the trial is over, they take me off and they put me in this little room on the side of the courtroom, a little cell, basically.

And they have a bulletproof glass.

It's a place where you talk to your lawyer.

My parents come over there.

They give my parents five minutes with me.

This is one last visit before I go to prison.

They feel sorry for my parents because I just got life.

My dad can't talk.

He's in stunned disbelief.

So my mom does all the talking.

And she tells me, Mick, she says, baby, she said, debts in life demand to be paid.

And you just got hit with one hell of a bill from the state of Texas, but you did the things they said you did.

So you're going to go and pay the debt to society, but you owe Texas that debt.

Now you owe your father and I debt too, because we gave you all the opportunity, love, and support to be anything in life.

And that's how you repaid us.

That's not going to work.

So here's the debt you're going to pay to us.

When you go to prison, you will not get in one of these white hate groups, one of these Aryan brotherhood type of gangs, because you're scared because you're the minority there.

She said, that's not going to work.

You were never raised to be a racist.

You're not starting that stuff now.

And she said, you will not get any tattoos while you're inside that prison.

And I always show the audience my arms, man.

I got no ink on my skin.

None.

I spent almost 10 years in a level five maximum security prison.

And these guys want to tattoo every inch of your body in the joint, but I would tell them all the time, man, I just can't get any tats because my mom said no.

My mom told me that day, though, she said, Damon, no gangs, no tattoos.

You come back as the man that we raised or don't come back to us at all.

And man,

I was stunned.

I was floored, right?

How am I going to deliver on this promise?

But she didn't leave on that.

She said, Damon, do you understand the debt you're going to pay to your father and I?

I said, yeah, mom, I got it.

Mick, what do I know about prison, man?

I'd never been to prison.

I'm a white middle class guy in America.

I don't know why it's been to prison at this point, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Brother, I get back to my pod in Dallas County jail.

I got two months before the prison bus comes to get me, man, and I'm frantically asking every guy that's been to prison before, how am I going to survive?

What am I going to do?

And every guy I'm talking to, Mick, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, they all say the same thing that you've got to get into a gang.

They said you won't survive where you're going to physically survive without a gang.

But there was this one guy that was so different, Mick, this older black man named Muhammad.

Now, Muhammad is what you would call a career criminal, in and out of prison his his entire life, but he was the most positive guy I've ever met in my life.

Had a smile on his face everywhere he went, mate.

Wow.

So one morning, Muhammad comes up to my bunk.

He's got a cup of coffee in his hands.

He had a smile on his face.

He said, West, man, I've been watching you.

I've been watching how you're dealing with these knuckleheads and these dummies talking about you got to get into a gang.

He said, do not listen to these fools.

He said, do you want to keep that promise you made to your mom and your dad?

I was like, yeah.

He said, then let me tell you what prison is really going to be like.

And that's when he laced me up, Mick.

He said, the first thing you need to understand about prison, prison's all about race.

Race runs the whole institution inside of a prison.

And he said, that's the way all the races want it to.

Everybody divides up by their own race in there.

He said, when you walk in the door, the white gangs are going to get the first tips on you because you're white.

The Aryan Brotherhood, the Aryan Circle, the White Knights, the Woods, you will fight all the white gangs first.

If you survived the white gangs, Now you're fighting black gangs.

And the white gangs send the black gangs after you.

The Crips, the Bloods, the Gangster Disciples, they're going to all collectively tee off on this independent white guy who won't get with his own race and his own kind where he belongs.

He said, but if you survive all that and you can survive all that, you will earn the right to walk alone.

He said, the strongest man in prison always walks alone.

Walk alone.

Yep.

And he told me the truth about fighting, Mick.

He said, Wes, you don't have to win all these fights, but you do have to fight all your fights.

Some days you're going to win and some days you are going to lose.

He said, it's okay when you lose.

Get up.

Just get back up.

And that's what he's telling me.

Get back up.

But Mick, when he's telling me this back 2009, I'm looking back at this guy like a deer in headlights.

All this violence and terror about to walk into.

That's when he said, hey, Wes, let me break this down for you a different way.

He said, I want you to imagine prison.

as a pot of boiling water.

He said, now anything we put into a pot of boiling water will be changed by the heat and the pressure inside that pot.

He said, I'm going to put three things in this pot of boiling water and watch how they change.

A carrot, an egg, and a coffee bean.

So here's where I first heard the story of the coffee bean.

Mick, it was the summer of 2009 in a jail cell and Dallas got in jail.

10 years before John Gordon and I write that best-selling book in 2019 called The Coffee Bean.

So he said, first things first, West, if I put a carrot in that pot of boiling water, he said, what happened to the carrot?

I'm like, the carrot's going to turn soft, Muhammad.

He said, that's right, West.

He said, the carrot goes in the water really hard and firm, but the water, the prison,

turned the hard carrot soft and mushy and weak.

You don't want to be a carrot.

What about the egg, West?

What happens to the egg in the pot of boiling water?

I'm like, the egg is going to turn hard, Muhammad, like a hard-boiled egg.

He said, that's right, West.

He said, the egg has a shell that can protect it physically on the outside, but inside that shell, that soft, liquid core, the yolk,

the heart becomes hardened.

He said, now, if your heart becomes hardened, you become incapable of giving or receiving love.

He said, if you're incapable of giving or receiving love in the world you're going into, you don't come back as someone your parents recognize.

You've become institutionalized and your eggshell has swastikas all over it.

Then he asked me the question, Meg.

He said, what about the coffee bean, West?

He said, what happened to the coffee bean in the pot of boiling water?

And Mick, I didn't have an answer for him on that one.

I didn't know what happened to a coffee bean in a pot of boiling water.

And that is when Muhammad, this man who looks nothing like me, this man who doesn't come from the same America that I came from, this man who doesn't believe the same things I believe in my life.

This is a black Muslim man from the streets of Dallas.

I'm a white middle-class Christian from a little town called Port Arthur.

But this man who is so different than me, he's going to share with me one of the most important and transformational messages I've ever received in my entire life.

And the message there is this.

If you ever shut yourself off to people because of their differences, different race, different gender, different ethnicity, different religion, opinions, different political views, if you close yourself off to people because of their differences, you could miss some of the most important lessons and some of the best friendships in this life.

Because because muhammad told me that day he said if i put a coffee bean in that same pot of boiling water we call prison he said now you got to change the name of the water to coffee because he said the coffee bean west the smallest of the three things small like you had the power to change the entire atmosphere inside that pot because the power was inside the coffee bean he said just like the power is inside of you And that's what he told me, Mick.

If you want to turn this thing around,

if you want to change yourself inside that prison, you're going to be like that coffee bean too.

The last words he ever said to me, he said, hey, West, be a coffee bean.

And that was it.

The prison bus came to pick me up that day in 2009.

Bro, I've heard you tell that story at least 30 times, right?

Every time I hear it and the fact that you're talking and telling me, I know it's for the audience and viewers and listeners, but.

The fact that we're here, the chill bumps that I have, bro, because that is so impactful.

That's a message that everyone needs to hear.

If you're going through something, if you're a think about, if you're the leader of a corporation, you have to be the coffee bean.

You have to be.

You have to be the coffee bean.

If you're going through something personally, right?

What you said earlier, fight your battles, right?

You don't have to win, but you doggone for sure better fight.

That's right.

And somebody that's watching or listening to this right now, I guarantee is going through something.

And what Damon is telling you, I'm going to let Damon tell you,

but you got to keep fighting, right?

Because the moment you give up, you don't know how that's going to impact the legacy that you could or should have had.

Beck, you're so right on, man.

And you know what?

Here's what I truly believe about when people give up on their hopes and goals and dreams is they were always closer to it than they even realized.

You know, you were so much closer than you really think you you are.

You just got to keep going.

And, you know, and life is hard.

Life's going to throw obstacles at you.

But the good thing about this is, is that you get to choose the way you see the obstacles in front of you.

And the coffee bean message, I remember how it felt when he first told it to me.

And just hearing you talk about that, man, it makes me feel so good, Mate, because that's the energy I want to transfer anytime I tell this story.

And I'm on the road.

20 to 25 days a month speaking all over America to corporations, groups, and sports teams.

But I want everybody in that room every single time to feel that kind of energy because I want people to feel something.

I think that when we make people feel something, we can create an emotion out of that event, right?

It's like the old

May Angelou quote, right?

People don't always remember what you say.

They always remember what you do, but they always remember how you make them feel.

And I remember how I felt that day that Muhammad told me, and I'm going to tell you the one word I felt was empowered.

He put the power back inside me.

You know, Mick, that's a big thing, man, because at that time, the power was inside the criminal justice system.

The guards, the inmates, they had all the power in my mind.

But he put the power back inside me.

And if the power was inside me, I don't survive prison.

I thrive in that prison.

And that's what I want your audience to take away from this thing.

The power is inside each and every one of you.

It's not what goes on in the cities you come from, the states you're from.

The crazy politics and social problems this country has right now.

It's in you.

It's not what goes on in the workplace, the schools you go to whatever you're going through right now the power is always going to be inside you meg

man i love that brother i love that you know and i know being a former athlete right you you do spend a lot of time talking to professional teams to colleges and i want to talk about your good friend right and and how he inspired you

And everybody that knows this, the viewers and listeners, you know, I'm from the upstate of South Carolina, and there's a little college in my backyard that I hated growing up.

That college is Clemson University, right?

Like I had an uncle that played football at the University of Georgia in the early 80s.

Georgia and Clemson was a huge rivalry.

So by default, I was a Georgia guy, right?

I graduated high school and Clemson was the first school that I told no because I'm a UNC tar heel.

However, And I know he's probably listening to this, Dabo Sweeney is one of my most respected human beings on planet Earth.

The man that he is, the character that he has, but more importantly, you know, you talked about Maya Angelou's quote.

How you feel when you are in Dabo's presence, you never forget, right?

Oh, man.

The words that he gives, the character that he has, the spirit that he embodies, you never forget.

And so while I might not be a Clemson University fan, I'm not a tiger.

I freaking love Dabo Sweeney.

So, Dabbo, I want you to know that.

But Damon, man,

tell us about

that first interaction you had with Dabo and how that was a real big catapult for you and the things that you wanted to do in life.

Yeah, so the Dabo story, and

here's what we got to tell, though, before I get to that, it's the fact that I did go to prison.

I did become a coffee bean inside there.

Prison was the hardest thing I've ever been through.

It was the best training ground for me, too.

I tell people all the time, I had a spiritual awakening inside the prison.

I was able to transform myself from that low-life guy that got sentenced to life in prison to being a man of purpose and a man that saw himself as the voice of this coffee bee message that Muhammad gave me.

And it was hard, man.

Prison was hard.

The first two weeks, I'm fighting the white gangs.

After that, it's the black gangs.

But sports.

It's back to sports.

On the wreckyard in prison is where I finally earned the respect to exist inside that world.

And the reason why I went to play sports to do it, I was actually fighting the black gangs at that point.

I show up on the basketball court where no white guys are allowed, right?

But I show up there and play basketball for a week with these guys because I know, Mick, that in America, sports is the great uniter.

You know, you and I were just chopping it up about college football.

Sports is the great uniter.

Sports brings people together like nothing else can.

Not even religion will bring us Americans together like sports because we can self-segregate religions in America and we do.

but sports is the place where we all come together man that's where all the big melting pot is and here's what i was thinking as i went to the wreck yard that week to play some basketball before there was martin luther king jr there was jackie robinson

before you integrated a lunch counter before you integrated lunch counters in the south you integrated locker rooms

I knew sports would be the thing that did it for me.

And I go out there and I earned the respect of all those guys out there.

And then I started transforming myself inside that prison.

And I started serving other men.

I learned about servant leadership.

Servant leaderships, when you help other people reach their goals in life, I start teaching guys how to read and write.

I get guys ready for the GED test.

So if they ever get out, they can be a better husband or a better father one day.

And I watched these guys learn how to serve each other in there.

And that's what's really got parole's attention when they finally let me go in 2015 on parole for the rest of my life.

So when I got out of prison, I found out there were other men waiting to serve me.

Servant leadership, right?

You know, Mick, when I got out, I knew I was sitting on an incredible story and a great message but the problem was there just weren't a lot of places for me to share that story and i found out really quick you can't go knock on the door of a high school and say i just got out of prison i want to talk to your kids right i mean they will chase you down the street

so uh i didn't have a lot of places to go speak in the very beginning and i lived in my parents spare bedroom for the first two years i was out of prison i lived my parents i was grateful to have that spare bedroom but what i did have is a little vanity mirror.

My mom had that spare bedroom when I moved in.

And Mick, I think you either find an excuse or you find a way in life.

And my position I was in right there, I was like, hey, man, I want to go share my story, but I don't have an audience.

But I found that mirror to be my audience.

Every day for two years, I practice this presentation that I do now.

I practice that presentation in front of that mirror.

I got in my reps.

Anything you want to be good at in life, you got to practice that in life.

Because there's no such thing as an overnight success.

It doesn't exist.

It's not real.

You got to get in your reps.

So for two years, I'm doing this presentation from this mirror, getting my timing down, getting good.

I'm getting myself ready for the right opportunity.

And I believe the right opportunity is going to be the world of college football because I played Division I college football.

You know, I played, I was a quarterback at University of North Texas about the same time you were at UNC, actually.

I was there from 94 to 99 playing college football.

We're both playing D1 at the same time.

The problem is, it's been 20 years since I took a snap.

You know, college coaches don't know me.

I don't know any of them.

January 11th, 2017.

I've been out of prison 14 months at this point.

A buddy of mine in Houston, which is 90 miles from Beaumont where I live, he calls me up.

He works for the media.

He said, Hey, Damon, get to Houston right now.

It's the Bear Bryant Coach of the Year Award.

They're going to name the best college football coach in America.

He said, The eight best coaches in the country are in this room right now.

I've got an extra press pass.

I'll sneak you in.

Mick, man, I drove the 90 miles from Baltimont to Houston.

Yeah, man, I got there, brother.

And he sneaks me in the back door of the Toyota Center, hands me a press pass.

And so I'm in the room.

And all these coaches there, USC, Wisconsin, Penn State, PJ Fleck, they're all there.

So I run up to these coaches and I shake their hands and I give them my pitch of why they should bring me in to talk to their team.

And every single coach I met that night, Mick, slammed the door in my face.

They all said no.

In one hour, I got seven no's from eight coaches.

That's a no every eight minutes, man.

I'm standing in the corner to Yoda Center, man.

I'm licking my wounds.

I'm feeling sorry for myself and I am 10 feet from that door to leave.

The voice in my head is screaming at me, go home.

The voice in my head is telling me I don't belong there.

The voice in my head calls me an imposter that night.

I bet everybody listening to this show right now, you know the imposter voice.

We all know it.

But I'm going to tell you something I quit doing a long time ago, Mick, is listening to myself.

And I think you should really consider whether you listen to yourself too.

Because sometimes I found out the the voice in my head was fear talking to me.

And you don't want to listen to fear because fear is a liar.

So instead of listening to myself, I talk to myself.

I do it all the time.

I've been doing this since prison.

That night, I'm telling myself, Damon, you're not going anywhere, man.

That last coach is going to tell you no to your face before you go home.

And Mick, that last coach.

He's the hardest guy to get to the room.

His team just beat Alabama two nights before for the national championship.

Above Sweeney, man.

But I remind myself that night, right there on the spot, I'm telling myself, Damon, you survived a maximum security prison, man.

This is not going to hurt you like prison hurts you.

Sometimes in life,

I think that we need to remind ourselves of the times when we succeeded.

Remember the wins that you have in life.

Remember how good you are and what you did to get to that place you were right there.

That's the message you need to tell yourself, man.

I've done this before.

I'm going to do it again.

And I'm like, I'm not leaving until he tells me no.

So, Mick, I stalk Dabbo around this room.

And I look like a crazy person, man.

I'm hiding behind fake plants.

I'm pushing people out of the way.

Folks are getting nudged by me.

Dabo sees me and security sees me too.

And then it's who's going to get there first, right?

But I get in front of Dabo and I give him my pitch.

And man, Dabo looks a little frightened.

He's like, man, you got a card on you?

I'm like, oh, this is awful, man.

So

I give him my card.

He's nice enough.

He said, man, I'll check you out.

He's gone.

And

that night, man, that looked like a no.

It felt like a no, man.

I got a lot of no's like that that night.

But I felt good about that last no because that no meant that I left it all on the field.

One of the biggest lessons we learned from sports, right?

We learned that you give it all up.

Sometimes you come up short.

Or like Muhammad said, you don't have to win all those fights.

You got to fight the fights.

Make a went home that night.

I slept like a baby.

Forgot about that night.

Four months later, the operations director at Clemson, a guy named Mike Newy, he emails me.

It says,

Coach Swinney met you at award show in Houston.

He would love to have you come talk to the team.

Do you have August 1st open?

And I'm like, brother, I got every first open, man.

What are you talking about?

I'm talking to a mirror, man.

Dabbo didn't know that, though.

So August 1st, 2017, I go speak to the Clemson Tigers thing, the defendant of National Champions College football.

And when I get done with my presentation tonight, Dabbo's in my face.

And man, you know Dabbo, man.

He's high energy.

Yeah.

Damn it, that's the most amazing story I've ever heard.

I've never seen my players respond like that to a speaker.

He said, have you been to Alabama to talk to their football team and i'm like no dabbo i've been to clemson i hadn't been anywhere man he said we're going to see about that he said i just texted nick saban from the back of the room mick when my flight landed in houston from in houston the next day from my trip to clemson i turned my phone on there's a voicemail and a text message from the director of football operations at the university of alabama the whale The biggest broker in America with the best coach to ever do it.

And here's what the voicemail said.

Hey, Damon Dabo called Coach Saban last night.

Coach Sabin can't wait to hear your story.

He said, how does August 21st, 730 p.m.

work for your calendar?

Mick, I laughed out loud.

I didn't have a calendar, man.

I didn't need a calendar at that point.

Just like that, Mick.

Dabo opens the biggest door to college football and Dabo didn't stop there because Kirby Smart calls.

Lick O'Reilly, Chip Kelly, Lane Kiffin, Ryan Day, Mac Brown.

They all pull up my phone.

What are you coming to talk to my team?

So the dream is real.

It's happening, man.

but the biggest event hadn't happened yet i hadn't met that second servant leader so it was august of 2018

one year after that presentation to clemson my phone rings out of the blue that day and on the other end of my phone is a guy named john gordon now mick john gordon is one of the biggest motivational speakers and authors in america this is the energy bus guy yeah and i'm like john brother i know who you are how do you know who i am

he said dabo sweeney said damon i was just talking to clemson's team.

Dabbo brought me in the office for 30 minutes to tell me your whole story.

Now, Mick, I want to wedge in right here this story.

Something I just found out from Dabo this past year.

Dabo asked me last year when we were together, he said, man, he said, Damon,

did you ever hear the story about why John and I started talking to you that day, talking about you that day in 2018 in my office?

I said, man, I never heard the story about how my name came up.

When I spoke to Dabbo's team for the first time in 2017, Mick, I brought Dabbo a little wooden coffee bean keychain.

I didn't have much money, but

I wanted to give Dabbo something as a show of gratitude for him taking a chance on me and bringing me in.

This is before he was going to blow me up.

And I give him this little wooden coffee bean keychain.

He asked what it's for.

I said, when you hear Henry talk tonight, you'll hear what the coffee bean's about.

Well, Dabo loved the coffee bean message.

And like, you know, you talked, you said you talked to your family member, CJ Spiller.

Dabbo still talks about the coffee bean all the time.

It made an impact on him.

That day in 2018, John Gordon is done talking to the team.

He and Dabbo are real good friends.

So they go back to Dabbo's office to catch up.

When Dabbo goes to sit down at his desk, he pulls his keys out of his pocket and he throws his keys in the desk.

And John Gordon looks at his keychain and says, what's that little thing on your keychain?

Dabo said, oh, that's the coffee bean.

He said, have you ever heard the story of the coffee bean, John?

John's like, I don't know what the coffee bean is.

He said, sit down.

Let me tell you Damon West's story.

Yeah.

So John Gordon calls me that day.

He said, Damon, I was just in Dabo's office.

Dabo told me all about your life story.

And he said, Damon, the world needs the coffee bean message.

Let's deliver this message to the world.

He said, will you write a book of me?

We'll call it the coffee bean.

And in the summer of 2019, Mick, 10 years after I first heard that story from Muhammad in a jail cell in Dallas County Jail, that book, The Coffee Bean, came out.

took the world by storm.

The world, Mick, it starts off in America, man.

Four to six weeks at the top of every bestseller list, got a global publisher deal.

Global publishing deals are rare, Mick.

Your book gets reprinted in every language in the world.

You start seeing it popping up in Chinese and Spanish, Arabic, French, Italian, German, Vietnamese, Korean.

And then in 2020, a global pandemic hits.

The entire world becomes a pot of boiling water and the entire world is searching for the right message.

And that's when the world discovered the coffee bean guy.

Mick, my life went horizontal to vertical, man, just like that.

And it hadn't stopped yet.

Since 2021, I've been on the the road 20 to 25 days of every month, sharing this story somewhere.

But, Mick, and this is what I want everybody to understand.

It all goes back to that one night in Houston, Texas, January 11th, 2017, that night that I had seven no's in the first hour.

And I'm 10 feet from that door.

And the voice in my head is telling me to leave.

And Mick, I'm very close to walking the door because what are the odds the biggest coach in the room is going to say yes, right?

He's definitely going to be a no.

But if I listen to the voice of fear and doubt that night, we're not having this conversation today.

And the world doesn't have the coffee meme answer.

So what I'm telling everybody, listen to this, is you don't give up in life when it gets tough.

You don't quit because life gets hard.

You don't not ask your questions in life.

The only question you know the answer to in life for sure is the one you do not ask.

That answer is no every time because you never ask your question.

Mick, I think Wayne Gretzky said it best.

He said, you miss 100% of the shots you do not take.

You got to go take your shots, brother.

I love that, man.

I love that.

You know, I use this analogy all the time when you talk about keep fighting and you never know how close you are, right?

Right.

Right.

Like, you're going to get the most stress the closer you get to that breakthrough, right?

Like, glass breaks when it hits the most stress, right?

That's the only time it breaks.

You can tap it, does whatever.

But when it has the most stress, that's when it breaks.

So think about your breakthrough like that.

Like, you're going to get the most stress.

But I promise you, that one little nudge that you have, that one man let me turn around and go back in those doors right like that one thing is going to be the breakthrough that you need and maybe you didn't get it that moment right it took you four months later but what did you say you were able to sleep like a baby that night because you left it all on the field right and that's what

that you're hitting on something very big right there mic let's let's not gloss over what you just said man I was able to sleep like a baby because I could look myself in the eyes in that mirror and I see the man in the mirror and I felt proud about that person.

My buddy Ed Milet says,

confidence comes from the promises that you keep to yourself.

I'll never forget when he said that to me.

We got to keep the promises we make to ourselves.

And the more we keep the promises we make to ourselves, the more confident of a person we become.

And it starts off with little bitty promises.

But I told myself that night I was going to talk to eight coaches and I did.

I talked to eight coaches and I felt good about it because that was the promise I made when I walked in the door.

I didn't promise myself I'd get a yes.

I didn't know if I'd get a yes or not, but I knew I had to go try.

And you have to go try too, and not you, Mick.

Everybody listen to this.

You got to go try in your life.

You got to go out there and put yourself out there a little bit because, like you said, when you're closest to the breakthrough moment, that's when it gets the hardest, you know?

But

another piece of advice I want to give on this thing, too, is something John Gordon told me.

John Gordon told me this after we wrote the coffee bean.

He said, Damon,

he said, this message is powerful.

And he said, I want want you to understand this.

You keep going out telling your story and telling the message of coffee bean.

You are the coffee bean guy.

He said, don't ever stop telling the story of the coffee.

Don't ever stop.

Don't ever change your message, what he said.

He said, too many times in life, people don't see results fast enough.

And then they change their messaging, you know?

And then they go and they pick another message.

And now you just confuse everybody.

He said, because he said, are you the coffee bean guy?

Are you this guy now?

No one knows what you really are, what you stand for.

He said, what they just didn't realize they were so close to a breakthrough moment.

He said, especially when you don't see any progress at all, keep on your messaging, stay on your message.

He said, if you will do this, one day you will be known as the coffee bean guy, and that will be a pretty big thing to be.

And Mick, it's happening, man.

It took years and years and years and reps and reps and reps.

It didn't happen overnight, but it happened every day and night.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Damon, you know, one of the reasons that

I look up to you, you know, I call you you one of my mentors because one of my other mentors, Robert Irvine, celebrity chef, right?

Like, he's like, Mick,

if you're not impacting lives, what are you really doing?

And so, Damon, I want to applaud you because you're impacting lives, man.

And so the question that I ask all my guests, and I wanted to wait till we got to this moment to ask you, like, You're driven.

You're impacting lives.

You see it on a daily, weekly, monthly basis.

What's your because?

What's that thing that's deeper than your why?

That's like your true purpose, that true driver that's allowing you to do the things that you do.

What's that thing on the inside?

What's your because?

So here's what I think my because is.

I think

because I think everybody deserves redemption.

And I think at some point in life, we all need redemption.

I'm going to tell you where I learned this from.

When I got out of prison, here's the thing.

I think integrity is who you are when no one else is watching you.

It's when you choose to do the right thing, when you can get away with the wrong thing.

And if you live with integrity, then you'll look for ways to serve other people and you'll make the right decisions.

When I got out of prison, the biggest thing on my mind was finding Muhammad.

I needed to find Muhammad because I needed to tell him that I didn't become the egg.

I became the coffee bean because that's what he told me before I left.

I asked him, I said, what am I going to find more of in prison?

He said, you're going to find more eggs because the eggs,

the natural evolution of a human being in difficult situations is to become angry, become an egg.

And he said, you'll probably become an egg too, Wes.

Just understand that.

So I wanted to find Muhammad, tell him, not only did I become the coffee bean, but you saved my life.

If I don't run into you, none of this ever happened.

And I couldn't find him.

Muhammad's not his real name.

It's his Muslim name.

And when people convert to Islam, they get rid of their real name.

Like Cassius Clay becomes Muhammad Ali.

Same thing.

Right.

Right.

So I went to Dallas County Jail in 2016.

They said, Mr.

West, we can't find you from the Muslim name.

We need a real name or a birthday.

We need vital information.

I didn't have that.

And so I'm hoping at some point he finds me.

And so three years ago, I get a letter from an inmate in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

And the letter says, find James Lynn Baker, and you find Muhammad.

Seven years I waited for this clue, Mig.

So I go to Dallas.

We find, I get my lawyer, we find his criminal record, matched everything he told me.

He's in Dallas County Jail in 09 when I was there.

And so I noticed my friend, all we got to do is find my friend's current address, but we never find his current address because James Lynn Baker II, Muhammad, died of an opiate overdose in Dallas, Texas on May 9th, 2017.

Muhammad's been dead eight years now at the point of this recording.

Again, integrity.

I'm sitting there with this information now.

The guy that told me the story is dead.

I can go on with my life.

And like my lawyer said, you could be the coffee bean guy now.

It's all yours, man.

Lawyer's a little funny.

But I said, no, let's go find his family i said i gotta honor my friend and i need to find his family at this point he died of a drug yeah my lawyer's name is george i'm like george man look this guy dies of an opiate overdose man

they need to have the understanding of who this guy was and the impact he had in my life exactly and um and i did i found his family and um he came from a dynamic family his little sister was the first dallas cowboy chewed her ever

yeah von silbaker his mother his mother opened the first licensed black daycare in dallas in 1948 i mean he came from an incredible family

And so

he's got three living sisters, Visha, Von Sil, and Vanessa.

And I called these ladies up and I told them the story about the time I met their brother.

And they're in complete disbelief, Mick.

They're like, the man you're describing is not our brother.

You met him at a time when he was sober in county jail, but we knew him as the guy that would get high.

get into drugs, get arrested, go to prison, come back out of prison, steal from one of us, go back to prison.

When he gets high on drugs again, his whole life was incarceration and drug abuse.

they're like, that's the guy we know that you're talking about.

Sorry, this is not the same guy.

And I'm like, listen,

you need to understand that what he did in my life is a big deal.

And I think

if you'll allow me to tell the story with you, I'll be a part of it, you'll see that you'll change the way you see your brother.

And the history will change the way they see your brother.

Mick, there's a story that this newscaster did in Dallas about me finding the coffee bean guy.

It's a real big deal in Dallas.

And his two sisters in there,

if you get on YouTube and put WFAA and Damon West, that's a news station to WFAA and Damon West, coffee bean guy.

You see two of his sisters in that story.

These women are ramrod straight, man.

They're so proud of their brother.

Now, when they talk about my brother was a coffee bean guy,

he saved Damon West.

And look, Damon West has changed the world with my brother's message.

They are so proud of their brother.

I was able to change the memory of a human being, of a human being in this family's lives.

And what's the value of that, Mick?

I mean, I started a scholarship in his name, the James Lynn Baker II Via Coffee Bean Scholarship.

Every year I put $10,000 in this thing, and every year the sisters picked the winner of the scholarship.

We got kids going to college all over on his name, you know?

But what I found out is that

he didn't just tell me the coffee bean in 2009 so I could be saved because I am a redeemed man.

By every metric, Mick, I'm a redeemed man.

I'm a husband.

I'm a stepfather.

I'm a very successful entrepreneur.

I'm a speaker.

I'm an author, college professor.

I'm a redeemed man.

But I really believe, Mick, that he told me that story in 2009 in Dallas County Jail so that one day I could come back and redeem him

because everybody deserves redemption, Mick.

And if we all had the mindset that we're going to go out and help people become the best version of themselves so they can redeem themselves in their own eyes and in the eyes of the general public, what kind of a world will we have, man?

We'd have a lot of coffee beans, wouldn't we, Mick?

Bro, those chill bumps again man

redemption

wow

wow that is so deep dude that is so deep yeah it's a wild story i told you it's a wild story before we got on here man i'm telling you man i'm telling you so again you've been gracious with your time i mean you're you're on the road as we speak right

what's what's new with damon west let's tease what's coming up what do we have coming up now all right i'm glad you asked so i've got a book coming out and um you could pre-order it right now on Amazon.

And if you would, please pre-order my book.

That's how you become a bestseller.

And here's why I need to become a bestseller on this thing, because I want this story to be a movie.

I think this movie, the lessons, the morals that are in this story are what America needs right now.

And I'm this close to get the Hollywood deal on it.

But Hollywood will not entertain this conversation if Six Dimes and a Nickel does not become a bestseller.

That's the name of the book.

The book is called Six Dimes in a Nickel.

Remember, Prison Slaying, Six Dimes in a Nickel is 65 years.

A life sentence is what a jury gave me.

That's the name of my book.

Real catchy title.

Six Dimes in a Nickel is about all the lessons I live my life by.

And every chapter is a different lesson.

And there's a story behind each chapter, behind each lesson.

I'm a storyteller.

I believe people love stories and they love storytellers.

That's how we learn.

That's how we're entertained.

This book does both.

It's going to teach you.

It's going to entertain you.

It's my entire life story.

It's a memoir, a self-help book, all wrapped into one.

Each chapter is a lesson.

The body of the chapter is the story behind the lesson.

And at the end of the chapter, it's a reflection piece on how you apply the lesson to your life, because I believe that's important.

It's not just me telling you I did it, but here's how you can do it in your life, too.

It's everything that got me where I am right now.

And Mick,

it's going to be a heck of a book.

I need to make that thing a bestseller.

It comes out July 29th, but you can pre-order it right now on Amazon.

So we're going to do that.

And

I'm going to do you one better.

So, you know, in Greenville, in my hometown, I'm doing a leadership summit series, right?

So in June, I've got Robert Irvine, Les Brown, David Pollack, former Bulldog coming in, Katino Lakely, former basketball player, all speaking on leadership.

So it's a leadership summit.

In August, I've got Damon John coming in and some other powerhouse speakers.

In November, I've got Miss Kathy Hughes, the founder of TV1, Urban One, Radio One

coming in.

I'm going to get 200 copies of the book to give out at my event.

So, this is me buying 200 copies because it's that important that we're going to get people out there.

So, you know, when we end the recording, shoot me over the link.

So, and I'll, whoever you got book scanning, whatever, I'll make sure that it gets to what you need.

Man,

I'm going to challenge all my listeners.

I'm going to see if Damon will do this.

If through Mick Unplugged, we can get another 500.

How about I'll get Damon to come to a book signing somewhere in the Carolinas, and we'll have everybody who's ordered a book.

So you're going to have to let me know that you did it.

I'll confirm with Damon.

If we can get 500 through MC Unplugged, I'm going to pay to have Damon come to a book signing and speak as well somewhere in the upstate of South Carolina.

We'll do it, brother.

I'll be there, man.

I'll be there.

And I'll give you a couple of dates that I'm going to be in the upstate of South Carolina, too.

So maybe they'll line up perfectly with what you got already, man.

That's what we're going to do.

So again,

I'm grateful that much.

I believe in you that much.

I stand with you in all the things that you do.

And from the bottom of my soul, brother, I just want you to know, thank you for being that guy.

Thank you for being that guy.

Mick, I love you, brother.

Thank you, man.

That's one of the nicest things anybody's ever done, man.

I appreciate you, brother.

I mean that.

I'm stunned.

I'm speechless.

You got it.

I'll make sure we have links to everything everything in the show notes and description.

On social, we'll start pushing it out as well, too, so we can get these pre-orders done because I know how that works.

I've got a book coming out in September, so we're going to do the same thing back then, too.

So I'll help you with your book launch too, man.

I'll post about it, do everything I can.

And look, Mick, if anybody wants to find me to speak, it's at my website.

I'm not represented by an agent or anything like that.

Damonwest.org, D-A-M-O-N, W-S-T.org.

That's how you find me.

Email me.

You got something you want to talk about.

I'll answer all my emails.

And he does.

And on social, he's a great follow.

He and I chat all the time.

So again, just thank you for all the things that you've done for me personally, brother.

Brother, thank you so much for the day, man.

It's been incredible, man.

Thanks for letting me finally come on the show, man.

This is great.

You got it.

For all the viewers and listeners, remember, you're because is your superpower.

Go unleash it.

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Mick Unplugged.

If today hits you hard, then imagine what's next.

Be sure to subscribe, rate, and share this with someone who needs it.

And most of all, make a plan and take action because the next level is already waiting for you.

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Send us an email to hello at mickunplugged.com.

Until next time, ask yourself how you can step up.