In this conversation, rapper, actor and entrepreneur Bugzy Malone speaks with host Chris Williamson about the difference between making it and maintaining it. They discuss the childhood experiences that shaped him, including growing up around crime, and how he approached healing from trauma.
The guest argues that accountability, vulnerability and facing fear are essential, while the pair debate whether pain is the best teacher and whether greatness can be chased without suffering. They also explore how success can breed toxic motivation, why people often try to discredit those who rise, and what freedom and family mean beyond money.
Listeners will hear Malone's views on mastery, self-reliance and building a psychological kingdom.
In this episode Chris Williamson, Bugzy Malone
The transcript of this episode with Bugzy Malone on making it and maintaining it was made with the technology behind HappyScribe's meeting transcription.
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What's the difference between making it and maintaining it?
I think the difference is we're advertised to, right, a lot as kids. So coming up to me, I've seen a lot of nice clothes, Lamborghinis, lifestyles that appeared to sort of be people that have made it in life. So we're sort of programmed into trying to get there.
I think once you get there, there's a whole maintenance situation that nobody's talking about, and you're not prepared for. And I think that's why so many people sort of shoo up and plateau and fall off, because it's not advertised that it's tough all the way through. You've got to be the best version of yourself all the way through. It's not just make it, kick your feet up, and relax.
I think the total addressable market for people who want advice on how to make it, versus the people who want advice on how to maintain it, is basically a 10,000 to 1,000 to 1, right? Almost everybody is not yet where they want to be financially, in terms of status, in terms of recognition, or admiration, or respect by people that they respect. And because of that, it means that if you're looking at the world of advice, most people are still on the climb as opposed to trying to maintain the altitude that they've got to.
And that means, yeah, that almost all of the pieces of goodwill and sage archetype mythology is about you getting to the top, not about what happens when you get there. I'm kind of fascinated about the difference between someone who never makes it and someone who's fallen off, and the pain and the way that that's interpreted. Huh, that person never actually made it to the top, as opposed to the boxer, or the rapper, or the movie star that did, had it all in their hands, and then let it go.
No wonder which one's more painful.
It's such an interesting concept, man, because you—when we last spoke, you was like, "Where's your head at? How have you been?" And that's something that I'm sort of addressing at the minute. And, um, where is the top, right? And I think what a lot of people do is—maybe in the Bible it says a lover of silver will never be content with silver, something along them lines.
And what I've recently figured out is that, like, I'm content. I've really got everything I ever wanted, and more. And I think if you're not careful, what sort of happens is you're tricked into thinking that you need more. And I think they're the people that get into trouble, you know? They're trying to impress other people. They want validation. They want people to pat them on the back. And I think when you get into a place where you don't need nobody to pat you on the back, you don't need nobody's validation, you actually strip it back to, "Who am I?
What are my experiences of this planet?" And sort of recently I've understood that, like, I come from really humble beginnings, man. You know, I've had to sort of—it's been an interesting process making this album, because I sort of told myself if I can't be more vulnerable and more honest than I've been before, and make something that's of a higher quality than what I've made before, I'm not going to do it. And I was serious about that.
So I had to go through a process of, like, stripping it back. And when I spent some sort of time in my mind at the beginning of my life, it dawned on me that, like, I've got everything I ever wanted, and some, you know, which sort of starts a different direction, you know? And what I—what I see is people that have got, like, a number in their head and material things that they told themselves they'll get.
And now, because they've identified with being somebody that doesn't quit, they have to get there, you understand? And, um, I don't think any of that's real. I think it's an insecurity you must overcome.
I had a Navy SEAL on the podcast, a guy called Andy Stumpf, and he's now a big podcaster. I think he's done 10,000 skydives in his career, unbelievably accomplished. I think he holds some world records for maybe base jumping, or wingsuit gliding, or something like that. So, like, a very extreme human. But does it all with a lot of humor? So you've got like a—he's one of those people who—very lethal, very trained, but does it with a smile on their face, which makes them feel, to me, more disturbing.
The fact that you do it with that sense of, sort of, gallows humor, to me is like, holy shit, like, you're really scary. Anyway, he was telling me this story. He'd created his entire life identity around being a person that doesn't quit, right? "This is who I am. I'm a Navy SEAL. I do not quit. I do not give up. I do not leave my guys behind. I push through selection, training, firefights, anything, everything. I don't quit. That's what I've built my identity around."
But the "don't quit" muscle had also caused him to stay in a very toxic marriage for 15 years. "Well, I'm the guy that doesn't quit." He's like, "Well, sometimes that skill of not quitting, of not giving up, of continuing to push through, of denying your emotions, how you feel, pushing that to one side, can actually be something that is not a performance enhancer, but it's a constraint." And I came up with this line when he was talking to me, which is, "What you are praised for in public, you often pay for in private."
What are the prices of the things that you have built? You've constructed this very unique version of yourself: Navy SEAL, rapper, person who's overcoming challenges of childhood, okay? But what's the cost of doing that as well? And nobody wants to talk about that.
The cost, yeah. So, again, recently I've understood that, like, it sort of cost me anyway everything. Because what you don't understand when you're looking up at, essentially, a new world, you know? If you're coming from real poverty, real dysfunction, and where you propose to get to is a functional place and an affluent place, something's got to give.
And there's parts of yourself that have to die. And there's a whole life that you identified with that's got to die. And death—death is always violent, right? It's never gentle. So when you talk about, sort of, paying the cost, I relate. Yeah, yeah. And I think now that I've, quote unquote, "made it," the dust starts to settle with where you're actually up to.
And I recently had a family member pass away, and it's a heavy one because he would drink a lot, and there were some drugs involved. And when I was young, I would look up to him. He would be the guy that, like, I was trying to be like him. And then life got on top of him. We had a fallout. And you sort of see where it's going, and you're sort of grieving that relationship.
In advance?
Yeah.
Oh, that's so interesting.
Yeah, because, you know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Alcoholism, any of these vices, they're a train crash waiting to happen.
They're a slow burner, right?
Yeah.
Yeah. I think relationships are somewhat similar. Sort of, you have this sense that it's over between you and a partner, that it's not going to work. Sort of, the writing is on the wall, but you're still on the train car, so to speak. And you can slowly see this thing coming toward you, and it's this odd kind of prospective grief, you know? You're thinking about the future grief that you're going to feel in the moment.
It's like you're taking regret from the future and bringing it down into the present, anticipating that it's about to arrive. And I've had people in my life that have taken their own lives. One of my longest friends did only a couple of months ago in Dubai. Yeah. I mean, he was always an extreme individual, but he decided that the way that he was going to end it was to throw himself off the 60th floor of a building. That wasn't a surprise to people.
It wasn't a surprise, as much as everyone loved him. And he had, like, one of the biggest funerals that you can think of. I don't think that that many people were surprised. Saddened, distraught, like, destroyed by this wonderful guy not being here anymore, but you kind of saw it coming as well. And you're like, "Oh fuck, what does that mean?" And then there's the guilt of, like, "Well, if you could see it coming, how couldn't you step in to fix something?"
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I think there's only so much you can do. And I think that's the top and bottom of it, is in the end, you've got to be responsible for yourself, you know? This position that I found myself in comes with a lot of people asking for advice, people relating, people being inspired by. Almost feels like my purpose to acquire this spot.
However, I've got to be the best version of myself. There's only so much externally I can do. So to me, it feels like the journey's always an internal one, you know? And it's sad, and it hurts. However, these are the realities of life, you know? And it's not until you sort of take that on board that you sort of take your own life more seriously, you know? And that's the conclusion I came to.
Can you stop an alcoholic from drinking? I'm just a man. Can you stop somebody that's suicidal from jumping? I'm not God, you know? All I can do is be the best version of myself and hope that that rubs off in a positive way.
Can we talk about your childhood?
If you like.
For the people that don't know what growing up for you was like, what was that like? What were the formative experiences that sort of made you into who you became?
Yeah, just complex, really. I think the more I sort of look back and understand it from an adult perspective, there was just a lot of complexities going on in there that, like, create confusion. And as people were confused anyway, right? You go from being a boy to a teenager, that's confusing. And from a teenager to a man, that's confusing. You start adding in some dysfunctional characters, some crime, some deaths, some murders.
And what I've recently sort of understood is you sort of lose—you lose confidence in your place in society because you don't feel like you fit in, you know? You sort of know things, and you sort of see things that go against the norms, that go against what people think is reality, you know?
What, like?
I mean, if we sort of go to my early days of being interested in being a villain for a living, because that was sort of the example that I'd seen, you know? The coolest individual I'd ever seen was a very well-paid criminal. And you come from tough beginnings, and you're looking for a job description, right?
So in sort of trying to get my education in that world, in that area, you stumble across some colorful characters, man. And you meet a man that's murdered people and not been convicted, and he's at large, and he's just in the community. Prior to him meeting his own sort of violent demise, you start to see that, like, what people think it is, it's not.
There is a world outside of the parameters of what people are calling normal. And it's really there, and it really exists. I always sort of used to, as a kid, I'd watch Harry Potter, right? And that's got an interesting sort of similarity in that, like, you've got what they call the Muggles, the humans, the normal people, and then there's the wizarding world, but they're separate. You've got to go on Platform 9 and, what is it, three quarters, and run through the wall at the right angle to sort of be immersed into the wizarding world.
And that's what the underbelly is like. It's just a whole different ballgame with a different set of rules.
When did you first get exposed to that?
That's what I'm saying. That's why it's complex, because I think my mom sort of seen it coming and was trying to shield me from it, which sort of meant I was under-prepared, if you like, you know? And then it's just happening. It's just turning up. That's like Harry Potter when the letters are coming through the door, and he's like, "Where are them letters?" And they're hiding them from him because they know, like, there's a world that you're sort of inheriting that we're trying to shield you from.
It's just turning up. And it was like that for me, you know? And so you go from sort of very normal to, you know, a man has been murdered in your uncle's house where you're going to stay at the weekends, but you're a kid, so no one's having that conversation with you. You're just sort of getting exposed to it naturally. That's confusing, because then you'll go to your friend's house to play football in his living room with a little soft football, and you start seeing that, like, your world's completely different to mine.
The way you talk about your family is completely different to the way I'm hearing my family spoke about. And in fact, when your mom gets home, she gives you that look as if to say, "Why have you got him here?" So you start, you're not fitting in nowhere, right? And there's two ways of looking at that. You can look at that with the cup half empty or half full. And the more I delve into my faith, the more I sort of understand that, like, special people on the planet get challenged early doors.
It's all a challenge to sort of anchor you in faith and strength, determination. So there's been many a time that I've sort of felt like a victim, like, "Why was I exposed to these things?" And then eventually sort of come to terms with the fact that it was given to me because I can handle it, you know?
It's an interesting quirk of childhood that when you get exposed to things, nobody explains why they're happening. And you're right, it's just like osmosis. You're around this particular type of function or dysfunction, this type of love or this type of abandonment, this type of belonging or this type of isolation. And all of these things just sort of happen. And because you don't have perspective, because you're a kid, you just think, "Well, this is what life is."
Yeah.
This is how a family works, or this is how a mom and a dad talk to each other.
It's an interesting point, brother. You really got to go and get your education on that as an individual in the world, you know? I see so many people that have sort of taken for granted where they started, right? And let's say their father is an alcoholic, and he beats the mom. And that's their understanding of love. And they might be internally fighting that because they sort of know it's wrong, but then they get imposter syndrome because they feel like, "I'm sort of raised by a man that hits a woman and treats kids bad."
And you really just got to get into the world. And that's why in music, my sort of motto was be inspired, is be inspired. You've got to sort of look at greatness and high-performing individuals, responsible individuals, accountable individuals, and just take bits, learn bits, and understand what it is to be a man, I would say. But it's not just men, is it? It's being a good human being.
And then you've got to sort of detach. You've got to detach from the negative examples that you've been shown, that they don't define you.
It's so fascinating when people start to do healing work or reflection or therapy or delve into their own origins. There's so many little pitfalls. It's kind of amazing that anybody ever makes it out of their own childhood challenges by reflecting on them without being completely destroyed, because there's so many ways that you can go, "That thing happened to me, therefore I'm a victim. That thing happened to me, therefore I should be bitter. That thing happened to me, therefore I should repeat it in my life.
That thing happened to me, therefore I shouldn't be able to work as hard, or I shouldn't be able to get as far." There's so many ways that deciding to finally face what happened when you were younger, whether it's big or small, whether it's traumatic with a capital T or with a small t, so many different ways that that could be interpreted in later life as a justification for you railing against the world or not being a good person or being a good person but wrapping your entire identity up about something that happened to you when you were 11 or 12 or 15.
It's kind of amazing that anybody makes it through adult life healed without being taken away by what happened to them when they were a kid.
Yeah, I think it's the pattern of the universe, man. If we were to use an analogy of a boxing coach, I think what God's sort of doing is putting you in the exact situation that is going to create resilience in you for the challenges you're going to have to go through in sort of parenthood or your career or seeking your purpose, basically. I think that's all it comes down to.
I think each individual has a purpose of some description. And if we do use the analogy of a coach, when a boxing trainer puts you in a spa, and this has happened to me, puts you in a spa with a guy that can whoop your ass, you don't understand that until you get the benefits later down the line. He sort of put you in that situation because he knew it was just enough for you to handle, you know?
And the adversity that you have to face on that day is going to be exactly what you need to sort of gain the skills to sort of take you to the next level. I had a situation with a guy. He happened to commit suicide, rest in peace. But he was a good boxer, man. He was a good boxer from where I'm from. A little villain he was, and a little bit older than me. And I'd sort of been in and around the boxing gym for a couple of years.
My coach liked me because I'm a student-type character. And he threw me in with this guy, and I remember thinking he's a bit good for me, isn't he? And he was beating me up pillar to post. And here's an interesting one about belief, because when I was getting beaten up, I just couldn't believe I could lace this guy's boots. And I remember after a couple of rounds, my coach said, "Remember the uppercut we've been working on?
Jab and step back and then uppercut." And I was, "I'm just doing as I'm told," right? So then I get back in, we get into it, I do the jab, I take that step back, I throw the uppercut, and the guy bites his tongue in half. Blood everywhere, spa called off, right? And in that moment, what I sort of took from boxing is that same belief that my coach had in me about my ability and what I was actually capable of, I had to learn to have in myself in order to actually attain success, you know?
And that was probably the heaviest lesson that I learned in boxing, because it was because of that coach, an elderly man called Brian Hughes. I'll say his name as much as I can, just because he had such a profound impact in my life. But the way he was able to see things in me, I couldn't see them in myself. And it took me many years to understand that, like, oh, belief, faith is a journey that you've got to walk by yourself.
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Well played. There's an idea called Solomon's paradox. Solomon's paradox is that we are much better at giving advice to other people than we are at giving it to ourselves. And you have a friend that's going through a difficult relationship, and you tell them precisely the sort of loving, caring, encouraging, reassuring, motivational thing that they need to hear, and it's pithy and beautiful and memorable, and also the exact thing that you need to hear yourself. We're much better at giving advice to other people.
But I wonder if there's an equivalent here with regards to self-belief for a lot of people, that sometimes we are much better at believing in other people than we are believing in ourselves, that we can often see in our friends and the people around us, and maybe even just the people that we respect and admire, a type of resilience and capacity and talent that they can't see in themselves. And maybe your goal in life should be to try and find as many friends as possible who believe in you more than you believe in you.
I'm going to disagree. Yeah, I think it's harder. I think it's a harder path. I think the actual challenge of life is removing all crutches that you're leaning on.
Entire self-reliance?
Yeah, get to that place, and then you've got something to offer to friends, as opposed to being reliant on friends' opinions of you. Because as human beings, we've all got a persona, right? So that means sometimes that people say they believe, but deep down, when they go home and take the mask off, they're like, "He can't really do that." And that will have an effect that's there in the vibration of that person.
Do you think that part of that worldview comes from growing up in an environment where you couldn't rely on anybody, this level of extreme self-sufficiency?
Interesting, man, because I think the closer you can get to the dark side of life, the more realism you're exposed to.
How so?
You see it for what it really is. You see human nature for what it really is. A lot of people are acting, man. You know the Scarface scene where he says, "Say goodnight to the bad guy." Never going to see a bad guy like this again. And he starts to sort of address the people in the room, and what he's saying is, "You've not got the guts to be who you want to be." And the more I reflect on that sort of scene, and the more I take acting serious and dialogue, what he's basically saying there is that, like, all of you are savages, man.
It's human nature. But you've learned to hide yourself. You've learned to fit into society. Whether it was a time on the planet when, like, all the laws and rules and regulations weren't in place. And that's when you've seen what man is really like. If you look at a lot of the wars where people are from one side of the world, and they go to another side of the world, they attack everybody there. They steal everything from that land.
You know, this is what human nature really sort of looks like. So I guess to answer your question, what I'm saying is sometimes violence, dysfunction, sort of chaos is a people being themselves, a people living the most honest version of their existence. You know, not everybody is a good person. Not everybody's learned restraint.
So that doesn't mean that the darkness doesn't exist, you know? It's sort of a part of the polarity of life, the bigger picture of what's going on.
Isn't it interesting that as a civilized society, a big part of the game is people being noble, calm, socially aware humans?
Sophisticated savages?
Yeah.
That's what.
And keeping themselves, keeping their truth hidden. We would sooner somebody lie and be domesticated than be honest and dangerous. That's kind of how society's held together. Hey, you behave yourself. You have to. There is a type of decorum and behavior that's mostly acceptable here. But yeah, maybe that's part of the reason that mafia boss stories and true crime killers and heroes are both on the good side and the bad side. What's so alluring about them is that it appears to be someone who is being themselves, unashamedly being themselves, for better and for worse.
We're taught that as kids, right? If you're three years old and a kid gets on your nerves and you slap him in his face, you get told off by an adult. Don't do that. That's outside of the norm. That's outside of what's accepted. And you quite quickly put into line. I think what's interesting, to go back to your question before about my sort of childhood or my job description now, is that, like, I've experienced lots of freedom, man.
I've been outside of the curriculum system at a point when everybody else was taking exams. I've been outside of work at the early phases of people getting the first job and doing the first couple of years. And it creates a freedom in your mind that can be drawn out of a person when you're told about all these rules and regulations. Now, if with discipline, you learn sort of self-restraint and you become a good person off your own back, you develop your own morals and principles.
What you've got that other people don't have is a sort of a freedom of thought. They've been within the curriculum system and within fitting into society in order to get a job and, you know, they've restrained themselves. I find that tough about the industry. You know, I really I'm really sort of from a place where the liars are lying from their asses. These are some of the most talented liars on the planet, some of the most charismatic and sort of fluid thieves on the planet.
So when you turn up to me from a record label, you know, and you went to school and you behaved yourself, you might have done some drugs when you were younger or whatever, but you've been a good person and you went to university and you've climbed the ladder and you found yourself in this job description that means you want to sort of exploit someone for their artistic creations and strike a deal with them. Your lies stand out to me as, like, robotic, uncharismatic.
You know, you want to meet a scouser and see the way that they can steal or sell something.
Unsophisticated deception?
Yeah, you know, you get to these sort of corporate lies. And I struggle with it because I can sort of see it coming a mile off. And for them, they've compartmentalized it because it's their job and what their thinking is. Yeah, but outside of my job, I'm actually a really nice person. Like, when I go home with my family and friends, I'm honest, I'm cool. But what you've done is you've accepted a job description that means that you're putting a smile on trying to take more off the table than you're putting on.
And for me, that doesn't sit well, you know? And I think that's why being independent, staying independent, and sort of climbing the ladder has been my path.
What does ignore discreditation mean?
Yes, it is like, in that particular instance, I'm talking about the fact that when you get into the underbelly, like, there's certain things you have to get under your belt to be deemed as credible. You know, you're a, again, if we use the Harry Potter analogy, you're a credible wizard.
When you then transition over to being completely legitimate and having morals and principles, then people that have sort of stayed in the darkness will sort of try and discredit your the realism of your story or who you say you are or what it is that you say that you've lived through. You're no longer a part of this. I just don't believe in it, you know?
And I think, by the way, I think that can happen to anybody. I'm sure that you get into where you've got to in life has came with many a person trying to just discredit you for what you are, who you are, what you've become through all the challenges that you've endured, you know, and just try and take away from all of that as if what's happening here is luck. So it's not I was using it in its particular, but it's not particular. I think it's just the mindset of the sort of victimhood person towards a person that no longer identifies with being a victim.
I think they'll discredit you. And I think the psychology behind that is, how have they done it? Why has it happened for him? Why has Chris's podcast blown up? Right? And because they can't justify that in their head, they'll just discredit everything you've ever done.
Well, it closes the gap. You know, anyone that makes progress throws into sharp contrast the lack of progress by the people around them.
For sure.
And that's uncomfortable.
Yeah.
There's a bunch of sort of male subcultures on the internet that don't like the word "ascending." So if you're struggling to get a goal and somebody in this community manages to not even get a relationship or get a kiss or whatever, even if the barista at Starbucks, her eyes linger a little bit longer on them than they think they should do, maybe she might be a little bit interested. That's seen as kind of being persona non grata inside of the community.
And the reason is that if you ascend, if you become a person who's a fake cell as opposed to an incel, so incel, involuntary celibate, fake cell, you weren't one of us anyway, what it means is if this person is able to be very close to me in terms of construction and worries and concerns and maybe disfigurement or height or charisma or setbacks or financial status or whatever it might be, but is able to get to a place that at one point in the past I wanted to but have since given up on, that now still leaves the doorway open for hope and for aspiration.
And that means that if I'm not getting there, that might be on my shoulders. And I think that that microcosm is what happens broadly when anyone that comes from an area where lots of people would love to get out of it to ascend in one form or another. Maybe it's a dysfunctional northern town in the UK. Maybe it's a sports team that lots of people had the opportunity to get started in. But if one person that you used to play football with goes on to become a pro, oh, well, you know, his parents had more money than mine, or he, you know, the coach liked him more than they did me, or he was a suck-up.
He was always being a suck-up. Whatever. The ability to try and discredit the legitimacy of someone's progress reduces the distance between the person who didn't make it and the person that did by saying that it was unfair or they cheated, they sold out, they aren't that talented, whatever, they got lucky. And as opposed to going, fuck, what should I learn? How can I try and deconstruct the path that was taken there? And yeah, for sure, like, lots of people managed to make it through fortune and serendipity and unfairness or, like, nepotism or favors.
All of that stuff happens, but I think far less than people actually think.
Yeah. I think my career has allowed me to sort of heal publicly and talk about some of the things that I've been sort of learning on my journey, sort of share it with people. And so I try and take things down to the essence. And I think the word there is accountability, ruthless accountability. And I think when a person struggles to be accountable, that's what it looks like, you know? And so I'm almost tricking the audience in that a guy listening to me might be 13 years old and he's not really that interested in healing.
He actually doesn't know how broken he's going to be later on down the line when trauma sort of sets in and takes a hold. But just the sort of phrase "to be inspired," if you sort of take that on and take it seriously, it will change your outlook on the guy that became a professional footballer. And you'll admit to yourself, you know what? When he was trying, I wasn't. When he was doing the runs, when he was doing the extra stretching, when he was watching and studying the game, I wasn't even interested.
I was chilling. And that's why he's a professional footballer and I'm on the streets chilling with my mates. At least then you get the opportunity to pick someone else and go again, you know? And that's what accountability will do. It will tell you the truth, you know? And that's what I'm interested in. And that's why rap music as a job description is tough, because for you to tell the truth about your life experience pisses a lot of people off, man.
Why?
Because you sort of can't help but tell parts of their story that they don't want light shining on, you know? And you can be as respectful as you want. Try to be as respectful as you want. Or you can be as brash as you want, but you will end up telling other people's stories. I think Martin Scorsese talks about that in the films that he makes. And a lot of his inspiration comes from early, might be New York sort of mob culture.
And he said a lot of people was upset with him because naturally his inspiration was the things he really seen, right? But what to us is Robert De Niro having an argument in the street. In his world, it's some real person somewhere that's like, Martin, I know you. I'll be telling my story to the world, you know? And I'm sure it's the same for a guy richer, a Tarantino. These artists and storytellers, you're the best stories are true, you know?
I'm real and honest.
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Fuck you.
You flinched. You used the word "vulnerability" earlier on. What's your relationship like with vulnerability? A heavy one. Because it's something that you're always vulnerability is like a guy that's stood there with his fists up ready to throw punches at you. And you just, you're nervous. You don't want to go anywhere near this guy. He looks big and strong.
You can tell it's going to hurt. And it's your job to get closer and closer and eventually go and have the fight, go and face it head-on, you know? And it's just something that has bravery sort of sets in. Courage. In my instance, hopelessness. You sort of hit rock bottom. You sort of realize that you're not as cool as you thought you were.
And you ain't got nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. You're too tired to run from him. So you just get into the fight. You just stand in the face of the truth. And in order to do that, you have to be vulnerable. You have to be open to embarrassment. And yeah, so that's been my experience. And I think with making this album, I've really had to go there, man.
And I think in going there, you see yourself in a way that might not be as glamorous as you'd like for it to be.
What did you learn?
That I'm just a human being, man. I think I thought, I think to be successful, early doors, you think a lot of yourself because you're just trying to get your head around, like, how did that happen? You know? You know? And you think more of yourself than you actually are. And then there comes a point where you see yourself for what you actually are.
And you're like, oh, you know? So yeah, I guess I learned that the work paid off, the consistency paid off, the standing back up after getting knocked down paid off. But I'm nobody special. Do you know what I mean? Like, I'm not above people because my results have come in sooner than theirs, you know?
Was there a moment of formative experience that was the beginning of that honesty, truthfulness, self-reflection, vulnerability, like inflection point? Was there something that sort of spurred that on, or did it accumulate over time?
Just the solitude of walking the path. While I was making the album, we was using the analogy of the tunnel. And what I was basically saying in the studio is that, like, success, the place that you see yourself getting to, there's like a tunnel between you and that place. And you're in your starting point, dysfunction, whatever it is for you as an individual.
And then there's this tunnel. You think, yeah, I'm brave enough to take that. You'll run into this tunnel. Everybody else stays behind because they think it's dark. I'm not going in there. There's a point halfway through the tunnel where you're being ridiculed, by the way, by the people that didn't go in. They weren't brave enough to go into the tunnel, but they're shouting and calling you names. They're trying to scare you out of it. And there's a point where you sort of look back and you can no longer see the light at the end of the tunnel that way. But now you can't see the light at the end of the tunnel that way.
And then you step on the bones and the remains of the people that failed before you in the tunnel. You start to realize you're in sort of dark territory and it might not happen. And at that point, what do you do? Do you freeze and try and go backwards? Or do you keep a steady nerve and keep marching forwards, which is all that you can do, you know? Until eventually you can see light at the end of the tunnel and eventually you get to your destination.
And that tunnel is the reason, that is the difference between individuals like yourself that get it over the line and individuals that stay at the beginning of the tunnel shouting in and ridiculing you, hoping that you fall, hoping that you're not brave enough to keep walking forward. Now, I use that analogy to sort of talk about the isolation and the solitude that happens in the tunnel because you lose a world that you're familiar with. You lose a type of an individual that you're familiar with, you understand, you relate to.
And there's a long period between going from where you were to where it is that you're going to go, that you'll be isolated and in solitude. And I think that, for me, was the sort of pivotal point where I was like, oh, I have to have this fight. I have to face all of my insecurities and all of my fears head-on, you know? And I think that unlocks a version of you that people can no longer pull down, you know?
There's a line from Bedross Cullyan. He says, "Your haters are out there holding their breath, waiting for you to fail. Make sure they suffocate."
Ah, there you go. They have no choice other than to suffocate. Because, yeah. And when I talk about the brutal honesty, at the bottom, at the bottom, I've met some of the most honest people I've ever met. And then you get into the corporate world and you meet a guy in a suit and you think, this is it. I'm around some affluent people now, like.
High integrity.
High integrity. And it's just not the way it is.
Just villains with slightly nicer suits.
Yeah, man. They've learned to hide themselves, man.
Yeah.
You know?
Yeah, it's interesting. It's really interesting. I know exactly what you mean. There's something more kind of noble about the, yeah, I'm the bad guy. I'm dressed in black. I've got a balaclava in my pocket, as opposed to the dude that's got a Patek Philippe on and is smiling at you as he tries to get you to sign this particular contract.
There you go. There you go. And that being said, it means I am educated. And the reason that I talk like that is because you sort of come from the bottom and you don't feel like you belong when you're in a room full of people that went to university. Wow, what's that like, right? But it's like, actually, my education's the real one. Because we're all in the same world, right? And then you start understanding that actually on my head, my intuition's much stronger than yours.
My sense of reality is much stronger than yours, you know? And that being said, that's what I'm trying to do through music. I'm sure I'll go over into acting and sort of give an account of myself. But through music, I try and give an account of myself that makes people understand their own strength, their own power, you know? That just because somebody may have started in a position where it was better than the position you started in, it doesn't mean anything, man.
You've been given the challenges that you need to take you to. That's quite profound, actually. Last time I was on your show, I was talking about, like, the law of attraction. My opinion on that has changed slightly.
Okay, tell me about the law of attraction.
The more that my faith strengthens, the more I have an understanding of God, the more I sort of feel as if we're sort of co-creators in that you will see the way that your life's going to go. I'm going to do a podcast. I'm going to do these shows. I'm going to live in this kind of a house. I think you're then given the challenges in order to make you that kind of a person, a person that can not only attain them things, but maintain them things.
That's what the solitude's for. That's what the hardship's for. That's what the stress is for. It's building a strength and a resilience that means that not only will you get that house that you want to live in, you'll be able to maintain it. Light work, you know? So yeah, that's, yeah.
What's your insight around dark forces as you are able to make a more positive change in the world? Dark influence, realizing that the impact is so positive that they need to put increasingly difficult challenges in your way? We talked about this last time, but I find it really interesting. Are you thinking this is devil, bad energy, karmic retribution? How do you see this happening?
Yeah, I think you've got to, within the album, I play with biblical framework, right? Just because if you look at some of these cathedrals, men were building them sometimes for 300 years. And as you know, a man will live for 80 years. He has to pass on the assignment. So there's something in religion to be taken seriously. However, I sort of look at, let's say, if we look at a different culture and a different religion, and you look at a guy and you look at the grandparent of this guy's grandmother, and she's a really nice person.
She's helped bring the kids up. Just because she's of a different religion to another person, I'm not sure that means that she's not in contact with God. So I sort of take a step back from being sort of particular in my thinking towards religion and the devil, and I'm really down here living it, which sort of goes back to what you were saying before about when you're living it, it's hard to apply everything because it's all going on, you know?
So I think you can get as deep into a sort of biblical framework or sort of spiritual thinking as you want, but we're here in the physical living it. And you've got to sort of, you've got to sort of wrap your mind around it. And I think from this conversation, you can see that analogies and stuff has been the way I've learned.
Do you think pain is the best teacher? Or is it the loudest teacher?
Well, I mean, if you disrespect a man on a cold night and he punches you in your face, you'll quite quickly learn that you've done something wrong in that situation. You'll be in that situation again in front of a guy that looks big and strong, and you will think the next time you address that person, how am I going to conduct myself when I say something here? Because I wouldn't like to get a tooth punched out on a cold night.
So I just think it's the, I think it's shocking. I think as a human being, to have a nervous system, it's hard not to be influenced by pain. And I think these are the ways that God teaches you. I think pain's a big part of that. So I think it's one of the, one of the most sort of impactful teachers.
How do you handle fear? What's your relationship like with fear?
Like everybody else. Like everybody else, man. Sometimes fear wins. But what I've realized about fear winning is you sort of run and hide, right? And a pivotal point in my life where I could give you an example of my relationship to fear is, and I may have touched on it with you, but I get stabbed off a guy, you know?
I'm 11 years old. I go onto an estate to see some friends ask me to come out, and some guys sort of starting a problem with me. And he ends up stabbing me. And what happened in, I've touched on this before, but I've not gone into this particular point. And what sort of happened is I went home, I hid in the trousers from my mom. I got stabbed in my leg.
What bite? What was it?
It was a screwdriver.
Okay.
And he opened me up, you know? So there was a lot of blood and holes in these pants. And after that, I was afraid. The six-week holidays came up where everybody goes out to play with their mates, and I wanted to stay in, right? And there was just sort of a three-year period where that situation was in the back of my mind. The fear of that situation, the pain that I felt, the embarrassment in front of these people that invited me out.
Some of them was girls. They picked my bike up. They smashed my bike. I was running from all of them feelings to a point where I went into a sort of a really dark place where I was experiencing suicidal thoughts. I made a couple of attempts, but was too young and too cowardly to really sort of get that over the line. And at that point is when I realized I had to face it. And I went on to have that guy a fair fight on his estate.
And I won that fight. And that was, that for me was, gave me an understanding of fear. And what it made me realize is you can hide for as long as you want, but at some point you've got to come out of the house. At some point you've got to face whatever it is that you find scary and again, have that fight. So that's my relationship to fear. Sometimes it still wins, right? Sometimes I'm just not ready to have that particular fight.
But then a lot of the times now, I just go and get it done. Within reason as well, there's some fights that the time's not now. Some fights can wait. And then some fights are imminent and you just go and get it done.
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Yeah.
What does that mean to you?
Yeah, I think. So you've just been doing a tour, right? You'll have made progress on some of them nights. It's the same as a seed being planted, and you don't see the first bit of the seed growing because we're outside of the soil looking at the ground. But it doesn't mean that it's not progressing. The seed has started to sprout. It's started to grow, you know? Eventually, it'll be a big beautiful tree or whatever it's going to become.
But you must believe in the fact that progress was being made under the ground. And there's some of the toughest nights because you might be trying to become somebody in your life and, like, nothing's happening. It's like me now, for an example, I've made Make It Maintain It. I call it part one because eventually I'll make a part two. But by the time I make part two, I'm not interested in being a rapper no more. I'm not trying to sell albums. Even with this album, I've not promoted it much.
Yeah, this is for the people listening. This is the day before the album drops. There's been one pre-release song, one, two?
A couple.
Yeah. Doing this podcast today, I know why you're here in London. You're busy doing a big project that isn't the album, which comes out tomorrow.
Yeah, yeah.
And you're spending a few hours today, and then we're doing dinner later on. I mean, it's something that's obviously very meaningful to you, and yet you're getting on with life outside of it too. It's already transcending.
Yeah, yeah. And I'm interested in diversifying. So the project there that you're talking about, they actually announced that the other day.
Did they?
So we can touch on it, which is.
Tell me.
Yeah, it's the Gentleman Series 3 with Guy Ritchie, which is just an exciting prospect for me, being that Guy Ritchie films prior to me being in the media were films that really sort of grabbed my attention. His style of directing really grabbed my attention. I look at rap music as a young man's sport. Not to say that I'm not a young man now, but rap music is sort of about the come up and the transcendence of dysfunction.
Anything after that, you can hang about too long. And I'm sort of looking at my skill set, and I'm like, I've got transferable skills that will apply to different worlds. Acting, to me, looks like a world I'm interested in going over into.
You will be the only actor from the Gentleman movie in the Gentleman series. Is that right?
Ha, yeah. Yeah.
That's crazy.
Yeah. All right, what a privilege.
I mean, fuck me. Like, Guy Ritchie is the most on-fire man in the world at the moment. Like, just out of this world, good. And the most recent Gentleman series is like, I'm seeing guys dressing like Theo James. Like, people deciding, oh, this is going to be my expression of myself. It's an entire new subculture, I think, and it's crossed across into America as well.
Yeah. I'd sort of, I've never said this to Guy, but I'd sort of said it. Guy Ritchie's time is coming. I don't even think we've seen his best work.
Which is crackers to say, given that when was, like, Lock, Stock, and those movies 25 years old? At least 20 years old, right?
Yeah. I mean, look, I'm speaking out of school because, again, they're not conversations that I've had with Guy, but in my early sort of career in music, there's a freedom in your first releases. You're not really a part of the industry. You know, rigidity is not set in that, like, loads of responsibility comes with it. Fame might come with it. There's just things that happen that can impact the type of work that you make.
And in my experience, you end up catering to the audience at some points. That never works. You know, you end up thinking you're smarter than you actually are at some points. That never works. And you end up making some work that's not a true representation. It's still solid work, but it's not a true sort of representation of the artist that you actually are. So in my short experience of being in and amongst sort of Guy Ritchie's atmosphere, I think he gets better.
Yeah, I don't think he's peaked yet.
There's a line that I had to write down from season two of The Gentleman. I think it's Theo's character when he's ill, when he's banged up.
Right.
When he's sick and he's been in that fight. And he says, it's not until you leave yourself behind that you can experience who you truly are. And I thought that was so lovely. And I wonder whether there's something similar with what you're talking about here that you start off, I have something to say, and it's true, but it's unrefined. It's like rough, right? So I have a lot of raw material to work with, but I don't maybe have the experience that allows it to fully flourish. And then after a little bit of time, you gain some experience, but you gain some pressure and some awareness and some notoriety and some expectations.
And people want you to do these things, and you've got, well, great first project. Like, let's see if you can run it back again and again and again. And then maybe you go off track a little bit with that, and then, oh, okay, well, I tried to chase success by giving people what I thought that they wanted. That's not fulfilled me in the way that the original one did. But now I've got the experience to be able to make something more grand, more beautiful, truer to what it is. But I've got all of these other things pulling me in different directions too. So I'm seduced. There's sort of this eroticism of attention that comes from the people around me and the world and the recognition.
Okay, so I need to rid myself of that. I need to keep the experience. I need to stay tapped into the thing that I had in the very beginning. And then finally, if you can weave through this maze with seductresses and temptresses and sirens all over the place, finally you get to come out the other side and you go, wow, I have all the experience. I'm still emotionally, existentially connected to sort of what that route is. And now I've rid myself. All the barnacles have been culled off the bottom of the ship so that I can actually finally get there.
And I think that's hopefully what mastery looks like. You know, this sort of ever-increasing refinement of getting better and better and better at your art.
The journey of greatness, man. That was a far more articulate way of saying what I was just saying about Guy Ritchie. You know, you witness somebody's journey. There's lots of greatness on the way. But then eventually the work sort of complete. And yeah, that's what you're left with, a master of their craft. And I just don't think there's many of them in this day and age, man. You know, if you go back as early as, like, Da Vinci in the, I've got a track called Da Vinci on the album.
And in the beginning, I say, in the Mona Lisa, there's hundreds of layers of paint called it's Da Vinci because there's hundreds of layers of paint. And when I was, I was sort of trying to study guys like Da Vinci. This is where I'm probably quite unusual.
You texted me at the start of this year, I did an episode with a guy who broke down the life of Da Vinci, how to think like Da Vinci. And I was going back through our messages earlier on today, and you'd sent me a text about that particular episode.
Big in Europe. It's a big episode. And so now we're getting to probably a version of me that I've not probably even spoke about much. And there was a point when I'm 16, I'm sat in jail in solitary confinement, and I have this dream that there's like an earthquake or something, and all the world's coming to an end, and everybody's escaping, but I'm stuck in this room. I'm locked in this room, and nobody's going to come and let me out. And the whole world's falling down outside.
And in that moment, as a 16-year-old guy, people that you came up in school with or whatever are sort of getting their GCSEs. And I remember being like, not so much envious, but aware of the fact that, like, my household was falling to bits. There's no way I could have focused and got my education. Now, to go back to the victimhood narrative and the accountability that we spoke about before, my approach to that was, I'm going to go and self-educate so I can only really educate on things I'm interested in.
So I try and, yeah, I try and find, I mean, I can educate myself in areas. Again, I was talking about ADHD not long ago, talking about, I've got ADHD or ADD and whatever. And the more that I take accountability and strengthen up, the more I sort of realize, like, you know what? I can learn the things I'm not interested in. It just takes more of my energy. I'm bored. I'm yawning, but I get through it. I will build the stamina to get through it. And that's where I've sort of got to now, right? However, Renaissance art and things like that are things that I'm just naturally interested in.
So you were telling me, did you say that you got into learning about, is it crests? Like how the coat of arms is constructed because you needed it for your house? Am I making this up?
No, no, no.
What's it called? What's the name for it?
Yeah, coat of arms, basically. What would happen is in the early days, and I guess that's attached to my interest in history, right? Because when I'm sort of looking around at the system that's in place, I'm like, let me strip this back and let me go to the beginning prior to the system and the types of people that put systems like this in place so I can have an understanding of what I'm looking at when I'm walking through this corporate world, what I need to take serious and what's not that interesting. And when you get back to the sort of early days, the primeval days, what would happen is lots of wars would be kicking off in them days.
And you would have, if you was sort of associated with royalty, family of the king or, you know, attached to royalty, you would have a coat of arms that would have sort of a representation of how that king came up. And that, I don't know, it just fascinated me and the fact that some of these kings were just men that was able to take power by force. And then you got to think, who is that individual?
Well, that's the essence of what a king is. Because when you get to guys like Henry VIII, when he was like educated and flipping bit spoiled and chopping his wife's head off when they'd annoy him, really, he doesn't represent what an actual king is. A king is a man that's took power by force. He's made it, and he's maintained it. And that's the essence of what I'm kind of talking about. I'm talking about the fact that any man can be a king. And this doesn't mean that you're going to rule the land.
You're going to be the king of the place that you live, but you'll be the king of your own kingdom. And that's just what I got interested in anyway. So that's the nature of me getting interested in the coat of arms. What would happen is be a big battle. And you might have had your ass whooped all your guys are dead, and then you bump into 10 guys from the other side on horses or whatever, and they would see you ordinarily what they might do is just chop your head off. So what to do? Torture, whatever they felt like doing, because there's no laws going on at that point.
But if you've got this particular coat of arms on, it's in their best interest to take you back to their king. And they would then, their king would decide what to do. And ordinarily, you might negotiate with your king and sell you back to that king for a ransom. Anyway, so then they'd make a crest of that coat of arms. I made a fragrance called the House of Vision, and it was a part of designing that fragrance. So I guess I'm lucky in that I've got job descriptions that allow me to educate myself in places.
You know, I'm not just generic. If you put me back in a room with the kids that were A-class students that got A's in their exams while I was sat in jail, I bet now I'm more sophisticated than them in many areas because that was a generic version of history. I've gone off and got into the nuances, the little details of how things really work and how it's applicable to sort of times now. So yeah. And your episode on Da Vinci, again, a version of me that people probably don't understand is I go away and I educate myself more and I read lots and I go and open my mind because of where I've come from, I think there's going to be people in the underbelly that are coming from real dysfunction that have no one to grab onto and look at.
I think the more my career grows, the more they'll sort of grab onto me. And by the time I get there, I need to be educated enough to be able to stand on what it is I'm actually saying, let alone having the type of wife that I'm interested in having, let alone bringing up the types of kids that I'm interested in bringing up. You know, so education in that respect is key, I think.
There's always another level. There's always another level to keep on educating yourself to, to develop yourself toward. And in some ways, that can make people feel a bit despondent because I'm never done. I'm never finished. But also, if you enjoy what it is that you're learning, if you enjoy the process of growth and improving yourself and impacting the people around you, the people that you haven't even found yet, the wife that you don't have, the kids that don't exist, the dog that you haven't raised, the house that you haven't bought, it's an opportunity.
Yeah. And I think that is where maintain it comes into the equation. I think that the anatomy, the way that the body works, how to keep the body strong and functional, the mind, how to keep the mind elasticated and open to learning more. I think these are all things that are necessary. I don't think there's any two ways about it.
You're either going to be the type of an old person that's got a walking stick and you're frail, or you're going to be one of these that we're seeing a lot of in the modern day and age, where you're still looking young and feeling fresh and, you know, living your best life. That's what I'm interested in. That's the kind of wealth I'm interested in. I'm content. I've got everything I ever wanted. If I'm smart, there'll be people far richer than me. But if I'm smart, I'll never work again.
At that, I'm uninterested, man. What I'm interested in now is enjoying my life, doing the things I enjoy doing, building the family I'd like to build, looking after my children, giving them every opportunity to live a solid life, you know? And that's what maintenance is, you know? It's the, you take the kingdom by force, and then you maintain the kingdom with discipline and consistency, you know?
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The fit and the quality of the fabrics are phenomenal. And the sale doesn't last for long. So if you want to save up to 60% off the best gym wear on the planet, go to the link in the description below or head to gym.sh/modernwisdom and use the code MODERNWISDOM10 at checkout. That's gym.sh/modernwisdom and MODERNWISDOM10 at checkout. Do you think if you stayed in primarily focusing on rap, that that would limit you, limit your growth, limit your life?
I've probably been in the rap game longer than you should. And I've been able to do that because my storytelling ability is, that's a gift that I've been given. That's one of the gifts that I've got. And I remember being young and being in lots of trouble. I was at an old friend's house with who's on the computer, the PlayStation. And his mum rushes up the stairs, all flustered and worried.
And she's like, just tell the police on the phone. And she's like, you've got an Osmond warning. Now, I could be wrong about that word, but I think it's an Osmond warning. And that's when there's intelligence that somebody wants to take your life.
About you?
About him.
Right.
I had nowhere to live, so I was staying on his sofa. And it didn't fluster us. It was the lifestyle we was living at the time. We thought we was going to be career criminals. And this was our sort of practice stages. This was the same as being a young boxer in the gym, sparring.
How old were you?
14, 15. And at that time of my life, so much chaos was happening on a day-to-day basis that I was sort of, that's one of the few times that I've questioned God and been like, why am I having to go through all of this? And it's not until my career sort of formulates and takes shape that I understand that like, oh, I'm able to be a storyteller in the rap business that's actually got lots to talk about, you know?
And I'm just coming to a stage now where I think the rap game, it goes in stages of you're from a dysfunctional background. You talk about that. Here's who I am. Here's where I'm from. Here's what it's been like. We relate to that guy. He gets another album out of that if he's clever. Then he's got some money. And then he starts talking about the money, the cars, the girls, and what he spent his money on. What I'm talking about in this album is the point that's under-documented in rap, which is what happens after you've spoke about where you've come from, an audience that's connected with you.
You've earned some dough. You've spent some money on some fancy things. What next? That's maintain it. That's maintenance. We've got that in America. We've got Jay-Z. We've got 50 Cent. We've got... But if you look at guys like P. Diddy, if you look at the way, you know, 50 Cent conducts himself, there's still some heavy dysfunction going on in the mix of that. And don't get me wrong, America's a big brash place. So the British rap game is a different game.
However.
And the US is probably another good example.
Good example. Lots of dysfunction there, right? But we're British. So we conduct ourselves different. So I'm one of the first British rappers, one of the pioneers in that. Here's what it looks like after that phase. And I understand the responsibility of that position. And that's why I take diversifying seriously. And a lot of other rappers will be shocked and will find themselves having to follow the blueprint. And I just don't say that in an egotistical way.
I mean it with all due respect. I'm just on my journey. I'm not even interested in being better than anybody else at this point. I'm really just competing with myself. However, rapping is a young man's game, you know? And there comes a point where you must diversify. A lot of boxers don't diversify. A lot of footballers don't diversify. And it all goes wrong. We see them. They've put weight on. They've spent a lot of the money on the addictions they've picked up. And they're sad. So therefore, you have to take that transition serious, you know?
You must diversify. And in diversifying, you get yourself a more adult job description. That's why I'm interested in being an actor and take into consideration the fact that as a manager, your job to look after a wife and children, you know? And I think I just see people that don't take that aspect of participating in a young man's sport serious.
They don't take the next phase of their life serious.
That's interesting. I've been thinking a good bit about something like mastery with an open heart. What drives most people, especially in the beginning, to work hard, to be diligent, to be disciplined is maybe a chip on their shoulder. It's wanting to prove people wrong. It's wanting recognition and validation, admiration, respect from people that they respect. It's wanting to get money and freedom and independence to be able to navigate their own sovereignty, to not need permission from anybody.
It's a lot of fuel in the beginning. And I'm interested how many people are able to continue chasing mastery without relying on the toxic field that was there in the beginning. What happens when you've spent that fuel tank? Because you can keep using it, but over a long enough time period, it is toxic.
Well, because then you've got to go and produce more of the fuel.
100%. I know of a couple of guys recently who have basically manufactured enemies. They've this situation, a bunch of situations actually, did not need the level of friction, cantankerousness, divergence, disagreement. It didn't need that. These enemies have been confected, concocted, confabulated out of nowhere purely so that this person has something to push up against.
Yeah, sophisticate and articulate. I've been guilty of that.
I'm going to make an enemy. I'm going to make an enemy to give me more of this fuel that I worry I'm dwindling out of.
I reckon 50 Cent's guilty of that.
Which enemies has he done?
By the law. But no, by the way, I have no interest in sort of speaking on another man's journey. It's just an observation. If I talk about myself, which is all I understand, I just see similarities, right, that I can relate to. And what happens in the streets is there's some scary individual that would like to take you off the face of the planet if they could. And it's down to, I don't know, jealousy, hatred, anger, whatever the reason is.
But it fires up something in you. That also happens in boxing. When you walk into the boxing gym and the coach says, "I've got you a fight." Really? Yeah. You're going to be fighting this guy. He's had this many fights. And it's real. You're going to be having a fight. That'll have a similar effect on you. And what it is, is there's this sort of final destination in your mind if you're not careful whereby the worst can occur.
Like you can really, you can lose. And in losing, you can lose your identity. You can lose your self-respect. There's so much on the line. And it just brings out a new version of yourself. You'll do the extra run. You'll go to bed early, reading a book, you know? And I experienced that in the streets. You have a problem with a scary individual. You'll take making some money more serious because you're like, "I can't be out here forever, man."
So that being said, I'm guilty of trying to initiate the production of that toxic fuel just because a professional career kicks in in entertainment and some of the lines are blurred. It's like, "I'm a rapper. What does that mean exactly?" You know? So you've got to create your own framework.
You've manufactured enemies and rivalries because.
Well, they're sort of there, right? But they're just not as interesting as they once were. Actually, your pride's not on the line. You don't care what they say about you. But you can open that part of your mind and be like, "What did he say?" And that brings out a version of you that you're like, "If I bump into him and he thinks because I'm famous, he's going to do something to me and I'm not going to take self-defense serious," you know?
And that'll just bring out a version of yourself that turns up with a solid physique, turns up focused, has been reading before bed. And so there was a lot of that in there. There's a world out there where there's a lot of jealous people, a lot of people that are probably upset with things I've said, things I've done. And there's been versions of events where I've actually looked at that. Let me see what these people are thinking. I'm provoked myself. Got myself a little bit nervous. Thinking, "Oh, is he out there?" And he would like a problem with me if he could.
All right, for sure. And then you become the version of yourself that is prepared for that challenge.
What do you think about that? Because I can see both sides of how useful and adaptive and functional that could be. In one way, it is free fuel for you to push yourself harder to become better. And in another way, you are manufacturing, like just creating out of thin air, antagonism against the world.
Well, it's energy. Essentially, you're farming energy. But it's a crutch also. You're relying on something external to create energy.
In the same way as you were saying, you want to be able to be the best that you can without people around you bigging you up and telling you that you can be better.
You've got to go through this season of isolation, man. It's just not spoke about enough.
Oh, we're going into winter. That's the winter arc, right?
Yeah, man. And have the confidence in yourself that you'll come out the other side, man. And in that, you will let go of all crutches. I don't need some negative individual that would love to have a problem with me because it prospers his life, but hinders mine. It doesn't matter. I don't need the fuel from that to get up and get to the gym and lift heavy, you know? Or go sparring and let it fly, you know? So you'd learn to look within and as opposed to take toxic fuel, find the real fuel, you know, your essence.
And really, it comes from a place of love. That's what the real fuel is. Yeah, man. It's love, man. Why am I interested in my purpose? Well, it's because I remember being 12-year-old looking at a documentary when we were kings about Muhammad Ali and George Foreman. They go and fight in Zaire. It was the Rumble in the Jungle. And I was just surrounded by complete dysfunction.
And I was desperately looking for sources of inspiration. And that's what I served as in a major, major way. You know, there was suicide on my mind at them times. It was, you know, I was in a dark place. And from a place of love, tapping into that abundant energy source of love, I know that kid's out there. And I know that that kid is taking strength from what I do next.
So therefore, that's all the strength I need to maintain it in that if I fall off, I let that kid down, you know? And I could have saved a life there. And that's, I think, when you've got a very dysfunctional family, there's this internal battle that sort of goes on where you're like, you've got to let go of people. And you're like, "Am I not loving? Have I gone cold?" There's a song called Prisoner.
And I talk about it. I'm saying I'm afraid that I've gone cold. And that's the question I'm sort of asking myself, sort of writing like my diary in this particular song. And in asking yourself that question, you have to look at your relationship to human beings in general. Because I'm really willing to cut people off, man. Like if, regardless to the title of an individual, to preserve my inner peace, I'll really let go, man.
I don't care who you are, what it is. If you're not going to take accountability and you're going to lie and be disrespectful or whatever it is, I'm going to leave you over there. I'm just going to keep walking my own journey. When you then look at your relationship to human beings and you meet an individual that is accountable or from a dysfunctional background, but he's trained, and that's where you see what's going on in your heart. And it turns out that there's lots of love in my heart.
Yeah. And actually, I'm more open than I thought I was. I'm just triggered by people that have the same traits, similar traits, to the ones that I was sort of brought up, exposed to, and sort of firsthand witnessed the destruction that comes with how them people are acting.
Do you know why I think that is? So there's a type of illness called SIRS, chronic inflammatory response syndrome. And if you live in a house that's got toxins, biotoxins in, like mold and microbes, your immune system begins to learn that that's a threat. It's slowly, over time, breaking your immune system down. And chronic inflammatory response syndrome means that if you ever get re-exposed to that kind of environment, almost immediately your immune system switches on.
It's like a warning alarm. This is familiar and dangerous. And it's an immediate response. So if you have SIRS and you walk into a building, even if you've been out of a toxic environment for 12 months, let's say, you walk into a house that's got mold spores in it, similar to the ones that you were exposed to in the past, your neck will go red, you'll be inflamed, you'll get a ringing in your ears, you'll get brain fog, you might feel sick, you might lots of things happen. Immediately, this thing switches on. And I think what's happening there is your body has learned that a very familiar but dangerous kind of pathogen is around.
And I think that this is somewhat similar to what you're seeing here, which is I know that archetype. I know that kind of person. I understand the mentality, the background, the worldview. And there is a psychological immune system that kicks in, which goes, "If I spend too much time around this person, I might go back there." I don't think that it's fully conscious, but I certainly see it myself. There are patterns from my childhood, people that I spent time around, lessons that I learned or observed, people that I saw in the modes of behavior.
I'm like, "That was imprinted so deep into the source code of who I am that I do not want that in my life. I don't want his relationship with gambling. I don't want the way that he cheats on his wife. I don't want his lack of care for his kids. I don't want the fact that he uses alcohol in order to be able to deal with his problems." And any time that I see something that sometimes isn't even that, I like incorrectly pattern match. In the same way as chronic inflammatory response syndrome, you can go into a building and it's 1/1000 or 1/100 of the dosage that you were exposed to previously, but immediately the immune system switches on because it's looking for this thing that was maybe a killer that maybe could have taken your life down a path or your immune system or your health down a path that you really didn't want it to go in.
And this is kind of the same, which is I see in this person somewhere or in this relationship or in this dynamic or whatever, I see a world that I really, really don't want to be a part of. And it feels familiar to me in a way where my psychological immune system is kicked on to go, "Get the fuck away from this as quickly as possible."
Interesting point, right? Because there's two versions of events there. Okay. And what you're talking about with the inflammatory response is the sort of the body's like airbags, you know, in a car. The car crashes and the airbags come out. And you're talking about them airbags sort of prematurely.
Yes, yes.
Sort of alerting and coming out. So within sort of the healing process, there is a phase where prematurely the airbags come out and it's like, "Oh no." As you become, the more you become a man, the more you're making decisions, essentially. You're looking at a situation, you weigh it up for what it is and the impact it can potentially have. And you're initiating healthy boundaries.
You're not responding impulsively.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
There's a degree of intuition, but it's cultivated intuition, refined.
There you go. Yeah. And at that point, you're just making decisions as opposed to just being triggered and there's a triggered response.
Or as opposed to having permeable boundaries, so malleable and floppy that you never actually end up standing up for yourself.
Yeah.
Or when you were young, being so inexperienced that you weren't able to see the pattern that you should have been aware of. You didn't know what a microbe was. You didn't understand what a moldy house smelled like. So you go from ignorance to awareness to reactivity and then finally to discernment, maybe, something like that.
The word would probably be responsibility. You're responsible in the decisions that you make. You can see what it is that you're walking into and you decide to walk away. You decide to let it go. So like some of them people, them individuals you spoke about, a gambler or, you know, I've been around guys that cheat on their partners and you have to make a decision in that moment because there's 80% of that person's character that is up your street. This is my kind of guy.
But at the point that he cheats on his partner, it's like, and as a human being, you can't be judgmental, right? Because we all come from dysfunction. However, when you're becoming the person that you see yourself being, you've got to make decisions, man. And some things you've got to take a step away from. You know, so it's honesty, really. I think it's authenticity. I think, again, it comes down to love.
How am I supposed to look that guy's partner in the eye if I have an understanding that he goes and cheats on his misses? You know, how am I supposed to trust what he's saying to me if he goes home and lies to his best friend?
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, it's one of the things I don't think people fully realize about gossip, that everyone likes gossip in one form or another, right? Even if you know that you shouldn't, until you realize that you've been seduced by it, you're like, "Ooh, is that some information about something behind the scenes that could be quite interesting or cool or a little bit like venting and gossipy?" But one of the things that people who gossip a lot don't realize is that even if the person they're gossiping about doesn't find out, the person that they're gossiping to is taught a really interesting lesson.
Oh, they found out.
That you are the sort of person that talks behind people's backs.
Yeah. And then you get the types of people that won't do that for that reason. Or you get the types of people that don't do it because it's just against their moral code.
Correct.
That's who you want to be. They're the people that are, they're the people that I gravitate towards. Their morals and their principles. I like being around them people because they're accountable. They're responsible. Now, by the way, I have been an unaccountable and unresponsible individual. And that is the nature of growing up. That's a part of the journey. So I don't sit here as somebody that's like perfect and always been perfect. You know, I sit here as somebody on the journey, you know, but taking it serious.
There's a letter from Sigmund Freud to Carl Jung, a letter that he wrote him. One of the lines in it says, "One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as most beautiful. The years of struggle will strike you as most beautiful." And I think that it's just such a gorgeous reflection on what most people realize, but only in retrospect. Unfortunately, when you're going through it, eating shit, unsure whether or not you're going to be able to get out, tarnished, doubtful, in pity, how can you say that this is beautiful?
And yet when you look back, the years of struggle are the ones where you go, "Oh, that was it. That was where I was forging myself."
I think the key is to be present. It's to try and see the beauty in the darkness, you know, in the midst of the tunnel, in the midst of the chaos, understanding that there's beauty within it. And it's a tough place to be. It's a tough place to be. But there does come a point where you've just been through so much that you sort of know now that this is my path, so I might as well accept it.
And this will pass, you know. I will get through this one way or another. So you start to admire the fact that that is the beauty of life, man. You know, I've had some really dark situations. And like I said before, the time when I questioned God, I've had darker situations where I've not questioned God and I've just understood that like, this is it.
This is how it's supposed to be right now. And I'm sure I'll come back stronger. And I've been right and I have come back stronger. So yeah.
When were you most uncertain?
When are you not uncertain, man? I think in times when I felt the most certain, it's been fabricated. It's because I'm leaning on these crutches, these friends that you're talking about that like believe in you more than you do and all that. Like that'll create a false sense of security. I think the whole way through, there's just moments where you're just like, you know? And I think the most uncertain I've been is when I'm losing trust in my own mind, my own ability to control my impulses.
And I'm making decisions that are out of my right mind. It's like, I wouldn't do a thing like that, you know? Or I wouldn't become addicted to doing a thing like that, you know? There was a time where earlier in my life when I was exposed to violence on quite a regular basis and some pretty bad things had happened to me, I was taking I'm going to say joy in sort of inflicting pain.
And it's just with some being somebody that's interested in fitness, it's just one of the vices that sort of fit with me. So I'd have a friend that I'd have trouble with an individual and I'd take it upon myself to rectify this situation.
Some retribution.
Yeah. And because I think, and again, like honestly, brother, like you sort of grow up. My stepdad beat me up when I was 11 and it had a profound effect on me.
One particular time did?
You know? Yeah. But. And it has a profound effect that you, it's not until you grow up, you become adult and you look back at your life and you're like, now I understand why I was interested in just being a nuisance, you know? And it's because that's what you're taught. And you know that it hurt, but it also felt embarrassing.
How much of it was the pain and how much was the humiliation?
It's part and parcel, right? And you want to inflict that onto other people. So that feeling that you feel after being physically violated and left on the floor or whatever, when you see somebody else in that situation, you think, deal with it. I did.
Yeah.
Don't cry. What are you crying for? I didn't, you know? So there was a phase in life where, you know, and all that's part and parcel of thinking you're going to be a criminal for a living makes you a handy guy to have around. Because it's a thing that you're at the time enjoying. And then you sort of tap back into the true version of who you are. And you realize that that's something that life, if I wasn't careful, was going to do to me.
Life was going to make me that individual. Do you understand that I had to snap out of that? And I had to realize, actually, I'm not like that. I'm a loving, kind, caring, respectful person. That's something I've felt like I had to become in order to keep myself protected in the environment that I was in. This comes back to make it. Some of these environments that unfortunately having no money will leave you in, you will be exposed to dark things.
And you will have to become a version of yourself to deal with them dark things that when you mature, you just won't be able to stand by, you know? And if you're not careful, you take it over the top. And I met a lot of them individuals in jail and they've done dark things. And you can see that the maturing out of that mindset now. But what's done is done. And you've got 14 years in this place, you know? So the whole thing is a process of healing, man.
Healing, man. And only now are people starting to talk about, only now are people starting to talk about sort of men addressing their emotions and what they've been through. And I was talking about this from the get-go because my original mixtapes were me sort of quitting boxing, coming to terms with quitting boxing, and coming to terms with being depressed, you know, and sad and down. And what I started to do was look at everything that I've been through just from a perspective of, you know what?
That is sad. That happened. It's sad. It's okay to feel sad about it. I don't have to snap and get angry. And just accept and move forward, you know? And actually, as I look back through that process, I've built an incredible life for myself, man. Like I've done really good. Yeah, man. You know, I'm a young man. I'm single. I'm in a position where I know I can protect a family.
You understand? I know I can pick a country in the world that I want to live. I can design a house exactly how I would like for it to be. And I can protect a wife and children. And it just gives me a security and I can look after myself, you know? And it just gives, that is all I think any of us really want, give or take, you know? And in that being said, that's what I'm trying to touch on in this album is the getting to that place.
I don't think the numbers are important. I think once you're financially secure, financially free, financially free is the word, freedom. Once you've got to that point, who cares if that's 100 million, 50 million, or a million, half a million, whatever makes you free? Once you're there, you're there. You've got to be content with your position. Once you know you can sort of look after a family, move on and enjoy your life, maintain it.
It's interesting. There's a variety of different levels of freedom. And one of them is, we've heard of fuck you money, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So fuck you money means maybe you don't need to work for anybody. You don't need to listen to a boss in the same way. You are liberated from having to worry about how much something's going to cost. That's one type of saying fuck you. Another way of saying fuck you is fuck you freedom. And fuck you freedom, maybe you live off the grid or maybe you're able to move to another country where you can design your lifestyle in a different kind of a way. Maybe you've got your own cows and sheep and goats and chickens and you're self-sufficient, right?
There's a kind of, even the local council, the power grid, sort of, you're not even, you've got solar panels, you're completely prepped and off the grid in that way. But there's a third kind of saying fuck you that I think is much more attainable for a lot of people. And that's a fuck you family. And that is no longer needing the validation of anyone. Like, yeah, maybe you're not reliant on a boss to tell you when to go to work. Maybe you're not reliant on the power grid or the local food supplier to give you whatever.
But something that's much more attainable for a lot of people, I think, is to reach escape velocity from being judged, needing the validation of other people by knowing that the people that you care about most think that you kind of can fly, that you can levitate, that you can lift the world up. And even if the rest of the universe is falling down around you, the person sleeping next to you in bed and the two people sleeping 10 feet above you in the same house think that you're a superhero. And I think that that is a kind of liberation that I see a lot of men when they become fathers achieving that throws into quite harsh contrast the way that they were trying to gain liberation and freedom and sovereignty and recognition previously.
It makes the games that they were playing, like probably quite shallow and desperate, look at my need for performance. Like I'm jumping in the air, like look at me, look at me, look over here, like look at how cool I am and how much I can do. And they didn't know that the right woman and the right kids.
The bigger picture, right?
Is everything. It's all of the fuel that they needed. And I think it probably in a bit of a smirky way makes them look at that version of themselves as like kind of a kid. You were jumping up and down performing for all of these people. It was cool or whatever. But really what you needed was this unit.
So I say why not have all three, right? And I can only speak from the perspective of a young man. But without fuck you money, you can't get fuck you freedom. Not the real kind. And if you're not careful, the fuck you family will turn around and say fuck you if you ain't got yourself in, you know, if you're not functional and if you've not got yourself together. So therefore, I guess that is the sort of philosophy I'm talking about.
But in order to say fuck you, you need all bases covered. So you're going to need some money. How much that is, you can figure that out for your particular set of circumstances. The money will buy the fuck you freedom, you know? And also buy the protection of your family, the freedom of you being able to sort of connect, build relationship. And then your family won't turn around and say fuck you if you've developed the sort of functionality to be a man.
So that's the interesting thing that keeps coming up here. And I think it's because you've spent so much time thinking about the psychology, where you've come from, how the human mind works, what human nature is, that when people talk, especially men, especially young men that are aspirational and have ambitions, when they talk about building a kingdom, the kingdom that they're talking about a lot of the time is quite shallow. It's materialistic, it's physical.
And these things, as you say, important. And maybe even sort of the bottom of the pyramid of like, let's get yourself sorted first. Make sure that you're safe and secure and you've got the surroundings. But the kingdom that I think matters much more is the emotional one. How much work have you done on yourself? How safe and secure are you as a vessel, not you as a supplier of resources? Yeah, that's important. But I think increasingly to me, I am far more impressed by men who have built a kingdom of psychological security on top of one of financial security.
I'd much, much, much, much rather be friends with somebody who is one hundredth as rich and wealthy and famous and statusful, but has got a cathedral of psychological stability than one who is unbelievably acclaimed, but just sort of left it there and didn't go any deeper.
Well, the external reflects the internal, you know? You know them by their fruits, you know? What's going on inside a person will be reflected on the outside. So you see that in a man's physique. You see that in the way that he sort of conducts himself, the things he's acquired, the places he's trying to go, which essentially means that the journey is always an internal journey.
And he's not getting around that. And that is, that's work that involves solitude. So sometimes I see people that surround themselves with people because that's what the isolation journey will do to you, right? It'll make you think, have I become unsociable? Have I lost the ability to make and retain friendships? And then you sort of, you can see within some friendships that like, ah, you've not got comfortable with walking your journey of isolation by yourself to become the strongest version of yourself.
And you're clinging onto these people for validation and a sense of belonging. And little do you know, you'd be more, far more valuable to that friendship group if you just went through your challenges, man. Embrace the solitude, embrace the isolation, come out on the other side. So again, I just think it's an internal journey that one's taken seriously and taken. Then you come out as a man that can serve.
I think people have forgotten what a man's job is. I think sort of being around Guy Ritchie exposed that to me. And just witnessing certain conversations and having conversations with him. I don't know, because I just think that he's somebody that's a philosopher really. That's why we like his films. That's why we like the dialogue of his movies. But who that person is behind closed doors is an honest man and a devoted husband and a devoted father.
And also someone that's very human, that's come up through all of the levels, you know? And when you hear what a person like that has actually got to say as a much younger man, it just has a funny way of seeping into your bones, man. And you just sort of understand that like, again, you have to be just ruthlessly sort of accountable and responsible. And then you sort of remember that as a man, it's your job to serve, man. I take joy in helping out, if that makes sense.
Do you know what I mean? If I can, I've got a young fan called Oliver. He's autistic. He's dead in jail or was. And for me to be helpful towards an individual like that, I take joy from that, you know? I've been in situations where something crazy's going on and I can offer a woman in that moment some sort of protection.
They're the moments that I think is like masculine nature. That's like a part of me that I take joy from. I see some people that take joy from like spending money or, you know, a lot of the money I've spent has been to reinvest into my brand, which was a rap brand. Big part of rap is the perception. So you've got to give them proof of income. But really behind all of that, I'm quite a simple guy, man.
And in that, as a man, I like to, I feel like I like to do my job, if that makes sense.
How do you square rapping about having a hurricane and a wraith that are in the same colors while also telling young people that money isn't the point?
I think that you have a brand like mine. You better get financially free, man. And if you're going to be financially free and you're young enough to be brash and for it to be acceptable in any way, shape, or form, then demonstrate, you know? I've done this independently. I own the rights to all my music. That's one thing, right? But then you've got to run the record label yourself.
You've got to employ the people. At one point, the outgoings of the business, it was something like 1.3 million on staff alone as a rapper. Who's doing it? Who's taking on all that extra stress? So you're building a thing independently. And if you're going to do that and you're going to take that path, you've got to show proof of income. Like it's going well. It's possible. You're showing guys coming into the business, like by the way, you can do this in a way where you're not just relying on an industry to make it happen, you know?
So that being said, that was that sort of part and parcel with the job description I've taken on. However, you take me out of that job description and I'm really a simple guy, man. I'm really a simple guy. I come from humble beginnings, man. I come from a house with no carpet and floorboards and, you know, I really don't need much. And that's the truth of who I am behind it all.
But if you're going to be a rapper and, you know, being poor will really do something to you, man. I've been guilty of being a real show-off. And I was like that from I first started to acquire money just as a young man, you know? I'd buy a little superbike and turn up at the parties showing off. Like it was something that I had to sort of humble myself in that regard. But again, it's a journey. It's a journey, man.
Is there a line of yours that you wish more people paid attention to from the new album, one that you think people might overlook or from past work?
I think a mindset, I think there's a mindset that's overlooked. But in the times that I've I'm always going on about Vincent van Gogh, man. I bore myself sometimes, but you know what? That's the truth. I'm a bit of a boring guy. Why? Because that's where progression lies in repetition, man. So the things that I've studied, I've studied them over and over and over again until I've taken the gems out of them situations. The reason people want to learn of successful people is because they don't want to go and do the repetition that's needed.
Anyway, so one of the things that I sort of understood is the sort of hinge factor in van Gogh's legacy, which is what it is. Let's have it right. Some of his work is nearly priceless at this point. And he was trying to sell work. The work wouldn't sell. He dies. Then his brother goes on to die. And his brother had a wife called Jo. And Jo put the letters between Vincent and his brother Theo out into the world.
And when people understood the mindset and the philosophy behind Vincent van Gogh's thinking and the fact that his literature was probably as beautiful as his artwork, that's what made the painting sell, okay? So the more that I grow and the more that I'm courageous enough to articulate what I'm actually thinking as somebody that comes from a very complex background that sort of identified with being a villain at one point, but has also been exposed to sophisticated people and sort of took that on, when people really get an idea of my thinking, then they'll go back and listen to what I was saying in retrospect, right?
And there's a film called Eternity's Gate. It's about van Gogh. You may not have seen it. And there's a point in that film where van Gogh goes to St. Remy's Hospital. And in them days, it was like a mental asylum. And what you would do is you would go and see a priest. The priest would come and see you to figure out whether you was copious menace or not. And they would do that by your orientation in faith, in God, your belief. And van Gogh, his parents happen to be like pastors and religion or something.
He knew like the back of his hand. So then when the priest holds up some of his work and he says, you think God made you a painter to paint this? And what he was saying is your work's ugly, right? It's different. Monet and some of the big painters in France, they was making money from painting like realism and, you know, it all looked real, but the camera was going to come and destroy that little trend. What van Gogh had made was from his essence, right?
And what van Gogh says is he says, sometimes I feel like God's made a mistake. And he says, sometimes I feel like God made me a painter for people that haven't yet been born. And when I understood that, I understood that as an artist, the influence that I am having on people might not be for right now. It might be long after I'm gone.
So it's my job to just do my best work and be humble enough to accept the fact that people might not be able to see what I'm doing. They might not be able to see all of the layers of the painting and the works of art that I'm putting out. But that doesn't mean that I become lazy because it's going to go over people's heads and people might ignore it because it's in the world forever. As Vincent van Gogh's paintings are in the world forever. And that's why they go up in value, you know?
Because the more you understand his philosophy and his thinking and his outlook on the world as somebody that was experiencing a really sort of rough go of it, he was sort of closer to reality. And you can't escape reality. So you will always go back and you will always refer back, you know? That's something that had a profound impact on me. And that's what I've tried to do with this album. I've disconnected from feedback, validation. I've just made it.
I've tried to make it more musical. These layers and I've thrown it out there. With part two, I've not really even verbalized this, but with part two, I'll be getting on with my life at that point. I'll make it and I won't be promoting it as a rapper because I won't be a rapper at that point. I'll be a husband and a father. So I'll make it and I'll throw it out into the world for people that are following the trail that I've sort of left out there, you know?
And that'll be that. And at that point, acting will have either taken off and I'm supposed to be a more famous person or I'm not. At this point, I've let go. You know what they say? To let go and let God. I've sort of got the things that I wanted in life. And now I'm sort of revisiting faith and understanding my purpose. What am I here to do? How am I here to help? How can I serve? How can I help?
And if that means that I'm supposed to be more famous, then so be it. If that means I get to be less famous, you know, and I get my privacy back and freedom, then so be it. Both times round, I'll be doing things that I'm proud of that I can stand by, that like you say, my children can be proud of, you know? So that's my outlook on that.
Bugsy Malone, ladies and gentlemen, dude you rule. I appreciate the fuck out of you. Where should people go to keep up to date with what's going on?
I mean, look, the album comes out Friday. So it'll be out by the time this is out. It's called Make It, Maintain It, part one. It's my best work. The Gentlemen season three will come out at some point. I'm giving that my all. I shaved my hair off and everyone's like, why has he shaved his hair off? It's because I'm giving the acting game everything I've got. So I'm looking a bit different.
Gained 10 kilos, shaved your head.
You know, I'm serious about it. It's a job description I'd like. I was lucky enough to be in a film with Jason Statham and I've seen his job description. I've seen the way he conducted himself as a man. And it's a job description I'd like. So I'm marching in that direction. That being said, I'm around, you know? And I appreciate you having me again.
I appreciate you more, man. Until next time. Goodbye, my beauties. Dude. Yes.
Thank you, bro.
Hey, a quick note. One thing that we've been told by a lot of our subscribers is that on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube, they've been unsubscribed or unfollowed even though they pressed it. So just do me a favor and check below if that has happened. It's happening to a lot of people. It means that you get to find out about episodes before anybody else and it supports the show and makes me very happy indeed. Just give it a little check. Give it a little tap. All will be well. Thank you.
Bugzy Malone is a British rapper, actor, and entrepreneur from Manchester, England.
Expect to learn what the difference between “making it and maintaining it” is, the childhood experiences that shaped Bugzy, and why it’s important to be ultra vulnerable, if you can ever have mastery without tapping into your darkness, how to handle uncertainty, why you must be ruthlessly accountable to yourself, and much more…
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Timestamps:
(00:00) The Cost of Making It
(12:06) How Bugzy’s Childhood Shaped His Success
(19:43) Can You Ever Truly Heal From Childhood Trauma?
(25:17) Why We Believe in Everyone But Ourselves
(33:56) Don’t Listen to Those Trying to Discredit You
(40:21) Why It’s Tough Being a Rapper
(42:58) Don’t Let Vulnerability Suffocate You
(52:01) How to Turn Dark Influences Into Positive Change
(54:08) Is Pain the Greatest Teacher?
(55:13) How Does Bugzy Handle Fear?
(59:15) Is Progress Irreversible?
(01:04:30) The Key to the Pursuit of Mastery
(01:16:48) How Bugzy Is Changing the Rap Game
(01:21:42) Can You Chase Greatness Without Pain?
(01:38:53) Why You Should Try Find Beauty in the Darkness
(01:40:59) When Was Bugzy Most Uncertain?
(01:47:24) Why Family Is the Ultimate Freedom
(01:57:04) Can Money Really Buy Happiness?
(01:59:31) The Line Everyone Needs to Hear
(02:05:49) Where to Find Bugzy
Extra Stuff:
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#577 - David Goggins - This Is How To Master Your Life: lnkfi.re/SN-Goggins
#712 - Dr Jordan Peterson - How To Destroy Your Negative Beliefs: lnkfi.re/SN-Peterson
#700 - Dr Andrew Huberman - The Secret Tools To Hack Your Brain: lnkfi.re/SN-Huberman
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