Someone said once about me he's not the brightest candle in the room but he burns longer than anyone else and that's exactly what I do I won't be defeated you see this week on high performance we welcome boxing Legend Barry Hearn I can't tell you how many times I've had the most amazing bits of don't you think though that the successful people are open to the luck they're expecting the lucky break everybody gets that beer Luck some people don't recognize it and others don't take advantage of it see I never took a risk in my
life you know my dad was a bus driver my mum was a child lady the worst thing I could have been was a conductor in life if you don't feel good about yourself how do you expect other people to feel good about you yeah I get up in the morning I'm excited every day now it's embarrassing I'm 74. I should be calming down I'm getting worse Bang out of the officer let's go and have another day to change a whole Sport with its social Hang-Ups and then you say yeah and 22 000 people bought a
ticket in the shout but football stadium to watch it eat that what was the moment realizing that you were poor I never knew I was poor until I didn't know people they need no toilets I wasn't unhappy I was happy every day I had a loving family around me pressure is only felt by those that Fail what that really means is that people make excuses for their own weaknesses we've all got an opportunity in life to do something and it won't always go right and if you do fail use that as a spring ball to
succeed you will run a Better Business and a better life if you think poor it makes you get value for money you know think poor and say I want my value doesn't make you a nasty person it just means don't disrespect me people say what's enough Money there is no enough you're playing a game you're planning to win There's No Limit you don't stop you don't ever stop because once you stop what else is there to do so you don't think you've made it oh of course I'm nowhere near come to the enemy people with
small Visions think we've made it that's because they haven't got the vision you've got to look at that little light coming down the tunnel and convince yourself it's not a try and come in towards you but It's a long way around so you never ever stop because if the day you stop your week and the day you're weak you won't be a success the answer is to have an open-ended approach to say I just want to be the star campaign every day of my life every hour of my life there isn't a day off there
isn't a time off mentally but it taught me lots of things and you learn more about yourself in adversity then you'll ever learning success and what did you learn about yourself that Surprised you I've got some nuts mate I'm unbeatable I'm totally and completely unequivocably um beatable listen I want to say a massive thank you to all of our new subscribers but you know most people that watch this content on YouTube don't subscribe I want to change that to my subscribers and the more amazing we can make high performance and I've had a lovely message
actually from Rob who says I Only recently discovered the high performance Channel and I watched the full Eddie Howe and Tyson Fury interviews both some of the best content I've seen in the last five years on YouTube listen if you agree and you want to keep this amazing stuff coming for free then hit subscribe right now thank you so much well look thank you very much for making the time by the way to do this right joking will you too much of a high performance yeah exactly you Can only dream of being invite this is
like the Royal Variety performance of podcasts well look let's start then with the name of the podcast we always start with this same question in your mind what represents high performance well you can't take the chart of the county at the chartered accounting higher performance is represented by bottom line success uh it's what you do with the bottom line Success which defines your own success whether you're creating a sustainable business for whatever reason um the performance is just to be the best you can be and that's what you try to do every day in the
knowledge that you will fail many times that you will make dozens of mistakes but you will make thousands of decisions very nice well your decisions are defined by your 10 rules for life and what we wanted to do with this Conversation was to base it on the 10 rules and we'd love you to sort of put some meat on the bones for us so your first rule for life is it's better to be born lucky than good looking well it's so true I mean because without that little bit of luck and no matter what you
might think how bright you are or how well qualified you are we all need that beer luck we need we need to now to take advantage of that What was yours I've had a lifetime of God smiling on me I can't tell you how many times I've had the most amazing bits of luck I mean whether it's a ginger kid just knocking on door random saying can I play in one of your snooker tournaments Mr Hearn and it turns out to be Steve Davis whether it's B Sky B coming over the hill when I was
probably about to go skin having lost millions of pounds they were like the Cavalry coming over it was That close for you yeah I mean yeah historically I made a lot of money in 1982. probably before you both were born with it yeah um and I was going to retire I was 34. I've been quite smart uh I had a passion for sport I was always good at everything and never great at anything but it gave me a little bit of a head start in the knowledge and appreciation of what Sportsmen and women Do so
I got stuck into it and then I saw division of loveliness in America where I saw ESPN going from a porter cabin doing college basketball to being this amazing techno Giant in television I thought one day one day something like that's going to come into England so I started doing events in the 80s and as usual I was several years ahead of my time so all I did was lost money lost money lost money Until it all came right and then a strange boxer where the lisper came into my life just an off chance as
a recommendation from Len Ganley the snooker referee and things like that have happened all the time but uh don't you think though that the difference between successful people and others is that the successful people are open to the luck because they're yeah they're expecting They're expecting the lucky break to come now and I think you know it's how you take advantage of that break and entrepreneurs which is a word used often and there's not that many of them in truth um but we're Risk Takers you know we uh I I always think it's fascinating or
I what it fascinated to me whether it appeals to anyone else see I never took a risk in my life because I had nothing to lose You know my dad was a bus driver my mum was a child lady the worst thing I could have been was a conductor or you know I don't know a window cleaner and even that's not bad I always think I've put my own kids under much too much pressure in a way Eddie especially I mean my daughter is technical genius but she's not like me and Eddie she's not a
salesperson full of nonsense but Eddie's been under Pressure from day one to follow in the footsteps and to go further which is magnificently managed to do much to my chagrin um but for me I was never under any pressure so there was nothing to lose so I don't like the word pressure anyway because it's you know it's another rule we come on to so I think with me being good looking is always nice but you can't take away that bit of luck and if you look at any successful person There's a few key moments in
their life where the good Lord smiled and Lady Luck dealt the cards and they were good enough to take advantage and that's probably the key difference between everybody gets that beer luck some people don't recognize it and others don't take advantage of it so how important then Barry do you think humility is because your answer there just just reeks of humility that you don't take myself too seriously because I think one if you ever go on an airplane look out the window you realize that significant you're not you know we're just a little bleep onto
we all make ourselves out to be and people who believe in them so I mean you've got to believe yourself you've got to have self-belief of course you have you know because otherwise we wouldn't get up in the morning and do what we do but at the same time I think you've got to keep This sense of humor you've got to realize you're not really that important in the bigger picture so we're all going through I mean it sounds a bit deep this is not like me at all but we're going through this journey and
if we can have a few Smiles along the way and not take yourself too seriously you build a little wall around yourself like that you compartmentalize things in your brain you don't get hurt by other People so much or by circumstance or facts come on tell us more about that well because you don't allow it you don't look back with any regret it's the total waste of time you can't do anything about it you've already learned the lesson of that regret anyway because it happened but there's no point looking back and I'm tired of people
say I should have done this I wish I'd have done that save your breath You didn't move on look forward plan the future learn of course from mistakes but don't let them change your life so it's humility is a nice word to use it's probably not quite it's a bit more superficial than humility it is what it is it's superficial so when you get bad things you compartmentalize it and you lock it away somewhere in your brain and if you're going to think about opening that box you do it on your own And not in
the public layer so you never appear to be having a bad day because that really pisses off the opposition right that takes us nicely actually onto your second rule tell the truth yeah it's easier than telling lies it is the most refreshing thing to be able to do it's probably a reason why you call yourself independent thinking is and I don't think I've always told the truth by the way I mean I think it's a Luxury that comes later in life with perhaps commercial success or a feeling of uh it's all going to end one
day anyway so what's the point you know about early doors when you're out there grafting and trying to get somewhere you do tell a few White Lies I'm I don't know when I got to that stage of cutting off but I think quite late in life you know I don't think I was always like that you know I was a Chancellor early doors of course I was Where I came from I didn't have much excuse not to be but when you do acquire that discipline of Mind where you can actually tell people exactly what you're
thinking and those that appreciate it will love you for it and those that don't you don't really want to be in their company anyway so give us an example of somebody that did appreciate your truth talk years ago years ago I got approached by some Uh.com people from the states that wanted to buy my company I was doing okay not special and they offered me a load of money I think that offered me about 30 million quid oh it's a lot of money in those days it was a fortune still a lot of money today
and I got involved you know I thought this is it you know business was quite tough let's get the money and get out of it and I always remember walking around the Garden with my wife who was looking for a new house at the time and she had a budget my wife is old school proper proper lady difficult impossibly difficult 52 years married to the same woman are horrendous as she as she's part with me I will never ever know but I would be lost without and I decided to do what I don't normally do
which is take people into my confidence I'm quite an insular person Other than direct family because I don't think people deserve to be told my innermost thoughts that's why they're called innermost thoughts you don't share them but I share them with her that we had this opportunity and if she was looking for a new house she might did you do you want a bigger budget because there's a few quid to spare and I told her the story and she said well why are you doing this Dylan well you know it's A lot of money blah
blah blah said that and what about you I said well you know I'm gonna have to stay on for a few years to help the process and so how did you feel about that and I said well I don't really like these they're loud they're aggressive Americans they bang the chair the desk and she said is that where you've got to in life that you know you will surrender your Independence out where you've got to in Life yeah and I thought no I think I've gone a bit beyond that and the following day I phoned
him up and said the deal's off and they've done all their due diligence and whatever they went potty done you young boys and uh I said why I'm not telling the truth I said I don't like either of you and I don't really want to work with people like you in fact I don't even Want people like you in my world and they went oh the jaw dropped and they left and I felt cleansed I felt like I've been baptized again you know the waters had rushed over me and there was a stride come out
and the chest came there and I thought you know isn't it lovely and it works in a much simpler scale even with wise families whatever tell them you know tell them the truth in business it's quite unusual really especially in the Cutthroat business That we're in you know you'd be a boxing promoter and tell people the truth you know as far as most people are concerned boxing promoters are all gangsters which they're not of course but it's in imagery so it's refreshing and it makes you feel good about yourself which I think in life if
you don't feel good about yourself how do you expect other people to feel good about you yeah so there's no pressure on that see I love that Barrier like having been around sport a lot I often divide people into two cameras you talk about people that tell you the truth from people that tell you the time so the ones that deliver the stuff that you maybe don't want to hear are the truth tellers the time tellers are the ones that tell you the fluff tell you all the things that are easy to tell like the
time so how do you make that distinction of allowing people into your world into your business and Encourage them to reach retailers rather than time tell us it takes time it takes time I mean we have a history I mean bear in mind that matrim has grown into a sizable company now but for years I mean it's a long time coming you know started in 1982 as a hundred pound company with me and a girl underneath a billion dollar in Romford no no aspirations whatsoever I just thought I made some money I had Steve Davis
of his world snooker champion Let's have some fun so I needed a vehicle so we had a hundred pound company called it Metrum named after the room that Steve Davis used to play money games in over the years against top Pros it was but he wasn't supposed to go anywhere it wasn't written it was going to be a big company it was just going to occupy my timers having fun and you know having fun is an aspect Where again there's this independence of thought that if you're not having fun what what are we doing it
for now it starts off you have no choice you've got to put bread on the table for the family so that's not about having fun that's about achieving a certain goal but then you've got levels and you go up and down levels don't you and when you get to a certain stage you can really have fun and I think since 82 Although we've had some tough times we've had some disappointments and some tragedies along the way we've had fun and part of that fun is the type of people that we are that we can tell
the truth and we can you pick your friends I think you have to be a little bit cynical in this life because let's be honest they're not not all nice people are they sure yeah I deal in an industry where there's a lot of people that you Probably wouldn't have in your house as a guest but you get used to it and you treat them with honesty and respect and they return that funnily enough you know in a different type of way I mean you know there was years when we was running my old partner
Freddie King who's your Dad knew well yeah but two great trainers and uh Freddie and I ran the fruit machines and the jukeboxes and pool tables for the whole of the East End we ran the whole East End in that department and there was a lot of strange people there but we never had a problem with anybody because we just told them the truth and that was mutual respect and that's a it's a nice feeling to have that when you can walk into a room and Everyone they don't take liberties with you because they know
you're not going to take liberties with them that makes sense so lesson number three you've just said matram was about having fun but number three on your list of your ten rules for life is sheer work ethic genius yeah isn't it isn't that working hard fan I think is what I get up in the morning I'm excited every day now it's Embarrassing it's embarrassing I'm 74. I should be calming down I'm getting worse what are you excited about I'll be excited about deals I'm excited about doing things I'm excited about growing sport I'm excited about
changing lives I'm excited about ratings I'm excited about tickets I'm excited I'm I'm pathetic I am an anorak my heartbeat goes up as I drive to the office I'm supposed to be retired I'm going to be nearly every day my wife's Killing me when are you when are you going to spend more time in your house I'm like yeah you know yeah next week I'll be back onto you on that uh what's the secret then for people listening to this for finding a life that makes them feel like your life makes you feel probably a
very small brain like mine I mean I'm no I'm no genius I didn't go to university I'm not you know I'm not a smart bloke you know do a crossover with me takes a long time but I'm very good At numbers as Sudoku I'm great you know crosswords I'm terrible probably just just feeling good about yourself having conversations with yourself in the mirror in the morning is always a good start to the day what do you say Baza you've banged off son let's go and have another day and every day you think you know we
will not look you know who knows who knows I hope to be playing Cricket when I'm in my 90s is unlikely but I'll give it my best shot so the work ethic is absolutely fundamental to it of giving everything Your Best Shot so I knew early doors I was no genius but I don't someone said once about me he's not the brightest candle in the room but he burns longer than anyone else oh and that's exactly what I do I won't be defeated you see it's I don't I don't think my ego will Take it
I have to win everything is a competition everything so you go to my office and take my right hand draw you will see a list of the number of days I've been in the gym for the last 12 years and every month I look and go you lazy bastard you're letting it slip as you're letting it slip you're doing less than you did last year and so on so you make everything into a game and that's when you know you've cracked It because like I love sport but unfortunately God decided I was never going to
be great at anything but it didn't stop me loving small so I thought well I'll make business into a sport so my business is a succession of sporting events and I want to win all of them so I prepare diligently put in the dedication our sacrifice Put in the time I create an environment where I'm the best I can possibly be and then I bring up put on my Chartered Accountants hat and say now really how are we doing because people tell lies but Numbers Never Lie so every year I set out to be what
I did last year and I will continue to do that until I'm pushing up the daisies but the people that I've trained and I've got a lot of Tremendous people come in you know very young you know Frank Smith on the boxing joined us when he was 16. you know as a as a run around for poker tournaments delivering pizzas and coffee Matt Porter runs the DARS came in from the local newspaper when he'd just come out of University and there's a whole succession of people like that and they are trained with my ethos you
know this is how we're going to run this business uh it's Changing I can feel it changing because we're getting so big that we have to be what you might call a normal business which I hate which is why I came off the board because I'm never going to be chairman of a PLC it's a person wrong job so can I see them Barry like who trained you in that work ethic my mom I think you described him on being a child lady well my dad was up my dad ate his first heart attack when
he was about 29. so And his father had died early and his father they're all in their 40s so when those days are in you had a heart attack they said sit in a chair for three months and carry on smoking you know today is slightly different um so my mother was the one who was she was a working class snob really lovely lady but she was you know tough old girl as always the women in our world my world run everything right you know you know equality is something that Never really came up in
our household because the women were always the boss anyway you know the dad would come home on Friday his ways back it would go on the table it would be unopened because there was nothing left he would have rattling money in other words any coin in the waste back it could go in his pocket and the wife my father never had a bank account in his life never had money when he died he had one and Temperance on him in his pocket that was His total assets but the mother looked after everything and my grandmother
was the same I mean I think it's a working class trait in All Families because there wasn't enough to go round so no one was going to be silly with money all it was all allocated but she was the one that wanted me to be special I think and in our world special was first off you've got to learn speak properly so she sent me to elocution lessons when I Was 11. as you can see it had very little effect but after that she sent me to I think amateur dramatic Society I joined at 12.
at 13 I was doing bertok break plays and Shakespeare and at 14 I was in the verse Appreciation Society I specialized in poems of Robert Graves and toured around all the schools uh poetry and that it also taught me to look after myself because the kids took the mick mercilessly as you can imagine but it Was my mother's and this is part and past of making I hated it I hated it but looking back it made me what I am you know go and learn your lines go upstairs when I when I she got me
a job effectively as an article Clerk and charted accountancy she was the one every night go to as soon as you finished your meal I'm 18 years old no there's no going out You know go to your room lock the door three hours before you go to bed Lee reader there was never a possibility of failing an exam because I knew it all I may not know what it meant but I knew it Word Perfect and it was just about the work ethic she said you know if you're not the bright singing read that book
five times instead of once you know just put the hours in put the hours in and you'll be all right and it Worked and it's worked ever since even today I have a prodigious work ethic now which is sometimes annoying to those around me yep and especially when I'm supposed to be retired and putting my nose in all these bright young people doing this business and making broadcasts and Sport so attractive to everybody but there's an underlying role for us as well which is taking away barriers to entry diversity all these things are Commonplace in
the background where I came from and they're really important to me so you know I want to see people like me be successful but they've got to make the effort that I made and if not I will throw them away like a used tissue another thing you're joking there are you I think people have to come up to yourself absolutely no no no I don't joke about things like that you can be nice to everybody but if they Won't help themselves I don't have time to change the world I can change if I've got the
right army with me which I have and individual sports like DARS snooker boxing but particularly darts probably I think when I finish I look back on darts and say that was the biggest because to change a whole Sport with its social Hang-Ups and oh fat blokes throw in errors and then you say yeah and 22 000 people bought a ticket at the shalkan football stadium To watch it eat that you know because it's like us getting even against the rest of the world I think we all have a little chip on our shoulder as well
I had a big chip on my shoulder anyone who spoke because of what well because of what you haven't got and what other people have got yeah you want it you you know I never knew I was poor until I was 10 or 11. I didn't know people had indoor toilets you know and things like that but you Just kids are not I wasn't unhappy I was happy every day I had a loving family around me later on you realize you want you want those things you got you see the houses on the top of
you and you say why haven't I how can I get one of these yeah but there's two or three paths you can go down right you know and that's where your parents come in and steer you in the right direction and what was so what was the moment that you remember realizing that you were poor I started a Car wash around when I was 12. with a mate of mine at school and we borrow enough money to get a bucket in a sponge and like I'll see all these big asses half a mile away at
the top of the you know moves on the council stay at the bottom and I just see these houses and these cars you know knocking on the door it's gonna wash your car five Shillings a car you know and you'd work and then later on it became gardening window cleaning Babysitting anything to make a few quid because when you saw things that it was quite clear you could either steal it and get it for free and get yourself in trouble or you could work hard well what she causes you know how many All Eyes think
about how many can I do in a day and what time is it going to get dark you know so their Drive was there because I wanted I wasn't going to steal anything I knew that was wrong so I was just going to work hard and and Get it so you know I remember buying my first scooter at school 240 credit was lambretta gt200 absolute nuts absolute nuts and no one in my school had a brand new lembre gt200 and I paid cash and every penny came out of that bucket and I I met a
lady that I used to wash her car well I'm going off the engine here but bear with me uh I I became part of a family I was known as boy Berry Because I saw the kids grow up you know and I got almost adopted by him and I went to see her about a year ago and she's very old now but you know quite frail and she sort of looked at me and she said you always said you'd have a golden bucket one day really yeah and I remember saying that one day it's like
Fools and Horses Rodney one day we're gonna be one day I'm gonna have a golden bucket and I've got a golden Bucket now in fact I've got several of them brilliant and I've earned every single one of them let's talk about failure because lesson number four is pressure is only felt by those that fail this P what that really means is that people make excuses for their own weaknesses we've all got weaknesses but it's very tiresome for me to hear people say oh yeah I couldn't handle it or yeah I'd rather keep my mouth shut
firstly I would never tell anyone if that was the case with me because that's something entire me to sort out and secondly it's probably lacking appreciation that we've all got an opportunity in life to do something and it won't always go right so don't start crying around me go out and do something about it and if you do fail make it one time you fail And use that as a springboard to succeed it's about character isn't it it's about what's inside is it with breed character enough into people with these no no we don't and
and sometimes it's frightening I had this thing with my children about I love I love them so much but when it comes down to it are they going to be good enough in this world no you know when dad's not there you know my kids was you know Sometimes they were taken to school in limos they went to private schools all the things that I hated when I was younger because I had an inferiority complex about people that had things I didn't have and you've seen do you spoil them and then you realize maybe not
you see it I mean Eddie's a great example I can't believe how he's turned out I use a credit to me and what he does and he's got a tremendous work ethic and he Doesn't need to have no he wasn't ever going to starve or go without and yet there's something inside and that's what everyone's got to find they've got to find that inner strings that take some past Ordinary People if they want to be special so what did you do then say if we take Eddie as an example so as a parent what did
like what were the most important characteristics that you would have Demonstrated or nurtured in him I think it's just lessons I mean everything in our house is competitive tremendously competitive viciously competitive so even now I play table tennis with my grandchildren on a Sunday I don't let them win a point not a point not a point they win a point they've won a point themselves yeah and you know every now and again Baza can't you let us win one but it's getting closer The 13 year old is getting closer and it's only a matter of
time and I was like that with Eddie you know we'd play cricket I wouldn't hold back I was quite a quick bowl when I was younger I both flat out to him no matter how wide he was he would have been this game we'll find out when I thought he was going a little bit too public schoolish I took him I had famously took him down the gym and we had a proper what was supposed to be a proper three-round fire Proper fight and uh he dropped me twice in the second round we never had
the third round but I left happier than he did you know because I found out something about my son that I hoped was inside him he didn't swallow it right he had some character about him and he took a couple not many and he handed it out you know and it was nice he was just disappointed he didn't have a chance to beat me up in one one extra round But no it it's it's not something you can describe in in a one-page or a set of lines all parents or parents love their children and
no children in the world are born bad it's up to us and sometimes we let our kids down and sometimes they surprise us with how good they are and uh I've been very blessed number five is you will run a Better Business and a better life If you think poor do you know what that is probably the greatest line I've ever read and I use it all the time there are lots of people that achieve short-term success they get they get lucky like it says better to be born lucky but they haven't got in them
to be sustainable and that's because they don't think poor they think they've cracked it and I I think I might have got a little bit like that in the 80s a little bit where I've made a load of money and you think I'm untouchable you're never Untouchable you're never over the winning line when the fat lady sings That's the time you well the greatest song ever written a gambler it's time enough for counting when the dealing's done so after that stage you think poor but that is a two-fold connection one It makes you get value
for money even if you're stinking Rich even if you've got money coming out your ears do you really want to be treated like that person or you're going to think poor and say I want my value doesn't make you a nasty person it just means don't disrespect me I'm thinking poor two with the clients and the people that you're Servicing If you think poor you're going to give them value for money because you realize that that customer will keep coming back to you if you've serviced their needs properly and you haven't taken liberties with them
either sometimes there are people there that you think oh and again I think this is an attitude that takes some time to evolve I've no doubt I took people's trousers down in deals over the years I've no doubt some People took mine down but when you start thinking poor it gives you a new balance because you're just you're running it just on the facts of the situation aren't you what do you do to check yourself when you realize that you're not thinking poor I have a wife that tells me keep my feet on the ground
it's very tempting when you get old especially men because men are basically immature far more than Women and you know you think I'm Jack the lead you wake up in the morning you're feeling happy you think you know what I am untouchable the moment you think like that it's a slippery slide down you've got to keep thinking about the long-term plan so you put in plans in your head because you ask yourself what do you want to achieve don't you and what you want to achieve is different at different stages in your life You know
you start off my I remember the first thing I want to do I want to have my own house you know I mean we are our own family as I was 18. our first time we bought a house you know it was great but then I think as a working class bloke I want to pay my mortgage off I want to pay my you know because then no one can take that away from me I'll always have a house over my head You know it's a bit of a negative thought as well as a positive
thought but then you set different barriers where you want to be and there's always people say what's enough money how many times people said to you what's enough mate there is no enough it's not the whole point the whole context of money is not about what's enough you're playing a game you're flying to win There's No Limit You don't stop you don't ever stop because once you stop what else is there to do so you don't think you've made it of course not I'm on a journey I'm nowhere near come to the end of it
it's like people say to me wow darts it was a tiny little business it's now massive what second biggest rate is bought behind soccer on Sky haven't started people with small Visions think we've made it that's because they haven't got The vision world domination global domination by the way you're never gonna hit the target you set but you've got to you know you've got to look at that little light coming down the tunnel and convince yourself it's not to try and come in towards you all right so you never ever stop because if the day
you stop you're weak and the day you're weak you won't be a success but there's that great quote I Think it was that Joe Louis that said it's hard to get up and run when you're wearing silk pajamas by yourself how when you look at your your home again it's and you're surrounded by opulence and wealth and all the trappings of the success you haven't been to my tent but how do you keep that that mindset it's an attitude it's you see when Joe Lewis said that he's coming out of an environment of complete and
utter Poverty probably troubled childhood uh dealing with very unsavory characters having to earn a living with his fists and suddenly you get still pajamas that's a Quantum stage of his life that's very difficult to evaluate my grandfather was a oil tanker driver for 40 years all he talked about was retiring at 65. and once he got to 65 he sat in his chair and he was dead two years later happens to a lot of people yeah That's because they set different targets the answer is to have an open-ended approach to say I just want to
be the best I can be every day of my life every hour of my life there isn't a day off there isn't a time off mentally you know I mean I I apologies I I sit around sometimes I go fishing a lot but I'm always thinking and I have some great ideas when I'm thinking you know some some of them may work some don't work you mustn't take the easy way out You mustn't it's so tempting because again it comes back to what is enough enough is not a material question it's a mental question enough
is when your brain says I really don't want to get out of this chair anymore that's that's enough yeah enough is when you just lose that passion to do what you've loved doing every day of your life and please God you can never say for Sure it's a cruel world as we know that uh you keep that feeling in your head and it drives you forward every day and that's why it has to be a game because it's too serious to be treated seriously yeah unusual things happen every day of your life how you deal
with them makes you unusual everybody in this world has got one not everybody but pretty well everyone's different they've all got a different DNA I think the odds of having the same DNA are 14 million to one actually exactly the same as number of telephone lines there are in this country as well and actually exactly the same odds as winning the national lottery is the same as having the same DNA there you go put that in your Christmas cracker so we all deal with things differently and we're all different and People have different approaches and
different ways and different thoughts in their head different circumstances everybody in the world is absolutely better than anybody else at something the sadness is most of them don't find out what it is because they don't get the opportunity but nature says that they must be bare at something than everyone else because they're different when you get into a situation in in life And your honor some sort of progression you have to make a lot of decisions and sometimes they'll come at you from really bizarre angles you know and you can mix a lot of these
rules by the way together I'll tell you a little story so I'm doing my conquers in 1989. for those of you who don't understand what your conquers is it's not a good time I'm losing Millions a pound I owed a Bank millions of pounds and like a fire coming out for the later Championship rounds I'm getting close to having enough I'll learn more during this period by the way than I learned the whole of my life I never shared that time with anybody wives family anything it wasn't their job to know it was my job
to fix and I had an event starting it was the European snooker League I think it was starting in January 89 and Christmas Eve 1988. I had one last pitch I needed a sponsor for 300 000 pounds and I didn't have one and I was losing so much money this was like for the first time I actually thought I'm a chartered accountant I can always get a job so I wasn't going to starve I wasn't Going to be in trouble but the dreams of what I was thinking about my life was going to be clearly
wasn't happening I'll go off at South Station to see trust as faulty the managing director there was a guy called Alan Hearn no relation but an interesting same surname four o'clock I got off to trying it slow and it started to snow it was like a Dickens novel walked into it my heart wasn't in it at All got in to see Mr Hearn he said what have you got for me I said and I started the sales pitch which I'm generally quite good at but this was awful my heart it was I'd add too much
of a battering I'd lost too many deals uh finished in 20 minutes quite honestly I was an embarrassment to be there not professional at all and he looked at me and he said it's Christmas Eve It's 4 30 Christmas Eve I went I know he said you must really need this and I said tell the truth I said I do I really need this and he said well I've got no money and that was like someone kicked me straight in the lower region so I thought well that's it I can't do more than I've done
I've given the best shot I've had two years of absolutely nightmares and I've shouldered it on my own Probably a mistake so I just thought well I'll go out with some class and I said well Mr Hearn thank you very much for seeing me I appreciate it's Christmas Eve let me wish you and your family a Happy New Year turn around to walk out the door and he said but I've got hotel rooms I'll say what does that mean s well I've got no money I said no I understood that bit he said but I've
got Hotel rooms he said and at that time trust has 40 head Sandy Lane in Barbados Plaza ethnay in Paris Waldorf in London they're gray hotels is I will give you 300 000 pound of hotel rooms but no money for this sponsorship and we shook hands I left by the time I got walked back to Slough station I'd sold the lot to mates of mine in the travel business at a 40 discount for cash I got 180 Grand that 180 Grand saved my life saved my business and save me more importantly show me that you're
never completely finished now while you're breathing there's fighting the old dog that was a 12th round knockout for me in my world but it taught me lots of things it taught me that when you're in situations like that the situation will Define you as a person as well as you will Define the Situation and you learn more about yourself in adversity then you'll ever learn in success and what did you learn about yourself that surprised you I've got some nuts mate I've got I'm unbeatable I'm totally and completely unequivocably um beatable but you didn't know
that before no I didn't know how unbeatable because I'd never been beaten that badly it's like a fighter just look at it as a Fight there's plenty of times you're going to ring you fancy the job you're unbeatable yeah yeah it's all in the head other times you're going to ring think this geese is too good for me you've lost before you start yep it's in the head but over a period of time you learn a little bit more about yourself because you have more experience in different circumstances then you find out what you Really
are I found out I'm unbeatable I can't be beaten it's impossible you condemn me you can damage me you're never ever gonna beat me I'm too happy to I'm too happy not to exist come on tell us what well that actually takes us nicely onto rule number seven doesn't it life ends in tears yeah you know my father never taught me anything because he was you know he wasn't an active father yeah but what he Did say was don't waste a minute son yeah don't waste them but everyone knows this everyone knows this already but
we all walk around obsessed with the tiny little things that get us down or frustrate us or missing a bus or you've managed to get rid of those things like how have you done that well again I think you just compartmentalize it compartmentalize your brain into such what's important what is important in your life you know you can make a list Couldn't you most importantly in life family without a doubt that's don't want to plug my book but business a close second is what it says on the back page and that's exactly what it is
everyone knows but when it comes to Sunday lunch around my house you took dinner my wife will pick out your plate and give it to the dog end of story no one disagrees the woman's in control you know she's in charge she's the Matrix of the family and that's how it should be well good I've been used to that succession of time when my grandfather retired at 65 I remember him saying about a month before he retired to my grandmother Gladys I don't know what we're going to do in retire because my pension is only
going to be three or four quiddle month or week or whatever how are we going to survive she said well we've always got our Savings wheel and he looked at her and never forget his face savings we're talking about savings she said well I've always put a few pound away have you he had no idea been married 45 years he had no idea he said how much have we got she's a little over six thousand pound he nearly had a heart attack six thousand pounds I mean that was Enough to buy a little Bungalow by
the way when he retired in should be nice and some change but it was like he had absolutely zero idea so you know just go through your life I mean it's terribly easy to say and people are out there suffering we're in a recession there's gonna the gap between the Haves and the have-nots is widening every day we've got to do something we've got to do a lot about it because this country Is unique and without getting too deep we don't look unique enough for me but somehow or the other you've got to try and
push that to one side because we're we're going through the motions of waiting to die so deal with it and you do know I think life begins with smiles and ends with tears doesn't it but that's that's what's going to be that's one thing you can't change so There's no point when you can't affect anything don't give it a moment Saul because that moment is a wasted thought and you could be thinking about something else and as you get older you're now 74. hmm are you more aware of your mortality yeah wow I spend most
of my time planning how I can get around inheritance tax I hate it you know 40 the government that's a very practical way of looking at it 40 you've Already paid tax on by the way I know I know don't tell me don't tell me it's absolutely disgraceful but then I start thinking about there's other things we can do I think there's three stages like this is five stages in life but really three for most people number one is the selfish stage when you're fighting to get out wherever you are not trying to achieve you
whatever you're doing you could be a rich kid you still can be selfish that just poor Doesn't change anything it's an attitude perhaps you're not a nicest husband perhaps you're not the nicest father you're so determined to succeed you've got to run over people to get there yep there'll be casualties then you get to a certain stage where you sing I'm getting there inside you start to relax your metabolism slows down a little bit now I used to have a terrible temper when I was younger that's gone it's gone I smile at everyone now did
that go oh 73. no there are times but no but what I'm saying is that's the selfish so the next one is that when you can be a decent father decent husband and a better person and you're into the the swing of business and life and you're mature a little bit and then you you become a little bit nicer the third Stage is where you say well that's all taken care of now so I can look at my community or where I come from and perhaps do a little bit of good to that it does
go to number four we can say I can look at my country and say how can I do well for the country and number five is how can I do well for the world but unless you're Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates or Warren Buffett very rarely do we get to number five I don't suppose I'll have a dramatic effect on the world But I can have an effect on where I came from and the community I work in and that is actually another Target as for later in life because the great thing about making money
and being successful is the race is over when you've done that there isn't a chapter on what to do with it so you might as well do some good with it see that reminds us a few of our Previous guests that we've interviewed Barry have spoken about a book called the second Mountain by uh American writer called David Brooks that says that the first mountain of your life is your stages one and two yeah the second mountain is stage three when you start thinking about Legacy and wider impact so how how do you intend to
make a difference to a wider community well I've it's not something I'll Publicize number one because I always hate people you know charity charity giving charity publicly is not really charity so we started the matrim Family Foundation okay and we support various mainly children's auspices or wherever I have a place of business so I'm in Bristol where World snook is based I have a children's hospice there Sheffield which is very important to me I have hospice there Couple in London right one inch Stoke funnily enough because Stokes where a lot of darts players come from
okay and particular scheme on for the kids in dag number where I was born so and that's a beginning there's not we haven't finished at all but as I say the game the business game is over what do you want to do well you know it's if you could get to a stage in your life where you sit there and probably I've got less expectations Than a lot of other people I can't think of anything I need I need to get up in the morning I need to watch some competitive sport where I see people
really achieving their dreams and entertaining me by their excellence but me personally I can't think just give me another day is all I think give me another day and while you're doing that You know you've been quite smart you've had a few results God's been kind to you there's a surplus there that will be used and actually it's quite rewarding but it's not something again I don't think I've ever talked about this before it's not something I really want to share to be honest with you because I don't like the downside of that which is
what well thousands of letters I mean you know 1000 I pick what I want to do and I try and do it well And I want to make I want that to be a family Legacy because we've been fortunate and you know somehow or another God knows how I've been successful so it's good but but that race is over and when the race is over you don't need anything else all right let's talk about one of the reasons why the race has been successful even though you say God knows how you've Given us your life
lessons in this interview and number eight on your life lessons is nothing will change by sitting on the sofa well it's a little bit like the work ethic one really but sitting on the sofa comes in different stages you can start off by being lazy what worries me today especially amongst some of the youngsters that I see is that there's not enough get up and go and a lot of that is society's problem it's not the the kids weren't born like That no maybe they didn't get enough Parental Guidance maybe maybe they didn't get enough
activities at school maybe maybe they got in with a wrong crowd who'd failed earlier I don't know but for whatever reason is we need to get people motivated to do something if the facilities don't exist I'm a big believer in government spending on sport which I don't think is anywhere near enough I think we should be spending the Same amount of money on sport as we send on defense there's a percentage of gross national product that we allocate to overseas good causes and yet we've got 30 percent of children undernourished in this country all these
things I can't live with I don't I don't see the rationale to it but when you look at kids is depressing sometimes and it may be not their fault but it's very easy to Get in that rap gang culture you know peer pressure against kids we talk about carrying knives and things like that you know hardly ever did I see a knife growing up you know see a lot of people who were tough guys a lot of people could fight but they weren't you know there wasn't the drugs and all that sort of stuff as
much as there is today and this is an issue that's got to be dealt with Because these kids if you take away someone's dream you know I had a dream you had it we all had dreams when we were growing up sometimes you want to be you know when I was seven I wanted to be heavyweight champion of the world so bad I used to listen to Rocky Marciano fights on my transistor radio and you know four o'clock in the morning underneath the big clothes so my mum and dad didn't hear I remember the first
fight was Rocky Marciano and Archie Moore Oh yeah and I remember the first Ali fight I ever listened to was Ali against Archie Moore yeah unbelievable so we had a dream and what worries me about today's societies not enough kids have a dream and it's our job to give him that dream some earlier if you were given 30 seconds or a minute in front of a bunch of young people What do you say to drive that message home to them I've done lots of things with young people I should do some little stuff in the
Eastern London with the police on kids who are on second or third chances and I also asked some questions I used to horrify me first question was always hands up how many of you get out of bed before midday on Saturday 6 out of 20. how many of you I've got a Part-time job on proper job not running Bits of Paper around for bouncers to sell drugs to people proper job part-time or full-time 6 out of 20 and the worst how many of you do active sport 6 out of 20. it's a bad percentage when
we were growing up everybody tried to do anything you know one of the things you know I always think about darts is you know not everyone can be a professional Footballer kids can tie a dartboard in their bedroom and smash the granny out of the treble twenty come out and put on the developmental tour and win a few Bob and be a hero in their community because they're not professional footballers they're blokes that might earn 20 grand a year are suddenly earning 200 Grand a year but they look like the bloke around the corner so
that accessibility is why boxing has always Been so special because you can come out nothing and just on your own efforts you can become something my job was because I wasn't good enough I mean I would like to have been them looking back I'm glad I weren't because our module goes on forever until the good Lord takes me but you know that extra ability to go that extra mile is what we've got to put in the kids today and it comes down like everything to money no we spend so many billion a year On defense
to safeguard this country which I accept but we're safeguarding the character of the country and Sport builds their character of that country so my mindset says spend the same on both it's not about inviting test match players or Europe or or footballers to Downing Street for a photo opportunity with the then incumbent prime minister I wouldn't go until you start doing something for Grassroots that gets on my Wavelengths where every kid's got a chance not just private school kids this the diversity is what I'm looking for Equal Opportunity barriers to entry to be removed everything
should be based on ability because life is a meritocracy end of speech [Music] number nine on your list for life is avoid being a secret if you're good admit it if you're great shout it from The rooftops but this do you know what when I wrote that I didn't realize how smart that was when you look at sport today so much of it is becoming it's more important to be famous than be good that's a bit of a generalization but if you're not famous you're never going to maximize your commercial earnings so many great spokesmen
have gone under the radar I mean I was thinking that Take aerogram bomber Grime one of the greatest middleweights of all time he wasn't particularly famous he didn't have a style that was particularly attractive commercially and no one wanted to fight him because he was so good yep you never made the money Chris Eubank Nigel Ben I believe Harold Graham would have boxed their ears off yeah yeah they never got the chance so it's about opportunity it's about taking your chance at the Right time it's it's so important today's world to be known you know
it's funny that a huge social media following you know look at the YouTube boxes I mean good lecture listen good luck to everybody that makes a living it's a tough old world but don't tell me they're any good because they're not But they're very famous and they make millions and millions of pounds more than a kid who's come up the hard way and paid it you know don't seem fair when I was a chartered accountant I was from a different area in those days I was very lucky to become a child to get in in
the first place from where I came from was unusual on occasions not every day I qualified very young I was probably one of if not the youngest fellow of The Institute or one of the father ever of all time I was so I mean I'm super smart now don't tell lies tell the truth I used to wear a white suit to work every now and again yeah yeah and people used to go potty but everyone knew who I was when you come up for thinking about jobs or promotions they knew me they wouldn't have known
me otherwise I'd have just been another faceless Individual but I turned up looking like John Travolta every now and again and people would take the mick I remember getting into a lift with a senior partner of my firm one of the biggest firms in the world and he looked down his glasses I'm in this white suit and he said do you work here I mean yes sir I'm I'm Hearn from such and such good Lord You remembered me the rest of his career and hundreds and hundreds of people in the office so when you talk
about boxes we talk about personality as opposed ability great if you've got both but that's quite rare but then you go look at isn't that not the case in all sports you know is uh I don't know is a cricketer better now than he was 20 years ago so who knows he's a boxer better who knows he's a snooker player How many people know Ronnie O'Sullivan in compare I mean difficult to say that because Ronnie's been around for years and years and years but the personality and what they say the media work they do how
much they put themselves out that's what I say to people now if you look back on the snooker era I got eight snooker players in a room and said right we're we're in a soap opera boys we all need a roll So I'm not going to change anybody but I'm going to accelerate accentuate your personality so Dennis Taylor you're the little lovable fat Irishman that tells jokes tell jokes all the time Dennis Griffis you're Welsh so you think you can sing so when you're playing snooker have a little sing song every now and again and
comb your hair all the time Davis you're the boring one wear a white Shirt black tie you only drink water and you don't talk Jimmy You're The Artful Dodger you can't read or write but you can work a six horse accumulator out faster than any man I've ever known and we went through all of this and then you just pick the same thing up in darts everyone gets a nickname everyone gets entry music and they'll go out and live it tell the crowd you're happy to be there show them by your face you appreciate Their
support like don't have a barrier Embrace how do we move that into the real world if you like like into people's everyday lives who are listening to this but what do they do and how can they be better that's how you starve yeah and it's not just being better at what they do it's being better known for what they do So you're doing a podcast there's a couple of people listening to this podcast the better you Market your podcast which is marketing you the more successful you'll be so don't be a secret by the way
if you're [ __ ] be a secret final lesson is number ten when you need a hand you're more likely to get a kick in the nuts when you need no help there'll be a Queue of people waiting to give you things which is one of life's great Mysteries and it's more a mystery than a lesson really because it's what exists when you need a helping hand you find out who your friends are and you're surprised at how few there are that's life you're much more likely get a kick in the nuts people around you
really want to see you fail most of the time I love the phrase keep an eye on who doesn't Clap when you win yeah and you see there's a lot of them yeah yeah but also you'd be surprised at people close to you really want you not to be successful yeah because your success reminds them of their failure so tell us more about where that where you've observed that in your life I think any successful Sportsman is you know with a habit in this country of building people up and they're knocking Them down we've done
it regularly over the years through the media mainly but that's just part parcel of air we look on our own shortcomings and criticize those that don't have those shortcomings because we really want them to be more like the failure that we are in in a bigger picture yeah so what you would find is on the way up no one's going to give you nothing in a way that differentiates between Success and failure it's a greasy Pole some people get up a greasy pole over and over and over again you know other people will slide down
say I can't do it when you get success that's the scary bit you don't pay for anything I remember going out with Steve Davis years ago when snooker was massive in the 80s when we were mates I mean one of the nicest thing is still my best mate Now although we're so different people you wouldn't think we could ever survive with each other but we actually in a way bizarre way feed off each other I mean Steve Davis has done five glastonburys now most people don't even know he's a snooker player I think he's DJ
Thunder muscle foreign band so he tells me I've listened to it it's not my style but we'll give him a plug anyway Utopia Strong wow it's a it's a mushroom from Holland anyway [Music] all of a sudden people just give you things so why are they giving rich people things for free it's nice bizarre what's what what does that do and of course we're we're gonna we're gonna take it do ya yeah well they were confident That's why I still take I still take my hair shampoo out of the hotel when I go when I
leave don't you and if I and if I put three in my bag and there's three more I'll take them as well what I mean just what you do I mean Eddie goes out and I mean he gets dressed by people I'm not going to give them a plug because they're not dressing me so they don't deserve that but you know I'm like I know how much these clothes are and you think Jesus Christ you wouldn't you know it's a fortunes it's just it's just this bizarre trait of human nature to be kinder to people
that don't you don't need to be kind of and forgetting the people that you should be being kind to and that goes right through Society see but I'm surprised that like that's why I'm asking you about do you take it because I won't tell you the name of the Person at the top of this but there's a there's a famous football manager that told me the story how he when he first got famous he had that experience of people giving him stuff free meals things like that and it was one of his colleagues that said
there's no such thing as a freak male there's no such fingers of free so they'll come there's a price that they'll come back again there's two things to do firstly if I go back to when Steve Davis was massive we Used to go out to restaurants all the time and we used to toss a coin because we're mates who's gonna pay okay when he had to pay he would ask for the bill invariably they would say Mr Davis it's a pleasure to have you here when I lost I used to Pastor give me the bill
after a few times I said you know let's not toss a coin you ask for the bill all The time which we did we never paid it's bizarre that what your friend is talking about is quite right is levels of favors really you know you never do a favor favors have to be repaid having a Gratis t-shirt or whatever is not a favor is usually cash or Services beyond that right and then that's when you're in Trouble so you don't do favors because favors have to be repaid and that can be very bad for you
right I like that distinction it's a big distinction big distinction I mean someone gives you a Ferrari that's not that's not giving you a gift what I'm saying is just the general walks of life is you know you get in a taxi and the taxi driver goes Bell I love the darts mate I don't I'm not taking money off you that would be an insult to take money off him now of to give him money yeah no so it's it's levels right but you're right you mustn't do favors I'll never know there's no such thing
as a freedom when you say there's no such thing as a free lunch there is but there's no such thing as a free Ferrari or a 300 Grand or whatever yeah final question for the people that have listened to this conversation and it's Been absolutely full of amazing gems and life lessons and wisdom what would you want to leave people with people from all walks of life in all ages and all backgrounds and all levels of success listen to this podcast and it isn't a podcast about success it's a podcast about happiness I think you
do have a different attitude and I'm sure young people won't relate to some of the things I say as much as the Elder people because what I'm Talking about is what your granddad might tell you or your great aunt uncle or your dad told you when you was younger um the biggest lesson of all is just comes back to be the best you can be that's all you can do you can't do anything else so there's no pressure because you can't be better than you can be and try and do it with a smile on
your face And don't tell yourself too seriously because I'm not brilliant thank you so much Larry amazing [Applause] just a quick one to say thank you so much for watching this content on the high performance Channel we would love it if you would subscribe you know most people that watch what we do don't subscribe if you can subscribe we can make this bigger better Bolder than we've ever done before so hit subscribe Right now and help the high performance podcast make a real difference to the world see you soon [Music] foreign [Music]
