JT McCormick: Episode 1

Transcript

[0:00:00] Host: This call is being recorded.

[0:00:13] JT McCormick: Hello?

[0:00:14] Host: Charlie, what's going on, sir?

[0:00:16] JT McCormick: JT, how are you?

[0:00:18] Host: I am excellent, always excellent.

[0:00:22] JT McCormick: Awesome. So glad. Congratulations on everything that's going on.

[0:00:29] Host: Like I said in Slack, man, the hustle is real.

[0:00:34] JT McCormick: Yes, indeed. Welcome to Author Hour. This is a quick greeting message because we're getting a couple things set up for your interview. So sit tight, stay on the line because we'll be joining you very soon. JT, I'm sorry, are you still there? Okay, it dialed me in twice somehow.

[0:01:05] Host: That is why we do this.

[0:01:08] JT McCormick: Exactly. I'm thrilled to have the chance to interview you truthfully. I read your book I have so many notes and I was telling Andrea last night that reading JT's book is like a chiropractic adjustment for your attitude. so motivating. It brought some awareness to some things personally that is some thought patterns of mine that I hadn't reflected on in a while. It got me back on course. On a personal level, I want to thank you for doing it. I think it's great. It's really remarkable.

[0:01:59] Host: What were a couple of those things that it brought to light for you?

[0:02:04] JT McCormick: There have been a few things of self-doubt and there have been a couple of situations that I've been kind of miring in my own worry or cynicism and just kind of letting that consume more of my energy than was helpful. It just was hurting me and other people because of it. It's come at such a great time because I really want to step up my game and be a leader at the company. I really felt like this came at the exact right time that I needed this. So...

[0:02:57] Host: Excellent, man. I am sincerely humbled by that. I'm shocked at the emails I'm receiving, the conversations people are having with me in their takeaways from the book. And it's still... I'm getting more and more comfortable with it. But it's still incredibly humbling and flattering that people have read the book and will then tell me, hey, JT, you did this for me, or your book did this for me, and it gave me this mindset, or really showed me what hustle is. And I'm so humbled by that because I'm like, hey, that's my story. That's what I got.

[0:03:47] JT McCormick: Right. And there's plenty more of that to come. I think this is going to make an amazing episode. And I'm going to do what I can and I'm sure the rest of the tribe will too to help get it in front of Jeff. That would be awesome. So a couple things before we start, I've got an hour set aside for us to talk. If we go over, is that all right with you? Or do you have a hard stop? Okay.

[0:04:16] Host: Nope. If we go over, if we need hour, hour and a half, I mean, the goal for us, two things. One, obviously want to make sure that we test out all the kinks, tests, everything we need to make sure we put together a phenomenal process in podcasts for our authors. And then two, like you said, I'm completely secondary, but I'm excited to listen to this afterwards.

[0:04:43] JT McCormick: Yeah, absolutely. Did you have a chance to read the How to Prepare for Your Interview page on Author Hour's website?

[0:04:53] Host: I did. I did.

[0:04:54] JT McCormick: Okay, great. So you're a special case. So just to be upfront with you, I use that template based on another show that I thought Author Hour might fit the mold on. But going through your story and all my notes, It really became clear to me that I really want to ask you as much about your journey as I possibly can. And so there's going to be some of the initial template, but we're going to veer more toward asking you a bunch about your story. Is that cool?

[0:05:30] Host: Yeah, definitely.

[0:05:33] JT McCormick: Alright. So let's do this. We're going to start... I'd love to start with you actually reading the first page of your book so that we can use that in the episode at some point.

[0:05:50] Host: Charles, you know that would actually be 100% awesome if you asked me if I read the damn template. Now I'm sitting here thinking, okay, where is actually my book?

[0:06:10] JT McCormick: If you want to look for that or do it later, we can do that. But if you think it might be nearby, let's do it.

[0:06:18] Host: Let's do it later, Charlie. Cool. Here's why I ask for me. I know you get the luxury of going through and editing and things of this nature. As much as I believe this is going to be incredibly beneficial for our authors to do this, I am not very fond of my reading skills. You read my book. They're not great. They're not the best. I read very slow so I can retain the information I'm reading. So for me to actually read on the podcast, I don't believe would be too beneficial for anyone.

[0:07:00] JT McCormick: Totally. And I completely appreciate where you're coming from. And I'm going to note that for future authors, because a lot of people feel that way. So totally. I'll figure out what might make sense. You don't have to read it at all. I'll handle that and figure out what makes sense. So, JT, how did your life start? What were your earliest memories?

[0:07:29] Host: Wow, earliest memories. I have often thought about that and my earliest memories are riding the bus with my mother and our small apartment that we had are my earliest memories and I believe it takes me back to maybe four years old. I don't really remember anything before that, but riding the bus with my mother and our small apartment are the pieces I remember most and just how loving she always made our, the little that we had, she always made it so incredible. And it seemed like we had so much more. I mean, for the longest, I just didn't know we were poor.

[0:08:20] JT McCormick: And how did you find out you were poor?

[0:08:25] Host: One of the biggest memories I remember, I recall, and much of this that you'll hear me say is in the book as well, I joked with people that we were so poor we couldn't even afford the O and the R. We were just poed. And so one of the It's a very touching memory for me because I always remember how disappointed I was, but I remember when I would go through the lunch line at school and I would get free lunch. We were on welfare and so I, you know, product of the system and I got free lunch. But when you would get free lunch, you got white milk with your free lunch. If you wanted chocolate milk, it cost a dime. Well, I never had that dime. And so I would sometimes try to sneak a chocolate milk on there in hopes that the cashier would not catch that I put a chocolate milk on there, but it never failed. She always caught it, and she put a white milk on there and put the chocolate milk back. But that was really when I realized that, yeah, we were poor. We don't even have a dime for me to get chocolate milk.

[0:09:39] JT McCormick: And were you like the other kids? Were other kids trying to steal chocolate milk? Or were you the only one?

[0:09:47] Host: Oh, no, there were several kids around me that were in the same poor situation. But it was, you know, it's interesting, at least for me, I was never one and I believe Charlie said this is maybe a long, When did answer here, but I was never concerned around those people around me and I believe why develop that attitude was. Being a mixed-race child, half white, half black, black people didn't like me because I was half white, white people didn't like me because I was half black. So I had nowhere to fit in. I had a piece of an identity crisis there. So I never looked around at, okay, they're poor, just like me. That didn't mean anything to me. It was I was poor. I didn't have money for my chocolate milk. And that's all that mattered to me. I didn't care that other kids were broke or poor as well.

[0:10:49] JT McCormick: So how did you form friendships then? It sounds like no one wanted you around.

[0:10:58] Host: You know, I had some friends that, you know, I never really had a problem doing my best to fit in. Fortunately, as a little boy, I was at least coordinated. I guess I had a little bit of athletic ability, so I was always good at playing whatever game we were going to play and was always picked to participate when you pick teams and things of that nature. So I was always okay there, but it was... You know, I never really had a friend that I identified with, that this person's mixed race just like me. I didn't have any of those. Until my freshman year of high school, when I moved to Texas, that's when I personally got my first friend.

[0:11:54] JT McCormick: How did you find it having a dad who was a pimp? Were you able to look up to him?

[0:12:03] Host: In many ways I did. You know, it was the few times that my father would come and pick me up for the weekends. It was magical. I'd stand in that window for hours waiting for this man to show up. And more often than not, he didn't. But when he did, oh, it was like I was a lottery winner. And he showed up and I'd tear ass down the stairs and run to his arms and jump. And he'd pick me up and give me a hug. It's the greatest thing in the world. And I always remember, If we were going somewhere that maybe took 15 minutes to get to by car, it took us a freaking hour and a half because he knew everyone. We'd stop at every corner. People would wave hi to him, stop, you know, whatever the case may be, be it he may have been selling some drugs, be it that he had prostitutes that he had to check in with, or be it that there were guys that just looked up to him and wanted to be like him. As a kid, you see that and it rubs off on you. But I looked up to him for certain things. As I got older, the admiration wasn't there as much as it was when I was a kid. But when you're a kid, you're just looking for some love from your dad.

[0:13:21] JT McCormick: How did you start to find out that what he was doing maybe wasn't so great?

[0:13:32] Host: Every time, if I was just with my dad or maybe my half brothers and sisters, we were just with our dad, it was peaceful. But whenever a woman was around, it just was never peaceful. There was always an argument. There was always violent, belittling, calling a woman bitch or out of her name or whatever the case may be. I started seeing that my dad, the other side of him, from the part that I love being picked up and held, he just wasn't a good person. And although he was never violent or mean to me, or my brothers and sisters, my half-brothers and sisters, man, he was a monster when it came to women.

[0:14:27] JT McCormick: Yeah, actually saw him pull a woman out of his car and beat her highway.

[0:14:36] Host: Yeah, it's one of the stories that stick out to me the most. My dad had had us for the weekend, me and two of my half brothers. And my dad had this, I'll give you the, set the whole stage for you here. My dad had this red El Dorado Barrett Cadillac in the 70s and that was the black man's car of choice. And he had ordered it custom and he was the only person who had one. So he loved that car. He loved that car, I believe to this day more than he loved his kids. Obviously he had 23 of us. So he loved that car. So anyway, One day we're driving, we had just gone to Wendy's and he's got one of his, his prostitutes in the, in the front with him and they're arguing and that wasn't, there wasn't anything abnormal about that. Like I said, every time he was around a woman, there was an argument of some sort. Well, when you rode in my dad's car, you technically shouldn't even breathe. Don't, don't put your feet on the seat. Don't, don't mess up anything. Sit there, be still. And so we're driving and they're arguing, she pulls a burger out of the Wendy's bag and she hits my dad in the side of the head with it. Now, most kids, in my opinion, would immediately think to themselves, oh shit, she just hit my dad. Well, my immediate thought was, oh shit, that burger just opened up and fell on the car. Oh my God, what's gonna happen? He stops in the middle of the highway, just consider major highway in any major city, stops in the middle of the highway, puts the car in park, walks around, pulls her out of the car, commences to beat her ass, and then pulls out her purse, dumps it on her, pulls out the food, dumps it on her, shuts the door, comes back around, puts the car in park, we drive off, she's laying in the middle of the highway, beat to a pulp. He casually and just calmly turns around and looks at me and my brothers and says, so hey, where do you guys want to go to eat? Like nothing happened. Like he had just picked us up or something. And it was so traumatic. But to this day, you saw how detailed I could tell that story. I just remember how traumatic that story was.

[0:17:06] JT McCormick: And how did you deal with that? I mean, it seems like you saw that kind of thing on a pretty regular basis growing up. How were you able to deal with that trauma?

[0:17:19] Host: The relief for me or maybe the better word is relief for me is if my dad, like I said, it was on occasion. If I was fortunate, my dad picked me up twice a month. It was a great month if you pick me up three times, but if my dad picked me up on a Friday evening, I always knew I was coming back home Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening to my mom. So regardless of how chaotic it was when I was with my dad, and God knows it was chaotic, I always knew I was going home in two days or the next day or later that afternoon. So I feel that that was a huge coping mechanism for me. However, there was a lot of stress that I remember carrying because I never wanted my mother to know the things that I saw when I was with my dad because I knew she wouldn't let me go back. And so I was always cautious of what to say, what not to say around my mom. And I just always felt like I was tiptoeing on, you know, if she said, oh, well, how was your weekend with your dad? I may get ready to break into story, but I had to pull back and sugar coat it, change the details of it a little bit.

[0:18:41] JT McCormick: Right. Because you still wanted to see and have a relationship with your father.

[0:18:45] Host: Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.

[0:18:47] JT McCormick: So you spent most of your childhood with your mom, who sounds like an incredible person. How was she able to make so much magic out of living in poverty?

[0:19:03] Host: You know, everything was just made to be fun. The first nine years of my life were with my mother and we obviously did not have much, but she made the most of everything we had. One of my favorite stories, or it was every year that I remember, we had this little three and a half foot Christmas tree. And every year my mother would put a sheet on this table and she put the Christmas tree on top of the table. So for me as a kid, I always thought this tree was huge. It wasn't until I was in my thirties, I was at a store one time and I saw a price tag and it said, you know, three and a half foot Christmas tree. And I'm like, holy shit, that was the size of my tree. Our trees suck. But she always made Christmas phenomenal, and she made the most of it. You know, we didn't have a lot of decorations, so we would put one decoration on, then she'd make a step back and we'd have to look and admire the decoration and make sure we had it in the right spot. Maybe we'd go back and move it somewhere else. And so we decorated this tree that had maybe 15 ornaments at best, three of which I probably made in school at some point, and we, that was an hour. this little three and a half foot Christmas tree, or we'd pop popcorn and string it and put that on the tree. We had this half ass string of lights, Charlie, and we'd put it on the window and then we'd walk down outside and we'd look up at our window and I'd see this half ass string of lights on our window. But for me, oh, that was Rockefeller Center. I mean, it was incredible. So she always made things bigger than what they were.

[0:20:57] JT McCormick: And what else did she do? I know she did a bunch of things.

[0:21:02] Host: She loved me. You know, I always knew I was loved. She always said I love you. She always said, you know, you're special. And I believe a lot of that came because my mother was raised in a children's home. And when I say children's home, I'm talking old school orphanage where There were no rules and regulations. No one was checking on these kids. We're talking institution child prison is what she was in. She has no clue where our last name comes from. And so I believe so much of that had to do with the love she gave me because she was never loved. And here she had this son. And it was technically all she had in the world. She didn't have anything else. There was no aunts. There was no uncles. There was no fallback. There were no material possessions. She had a son. That was it. And so I was the benefactor of incredible amounts of love.

[0:22:05] JT McCormick: And she tried really hard to make you always feel loved even when your dad wasn't there. Uh, one of the stories I remember is you realizing that you were getting fake dad toys from mom.

[0:22:23] Host: Yeah, it's so, so to, to, to paint the full picture there, Charlie, what, what would happen is if you recall early on, I said, My dad would call and say he was going to come get me, and I'd wait in the window for hours for this man to show up. There he is. There he is. Oh, no, that's not him. There he is. No, that's not him. And I'd fall asleep in the window four or five hours later because he'd never show up. And that was the norm. More often than not, that's what happened is he just never showed. And so I'd fall asleep. I'd wake up, and my mom would say, oh, sorry, honey. Dad came by, and you were asleep. He didn't want to wake you up, so he left you this hot wheel. He left you this little book, whatever the case may be. And so, although I was disappointed that my dad, I had missed him because I wanted to go with him, I felt like I had this piece of, oh, great, my dad gave me this. So I'd go outside, and all the other little kids were out there, and I'd brag, yeah, my dad brought me this. It sucked because so many of these kids didn't have fathers either. So I'm out there bragging about my dad. Look what I got. My dad brought me this. My dad's cool. He does this. He's got a Cadillac, blah, blah, blah. And when I was in my 30s, out of conversation, I found out that my dad never brought those gifts. It was my mom who gave me those gifts because she didn't want to see the disappointment on my face. And it wrecked me in my 30s. I was angry. I was pissed. I mean, I was just mad at the world because I felt like all of those childhood years were fake, that here I dedicated some love in my heart to my father for a person who really didn't do anything. It was my mom, and I should have been loving her instead of my father. But as my mom pointed out to me, When you have children, one day you'll understand that you'll do whatever just to make them happy. And that's what she did. She wanted to make sure I had a smile on my face.

[0:24:28] JT McCormick: And now seems a great time to mention the fact that you're having your third child.

[0:24:36] Host: today. So my wife is actually in labor as we speak, maybe more information that you want to know, but she is dilated and we are on 100% baby watch. But as anyone who knows me or is close to me, I have a motto that is that the hustle is real. And I don't have a lot to offer my children in this world. But daddy has the ability to teach them how to hustle. And if my kids know nothing else about their father, I want them to know that their love and their dad hustled no matter what.

[0:25:18] JT McCormick: Absolutely. Now there was a time where you weren't getting that love anymore. You got separated from your mom. How was that period in your life?

[0:25:35] Host: absolute worst five years that I look now I'm 45 years old. Those were the worst five years of my life. I was separated from my mom at about nine and a half years old through about 15, age of 15. And it was just horrific. It was horrible. Yeah, that was a bad stretch for me.

[0:26:03] JT McCormick: How so? What happened?

[0:26:06] Host: Um, long story short, my dad had decided to get out of the hustle, uh, pimp game for whatever reason to this day. I still don't know other than the fact that supposedly the pimp hustle game was stronger in Houston. So I believe he was going to go try his hand at it down there, but He ended up actually trying his hand at living a quote-unquote normal man's life. Well, I went to see my dad one summer when he was in Houston, and while I'm there, come to find out when I was a kid, my mother was accepting welfare, but she was also working. And God only knows all the ins and outs of welfare and collecting it, whatever, but she was going to be forced to go to prison for welfare fraud. Well, lo and behold, my dad knew the person who was going to report her and potentially be the person who was going to send her to prison. And my dad knew this individual because this individual liked to snort cocaine and he liked prostitutes. And my dad had a connection with this guy. So my dad met with him and said, hey, you know, you can't send her to prison. What can we do? And the guy said, look, the only way she's not going to prison is she's got to leave the state of Ohio. So again, my dad living in Houston, He took my mom out of Houston. They didn't have a relationship anymore. He was just he was more so doing it because that was my mom and she came down to Houston and I was there with my dad and she got there. This is back in the eighties when they had all adult apartments. So my mom was let me all adult apartment. I'm living with my dad. And it was OK for a bit. I got to see him each day. There was a bit of normalcy. But then all of a sudden, now I'll try to be brief with this, all of a sudden, he just couldn't do the normal working man's life anymore. He said, I'm out. I'm going back to Dayton, Ohio. He left. He left me there with one of his girlfriends and two of my half-sisters. And then one day, my dad's girlfriend decides She doesn't want to stay in Houston anymore. So she starts to pack up a U-Haul. We get ready to leave. And I say, hey, I want to see my mom. I want to tell her that I'm leaving, whatever. And she says, no, we don't have time for that. So I was pulled out of Houston, went back to Dayton, and my mom didn't even know where I was. She had no clue that I left, nothing. And so there I was. And life just went downhill from there.

[0:28:57] JT McCormick: And how did life go downhill from there?

[0:29:02] Host: You know, I'll give a couple of stories here. My dad, when we soon got back, my dad's girlfriend was just not a nice person. And I don't know if I'm allowed to say these things on the podcast, but she was my dad's quote unquote bottom bitch. And what that means in the pimp language or the street is this was my dad's number one woman, meaning she stuck with him no matter what. Through thick and thin, she produced money for him, whatever the case may be. She was that bottom foundation, foundational woman for him. But she was a horrific person. So what happened one time is my dad said he was going to go to England for two weeks. And this was the day after New Year's. He said, hey, I'm going to England for two weeks. I'll be back. And he left me with my dad's girlfriend. And at this point, I had two half-sisters and a half-brother by this lady. And so my dad leaves. And shortly thereafter, It's mid-February, and my dad's girlfriend says, hey, I'm going to go to the store and get a pack of cigarettes. She left mid-afternoon, evening comes around, she's not back. Next day comes around, she's not back. Three days later, she's not back. And so I'm stuck here with my half-brothers and sisters who are two, three, and four. I'm not going to school because I can't leave them. Now three, four days into this, we're running out of food. And so I tell the four-year-old, hey, sit here with the babies. I'm going to go down to the store. Don't get up.

[0:30:52] JT McCormick: How old were you at the time?

[0:30:54] Host: I was 12, 13 years old. And so I'm telling a four-year-old, hey, watch the kids. And so I go down to the store. I steal some food, I come back, we eat, and so this goes on for five days, seven days. Well, all of a sudden, it rolls up that my middle half-sister, it's her birthday. And I'm going to apologize up front, Charlie, because this one may emotionally hit me, but it's her birthday. And no one's here. I haven't gone to school in seven, eight days. I have no clue. My mom's in Houston. My dad's in England. I have no clue where their mother is. We have no phone. So I'm like, what do I do? So I pulled into my bag of mom tricks and thought, OK, how do I make her birthday special? I had the oldest one watch the kids again. I go down to the store. I steal a bag of Oreo cookies. She was turning three. I opened each Face Oreo cookie, and I put a candle in each one and, uh, that's how we celebrate it.

[0:32:07] JT McCormick: That's beautiful.

[0:32:08] Host: So, but yeah, in fact, fast forward that a little bit to give you the whole, uh, horrific part of the story. Um, 13 days later, the mom shows up. And she opens the door. And of course, my half brothers and sisters, that's their mom, they're excited. They go give her hugs. And, you know, they're just happy, joy everywhere. They're giving her love. And I just stood in the background, pissed off. And I go up to this lady after everything calms down. And I'll be respectful here. I look at her and I say, where the F have you been? This lady punched me so hard. It put me down on the ground. My ears started bleeding. She commenced to start kicking and beating me. And by the time she was done, my body just ached. I was just hurting. So I ran upstairs. I'm sitting in the room. I decide I'm going to run away. I jump out of the window. I'm like, to hell with this. I'm done. So I run away to my Uncle Bobby's house. And my Uncle Bobby immediately, you know, he's got four kids of his own. And he goes, son, you can't stay here. So he takes me back. Well, if you thought the beating before was bad, that beating after I got back was way worse. So I just remember my insides just ached for days. The next day, one of my other uncles picks me up and takes me to another one of my dad's girlfriend's house. So I get out there and I'm out in the suburbs. No clue where I am, Charlie. I have no clue. I've never been to these suburbs. No clue where I am. And so I get dropped off. I'm at this lady's house. She's got two kids. Everything's good. My first week there, I feel like I'm being treated like a little brother. Life is great. I'm getting dinner each night. I got lunch money. I'm getting chocolate milk when I go to school. I mean, it's lovely. So, but then Friday night comes around and her boys go off with her dad for the weekend. And I'm left there with her. And I don't know if maybe I look like my father or she was pissed off at my father, but come to find out she's a raging alcoholic and she starts beating my ass. And at this point, I had just gotten tired of having my ass beat. And I commenced to beat her ass. And so she called the police and I went to juvenile. And that's, like I said, it was a downward spiral from there. But those are just a few of the horrific pieces in that five years that took place. In and out of juvenile three different times. My mother not knowing where I am. Yeah, just, it was horrible.

[0:35:05] JT McCormick: Wow. I mean, there's so many questions. Before we talk about Juvenile, how did you deal with this day to day, knowing that you were coming home to get beaten?

[0:35:25] Host: You know, you, put together, I don't know if you want to call it a defense mechanism, but you go in and you do your best to smile, you do your best to not give attitude, you do your best to not trigger this individual. And the way I would give an example is much like when you hear women talk about domestic violence, and I've often heard said that they would just tiptoe, walk on eggshells, and didn't want to piss off the individual. That's how it was for me. It was just, okay, let me just do whatever they tell me to do. Let me smile. Let me not give any attitude. just, you know, I'll go to school the next day and I'll stay out of the house as long as I possibly can. Whatever I can do to keep peace, that's what I'm willing to do. But, you know, as a 10, 11, 12-year-old kid, I mean, that's the stress of that. No kids should have to live that way. And unfortunately, to this very day, so many kids live that way.

[0:36:36] JT McCormick: Right. How has it affected you to this day or does it still carry weight? Are you hypersensitive to other people getting triggered over things or not?

[0:36:51] Host: Not so much hypersensitive to other people getting triggered, but I'm very, I say this respectfully without trying to sound arrogant. There, in my opinion, there aren't too many people who can read people better than I can. I read a situation, I pay attention to my surroundings, I walk in the room, I immediately identify how many people are in this room, where are they sitting, who's doing what. I'm hypersensitive about my surroundings and how to navigate the individuals that I'm working or dealing with at the time.

[0:37:30] JT McCormick: How does that look today?

[0:37:36] Host: And in the role I'm in or a personal life.

[0:37:40] JT McCormick: Not exactly today, but how does that look at, say, a business meeting? What are you doing differently that other people have no awareness of?

[0:37:54] Host: Watching the room, seeing who is sitting up, see who sits back, who's writing, who's not paying attention, who's engaged, who's not. Who's contributing? Who's not? Reading their facial expressions. Do they give doubt to the other person's insight? I read the room. I pay attention. I stay engaged the entire time, and that directly comes from my childhood. You know, if you, and I say this respectfully, if an individual grew up, I'll use my kids. My kids will grow up in a two-parent home, financially well-off, There's no chaos here, so they won't have to sit in a business meeting with that same type of skill set. I grew up in a manner of where those tools have served me well in business of understanding what's going on around me at all times.

[0:38:58] JT McCormick: It actually made me wonder if people in the FBI who do this for a living are naturals at it to the circumstances that they grew up in. Anybody can be trained to be better at it, but to have it developed at such an early age, it's remarkable. It's unfortunate how it happened, but it's really remarkable.

[0:39:22] Host: It is unfortunate, and I've always made the argument or the statement that I fully believe, wholeheartedly believe that if more inner city, low economic youth, doesn't matter what race, more economically challenged youth were given the opportunity in business, you would see so much success from these individuals because When you grow up in chaos, you learn real fast how to make order out of chaos. When you come from a structured, disciplined, routine home, you don't always understand how to make order out of chaos. And in many ways, sometimes business is chaotic. And so for someone who comes from these stressful environments, The stresses of business aren't stresses for us. We just see the way to structure everything to make it work.

[0:40:24] JT McCormick: Right. And one of the most stressful and chaotic moments for you, one of the most stressful moments I can recall from your book is you becoming homeless. How did that happen?

[0:40:43] Host: You know, I'll share two sides of that, Charlie, because the actual, if I had to say the most stressful moment in my life, if I boil it down to one story, one occurrence, it wasn't homeless. It was actually when I was, when I first got to Houston with my dad, we were living in a weekly rent motel. You know, not hotel, motel, weekly rent. And my dad was basically running prostitutes in and out of this hotel. And so here we were in this motel and at the time I'm nine and a half years old. It was the summer right after my fourth grade year. I'm nine and a half and I'm there with my six month old half sister. And she's got on the diaper. It's Houston. It's humid. We're in this cheap motel. She's crying and crying. And I cannot get her to stop. Her mother's out on the corner trying to pick up a trick, i.e. customer. And I'm with my baby sister. And she won't stop crying. And I don't know what to do. This is the first time I've ever been away from my mother in this capacity and I don't know what to do. She's crying, she's crying. I'm picking her up, I'm bouncing her, I'm rocking her. What do I do? And I'm talking to her like she's going to talk back to me. And this was a tough one for me because I swore this story would never come out and we put it in the book. But I got so frustrated that I threw my six-month-old baby sister on the couch. Oh, the stress. I mean, it's stressful right now to think about it. And I immediately, I mean, as soon as she left my arms, I immediately just caught myself and I ran over and I picked her up and I just pled with I'm so sorry and she's crying even more now. And so many people hear that, and they feel that that's the climax of the story. That's not the worst part of the story. Actually, what breaks me so much is I'm holding my baby sister, she's crying, and her mother shows up with this man, the trick, and her mother tells me to leave the hotel room with my crying baby sister in nothing but a diaper, She takes the man in, they go do their business in the back room. I'm walking around this weekly motel in the parking lot, scorching sun in Houston in the middle of the summer with no clue what to do and me and my baby sister just sweating like no other and I'm just completely lost and no clue what to do. And damn, that was the most stressful thing that I've ever gone through.

[0:43:53] JT McCormick: I can't even imagine. How often do you think back on that day?

[0:44:01] Host: I try not to. In fact, that was a story that I had put chains around. I put it in a vault and it went to the bottom of the Pacific, the Atlantic, the Gulf. It was at the bottom of all the oceans. And I swore that I would never repeat that story. And the only reason that story came back up is my father passed away while we were doing the book. And I went back to Dayton, Ohio after 30 years, had never been back, went back to my dad's funeral, whole another story. But to keep with this one, I saw my baby sister, the one that I was left with, And I talked to her and I told her the story and I broke down and I cried. The hardest thing I ever did. And she said she forgave me. She said it wasn't my fault. She knew. She said, look, our mother was horrific, speaking of her and my half brothers and sisters. She goes, I know that. She goes, I'm not upset with you. come to find out they had some great childhood memories of me when I was the one that was taking care of them and going to the park and walking places with them. And I never knew that after 30 years. And so I had made peace. Obviously, you see it still hits me. But I made peace with the fact that my sister was OK with it. And I got it off my chest. And so I decided, OK, If I'm going to tell my story, I'm going to tell my story. We're going to put that in the book.

[0:45:50] JT McCormick: Wow. How was it to be able to release that emotional burden and to open it up? How did that feel after?

[0:46:01] Host: Oh, Charlie, I would take it a step further. Personally, for me, my whole book was damn near 45 years of therapy within a year of doing this book. So many stories that came out that I had to retell that just lived in the back of my mind that I had tucked away. And I say this, I took those stories away, but I would also tap those stories at times because when any time in life something may seem stressful or hard, I tap a story from my past and like, if I got through that, I'd get through anything. There's nothing that I can't accomplish given the horrific shit that I dealt with in life.

[0:46:53] JT McCormick: But how are you able to maintain that attitude when so many others, through similar circumstances that are equally or even more horrific, lose their spirit, their energy, and they just turn against the world? How are you able to function?

[0:47:15] Host: I've had people push back on me when I say this. What I've learned early on is everyone is not going to like me. You know, I can take that all the way back to my childhood when my mom and I were walking home from the bus one day and all of our stuff was on the curb. I remember I was four years old. All of our stuff was on the curb and the owner of the apartment complex came out and he said, and forgive me for saying this, he said, no nigger lovers can live here. And he put the ER at the end of it, and he said, no nigger lovers can live here. And at the time, I had no clue what was going on, but I saw my mom break down. We sat on the curb, and we had nowhere to go. Here we are with our few little possessions, nowhere to go. And so where I'm going with this is I've learned early on, I can't make everybody like me. I can't make everybody believe in me, and everyone is not going to believe in the things that I say. But to your question of how do I keep that going, I have this incredible belief. It's a belief that I was not born with being mentally handicapped. I'm not disabled in any way. I have all my limbs, my arms. I'm not mentally handicapped. Therefore, there is nothing that I can't accomplish, period. And that's the way I live my life every day. Every day. And so many people will push back, well, JT, I went through this. JT, you don't understand it. And I tell people, it's not to try to one-up anyone, but I've been sexually abused and molested by my dad's girlfriends multiple times. I've been left alone. I've been at juvenile three different times. I barely have a high school diploma. I have a belief that I can accomplish anything and I just have to keep going. That's how I live every day.

[0:49:30] JT McCormick: that you realized you could accomplish anything. It's one thing to have a belief, but beliefs have to be founded on some reality.

[0:49:41] Host: Belief can come in something as easy as if you see that someone else has accomplished it or done it, then why can't I? And the problem is so many people never ask themselves, why can't I? They just assume they can't. And I am dedicated to believing that if so many more people in lower economic society could have that belief to know something could be accomplished, it could change their outlook. Because growing up, I had three options. Drug dealer, rapper, athlete. I'm not a rapper, I'm not athlete and fortunately I never became a drug dealer. But no one told me of the fourth option. No one said that there was business. No one said you can be a business owner or you could be an executive or you could grow companies. No one talks about that in the quote unquote hood. That's not an option. And so I feel that if more people knew what is available and what can be accomplished, more people would be successful, but you don't know what you don't know.

[0:51:03] JT McCormick: How did you find out?

[0:51:08] Host: A huge turning moment for me is crappy as it was to live in Houston and the weekly motel and my dad to just take off on us and that whole situation. I do recall my dad driving me through River Oaks. And I don't know if you've ever been through there, but River Oaks is one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the country. And it's like the Beverly Hills of Houston. So it's just immaculate, 25, 35, $50 million homes. And I remember driving through there with my dad. in looking at these houses that were bigger than the apartment complexes that I lived in. And there was just a belief that I want that. Why do they get to live there and I can't? Why don't I get one of those houses? And then he drove me through downtown Houston. And downtown Houston, beautiful skyline, hustle and bustle, people working. And I just said to myself, why can't I have that? What's stopping me? If that person's doing it, if she's doing it, why can't I? Who made the rules that said I can't do that? And I made a promise to myself that no matter what I do, I will be trying to do the very best I can at whatever it is. And that started with cleaning toilets at a casual dining restaurant.

[0:52:38] JT McCormick: Yeah. So I want to talk about how you got going in the business world and how you got your start. But first, I want to ask you, what do white people not understand about being black? And what do black people not understand about being white?

[0:53:02] Host: First of all, I greatly appreciate the question because One, if I may dig a little deeper into that question there is one thing that has always bothered me from my childhood is I've always been looked at. Because I had a black father, I was black. And it always bothered me. And I've always told people, no, I'm not black. And some people see that as, oh, what? You're not proud to be black? I'm very proud to be black. But I'm equally proud to be half white. I'm no more proud than the other side. I am half black, half white. If you just say I'm black, you completely cut my mom out of the picture. And the problem that I have with that, it was my white mother who was there taking care of me. And I'll be damned if someone's just going to label me as black and cut the person out who actually raised me and who was there through the struggle. That in itself has always just pained me with our society that, oh, well, I've even heard this said. If you ever drop a black blood and you're black, bullshit. Who made that rule? Where did that even come from? And so I'm very sensitive to when someone said that. And so I'm equally happy to be half white. as I am equally happy to be half black. I am a mixed race, blended, half-half, whatever you want to call me, but that's what I am. And, you know, all those kids made fun of me when I was a kid and called me zebra and Oreo cookie and chocolate and vanilla swirl. You know what? I am happy for what I am. But what both races, in my opinion, don't understand about each other is exactly what you heard me say a few moments ago. You don't know what you don't know. And if you grow up in a predominantly white community, you don't know. how black people live. You don't know their lingo, how they communicate their likes, dislikes, and equally on the black side. You don't understand white culture. You don't understand how the suburbs operate. I'll give you a great example of this. As a kid, I used to watch a show called Good Times back in the 70s, and it was about a family who lived in the projects Their dad was always getting laid off. They would not have enough money. The heat would get cut off. The elevator wouldn't work. There was always struggles going on within the family, but they had love. I identified with that show. I understood the struggle. I understood the love. I understood the pieces of how they lived. But then I would watch the Brady Bunch, and I just could not comprehend how six people lived in a house with a maid, a cat, a dog, two cars, and the mom didn't work. It did not comprehend to me. And so you don't know what you don't know. And I do this a lot with the kids that I mentor. No one's ever taught you how to shake hands. You don't know how to shake hands. And to make it that basic, that is my opinion of why blacks and whites have some of the struggles they have. No one's really taking the time to understand one another versus everyone's just, well, you're different from me, so I got attitude.

[0:56:56] JT McCormick: Yeah. And amazing. This was all during The time after Rodney King and leading up to OJ, if I understand the timeline right, which was an incredibly tense time. So it must have been extra challenging to be a mixed race.

[0:57:15] Host: It was. And in fact, going down the business path, because that's actually when I started really entering the business world, It's actually where, you know, people can say I sold out or I was embarrassed or, you know, I really don't care what people say, but because I was bound and determined to find a way to succeed. I realized that I would be judged at times based on my name. My actual name is Javon. And although back in the 70s, that wasn't a popular name. Well, as time has passed in the 90s, and now Javon has become associated with, quote, unquote, as a Black name. And so I never wanted anyone to judge me before you even understood me or got to see my work ethic or my character. And so what I found myself doing was I took my name, Javon, and I shortened it to JT because you have no clue who JT McCormick is. If I'm on the phone with you and we're doing a sales call or we're trying to negotiate a deal, you don't know who JT McCormick is. But if you're on the phone with Jevon McCormick, you've already judged me before you've even had a conversation with me or tried to understand my work ethic or my character.

[0:58:39] JT McCormick: Right. Yeah. Before we transition into the business stuff, let's talk. I want to say what my favorite story is from your book, which is, how did you find out about pizza delivery?

[0:58:58] Host: Oh boy. I had just moved to Texas. from Dayton, Ohio and my mother was living in a lower middle class area of town and she was renting a house and so I thought it was great. You know, here me and my mom were in this house. Well, it was the summer before I was to go back to school and I had made a friend with a kid. His name was Jeff, and he had a brother named Stephen, and they had a mom, they had a house and a dog and a bird, and both boys had Nintendos and TVs in their rooms. Each person had their own Nintendo. I thought, wow, you guys are rich. And so I'm at their house one day, and the mom says, hey, Javon, do you want pizza? Yes, ma'am. That would be great. And so she said, well, what would you like on the pizza? I go, my attitude was, shit, free pizza.

[1:00:00] JT McCormick: I'm not picky.

[1:00:01] Host: I go, whatever you order, I'm fine with it. Thank you. And so doorbell rings 30, 45 minutes later, and she asks, she goes, Javon, can you answer the door? Yes, ma'am. So I get up, I go open the door, and the guy standing there with the pizzas, he said, I've got your pizzas. And I'm looking at them dumbfounded, like, OK. And I didn't know what to do. I just stood there. He's looking at me. I'm looking at him. And I'm like, so what's the work? What are we doing here? So I turned around, and I called for his mom. And I said, someone's here at the door. And she comes over, and I watch the transaction. She gives him some money, and he hands the pizza and the soda to her. And so I shut the door, and I'm following her. And I'm watching the pizzas there, and she's got the sodas. We go into the kitchen and I'm puzzled. She opens it up and she goes, what kind would you like? Would you like soda? And I said, wait a minute. Why did they bring the pizza to the house? And she goes, what do you mean? So they're laughing like I was joking or something. I go, no, don't we need to go get the pizza? How did they bring it here? And this goes on for three, four minutes and they finally realize I really don't know why this happened. And so the mom says, oh, you order pizza, and they deliver it to you. You call them up, tell them what you want, and they bring it over to you. And I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. And she goes, no. And I said, I'll be right back. I tear ass out of the house, run down the street to my house, and I bust into the door. I'm like, mom. You can order pizza and they'll deliver it to you." And she looks at me and starts cracking up and I go, what? And she goes, really? Like she goes along with it because I was so excited. I go, isn't that crazy? I go, mom, we have to do this. And she goes, I promise you we will. I go back down to his house and we eat pizza. But yeah, that's how I found out about pizza delivery. I was 15 years old.

[1:02:10] JT McCormick: Oh, that's great. This makes me want to ask, what do wealthy people not understand about being poor? And what do poor people not understand about being wealthy?

[1:02:23] Host: Oh, God. That's a whole other podcast. That's another book. So I'll start with the poor side first, because that's where I started, and I've been very fortunate to be financially successful. But I'll start on the poor side first. And I'm going to use some examples here. Have you ever heard... We all have heard the stories where there's been this athlete that has made $50 million over his seven-year career, only three years later to be broke. And here's from a financial side because you asked me, you know, rich people versus poor people. Well, that deciding factor is money. And what happens is if I'm a kid from the hood and I've never had anything and you give me this free scholarship to go to college, that's an upgrade. because now the school pays to feed me, I get free lunch and breakfast, lunch, dinner, you know, and so that's an upgrade and I'm getting a free college education. Great. Well, now I get drafted to the pros and someone just signs me for a three-year $15 million contract. Well, I've never had to budget $1,000 a month. I've never had a budget, a checking account. I've never had $2,000 a month, let alone all of a sudden I get $5 million a year. It's very easy to figure out how they end up broke. The reason why I personally have been financially successful is it was not an instant thing. It's been gradual. I've worked my way into it. I've understood budgeting. I've understood savings. You know, you don't get your money and first thing you do is you run out and buy the brand new Jordan. That's not what you're supposed to do. But I've learned those lessons over time. Now, that's the poor to rich mentality that if you've never had money, you don't know how to budget it, you don't know what to do with it. And in many ways, you also don't know how to make it. You know, if no one's ever showed you this is what you do, you go to work, you save, you put in your 401k, blah, blah, blah, you just don't know what to do. You don't know what you don't know. Now, equally on the other side, rich people, wealthy people, whatever the case may be, what don't they know about being poor? I will keep this directly with me. I will have three children who will grow up incredibly well off. If they want to go to Harvard Medical School, it'll be paid for. They'll never have student loans. They'll grow up in a gated community, and so they'll have a very, very, in many ways, soft and nice life. They'll never understand the struggle, the hustle, what it is to do without. And for me as a parent right now, it is my greatest struggle in life that how do I give my children everything and teach them to appreciate it. Because as a person, you truly only appreciate something when you've never had it. So for me, I didn't grow up with cars. Me and my mom rode the bus everywhere. We had to go to the laundromat to wash our clothes. To this day, Charlie, you take away all of my money. You take away everything that I have. I will have two things. I will have a car and I will have a washer and dryer because I'll be damned if I ever ride the bus again and I'm never going into a laundromat again. So I appreciate those things because I know what it's like not to have them. Rich people don't understand. Not all. You know, I don't want to speak holistically, but a great majority of rich people don't understand what it's like not to have those things, to go to bed hungry, to go two days in a row with no food, to have the lights turned out, to not even be able to flush the toilet. Many rich people have no clue what that's like.

[1:06:51] JT McCormick: And how did you start to get yourself out? You had a childhood, of not having those things, going to bed hungry, wondering if you were going to be at home that night, wondering how you were going to get out of juvenile. How did you start to get out of all that?

[1:07:16] Host: I was very fortunate that the last time I was in juvenile, I was in there for two and a half months.

[1:07:29] JT McCormick: Why were you in there?

[1:07:32] Host: For beating up a kid and putting the kid in a coma. That goes back to what you asked me earlier. I was homeless for a stint and I was sleeping on a bus stop with my suitcase. But school was a bit of a peaceful place for me. It gave me somewhere to go with something to do. You know, I knew I could eat someone's leftover lunch that didn't need it, or maybe some little girl would buy me lunch. So it was a place that I could go. But I had my little suitcase with me, and I show up, and my suitcase didn't fit in the locker. So I had to walk around school with this suitcase, embarrassed, obviously. And you know, when you're middle school, kids are relentless. And so this one little boy just would not stop messing with me. We're about four days into me carrying my suitcase, and I snapped. And I just beat the hell out of that kid. And he went into a coma. I went to juvenile. And so when I was in juvenile, dad was in England, mom was in Texas. No one knew I was in juvenile. I was just left there. And no visitors, no nothing. And by the grace of God, My mother named me Javon at the time, which was not a common name back in the 70s, early 80s. And so one of the officers in the correction facility asked me, he said, hey, do you have an Aunt Jane? And I perked up, yes, I do. And she said, okay. And she walked off and I was, what's that about? come to find out, she called my Aunt Jean. She goes, hey, don't you have a nephew named Javon? And she was like, yeah. She said, this kid's been here two and a half months. No one's called. No one's come to visit him. She goes, I don't think anybody knows he's here. And so my Aunt Jean picks me up, takes me to eat. Well, then she takes me over to my Uncle Bobby's house. My Uncle Bobby, for whatever reason, decided to take me on. And that was really a first look into what a structured life was like. My Uncle Bobby was completely opposite from my dad. He went to church. He had a job. He had worked at General Motors for 20-something years. He had kids. He had a couple of rental properties that he owned. I mean, we had Bible study on Tuesday, Bible study on Thursday, and we went to church on Sunday, and it was structured. Everything he did was on time, punctual, and whatever you do, damn it, you better do it to the best of your ability. And that was really a change for me in my life to see what could be.

[1:10:16] JT McCormick: In what way? How did you see this? I guess, how did it feel to transition into that from where you were?

[1:10:30] Host: It was incredible where some people, I remember my cousins complaining and moaning about doing chores. I thought to myself, okay, wait a minute. All I got to do is wash the dishes and I get to live in the house. I get lunch money. I get to go outside and play. I was like, oh, this is phenomenal. I'm in. And so chores were like, great. I didn't mind. My Uncle Bobby hate to go cut the grass. Not a problem. The change for me was the structure. Regardless of what kids may or may not say, I believe kids like structure. I loved it. I loved the routine of knowing that Tuesday was Bible study. Now, did I always like going? No, but the structure, the routine, the rhythm. It was incredible. And I would say the biggest part with my Uncle Bobby is he taught me a few pieces. I was only with him for about 18 months, but he taught me manners.

[1:11:29] JT McCormick: Yes, ma'am.

[1:11:30] Host: Yes, sir. Thank you. May I please? So on and so forth. And so I've kept those with me throughout my career, even to this day. But he also taught me to keep your word. No one had ever kept their word. My mom did the best of her ability, I would always tell people, my mother and I survived. That's what we did. We didn't live. We survived. My uncle Bobby showed me what it was like that if you do this, you can get that. And I had never had that before.

[1:12:08] JT McCormick: You know, it really comes across that your hardships early on in life where you were deprived of things, actually gave you a healthier perspective when you did get them, and it made you want to keep them. Do you think that more people would actually benefit, not exactly from your type of upbringing, but some of the elements of it?

[1:12:36] Host: Totally. I can't say it enough. In my opinion, how do you appreciate something if you've always had it? If you've been born into money, it's almost expected. This is the way it is. I was born into this. I can't be mad at my kids because they've got a room full of toys. I bought them. I created that. How do you know how to appreciate something if you've never gone without? I love to this day when I go into our pantry and there's food everywhere or I go into the refrigerator and there's food everywhere, like my daughter just has gallons of chocolate milk in there because I didn't have chocolate milk. Makes me feel good, but that's all she knows is that, damn it, I opened this refrigerator, there better be chocolate milk in here. So I don't know how you, You teach that and, you know, really, I just, my belief is so much of my upbringing has benefited me as an adult because I always tap back into it and remember what it was like to walk into a room, flip the switch on, and no lights came on. I flip the switch now, lights come on, and it still makes me feel good.

[1:13:57] JT McCormick: And you seem like a person, I've known you for a little while now, and you really have always struck me as a person who has a genuinely positive attitude. You learn from the CEO of one of the companies that you worked for to always say, I'm excellent when people ask how you're doing. What about the days when you're not so excellent?

[1:14:29] Host: I go back to what I said earlier, Charlie, is do we all have days where maybe life's a little what we consider unfair or maybe, you know, Tuesday's harder than Monday was? Yeah, I'm not going to going to sit here and lie. But I always come back to, you know what? I live in this beautiful home. I had healthy children. I always remember what I come from. And again, I can't say this enough because it is very much a foundational piece in my positive attitude. I'm not mentally handicapped. I don't have any disabilities. Therefore, I've been blessed with the ability to be positive and happy every single day because I can get up and create anything I want for myself. And what I have found for me through hard work, hard work in sacrifice, you can do anything because that's really all that I'm made up of is hard work, incredible results-driven work ethic, and I'm willing to make sacrifices to obtain anything that I want.

[1:15:49] JT McCormick: Yeah. And your career has been that all the way through. It's nothing but hard work. You started off as a janitor, then you became a candle maker, then you worked in a mail room. How were those experiences formative in where you have eventually ended up as a president of a multi-million dollar company, two multi-million dollar companies?

[1:16:19] Host: Yeah, it's... I still smile when I was listening to you walk through there. It makes me smile to remember when I used to clean those toilets. And I remember standing there, looking at the toilets and always saying, okay, my toilet's going to look better than any other toilets in San Antonio. And that was my goal, to make my restrooms spotless. And I never... So I was the... busboy slash janitor and I made the iced tea at this restaurant. But I also remember always taking pride in everything that I did. When I wipe down the tables, I make sure that I would wipe down everything, the salt and pepper shaker, make sure there's no crumbs on the chairs, because when someone's sat there, It was, for me, very personal that that was my work. And some people don't look at it that way. They feel it's very trivial and I'm only making my minimum wage. I'm gonna give a minimal effort. And I've always approached things different. I may be making minimum wage, but I'm gonna give maximum effort because I believe no matter what I do, as long as I work hard, it will be identified and I will create opportunities for myself. I live by this. I ask questions. If I say, hey, can I get a promotion or may I have a promotion, please? Worst thing that someone can say to me is no, that's it. So why not ask? So many people go through life upset, pissed off because they feel like they were cheated or someone didn't give them something. And I'll ask people, did you ask? Well, no. What the hell are you mad for?

[1:18:04] JT McCormick: How did you find the courage to ask? Most people are handed things, I suppose, compared to what you had to deal with. How did you realize you just need to ask and can get a lot of things that you need?