Kobe Bryant’s LAST GREAT INTERVIEW On The MAMBA MENTALITY (With “LOST” Never Before Seen Footage!)

to inspire the people next to you I think that's what greatness is or should be it's not something that lives and dies with one person it's how can you inspire a person to then in turn Inspire another person and then inspires another person and that's how you create something that I think lasts forever 66 212 lb from more Marian High School he has given us some great memories over the years how about a big round of applause for right now on the floor number 24 the black Kobe Bri my father just gave me a hug and said listen whether you score zero or score 60 I'm going to love you no matter what now that is the most important thing that you can say to a child because from there I was like okay I gives me all the confidence in the world to fail there's a quote from one of my English teachers at La Maran named Mr Fisk rest at the end not in the middle and that's something I always live by when you're in this culture in our society you can do some phenomenal things individually but they'll never reach their full potential unless you do them collectively the spirit of your team must be good because at that moment is when teams fracture if the energy amongst each other isn't there that trust isn't there you're done nothing in this world moves without story and if we're going to try to make the world a better place story is a right place what brings you the most Joy right now being with my family what does love feel like I think I describe it as a beautiful Journey you know it has its ups and Downs things are never perfect but through love you continue to persevere and then through that storm beautiful sun emerges I'm so excited for you to watch and experience one of Kobe Bryant's last interviews for me it was so inspiring to connect with him and hear about his stories about love life basketball relationships and what it means to leave a legacy and his definition of greatness also we have 5 minutes of exclusive bonus footage that has never been released that I'm going to share with you at the end of this interview and also share with you my whole experience of meeting Kobe and the lessons I learned I'm so excited for you to watch this interview and to see the bonus content at the end it's content that we found recently that we are now releasing with this interview again stay tuned to the end and I hope you enjoy one of the great interviews of Kobe Bryant welcome everyone to the school of greatness podcast we have the incredible legendary Kobe Bryant my man it's good to meet you pleasure man um congrats on everything you're an icon a legend and the thing I love the most about you is that you really care about other human beings yeah your heart is so big even though you've been known for this Focus mentality that is just almost psycho in some ways but you care deeply about human beings and I think that's why so many people love you as well so I want to acknowledge you for your kindness and your generosity towards Humanity um my first question for you is I'm curious about who was your greatest teacher growing up because you had an an interesting childhood being in Italy for a while coming back to Philadelphia I think it was who was the greatest teacher for you in those early days it was funny I had a lot of them my parents were were great you know growing up you know they instilled in me the importance of imagination of curiosity and understanding that okay if you want to accomplish something I'm not just going to sit here and say yes you can do whatever you want yes you can but you have to also put in the work to get there right so they taught me that at a really early age man and uh when you grow up as a kid thinking that the world is your oyster all things are possible if you put in the work to do it you know you grow up having that fundamental belief yeah who was more influential for you your father or mother it both were influential at different points yeah right my uh my mom was there on a daily basis uh my father uh was really influential at a really critical time where I I had a summer where I played basketball when I was like 10 or 11 years old and a very prominent summer league in Philadelphia called The Sunny Hill League where my father played my uncle played and they were like alltime great all stuff and both Chamberlain played in the league you know early prom role playing the league and here I come playing and I don't score one point the entire summer really not one how old were you 11 101 and you're playing against other 10 11 year olds or and you didn't score once not one were you in the game I was in the game how did you not score cuz I was terrible really yeah that 10 11 years old you were that awful I mean I you know and I had these big knee pads on cuz I was growing really fast I have socks all the way up here and I had like the P top like skinny as hell and I scored not a free throw not a nothing not a lucky shot not a breakaway layup zero points and I remember crying about it and being upset about it and my father just gave me a hug and said listen whether you score Zer score 60 I'm going to love you no matter what wow now that is the most important thing that you can say to a child because from there I was like okay that gives me all the confidence in the world to fail I have the security there but the hell with that I'm scoring 60 let's go right right and from there I just went to work and I just I stayed with it I kept practicing kep practicing kid practice is that when you think the mentality of hard work started to come in for you at that age when you failed so miserably I guess that summer I think that's when the idea of understanding a long-term view became important because I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week I wasn't going to catch him in a year right so that's when I sat down and said okay this is going to take some thought right what do I want to work on first all right shooting all right let's knock this out let's focus on this half a year 6 months do nothing but shoot right after that all right creating your own shot then you focus so you start I started creating a menu of things when I came back the next summer I was a little bit better right menu mean like I've got my jump shot from 15 I've got my I got my jump shot from 15 I got my three-point shot like just open shots not miss open shots right be able to shoot it with speed cuz those kids are so much more athletic and then the next summer I came back it was a little better and the summer came back next sum I was a little better I scored you know it wasn't much but I scored this is 12 13 12 13 then 14 came came around back half at 13 14 uh years old and then I was just killing everyone and it happened in 2 years and I wasn't expected happen in two years but it did because what I had to do was work on the basics and the fundamentals well they relied on athleticism and their natural ability and because I stick to the fundamentals it just caught up to them and then my body you know my knees stopped hurting I grew into my frame and and that in your athleticism once you have the fundamentals exactly the hard work work the mindset and you tack on the it's game over then it was Game Over wow so from 13 you're good average still I I was good I was good then about about like the end of my thir like right when I was turning 14 I became best player in the state at 14 at 14 so from 12 to 14 you went from scoring zero to being the best in the state of all ages yep but it's it's simple like if you do the math on this right like if you if you're thinking about how often kids are playing mhm right I tell to my to my daughter and my daughter's team as well that I coach it's a simple thing of math if you want to be a great player if you play every single day two three hours every single day over course of a year how much better are you getting most kids will play maybe you know an hour and a half two days a week right math on that it's not going it's not going to get it done it's not going to get it done right so if you're obsessive obsessive obsessively training 2 three hours every single day over a year year over two years they accelerate you make Quantum leaps man just doing a summer camp for two weeks you you see a difference I remember playing B you get a lot better and you come back more confident playing on the playground with guys who used to beat you yeah and I and like I I tell the parents with my team I said it's it's when I say your kids are going to become great basketball players they like really like yeah it's not there's no math that's it show up every single day show up every single day do the work but you have this Mamba mentality your book's coming out soon and how did you develop this there's a there's a beautiful story that I love from Jay Williams I don't know if you remember jayon Williams where he did an interview a while back and he talked about how when he played you I think the first time or one of the first times he played against you he was he was like I'm going to show up so early to the court to warm up and practice like before anyone and he shows up at the court I don't know if it was in LA or where it was and you were the only one there already shooting free throws already doing your fundamentals he goes I'm going to stay here until Kobe leaves and then he was like gosh an hour and a half 2 hours later I got to go I'm tired and Kobe's still shooting free throws scorn like just going over the fundamentals he goes and then we played that game and you were lights out and he came up to you afterwards and said like dude why were you in there for so long and how' you do it and he said this is what he said you said said I knew you were watching and I wanted to show you I was willing to outwork you right something along those lines yeah yeah I don't know if you remember this I remember you remember yeah and I thought that was so powerful that you have this mindset but how did you devel that I I don't know if that's what you call the mamb mindset but how did you develop that and when did it start it started in in middle school and high school because a lot of the kids that I was playing against were inner city kids yeah and so you're looking at me as if okay this kid is soft right he's from the suburbs of Philadelphia his father played in NBA played professionally he's got it easy got it easy born on second you know all this sort of stuff right and so they felt like they could try to be physical or try to intimidate me do all other stuff which they couldn't right but now I'm saying okay well you're trying to attack me how am I going to attack you how can I mentally figure out ways to break break you down how can I show you that no I have the edge right and so that's when it first started for me is figuring out how to get the upper hand on an opponent that way and what would you do to mentally break people down then well I mean you know like uh we used to have an All-American camp that I used to go to and you know at the time when I first showed I was a sophomore and um one of the things I would do is while everybody would be at the cafeteria work you know eating and doing this other stuff I just go back to the gym I just go back to the just they' be resting they and they'd see me leave right but now you're in a tough position CU you're like okay I want to be like I'm following the kid to go work out but I know he's working he's up early and he's doing all the sort of stuff and so that was my way of show of showing them yeah maybe from the suburbs but you're not going to outwork me wow and I'm mentally going to did someone teach you that was that just a thing that you decided like I'm going to get in people's minds um I think it's just it's just figuring out ways to to to be better and and to win the game and it started as a defense mechanism because you know they were the ones talking trash to me and you know kid from Italy blah blah blah and all sort of stuff and it was like okay I got to I can't let them I got to defend myself here right then it became okay you know I'm I'm I'm pretty witty I can say some pretty witty things Italian Italian it's interesting you know I never I never was physically gifted to uh an extreme level I was always really good but I was never like the fastest or biggest or strongest but I remember my Edge was I'm not going to go party and I'm not going to drink alcohol right so I've never been drunk still cuz I was like I need every Edge when guys were out partying late at night who were better than me and drinking and showing up hung over I was like I'm going to be more focused and have Clear Vision and um but I wasn't w up at 4 a.m. like you so well that's that's interesting because like when I when I played um one of the things I had to learn is how to get the best out of my teammates yeah and most people think it's a simple thing you know pass them the ball you know but that's not how you make guys better you have to really affect their behavior how do you do that so yeah know like I would tell guys you know you got to back to backs you know I don't care if we're in Miami I don't care if we're in great City or Chicago you can't go out we got to get rest right back to back G back to back games right Monday Tuesday play Monday and play again Tuesday guys AR going to listen right you you know so few times say all right we'll all go out we go out together really I'll drink with you right but the next morning I'm banging on your door at 5: in the morning let's go they're not getting where we going I'll hung out with you now you come hang out with me this is what we do all right let's go and you're at the gym we're working out right we hit the bus we go to practice we play that night and they're dead and they're dead they're like lesson learned really lesson learned take them out once listen if you're going to do that do that but don't let that compromise what we're here to do this is why we're here this is why you're here in the first place yeah right and if we're going to win a championship we have to have that Championship mentality work ethic that's it so you got to show them no coob can do that and still has the energy to get up and do this so either I got to meet that same energy or I got to keep my butt in my go to B early yeah wow what are some other things you did to uh rise the level of the your teammates what are some other ways you can uh and what do you think people can do in general with the business team or any sports team I think you have to you have to listen you have to pay attention to to what your colleagues or teammates are saying and what are certain things that drive them certain things that motivate them that trigger them uh and uh one of my favorite ones pal hates it every time I tell the story he hates it he hates it but we we lost to the Celtics in know8 and it was a physical series I mean they beat the crap out of us yeah and so we go into the Olympic year that year we wound up playing Spain for the gold medal match and we beat them uhhuh and so now we come back to start training camp and pal shows up first day of of training camp I have my gold medal hanging in his locker oh no and he I mean like the one thing that he truly truly loves is this country of course that is like everything to him so it just drove him crazy I said pal listen he said you're said listen pal you lost to the Celtics you lost to us in a gold medal match let's not make this three in a row this year wow okay let's win this thing now was that was it for him and he probably stepped up at a whole another level well he he you know pal was a phenomenon to begin with and then for him was just steeping up to a level of physicality yeah that we needed him to get to which he did and we went on to win back to back championships my man how important is understanding human psychology and human behavior to work with a team as a suppos you just relying on your gifts and talents it's uh it's probably the most important thing you know when you're in in this culture in our society you can do some phenomenal things individually um but they'll never reach their full potential unless you do them collectively and you have to figure out how to do that and you know Phil Jackson was great at that Phil uh you know he wouldn't just coach the team or coach the game but he'd read everything about every single player you learned about your history how you grew up um how you were raised where were where were you raised you know he'll read every interview and he'll learn about you and gives him a better understanding of what's motivating you or what your insecurities are right and then it just helps him communicate with you better or even push a button here if he needs to when did you learn that it was important to understand who your teammates are what their likes or dislikes are was that in high school for you or more no it was I learned it from Phil there there was a stretch um in 03 uh where Shaq was out with an injury and Phil called me up to his office and said okay we need you to really turn on the afterburners and start scoring the ball if we have to win so I did and I wind up scoring I think it was nine straight games 40 plus points nine straight nine straight games and then Shaq comes back SEC second to last game of that and then Phil calls me up to his offense and says Co okay I need you to dial it back I'm like why like we're winning I don't understand is because our goal is to win a championship and we can get through the western conference with you playing this way but in the East you know we can dominate them inside with sha and the post but if you continue to do this we'll lose Shaq we'll lose him his motivation his excitement what triggers him right so I need you to pull back so we can pull Shaq forward for June wow and I'm I just looked at him like this one smart dude wow really smart one smart dude man so I pulled pulled it back wow yeah what do you think what's been uh the greatest challenge you've had since leaving the game the greatest challenge um I think it's you know you want an Oscar you're you're launching podcasts and shows and you got a book coming out yeah but it's it's uh it's different though like you know um we were just talking about it here in the office the other day um you know when you play the game MH you hit a game with a shot you miss a shot the reaction is there you can see how people responding to it right you can feel it the energy is the energy is there what I do now you don't like I don't see how people are affected by dear basketball or you know creating the punies and you put it out there like I wish I could see a car ride of a family the first time their daughter hears Lily's lemonade and what she's doing you know she's singing along to it that's not there right so that's the the challenge that's the one thing that I miss is being able to feed off of the energy the instant feedback you get from Shoot missing or scoring a shot winning a losing a game it's like either way you're getting a a result right yes yes yes that's the one thing and and when I went to because I spent a lot of time with mentors as well up at Pixar and Disney Studios it' been absolutely wonderful animation Disney animation and I talk to them about Frozen and Moana and how our kids love them and they're always like oh that's awesome and they want to hear because they don't ever get a chance to truly see it like they they're not sit in the movie theater like no no and they don't have time to go to Disneyland and walk around the park and see how many families are enjoying the content that they've created because they're busy making the next one creating yes yes so that that's the one thing what do you think the biggest challenge is for most athletes after they retire I think it's the fear of of starting a new and that was was certainly uh present for me as well really yeah identity you mean or well it's it's starting from scratch right because when you when you play for 20 years I play for 20 years you reach a certain level you're like okay wait a minute I have to start again at the base of a mountain and try to climb the top of this mountain first of all what mountain am I climbing I don't even know like what the hell am I going to be doing and it be it's very it's very scary it's very scary even for you oh absolutely absolutely and the thing that helped me actually was hurting my ailles because that forced me to sit there and say okay the day could be today that your career is over at any time when you were playing I mean yeah now what do you do you have these ideas about doing something with your life after basketball but what if today is the day that you that's it now what do you do so I had all this time sitting there with my Achilles injury and contemplating and thinking and I said I better get to work wow that was that what was the vision for you afterwards then was it to do what you're doing now or did you have other ideas or what is what's the vision for I struggled with it at first cuz the first question I asked which is the wrong question is what's the biggest industry I can get into was it more money thinking or money thinking saying okay athletes are saying you can't make more Revenue when you retire this is your source of your income is here saying okay that's a challenge what can I do and I remember going for didn't you launch a fund or something I did I did and so I started I went for a ride and I said okay stop thinking of it that way you're thinking of it the wrong way why did you start playing basketball because I loved it right what do you love to do oh I love to tell stories all right let's do that and then that's where it started for me and um and then on top of that it became things like you know you started learning more about the financial industry and about players going broke once they retire and saying okay how can I um how can I minimize the chances of that happening where are things that I can do um to invest my money smartly also help control some of that outcome to a certain extent right and that's when I called Mike repoli who Mike repole was a entrepreneur who built Vitamin Water Pirates Booty and some other companies and started learning from them and then from that came the opportunity to invest in body armor yeah and uh which yeah which we're drinking now delicious um but all that came from the injury and really having to self asset and uh you know face that that really dark room of what comes next storytelling is something you're really passionate about what's a story uh over your life that's been a a constant theme that you go back to is there something you heard as a kid that you that really resonates with you or a book or a movie that just feels like this is me yeah that's funny um movies there are plenty but there's a quote from one of my English teachers at La Maran named uh Mr Fisk he had a great quote that said rest at the end not in the middle and that's something I always live by you know I'm not going to rest I'm going to keep on pushing now there a lot of answers that I don't have even questions that I don't have but I'm just going to keep going just going to keep going and I'll figure these things out as we go right and you just continue to build that way so that I try to live by that all the time rest at the end rest at the end what's the question that eats you alive the most that you haven't answered yet the question that eats me alive that I haven't answered yet that you're still looking for the answer I'm still looking for the answer uh how to tell a good story I don't think I don't think anybody has that answer you know like when when I sat down uh to write de basketball I was like okay what do I want to say and um you know you have certain acts and how you can structure certain things right the es and flows of story uh certain formul that have been there since the beginning of time but it's such an in that an exact sign so challenging yeah right and so that one question is really interesting why do you want to tell a great story I think stories is what moves the world whether it's an inspirational story it's an informational one nothing in this world moves without storym you know be in from the political world Sports World nothing that we have moves without story um and so I think that is the root of everything and if we're going to try to make the world a better place story is the right place to start but most people understand like my my last year people would come up to me and say okay what are you going to do I said I'm going to be a Storyteller really and they go like what are you talking about all right man so so what like what's going to happen when you retire is you're going to go through like a week of depression then the second week is going to be like denial and all I'm like dude seriously I'm good so after a while I just got sick of it and I just just said I don't know I don't I'll go play golf or something right just tell them a why I'm not going to do anything real estate whatever I'm not going to do anything I'm just going to sit around what does losing feel like to you uh it's exciting why is it exciting um because it means you have different um ways to get better there's certain things that you can figure out that you can take advantage of right certain weaknesses that were exposed um that you need to shore up right so it was exciting I mean sucks to lose right but at the same time there are answers there if you just look at them um because you get the information from losing more than from winning probably yeah yeah I mean the answers are there when you win too you just have to look at them yeah right so it's a constant process it's exciting when you win it's exciting when you lose because the process should be exactly the same whether you win or you lose is you go back and you look and you find things that you could have done better you find things that you done well that worked figure out how did they work why did they work how can you make them work again yeah and but the hardest thing is to face that stuff um that's a really really tough challenge you mean face it you mean look yourself in the mirror and say okay this is how I showed up or this is what happened and I give you an example so Katie L Samson is one of the best college basketball players in the country she plays at Yukon she's going to be a senior right now right now yeah and uh she's from Huntington Beach out here by us and so she comes down and she work works with some of my my girls on the team and she helps coach and and uh they just had a really tough season last year where they lost to Notre Dame in the final that's right really tough first loss in like first L years right and so I asked her I said have you watched the Notre Dame game she was like no well why not said I don't want to watch that I said I know you don't but you're going to play Notre Dame this year yeah yeah there's the chances you see him again in the final well you probably see me again I said well you can't show up and play them without knowing why you lost that one right so you know the mistakes that you've made in that game you have to do the hard stuff and watch that game and study that game to not make those mistakes over and over again just because you weren't brave enough to face it so she came down to the office I brought down in the office and we sat down we watched that game together wow right and you got to you got to deal with it got to deal with it face it learn from it wow it must have been cringing for her to just be like oh we playing like we could have won that's exactly it isn't it I just did that one thing I didn't get that foul if I scored that layup that's exactly right you're looking at say oh there's the mismatch oh there's the Gap you know and all those little things and it sucks but but you don't want to have that feeling again do you right so you got to really study it face it and uh not to say you'll win the next time you f but at least you you'll give yourself a better a better chance yeah and did you what was your uh routine and ritual like after every game would you watch almost every game over or certain games all of them every game you watch every game the whole game the whole game yeah so it started with me when I was a um when Phil Jackson's his first year here with the Lakers one of assisant coaches his name was Tex winter and I call him Yoda I mean he was like 82 when he got here wow and uh he was responsible for teaching me the triangle offense how old were you then I was 21 so three years four years in the league yeah so my about my fourth year in the league okay and so uh I I go up to his room and this is when there there were no iPads or anything like that right so when you're on the road yeah you have to call down to the front des and have to bring up the TV with the whole you know the rolly thing in the VHS and the cassette tape you pop it in and I thought we were going to watch what we call touches so watch all your touches when you have the ball all the decisions you make good ones and bad no we're watching the start of the game oh my gosh to the end of the game and not like not like the TV feed watching the in Arena feed the layup line the timeouts oh my gosh yeah rewinding stopping fast forward rewinding slow motion every little thing every game of that season with the 82y old Yoda oh my gosh who is as brutally honest as you can get what did that teach you that season no it taught me to look at detail right look at things things at their smallest right look at body language you know um um look at the energy between players our team and the other team wow right look at the tactics you know look at the overall strategy and they look at how tactically things are manifesting themselves and because I watched so much film then it gave me the ability to see game in real time as if I was watching film wow where I can see because a lot of times the game starts moving really fast but if you train yourself to watch hours and hours of film the game's not moving that fast anymore you can really recognize who's doing what and why then you can position guys in the right places in real time seeing it before it happens yes yeah we you know in football we'd watch it once a week game film but not you know after every game it was only one game a week you got like three three a weeks sometimes yeah you got to you got to go and I know and I know Tom Brady's obsessive over game him as well I mean watching his show uh that came out tomber the time was all about him just in there studying mhm even months after the gain he's studying to prepare right it's just like he's OB and that's that's one of the keys you think it's like if you're not watching film whether it be as a speaker on stage or a performer a musician if you're not watching yourself back you got to learn man I mean Beyonce's same the same thing really after her performance she's immediately on her laptop rewatching the performance no way yes seeing how to do things better what could we have done differently right I mean it's just it's it's a it's an obsessiveness that comes along with it you want things to be as perfect as they can be understanding that nothing is ever perfect but the challenge is try to get them as perfect as they can be and what can you do it's in your control so control what you can I can watch film all day long it's going to help me get better yes yes now did you have your teammates also follow on the obsessiveness that you had as well or did you just encourage them or what was the no you can't push somebody to do that right but what you can do is is Alter behavior and also change the vernacular of how they speak about the game so on team buses team planes in a locker room after practice I would look at the film I'd pull pal Lamar defish pull them aside and say let's look at this right we probably should have done this that and the other so you'll show them the game from a little bit here and there and then you speak to them in in executional terms it's never come on guys we can do better come on guys we can do better better that's rah rah stuff right a leader must give very tactical you know uh things that we can do adjustments okay the defense is doing this that and the other that means we should probably do this this this and the other by Midway through the season through that behavior you start seeing them communicating the same way back to you right and it's like okay Co they're doing this that and the other to you maybe we should do this and like okay yeah awesome great let's do it yeah yeah what about um season 16 17 18 are you still watching every game film as obsessively as the first 10 years not not now no well when I was playing when you were playing yeah so when I was playing what I would do is is um study the film but study our younger players and see what areas do they need to develop in and how can I help them develop I mean that that was the big challenge As you move from you know um being the single dominant player to understanding okay I have to help these other guys how do I lift everyone else up it's tough what I mean you were so dominant your whole career one of the greatest of all time was there a weakness that you had or did you CU obviously you're always trying to master your weaknesses so they became strengths but did you at the end or towards the end did you ever feel like gosh I still haven't like mastered this one part of the game the challenge for me was always um compassion and empathy cuz you're like guys let's go get results shut up don't complain right I don't want to hear your whining I don't want to hear it don't tell excuses don't tell me I rough the water just bring the boat in you know like I don't I don't want to hear it you know and it's uh it's understanding like okay these guys have lives outside of here they have other things happening have other things happening to them that may be affecting the way that they're practicing or the way that they're performing right and it was hard for me to understand that cu no nothing bothered me you know anything personally never phased me when I compartmentalized it very well so I couldn't understand how my teammates couldn't do that either uh until I you know so I had to really work on that aspect of it that's hard so do you feel like you never really had the compassion you wish you would have had like until the last maybe couple years yeah so I think about 09 things started changing for me I started really uh making a conscious effort to better understand and that doesn't mean you have compassion and empathy so you go softer on them it's more like you you put you put yourself to the side and you put yourself in their shoes and understand what they're feeling and then you have to make certain decisions of okay what buttons do I need to push for this player to get them to the next level so it's never it's not sit around and all it's all happy gol lucky type of thing your leader your job is to get the best out of them um even if you know they may not like it at that time yeah wow what are you most proud of from your 20 Seasons um honestly was sounds um may sound a little shallow but I got to say beating the Celtics in game seven um that's what I'm most proud of because it was it was the hardest um you know they playing with ran Rondo Paul Pierce Kevin Garnett allar Ray Allen and you know it was myself pal and the players that other teams didn't want and you know how do we figure out as a group what to do and the reason why I love that Series so much is that we went down three games to two against Boston and now you got two games coming home I remember sitting in the locker room and they beat the crap out of us too that game so we're sitting in the locker room and it's really really quiet I'm sitting there looking around and we just lost to Celtics in '08 so this is like Revenge right and they're kicking our butt again right so I sit around I just started laughing I started laughing and then I remember uh Derrik fiser looked at me like and Lamar looked at me he goes what what is funny said dude they beat the crap they just beat the crap up and said I'm missing the part where that's funny I said man listen if we start this season and they say you know all you have to do is win two games at home in your NBA champ would you take that yeah and like right that's all we got to do yeah go home win two we're NBA champions all we got to do is win two G two games in a row that's it we'll take care of the first game and I promise you they're not winning game seven on our home floor it's not happening so we all just laughed about it and then we went out and we figured it out but that game seven was we're down 15 points in the fourth quarter right and that's when you have to collectively look at each other and say you know the spirit of your team must be good because at that moment is when teams fracture if the energy amongst each other isn't there that trust isn't there you're done and we were able to collectively dig deep together and say all right we're going to figure fig this thing out wow and I wasn't playing well I wasn't shooting the ball well at all um and so my teammates picked you up and they delivered yes yeah wow gosh man I want to be respectful your time I know we've got only probably like 5 to seven minutes left um I saw on Instagram that you're up at like 4:00 a.m. lifting by yourself in the dark and again you've had in one of the most incredible careers arguably of all time uh you know made all the money in the world got a freaking Oscar now you've got all these other things happening and yet you're still waking up or at least you're in the gym at 4:00 a.m. working out and you just turned 40 right which Congratulations by the way I hope I look as good as you um why still wake up that early and train at this level in your life right now well I mean there there's several factors for that like when I first retired let myself go a little bit really you got a little oh yeah oh yeah was awesome oh man I'm eating What In and Out bring it to me let's go steak oh let's go right milkshakes do it let's do it and then the challenge was okay can I get back in shape and it's it's really hard because there's no end goal there's there's no season there's no so how do you motivate yourself to do it do how do you and so for me it was like okay I have to I have to aim for something so I said I want to aim for size I want to aim for bulk right so that's a I thing I'm going to go for that right but then also it's you know my children cuz like you know your kids can't see how hard you work you go to the office I come in the studio they don't really see the effort right so how can we teach our children what it means to work hard well you do it through training right so when I get up in the morning my daughter goes with me 4 a.m. 4 a.m. my 15-year-old goes with me she goes with me before school and it becomes a daddy daughter thing that's cool she just got her permit right so she drives in the morning it becomes a cool thing right but through that process she understands the value of hard work and things taking time and the same thing with my 12-year-old right she practices every day right and so it's through those behaviors uh um is where I find the motivation to do it and what brings you the most Joy right now being with my family really that is man that is the most fun it's just um you know it's uh hanging out with them all summer uh being able to to like do things that I or couldn't do yeah cuz of training cuz of season stuff like that so being around them and watching Bianca grow up because there a lot of things that I miss with Natalia and Giana because I was playing so being there every day with them is so much fun man so it brings me the most Joy that's amazing and what is what does love feel like for you what does love feel like happiness is such a I don't really think I would describe love as happiness I think I describe it as a beautiful Journey um you know it has its ups and downs right whether it's in marriage or whether it's in the career you know things are never perfect yeah but through love you continue to persevere and you move through them you move through them and then through that storm beautiful sun emerges yeah right inevitably another storm comes and guess what you ride that one out too yeah so I think love is a certain determination and persistence to go through the good times and the bad times with the someone or something uh that you truly love um you've got a new podcast out right now called the punies which I started listening to I've listened to the first two episodes it's incredible they're like 13 to 15 minute um episodic uh storytelling you know cartoons I guess yes for kids and the thing I love about it the most is it's it's funny it's entertaining uh there's original music there's all these different characters you're teaching history like in a fun way which I like the last one where it's like you know we we talk about history so we don't repeat it right in our own lives and then you teach a lessons about overcoming failure for kids and insecurities and challenges we're facing and I think it's beautiful can you talk about the punies in the podcast and what it's all about yeah so the punies um came to me from you know we have our family tradition where we watch um the sand lot every fourth of July God it's the greatest movie greatest come on so like that's our family ritual every 4th of July Sandlot Sandlot right and so after watching The Sandlot movie I was like we need a new sports movie like this right so I started kind of concepting ideas and stuff but nothing I truly loved and then uh over Thanksgiving our other rituals to watch Charlie Brown uhhuh right the pumpkin patch so we watch that and then I go whoa wait a minute let's just put those together put those together right and I already had written some stories individual stories for puny Pete and uh and BB so I characters two the characters in The punies and I said well let's combine those let's let's and then from that that's when the punies started coming to fruition and I started thinking about the characters and you know why does this show need to ex exist and where are some of the deeper messages that can be there that consciously you may not observe but but you can sense and feel and that's when I started constructing the show and are you part of the whole process are you helping write the script are you helping so we have a great uh um U young producer here who actually started here three years ago while he was still at SC uh and since grown into a position school yeah greatest film school and so um he and I work together hand inand on outlining every sing single episode so we outlined each episode the story beats and then we found a great writer named John holler he's a great writer and so we gave him the outline and he just made it a thousand times better wow um and then I just I directed each episode and you oversee it all you you you yeah I directed it so um you know the other challenge was finding great actors voice acting is a different skill yes it's a it's a challenging art form I mean you really have to be able to communicate a lot just through your voice and energy with your voice yeah and so the trick was finding actors that have not lost that childlike quality right they can still imagine themselves being children being at the park and playing right and once we found them they really brought the characters to life and now here we are with the punies man it's amazing I want you guys to go download it right now subscribe it's the punies on Apple podcast or Spotify and every anywhere podcasts are at I'm telling you guys there's a lot of parents who listen to this show download this listen to it in your car and do me a favor take a video of your kids in the car and send it to me um send it to or tag me on Instagram tag Kobe on Instagram Kobe BR pleas that would be amazing because that's what's going to give you great feedback oh gosh that would be amazing seeing how kids react so put your phone again don't don't film and drive do it when have someone else filming it right um but make sure or put it on a GoPro and just press record it's about 15 minutes long take your kids school it take to the park too like on Sat we made them on Saturdays like every Saturday it's a new episode because Saturday is normally the day us parents drive our kids to different sporting events to the pool the games the park yes that's why every episode has to be between 12 to you know 15 16 minutes right cuz that's normally the drive yeah right sometimes it may be longer and in that case you can play multiple episodes but that's something you can listen to on your way to an event it's like many Frozen and Moana episodes right it's like little with original music and all that stuff it's really cool go download it again take a video and tag Kobe uh on Instagram are you on Instagram a lot yourself I am on Instagram yeah tag him especially Lil lemonade listen to Lily's lemonade and I would love to see kids out there trying to trying to do the Lily lemonade song love it hopefully we'll get a bunch of video clips for you uh and your book is out in October it's called Mamba mindset do you want to talk briefly about that well the mentality book is is really about um process and craft I've broken a book up into two sections and process is really about the process of preparing M you know through injury recovery uh studying of the game and then the craft is the actual performance and the tactics and so a lot of things that I learned uh through the game were through photos you can look at a photo and see like a player making a move look at the angle of his feet look how he's using his hands on defense and I can really break down things to the smallest detail through that and that's what you'll see in this book I mean it's really a basketball Bible yeah M but it's also your mindset Bible right yeah yeah well you'll see how I break things down like how I'm looking at things to the smallest of detail yeah and uh that's the best way to understand how to have that kind of mentality is to ask questions then find answers and then that lead to more questions and you find more answers and that's what the book is I love it make sure you guys get the book you can pre-order right now download the punies um follow you on social media the final question is what's your definition of greatness um I think the definition of greatness is to inspire the people next to you yeah I I think that's what greatness is or should be it's it's not something that's that that lives and dies with one person is how can you inspire a person to then in turn Inspire another person that then inspires another person and that's how you create something that I think lasts forever and uh I think that's our challenge as people is to um is to figure out how our story can impact others and motivate them in a way to create their own greatness well I want to acknowledge you again man for the inspiration you're you're just a symbol of Truth and inspiration to so many people thanks man and um I just appreciate you as a human so thanks man apprciate it brother thank you so much for watching this interview of Kobe Bryant again he brought such a mentality to the game of basketball but also he brought so much love to life and it's so incredible to see the stories to hear the lessons of people who have been impacted by Kobe Bryant I got to meet Kobe Once We messaged a few times on social media but I didn't know him like most people however I got to experience him before and after this interview in a way that I found really inspiring and uplifting I've done over, 1500 episodes on the school of greatness and you meet a lot of different people people from all walks of life people who have lots of money lots of Fame and success and sometimes people don't treat treat you the same way that Kobe does and my experience was profound and the way that he was so busy the entire day he had interview after interview all day but he wanted to really take the time and ask me questions what I'm going to do is share some bonus footage about 5 minutes of neverbe seen video of Kobe interacting with me before and after this interview we were able to restore this video we were able to get the audio the audio was never able to be used during the original interview but with AI we were able to capture more of the audio and that's why I wanted to share it with you today in this video now before I share this bonus content which for me was just really inspiring to watch and rewatch I'm going to share with you what that is and my reaction to it I just wanted to share a few lessons that I learned from my experience in this interview with Kobe and just my experience with him during that time again I didn't know him well um but I do know people that did know him well and they all spoke so highly of him and continue to speak about him and his legacy and such a high regard today but one of the things from this interview that really stood out to me is about inspiring the people next to you is how you create something that lasts forever and again Kobe inspired me in that moment and that has been lasting for years after his passing and so many people around the world it's about the value you add to each individual that's what it's really about he also talked about the power of unconditional love is giving you the permission to fail I love the story with his father where he said you know my father said whether I score all the points or no points I'm going to love you no matter what and I just think that's so powerful in today's world there's so much pressure on people to perform to get results and deliver especially parents with their kids and to hear that he had that type of relationship with his father and he felt loved no matter whether he won or lost it gave him permission to fail he talked about the power of the fundamentals and how it's important to rest at the end putting in the time and effort to train always coming back to the fundamentals and working on them every single day now Kobe wasn't a champion overnight he spent years decades honing his craft until he became a champion of the world and he worked on the fundamentals and sometimes we get busy trying to find the latest hack or trick to optimize us quicker than we need to get somewhere when really the more we focus on the F fundamentals over and over again the faster we will go in life he talked about losing being exciting now here's Kobe Bryant one of the greatest NBA players of all time one of the greatest athletes of all time talking about losing being exciting and whenever I saw him lose it didn't seem like he was having a lot of fun but inside he was learning he was developing he was analyzing and assessing what could I have done differently to prepare to win better the next time and when you make losing exciting it doesn't discourage you to try and give your best effort you're able to fully commit to the thing that you love and you're passionate about whether you win or lose and the more you fully commit the more likely you will succeed and win in that process I really loved that he talked about storytelling I just thought this was fascinating that Kobe Bryant is talking about storytelling he said this is the way we change the world he said in the interview that nothing moves without story he was working on this with dear basketball and his book and the punies podcast which is what we were interviewing him for in this episode and he was always talking about how to inspire someone through story and that's how you change the world I just thought this is so cool that this basketball player was much more than an athlete he was a Storyteller on and off the court and one of the things that I really enjoyed the most from this interview was him talking about family him talking about love and I think this is why this interview has resonated with so many people over the last few years that it's been out is really him opening up about family love relationships in a way that people never really heard him speak about that topic he talked about love whether it's for a person for a career or for a sport he says that things are never perfect but it's the ability to persevere through the ups and downs that matter the most and that spending time with his family brings him the most joy and for me at this season of my life it reminds me about what's really important and I don't have children yet but it makes me want to have children faster to create that experience that love that joy and um I'm just it just was so inspiring for me to witness this now those were just a few of the many lessons there was an incredible story that actually happened before the interview that I'll that I'll share in the future sometime but I wanted to get to the the bonus footage now again the reason reason this content wasn't out there originally is because it was broken audio it was kind of messed up and we weren't able to restore it but I said let's go back now that AI has been really leading the way over the last 6 months I said let's see if we can actually restore this footage let's see if we can capture it if we can edit it if we can make it so that we can hear it now the audio wasn't originally working so you'll see Tiffany who was working on the audio at a certain point in this video because we weren't able to get the mics to work so we are picking it up from the camera from a distance but we couldn't really hear it before and now with AI it's able to pick it up pretty well we also added subtitles here so I want to play a video uh right when I sat down with Kobe there was a couple minutes of us talking that we had a beautiful moment sharing some stories but then we started to record and this is what you're going to see right before we go into this full interview so here are the first 4 minutes of neverbe seen footage and experience of just connecting with him and I'm going to react to this video because um you're going to see again like I said before a lot of people on a on a big level who've succeeded like Kobe don't act the way he does in this video so I want to play this I'm going to pause it I'm going to react at a few different times but I just thought it was really cool so let's watch this bonus footage together right now so this is called the school of greatness we we interview the world's greatest leaders in business Sports y I was a former um professional football player and transition into business and I play with the USA national uh handball team I don't know if you know team handball yeah I do so I played with the USA team we haven't qualified for the Olympics since 96 so we've still been it's kind of a side hobby um which I haven't played in a while but um and I know you're legendary for your Olympics and how much you can give to the other athletes there it's really cool to hear that stories um you grew up playing handball handball is big in Italy big in in Europe huge in Europe massive so handball was like a part of our daily routine so in gym class we played handball right it was a big it's a big thing man you go to handball professional handball games man those things so oh 20,000 people it's like a soccer game indoors yeah Spain Germany they're all big Sports um is there anything um any questions you have for me before we start now this is interesting because usually when you're sitting down for an interview and you're starting to connect with someone across the other side of the table with you or you know wherever you are I'll ask these same questions um and most people just say no I'm good to go let's get started but Kobe starts engaging with me so I ask them do you have any questions for me it's what I ask everyone most people say no I'm good let's go because they want to get into the interview they want to talk about themselves but this is what I thought was cool right here well I mean just the transition I that's always tough for athletes right yeah to make that transition so it's always important for us to learn from each other and how you made the transition because there's some some cases out there that are popular as so Michael straight hand so guys who been able a lot of guys don't right was it 9% go broke years yeah not go not only go bro financially but bro emotionally spiritually yeah curious um again Kobe's asking me a question he's asking me about my transition from Sports into life he's giving examples he asked two questions here he's he's diving in and asking me questions when he's only supposed to give me 20 minutes for this interview again his team is telling me you've got 20 minutes there are only so many things that you can't talk about that you can talk about other people are setting up production in another side of the office he's back to backto back interviews promoting uh a podcast called the punies all day he is I'm the first one to go for that day and he is stacked for the rest of the day and they're like you've got 20 minutes and he's already giving me time because he's being gracious because our audio wasn't able to get sorted out for whatever reason the audio wasn't working even though we tested it right before so he's being gracious he's he's being present with me he's being connected he's not getting frustrated or angry or rushing this process he's not saying hey you don't have this figured out when there were some big Productions setting up just 20 30 ft away uh we were trying to figure it out and get things set up on remote location at his Studios again you see this is his office you see the famous black mamba painting right above there which I thought was pretty cool just representing him well but he's asking me questions most people didn't ask me questions this was five years ago my show wasn't as big I wasn't as well known I didn't have the audience the size that I had now but he is engaging with me and ask asking me questions again you hear the audio is a little bit off here because we had to re reclaim it from Ai and try to optimize it but you'll see the subtitles but he's asking me questions he's interested in me he's ganged with me telling about growing up playing handball in Italy watching handball he's he's relating to me where most people just want to talk them about themselves and I just thought what a classy move what a classy guy to really he doesn't know me he has no clue who I am or what I'm up to but what a classy guy to give that time to give me the energy and the thought process to ask me what's going on with you what's how did you transition and again I wasn't I wasn't a huge pro athlete I didn't make millions of dollars I was making $250 a week playing Arena Football so I wasn't like some big athlete that was hard for me to transition it was like I was just a younger athlete trying to figure it out I didn't have his credibility as an athlete either but he was still curious how did you do it how did did you overcome that and I'm just like I thought this is fascinating I was on my sister's couch for a year and a half after football I got injured I broke my wrist I was in a full armed cast from here to here for 6 months took the B my in there but I was making I was playing Arena Football so I didn't make the NFL was all my way up and I was only making 250 a week so I was just playing a love the game and you know to get paid a little bit JY and it wasn't until about 68 months in when I started really reaching out to mentors I said okay okay I need to learn the sport of life cuz all I knew was Sports I didn't do well in school I struggled um you know all throughout of school took me seven years to graduate college it just took a while so I said how can I recreate my life at was Sport and so I started to reaching out I was like I need great coaches right I need to structure my days like an athlete and so I just have everything detailed out on a schedule I get very clear what my seasonal goal is and I just reverse engineer just like an athlete you know in football we would get together the first day of um now when I'm watching this batch I'm kind of like man I'm speaking too much I need to be asking him questions I'm watching myself I'm like why am I speaking why am I telling my story in front of Kobe Bryant when I only have 20 minutes with him I should be asking him questions but that was the thing like when I'm watching this back you can see his eye contact with me you see his energy he's present with me he's relaxed he was calm again this is the the first time he met me a few minutes before this and he had a busiest schedule he just won the Oscar uh a few months prior to this 5 NBA championships I mean he was a machine he was a he was crushing it in all areas of life he was thriving in every area and here he is focused present connected engaging curious asking questions to me and I'm just like not a lot of people at this level do this and you leave a mark on People based on essentially something that lasts forever something that they can remember that will last forever that was one of the messages he had in this interview the power of the fundamentals he's just being an engaging human being when he really doesn't have that much to gain from this interaction with me and again I feel like bad because I'm just rambling here telling my story but I'm also knowing that our audio isn't set up yet so I'm trying to you know extend my time a little bit because we we don't have the audio ready for us to start the episode but he's being nice and I'm just like okay how can I make this happen but let's see what else I say in a locker room in it and the coach would say what's our goal for the season let's figure it out put it up on the cha for okay let's break it out weekly then daily and then positions and and that's just what I do now the end of the movies you edit every record that's it that's it that's brilliant most athlet can't do that though hard trans which took me a couple years he's still he's just still adding to the conversation Mo most athletes don't do that he's not saying okay you ready to go yet let's hurry up he he's not doing that he's just being present being in the moment being engaged you know going with the flow to really figure it out because I never made money really before right and U audio okay I never made money before really I was 25 and I I wasn't an entrepreneur but I had to really learn how to add value to the world and how to package it and sell it and sounds like yeah but I didn't know how to know how to nobody does that's the thing that's the Fig out teach yeah exactly that's it that's it that's it yeah and hope that when you get stuck in quicksand there's somebody out there that's BR exactly we exactly that's why I think happen powerful mentors and coaches with you along the way is what's important can't do it alone can't do it alone it certain a lot of people have there F absolutely yeah that absolutely and uh you my intention for this uh is to make this the most inspiring interview you've ever done just letting you know my intention awesome to tell your story in a beautiful powerful way so that people are inspired to take action on the podcasts you have to take action on anything that you care and also we sell a ton of books so I want to mention your book cuz it's coming out October right yeah which I think is going to be a huge hit so I'm excited for that so I want to kind of use this to promote podcast the book and then anything else that you're excited about or happen awesome man do to go there um audio is good all right there you have it so that was kind of the that was four minutes four a little over four minutes before we just sat down right before then just shook his hand and said hey Kobe thanks so much and let's sit down and um and that was that interaction because we didn't have the mic set up again we had like a couple of cameras a couple of live mics it was we usually did it at my apartment uh but this was a couple hours away at his studio so we brought you know our equipment there we just didn't have it all set up or there was a glitch but it allowed me to have these extra moments with him um before the interview and also right after that you know I was only supposed to do it for 20 minutes and this interview went for 40 minutes because Kobe was like you know what let's keep talking let's keep going he was so generous with his time with me when his team was like hey you got to cut it off but he was like you know it's all good like I'm really having a great conversation I love talking about this I love talking about greatness and he is the definition of greatness on how he lived his life and and how he showed up for his teammates and how he excelled in so many different different areas and I just thought that was really cool so this other clip right here is a is a shorter clip uh it's right when the episode ends I want to show you kind of the behind the scenes afterward which again I just felt like was so cool to watch looking back at it now recovering this foot because I've done over, 1500 episodes I've met a lot of interesting inspiring successful people you learn a lot about someone about how they treat you and the team around you when there's nothing in it for them so Watch What Happens here amazing dude I wish I could interview for like three hours so much good stuff there thanks manks we'll just do a couple quick photos and then get you into because I know you got to run so thank you dude that was amazing my Hest is going to love this dude you f you're great man I appreciate I appreciate it again generous with his time we do one standing up and then we'll of course yeah of course get the mic off here I love this photo now you got to run to your next thing I love this photo with the black mama in the background awesome than you now watch this the book when it comes out I'll do a app you thank you so much great to meet you that is cool that is cool right there again A lot of times people finish and then they're out of there Kobe went to me give me a handshake give me a hug he said hey man thanks so much and then he went to the two people on my team and he shook both their hands before leaving and I just thought you may not think that's a big deal but most people don't do that most people at his level don't do that and they don't treat everyone the same way again he's telling a story by doing that I'm still telling his story I just spoke at a conference in Mexico in front of almost 2,000 people telling the story of my experience with him before this interview and what I got to witness which was so powerful and just these little moments someone at that level to treat someone look them in the eyes ask them questions connect with everyone around them it's just a really special thing so so many powerful lessons I'd love to hear your greatest lesson from this interview in the comments below leave a comment on how Kobe inspired you the greatest impact he had on You by watching him or being a fan of his and again what was unexpected for you any comment or inspiration that you have let me know in the comments below thank you so much for watching this video for consuming this interview and for watching this behind the scenes com content which I just feel like was so cool to experience as someone who is interviewing him and um you know Kobe continues to inspire and leave a legacy for so many people around the world through his story and the things that he created and I'm just so grateful that I got to have that experience to interview him and I hope you gain something some value from this interview in this conversation as well I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved your are worthy and you matter and make sure to go out there and do something great I might be the luckiest sker of all time that I got that things clicked for me earlier than they do for most other athletes I feel like that's really important is you have to you have to click with the equipment you have you have to click with the coaches you have people have to be on the same page and the same mindset and the same goals and for the first three four years of my career I had that

Channel: Lewis Howes

Views: 112,693

Keywords: Lewis Howes, Lewis Howes interview, school of greatness, self help, self improvement, self development, personal development, success habits, success, wealth, motivation, inspiration, inspirational video, motivational video, success principles, millionaire success habits, how to become successful, success motivation

Id: XCHlc7dl744

Length: 68min 23sec (4103 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 26 2024