What Kevin Hart Teaches His Kids About Success | Joe Rogan

If you don't find shit to do, you won't lose your mind. You would get addicted to that. I just want to learn shit. You would like it. Because there's so much to learn. That's the thing about it. It's a long, long journey. Never ending. Never ending. Never ending journey of shit. There's also so many different variations of each different individual move and entries into new moves and defense. And then the structure of it is, it gets so crazy. It's super complicated. My son does, my son is heavy into boxing and karate. I got him into those. So he does them both. So the reason why I want to do it, I just like to keep up with him so we can do things together. I have trainers come to the house and we'll work out together. He loves it. So I just don't want to get left behind. I can't do that. I don't want that. You know, when you get 17, 18, would you say that? Hold on. Hold on. Yeah. You don't want that. Boy, you better back up. When he started getting that much confidence, I just want to be able to keep up and maintain. So that's why I like to do it with him. What's good for a kid to have that in your head? Just confidence. Confidence. You need that for confidence. It'll help you avoid things too. Well, I tell my kids, you know, your last name puts a target on your back that you didn't ask for. And we don't go and create problems, but you should always be prepared for problems if they were to occur. And if they do, I just want you guys to know how to defend yourself. So the things that I have my kids doing is just have the knowledge and understanding. The worst thing is just not knowing. You know, they're growing up completely different than I grew up. Where I grew up, you had no choice but to know. You ain't know how to fight. That's your ass because you're going to get tested. There's no way around it. You're going to get tried. You're going to get robbed. You're going to get your book bag taken. Somebody will try to take your sneaks. Like it's the reality. It's not a false reality. That's real. So if you're not prepared for it, if you don't have any type of heart, you won't last from where I grew up. Heart was everything. And heart was sometimes saying, I don't care if I get my ass whooped. I'm not going to be a bitch. I'm not going to allow you all to think that this can happen. So I'm going to lose today. But tomorrow I'm going to come back and I'm going to find you. I'm going to talk. Whatever that moment was, it was about establishing any level of respect that you could. And that respect eventually turned into friendship from all. So my kids don't know what that world is like. They're never going to have it. So as a parent, I just have to make sure that you have all the tools that I can possibly equip you with. Because my parents didn't have the ability to provide me with that. They weren't in the financial space to take me here and have this extra-correct activity or this extra-correct activity or learn this or learn that. Didn't exist. That is the big conundrum of successful people. When successful people have kids, what made them successful is dry. I grew up poor too. We were on welfare and food stamps, the whole deal when I was a little kid. And that always stuck in my head, this thought, like, we might not have enough food. Like, I remember thinking that when I was little. Like, what if we don't have any food? What if we run out of food? My kids will never feel that. They don't understand what that is. And everybody that I've ever met that's interesting came from some crazy struggle when they were young. Yeah. And that's the thing of you and I and most people that are doing well in life, you're raising your kids in a completely different way than literally what brought you to the dance in the first place. The hunger of not being one of those people that's left behind is what makes you successful in the first place. And it's scary. It's scary because, you know, my wife told me. She was like, you know, I love that you're not hard on your kids, but you always make sure there's a lesson within your conversation. Like, I don't yell. I don't yell at my kids. Nothing's going to register when I'm yelling. So I try my best to talk to you. Even when I'm at my angriest, I'm going to talk to you so you can process this because you need to understand what's the problem. You need to understand what's wrong. And what I had to really realize is they didn't ask to be born into this. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's not their fault that they're coming up completely different than how we were raised. And we can't have anger or frustration that's dedicated and thrown towards them because they got it so much better than what we had. How do we make sure that we pass down the proper lessons so that they appreciate and understand and not take for granted what they have? For me, it's tough because I got good kids. They're good students. They apply themselves to school. They listen. They don't do dumb shit. Yeah, they want to play video games and stay up like any other kid. There's no signs of bad or crazy. And the fear and panic is that you got to know that bad and crazy exists. This fairy tale that we're in isn't real. And at some point when I'm not around, when your mother's not around, when your friends or other family aren't around, you may get tested with the other side that's out here that you've never seen. Right. So I got to prepare you for the shit that you don't know exists. I got to take you to Philadelphia so you can see. I try to show my kids where I grew up thinking it's going to be like, oh my goodness, backfired. It's so cool. Can we live here? Fuck you. Talk about everybody in the car right now. We talk about this when we get back. This does not go the way I was supposed to. Oh my God. So cool. Dad is so different. Oh my goodness. Walk them around a neighborhood and it's like, it's not a reality. You didn't have grass. Goodness, dad. Oh, that's great. Would you play? Wow. When you hear. Yeah. When you hear these things. It's so different, man. These were your steps. The steps are broken. How did you even play? Oh my God. So wait, where, where was yours? We lived on the top floor. Not the whole thing. No. This is three separate units. So the top floor was me and grandmoms. The middle, that was somebody else. That was a neighbor and downstairs somebody else. Three different people lived in this one thing together. Y'all strangers. Hey, shut up. My only answer is everybody in the car. Get in the car. I don't know what to do. I don't know what to say at this part. Get right in the car. But when you see that, that's the reality that you get hit with of, I got to make sure that I'm talking. I got to make sure that I'm constantly teaching. If I'm not, then I'm not doing my part. I'm failing. You know, took them to the neighborhood and showed them how stores are in the neighborhood. That's where we got candy from. Here's where we would get little sandwiches from. Y'all walk. We don't have no stores like this. We can't walk this stuff. It's a completely different world. Wow. It's a completely different world. See people standing on the street corners. What they doing there? They selling drugs. That's tough right there. Those are people that your dad still knows. They've been there forever. That's what you don't want to do. But they're forced with these decisions just because of what they have to do. You just need to see this. Dad is taking you here to see this. Drove them all around. All around North Philadelphia. All around South Philadelphia. Make sure that they can see it. You got to physically see. We go out the country. We go to these resorts and islands. Before we go there, we're going to drive around so you can see what exists. Before you get to this, this is why we have to be good people. This is why we treat everybody with respect. This is why your dad likes to give. Everybody doesn't have. I'm constantly beating my kids with that information. Because if you assume that everybody does, you come off like such an asshole when you're around people that don't. Yeah. What? How did you? You don't have- Also the advantage that they had growing up the way they are now, it's such a rare thing. And they don't understand it. There's no way they could. A very small percentage. Yeah. A very small percentage. And that's something that I never want to let go of either. So I was in the back of my head, so you're talking about how, you know, are we going to have enough food when you were coming up? Chris Rock's joke is so great that he used to tell about how he keeps a bag packed at the front door. Because he don't believe that this shit is his. He said, I truly believe that at any point somebody going to go, gotcha. You thought you lived here, didn't you? This ain't your. Like, it's so real because even though you have it, you can't lose the sight of reality of where you once was. Yeah. Do you, are you comfortable where you are now or do you still have those thoughts? Like this, is this real? Because you're at this stratosphere of fame and success that's, it's rare amongst the rare. You know, it's like David Goggin said, you are uncommon amongst uncommon men. I will be a hundred percent honest and say I'm comfortable with the understanding of hard work brings great rewards. This is a reminder of the hard work and dedication that I put into everything that I've done. I'm not content because I know where I came from and I don't ever want to go back. That doesn't mean I don't want to go back to the city. That doesn't mean I'm going to go back to the people. That means I don't want to go back to living like I once was. I'm going to go back and I want to help. I want to inspire, I want to motivate. I want to show people that there is a way out, that there is a way to do more, to get more, to obtain more, but I personally don't want to lose all that I've been able to get. So I need to make sure that I do everything to keep it. So I can't be content. So there is an understanding, but I refuse to click on the switch of how. So even if you like, even if you have more money than you'll ever spend for the rest of your life, that's not what it's about. No. It's about the inspiring people and the influence and constantly giving back and moving forward in a positive way. And the only way you can do that is to stay active. It's the story, man.