Text copyright © 2022 by Kevin Hart

Adapted from The Decision, an Audible Original, by Kevin Hart with Neil
Strauss
All rights reserved.

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transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
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ISBN-13: 9781662511042 (digital)

Cover design by Laywan Kwan

Cover image: © Cover photography by Benedict Evans / AUGUST
You may not control all the events that happen to you, but
you can decide not to be reduced by them.
—Maya Angelou
 INTRODUCTION TO A WAY OF
THINKING

W elcome to Mental Boot Camp. It’s time to whip that mind into
shape.
Glad you made it here. I know it wasn’t easy.
Nice shoes, by the way.
Stand up tall and confident and proud, as you should be at all times, and
listen to what I have to say.
I won’t repeat it, because I’m making this part up as I go along. But I’m
going to say this from the heart:
These are challenging times. Only the strong survive. And by the
strong, I mean people with a strong enough mindset to make it through this
particular place that we’re in as a society. Because we’re taking steps
backward. We really are going backward.
There are people who are trying to repeat times of old. Racism is
becoming popular. Hate crimes are becoming popular. There are lots of good
people who are focusing on the negative people who choose to hate.
Energy flows where attention goes, and some of that attention is just
emboldening the negative forces in the world. There are many reasons for
this, but one is because people who can’t get positive attention often opt for
negative attention, rather than getting no attention at all.
But before you panic, here’s some good news:
There’s a way out for you personally. And you can lead by example.
Let’s put you in a position to celebrate the positive. It’s easy to get trapped
talking about what’s bad, but after today, we are no longer going to choose
easy. We are going to decide to celebrate the positive. Together, let’s change
the narrative and talk about what’s good.
In most cases, good and bad are matters of perspective. For example,
everyone makes mistakes, but a mistake is not a bad thing unless you decide
it is. Even without my experiences here, you already have a wealth of
experiences on your own. These experiences are nuggets of gold, and with
perspective they contain valuable wisdom. All you had to do to get them was
fuck up. My kids are at a great advantage because of all they gain from their
dumbass dad and the mistakes I’ve made. But why limit it to just my kids?
You can benefit from their dumbass dad too.
The scary thing about myself is that I feel that after age forty, I only just
processed the concept and understanding of what my true value and purpose
are and can be. All this time, all this work, all this energy and effort, all the
success have prepared me for what’s about to come. Because the biggest
hasn’t come yet.
I’m able to think this way because I’m focused on what serves my
higher life goals and chasing my best, not what serves the agenda of other
people. I’m always building on the past, growing, and moving forward. For
me, there’s no such thing as relaxation. Simply because there is no such thing
as being comfortable. I want you to understand that the guy who you are
listening to right now, who you may think is a machine and goes harder than
anybody else, or just talks about going non-fucking-stop—I want you to
really understand that I do get after it. I truly want you to understand that
success is earned. It’s not given.
I am driven by the same thing I want you to be driven by: big questions.
If your questions are big enough and positive enough, you can transcend the
ordinary.
Here are some of the questions I ask myself: What am I building? What
is the endgame? And when I get to the endgame, is it really the end? When I
die, what will other people talk about? What will the conversation be like?
What is the legacy I’m leaving for my children?
I can’t answer those questions definitively. No one can. But I can live
out of them. And I’ll be damned if I can’t put a fucking great situation
together that guarantees I’ll be proud to hear what people have to say. I’ll be
damned if I can’t put a great display of life together while I’m here. And I’ll
be damned if you can’t do it too. I know you can.
So let’s talk about you.

Whether you want to change the world or just your world, it’s the same thing.
The endgame is really noticing, oh shit, you know what? I did it my way.
And in doing it my way, I achieved things I never dreamed or imagined that I
would be able to. I also failed and didn’t do some things. So I went back, and
I redid them. And whatever people may say, I appreciate my individual
journey.
I want you to look in the mirror right now and say, “I’m proud of
myself.” Really feel a deep respect and admiration for your grind, your will,
your effort, your blood, sweat, and tears. Because all those things are you.
And this is where we are starting: loving who you are today.
Now ask yourself some hard questions: What path are you on now?
Who chose that path? Where is it ultimately leading if you don’t change
anything? Whose approval are you seeking? How far will you go off your
path to get it? What decisions are you making out of fear? What decisions are
you making out of joy? If you are marching to the beat of a drum, who or
what is beating out the tempo?
The only path that leads to the ultimate you—because beyond goals,
that’s really what we’re talking about—is the path you choose yourself.
Nobody is in charge of you but you.
I’d like you to walk away from this book with a valuable purpose and
understanding of yourself and your ability. Start now by challenging any
negative thoughts you have about yourself. I know you’ve got what it takes,
because we’ve all got it. We all wake up the same way: some people wake up
at 5:00 a.m., and there are some people who are comfortable with getting up
at 10:00. Some people just stay in bed all day. Which one of those people are
you?
If you answered 10:00, and you’re thinking you can’t do 5:00,
congratulations, you’re ready to begin your own personal journey of mental
strength. One of the greatest skills is the ability to categorize all of your
bullshit as it happens and put it into place where you can say, “All right.
Eventually, I can dump this. I can dump that. Oh, how do I dump this other
bullshit?”
All the information you need to take care of yourself in the best possible
way is out there. It’s up to us as people to choose to either ignore it or dump
our bullshit and use it. Me? I’m going to use it. You think I’m busting my ass
and putting 110 percent into every single day of my life and career to not be
healthy and die too soon so I can’t enjoy what I’ve built? Is that what I’m
doing? Do I not want to see the benefits of hard work?
 Of course I do. And I want to watch my children benefit from all this
work, too, for as long as I can. I choose to take care of myself so I can be an
example to them, and to you, of how much you’re able to do and get done
within your life span by simply giving a shit.
So, are you a “wake up at 5:00” person, a “wake up at 10:00” person, or
a “don’t even get up” person? Here’s some more good news: it doesn’t
matter. The correct answer is whichever you choose to be. It’s your path.
Your drum. Your beat. Just get to steppin’.
Ready to get some tools for the journey?
No need to rush. There’s plenty for everyone.
 FIFTEEN TOOLS FOR YOUR BEST
LIFE

A ll right, now that you’ve been motivated, you’re ready to pick up and
learn to build with the tools of success.
I want you to take a look at each item I present. Really study it,
feel it, and get comfortable with it. Then place it in your mental arsenal, if it’s
not already there.
Success, they say, is where preparation meets opportunity. And there
are two kinds of preparation: One is dedication to your personal craft, to the
specific skill set you need to reach your goal. The other is to prepare your life
and your mind to find, embrace, and receive that success.
These tools offer more than that. When you feel safe, like you can
protect yourself, you will be willing to journey further into the unknown and
take on bigger risks.
So these tools are not just for preparation—they’ll also lead to more
opportunity.
The following are the fifteen core tools of mental toughness—most of
which you’ll be using to win the internal battles of daily decisions. You’ll
need to use them at different times, and you will use them repeatedly.
Most importantly, the more you use a new tool, the better you’ll get
with it.
So be patient with yourself at first. Repetition breeds competence. At
first, you might forget you have these weapons. You might fumble and be
slow on the draw.
But as you practice and keep reminding yourself to wield them, they
will become second nature. You’ll pull them out by force of habit, becoming
more skilled and precise in time. They will become instinct. They will
become part of you.
 Okay, hold your hand out, and prepare to feel the power of this first
beautiful tool to walk out into the world with.
 1. POSITIVE MINDSET

N
o matter what you are trying to do, you’re going to face negativity. In
the age of the internet, negativity surrounds us constantly. Even if it’s
not about you, it’s bathing your brain in stress.
In the early days of the internet, most people were talking about cat
videos that made them smile. Now you can’t look at your computer or your
phone without seeing this week’s pick of negative bullshit: Who got beat?
Who got killed? Who got cheated on? Who got caught with weed? Who’s
going to jail? Who’s destroying this country? Who’s spreading hate?
That’s all we’re talking about online. What’s the last story you saw
about someone spreading love? And if you did see that story, how many
minutes was it until people were hating on that person who was spreading
love?
We are living in the most shit-talking time in human history. There has
never been so much shit talked and spread so quickly. And it’s easy to talk
shit.
The problem is that all this shit-talking makes it harder to achieve
something in life. Not just because of the negativity but because our brains
are wired for survival. And one of our biggest fears is being banished from
the tribe. Back in the old days, the worst punishment you could get was to be
kicked out of the tribe. It was the same as a death sentence because you
couldn’t survive on your own.
However, if we don’t do anything in order to avoid the negativity, then
we’ve wasted this life. You have to risk negativity, risk banishment, risk
hatred to have a life worth living.
Just look up the celebrity or public figure you most admire online—
along with the word scandal. Don’t just check out “Kevin Hart scandal”—
that’ll keep you reading for weeks straight. Think about people who changed
the world, like Martin Luther King Jr., Gandhi, Mother Teresa. Now search
their name along with the word scandal, and see what comes up.
Now imagine: If you had the whole world shouting those things at you,
whether or not you did them, could you still keep your mental strong, decide
to press forward, and succeed on an even bigger scale?
Because here’s a secret: Most people hate change. Most people don’t
like something new. So if you want to make an impact, you will have to deal
with negativity and people exposing the worst things about you. And
somehow, you have to take the appropriate steps to surthrive and move
forward on your mission.
Yeah, I made that word up. Not sure if I like it yet. But I’m risking
negativity.
Remember these three words: Mindset. Is. Everything.
It all starts here. How you interpret other people and your environment,
and how you feel about yourself and your direction in life, shapes everything
that you do. It’s all a function of your mindset.
Our default setting is usually to move through our days like our internal
states are automatic functions of cause and effect, and we’re at the mercy of
them. You wake up, feel a certain way, and that’s it—that’s your baseline for
the day. But every moment brings a decision.
You can decide to feel miserable and feel limited, or you can decide to
feel optimistic and feel expansive, with an enduring sense of possibility. You
can decide to see the worst intentions in somebody, or decide to have
empathy and understanding for what led them to act that way.
You can also decide to apply yourself—every day—or stay in neutral
and let life pass you by.
Positive mindset is so key because when you have it, it makes you
completely free. It means you have somehow figured out a way to think
about the bright side, no matter what. You don’t let yourself get stuck
walking in circles, dwelling on the negative. You keep your head up and keep
moving forward.
That’s one of the biggest messages I’ve got for you: Negativity (when
it’s not processed) is completely unproductive. It does nothing for you. It gets
you nowhere. It brings you and other people down. I really want you to see
that.
But if you take a second, you can always take something positive from
the negative. Because all your major downs in life are just preparing you for
the major ups. Every chapter has a lesson that builds on the one before. That
is, at least, if you have your eyes open to see it.
Understand that all of the shit that you go through is only preparing you
for the moment where that education is supposed to become of use.
With a positive mindset, you can’t be stopped. You can’t be knocked
down, at least for long. How can you be held back when every obstacle
becomes an opportunity? When every trial and tribulation life throws at you
becomes a gift to make you grow and become stronger?
This is one of the biggest things that trips people up: making speed
bumps out to be mountains.
Their minds have been trained to see the simplest upsets as the end of
their goddamn life. Their negative mindset is locked looking downward at the
problem instead of looking past it and staying focused on solutions, asking,
“How do I keep moving? Do I need to tackle this, or should I just make a left
turn and not waste a second of my time?”
This guy Napoleon Hill had a beautiful spin on the moments when
things don’t work out the way you planned and unexpected hardship falls on
you. Instead of coming from a negative place and looking at those moments
as a “failure,” he called them “temporary defeats.”
Damn. Do you feel the difference in that? One has a period that weighs
a thousand pounds. Failure. End of story. The other has momentum. You
hear the words and immediately know that the story isn’t over. You’re left
waiting for the next line.
Jail today doesn’t mean jail tomorrow. Divorce today doesn’t mean you
won’t get married again. Getting fired doesn’t mean you’ll never work again.
Nothing short of death is the end of the world. It’s not over. Don’t give up.
It’s a long life that we live.
How do we take advantage of this one life and make the most of it?
Keep a positive mindset.
It doesn’t matter what journey we decide to embark on. When you
depart with the automatic mental position of wanting to be the best possible
version of you that you can be, you will succeed. But if you come out the gate
with the what-ifs and thoughts like Oh my god, what if I fail?! that just means
that you’ve already failed.
Your arrow is going to land where you’ve set your sights. If you lower
them by indulging in fear and negativity, then that’s where you’ll end up. If
you raise them, stay positive, and keep your aim high, you’ll end up at that
level. You just need to have the confidence and believe in yourself enough to
raise your gaze up that high.
The gravity of this world will pull you toward a negative mindset 99
percent of the time. The constant static of negativity is deafening. But it’s
completely fucking useless. It’s just noise. It nurtures self-doubt, judgment,
and comparison.
But positivity is creative. It’s generative. It’s beautiful. It’s inspiring.
Positivity uplifts and encourages. Positivity creates options and possibility.
Positivity is movement. Positivity makes room for hope. Positivity is
freedom.
The higher you climb, the more attention and pressure you’ll have
coming at you. And so the more dialed in your positive mindset must be.
Otherwise, the world is going to tear you to shreds.
A positive mindset isn’t about feeling like you’ve got sunshine and
rainbows on the inside all the time. Sometimes you need to move through
harder feelings and tougher times. But throughout that, positivity means not
collapsing and giving in to feeling resigned and defeated. Sometimes life is
hard. But you know you can handle it and that every storm will pass.
I stand in front of you as a man who has been in every type of storm that
you can imagine. I’ve been blown in every direction, and after the wind
stopped, after I was left sitting there by myself, I chose to get up, brush
myself off, and continue to walk in a forward direction.
Anyone can do this if they really understand the true meaning behind
life. There’s a start and there’s an end. We all start in the same place. Then
we get older and it ends. All of the stuff that happens in the middle, for those
of us lucky enough to have one—it’s all helping us to basically be a fucking
great example to those who are coming after us. It’s all education. It’s all
knowledge. It’s all wisdom.
Somebody’s gonna get all this shit that you did, that you went through.
Kids, family, friends, strangers, whoever. They’ll see it and they’ll
understand it, and they’ll make life choices off your example. They’re gonna
know what to do and what not to do based off the things you did.
So the reason why I get up, the reason why I’m not affected, the reason
why I keep a positive mindset is because I know that my kids are going to be
able to take all of this. And I’m not talking about the money. I’m not talking
about a lifestyle. I’m talking about the knowledge. I want my kids to be
mentally strong—that’s what’s important.
Because you can have it all and not have a good mindset, and that all
will be lost. It’ll be lost, because you will be easily affected. And if you’re
easily affected, that’s a really tough thing, because that’s what people prey
on. We live in a world where they prey on those who are affected and are
bothered—that’s the best movie in town: watching a person become affected
by the negative bullshit that is thrown their way, watching them take that
downward spiral.
I don’t like to see that. I don’t support that. Instead I stand by those
people who are affected, and I encourage them to understand their self-worth
—and understand that life moves on no matter what. The dopest thing in the
world is getting up after you’ve been knocked down, because so many people
stay down. I mean, I can’t go through all the stories because we’ll be here all
fucking day.
I’m not supposed to be a movie star. I’m not supposed to be a successful
comedian. I wasn’t supposed to make it out of the hood. I have no education.
So how did I do the things that I do? How am I a CEO? How am I running a
company or companies? I went to community college for two weeks. How is
this guy achieving all the things he’s not supposed to do, according to what
people say?
Because he’s not affected by the conversation of others. I’m only
affected by me. Point blank, point blank. Develop a positive mindset. Try to
simply understand what it really can do for you. Turn the negatives into
positives, man. I did.
 2. WHAT-IS-NESS

I
n the game of mental strength, developing a capacity for what-is-ness is
going to be one of the tools you use most often. When you’ve trained
your mind to use this, it will change your life and relationships.
What-is-ness is a part of a positive mindset. But it’s a very important
part. It’s the first thing that kicks into gear before the energy positivity
actually begins to flow.
What-is-ness is accepting everything for what it is. When shit inevitably
happens: it is what it is. You are at peace with the nature of this new reality.
What? Are you going to tell me you built a secret time machine to travel
back in the past and unfuck this situation? I didn’t think so. So why spend a
second of time complaining about it, fighting it, or resisting it?
There’s stimulus and then there’s response. What people put between
the two is their story and opinion about the stimulus, which fucks up the way
they respond. It doesn’t matter if you dislike something that happened, or
find it inconvenient or uncomfortable. The only thing that’s true is that it
happened. Now what are you going to do about it?
Get with what is. Ditch your stories and judgments about what is, and
just be with it. Work with it. Move with it. Anything less than that is a
complete goddamn waste of your time. All you would be doing is indulging
negativity and staying stuck.
In the words of Bruce Lee, “Be like water.” He knew the secret to life—
to staying centered and strong—was flow.
People create so much friction and agitation in themselves by not
accepting the reality of their situation. They want to be in denial about it, or
be right about it, or wish it was different. Well, it ain’t. And you’re probably
not right. And you’re definitely wasting your motherfucking time.
Go ahead, I’ll wait. Keep walking in circles staring at the ground,
foaming at the mouth, spouting off all that negativity. Let’s see how many
years of your life you want to spend standing in place, avoiding happiness,
and making yourself and everybody around you feel like shit.
How are you going to learn if you can’t let yourself be wrong? How are
you going to create the future if you’re stuck in the past?
People can spend days and even years complaining about something
that happened to them or why something is the way it is. It hasn’t even
occurred to them to drop the ultimately self-harming tools of blame and
victimhood.
How dare life inconvenience me! Oh Lord, what did I do to deserve
this?! Why me?!
They’re acting like entitled, stubborn-ass boulders, not water. They’re
stuck in a fixed position. Inflexible. Immovable in all the wrong ways.
Thinking they deserve something different or better than what they’ve been
given.
Now, when you bring your what-is-ness to any situation, you have a
sense of peace and clarity about your mind. You can think about the next
steps. You can see what you did wrong and either correct it in the moment or
remember the lesson for next time you’re in that place.
Sometimes there isn’t anything to do but just sit there and take it. Some
of the things that are in life aren’t problems to be solved but realities to
allow.
My daughter told me that she hated school: “I hate school!” Keep in
mind my daughter is a straight-A student (every once in a while, there’s a B
in there). Hates it.
“Dad, I hate school!”
I said, “Does that mean that you don’t have to go?”
“No . . .”
“You still have to go, every day?”
“Yes . . .”
“So, you hating school is going to do what?”
“Nothin’ . . .”
“You make every day tough by going into school with hate. Every day.
Every day that you go to school will be a tough day because you already hate
it going into it. You still gotta do it, so why don’t you just accept the fact that
you gotta give me at least thirteen years of school? Accept it. Make the best
of it. You’re spending all this time being negative about something you have
to do anyway. It’s not doing anything to change it. Make the best of it!”
 My daughter stepped away, sat by herself for a while, and came back.
“Dad, you’re right. I love seeing my friends at school. I just think
sometimes it’s too hard. But you’re right. I gotta do it anyway. I’m gonna try
to make the best of it.”
That was a proud moment for me as a father, because she processed
what I told her. She didn’t go get an attitude and storm out. She went off by
herself, thought, came back, and gave me her own interpretation based off of
the information that I gave her. Sometimes we’re bitching and complaining
about shit we can’t fucking change. Make the best of those moments.
Complete those moments. And after completing them, move on rather than
sitting there and letting it fuck up your day. That’s my suggestion. Be like
water: allow, adapt, and keep moving.
Now I don’t want this to be misconstrued to mean that if you’re in a
dangerous situation in your life, you should just accept it. If you’re being
mistreated, to just sit there and take it. No, that’s not what I’m saying. I’m
talking about the things that you set out to do, that you know you have to do
in order to get to the goal at hand.
For example, let’s say you want to be a doctor, lawyer, journalist,
editor, basketball player, swimmer, or teacher, or if you want to finish school
and get your master’s degree. Whatever it may be, it takes an abundance of
work to get there. And so while doing the work, doing the thing that’s needed
to get you where you want to go, if you’re making it harder by bitching,
complaining, and hating—it does nothing. It’s a waste of time. Be like water:
allow, adapt, and keep moving—and finish.
That’s not a fart—my stomach growled. So if y’all are listening to this
on audio and heard that, I didn’t fart right now and I hate that this came at the
end of such a positive rant. The timing couldn’t have been worse for that
stomach growl. I haven’t eaten, so my stomach is—I’m hungry, and that’s
what it is. Maybe I’ll edit that out. No, keep it, fuck that—it’s about being
transparent. So we’re gonna keep that stomach growl / could possibly have
been a fart—we’re gonna keep that in there. We’re gonna keep it going.
Rather than sitting there and letting it fuck with my head, distract me,
and throw me off track, I’m deciding to just let it be. I adjust to the new
reality. I don’t try to bend it to be something it’s not or make it fit my
preferences and old ideas of the ways I want things to be.
Be like my stomach growl: allow, adapt, and keep moving.
 3. CONSISTENCY

L
ike the Body, the Mind is a set of muscles trained to operate in a certain
way. If you want to make it stronger or start changing the way it works,
you have to put in the repetitions and practice week after week to get
results.
Especially when it comes to trying to improve your health and wellness,
consistency is the goal, more than a single great day or performance. We are
in a realm of incremental change, where patience and good habits pay off.
Consistency is important not just because it takes time to create change
but because it gives your mind an opportunity to see new results—to see what
you’re capable of—and change its belief systems around what’s possible for
you.
For example, it takes consistent discipline to stick to a diet. You say,
“I’m not gonna have such and such for this amount of time.” It’s a series of
daily decisions about what you will and won’t put in your body.
When you actually follow through with that, and you haven’t eaten it
for even a week, you look up and think, Damn. I said I was going to do this,
and I did it. Wow. I’m capable of changing myself. What else can I do?
Deciding to do something and going past whatever the goal was that
you set is a major mental achievement. You get to feel proud of yourself for
completing something. You feel good for successfully controlling yourself
and doing something positive.
You’ll find that a lot of those simple things are very valuable—whether
it’s cutting back on drinking, smoking, screen time, or other bad habits. It’s
one of the biggest mental achievements you can make. It’s massive to prove
to yourself that you have complete control over you and that nobody is
capable of managing you better than you can manage yourself. In fact, if you
think anyone else can manage you besides yourself, you’re not operating in
reality.
 It could be as simple as going to bed at this time and waking up at that
time. It could be being the first one in the office and the last one out, or
hitting the gym five days a week at the same time. And it’s all just practice.
All it takes is getting up, intentionally applying your mind over the course of
whatever period of time, and doing it.
Being consistent in new behaviors creates proof positive that you’re an
independent, powerful, creative, strong, functional person.
Without consistency, there’s also no improvement and learning. There’s
nothing to pivot from and get leverage to the next level. There’s no
opportunity to reflect on prior executions. There’s no refinement.
How can you become a piano virtuoso if you don’t sit down every day
and hit the keys? How can you sink three-pointers time and time again if you
don’t spend time at the hoop? You think anybody can step into a comedy
club and kill it on their first try? Show me the funniest person you know, and
I’ll show you somebody who’s about to have one of the most embarrassing
experiences of their life.
The word consistency isn’t pretty, or sexy, or exciting. It’s not trending.
It doesn’t have buzz. But this is what separates the professionals from the
amateurs and the fit from the unfit.
What I found through health and fitness is that it’s a constant journey of
consistent self-improvement. And through this journey you’ll realize that
you’ll have your good days and you’ll have your bad days. But you’ll also
realize that it’s a consistent growth—if you want it to be.
Because you can look at your body and you can feel good or you can
feel bad. You can feel energized or you can feel sluggish. But when you’re
feeling your best, you’ll find that it’s because of the decisions you made to
put the work into yourself to feel your absolute best.
When you take a few days off and you look up and suddenly it’s been
two weeks, three weeks, and you haven’t been to the gym or done any work
or spent time with your friends, you’re going to do something about it
because you know what it feels like to be at your best.
So, when you start feeling down, it’s because you know that you’re not
doing what you’re supposed to do and applying yourself 100 percent in order
to give yourself the best possible opportunity to be great.
Consistency defends against the frequent funks that come from losing
momentum.
Through physical fitness, I’ve learned that “oh shit, every day I get up
and there’s changes. Oh wow, look at my arms. Holy shit, my chest! Damn,
my abs. Oh, wow, look at this. I’m leaning out. I’m getting a little more
toned. Oh shit, I wanna see more of this. I’m going to work harder to see
more of this.”
The same goes for the professional side of life. You begin to see results
build up over time, and it makes you want to put even more work in.
Consistency inspires consistency.
My son is getting older, and he’s at a point now where he has to study.
And he hated it. Of course he did—he’s a kid. What kid loves to study and
loves to do homework, especially when there’s shit to play, video games,
friends, bikes to ride, et cetera. So there was a lot of complaining and
negativity whenever it was time to study. But when he took a test and he got
the test back, my son came in hype as hell, eyes lit up, proud.
“Look, Dad, a ninety-eight.”
“How’d you get the ninety-eight?”
“From studying.”
“How does it feel knowing that you got a ninety-eight?”
“Dad, it feels great. I’m so happy I passed the test. I got an A. Only
three people in the class got an A.”
“That’s the benefit of studying, son.”
“I know, Dad. I can’t wait to study again. Because I want to feel this
again.”
My son studied again, and his next test he got like a B-plus, but it
wasn’t an A. He was fucking depressed! He was down. I had to tell him that
it was okay. He was depressed because he knew what the feeling of an A
was, and he felt that he put the same work in to get another A. So when he
came up short from getting that A, he was down on himself. I had to make
him feel better about it. So now every study session, it’s not a forced thing.
I’m not begging and fucking pleading for him to go get the work done.
“Hey, you study?”
“Yeah, Dad. I’m upstairs, I’m studying now. As soon as I get home, I
do it. I knock out my two hours—I get it out of the way.”
It’s not even a question because he wants it for himself, because he saw
the benefit of putting in the work.
I don’t care how long it takes, you will see the benefit from your
consistency. You will see the benefit from putting the work into your craft,
into your goal, into your dream. It will pay off. I don’t care how long it takes.
It’ll happen. I was on the road for I don’t know how long doing comedy.
Driving back and forth—hours and miles in fucking cars. Making no money.
Making enough to pay the fucking bills. Doing it week in, week out, week in,
week out.
Cut to years later, I’m sitting where I’m sitting. It will pay off. Do the
fucking work. Don’t bitch about it along the way. Shortcuts are for suckers.
That’s my motto: “Shortcuts are for suckers.” Let me take the hard way. So
many more benefits from the hard way. So many more benefits and education
from the hard way. I want what’s earned, not given. Point blank.
 4. RELIABILITY

B
eing reliable is no simple task. In this crazy, chaotic time where we’re
drowning in media and technology, it’s a trait you rarely find in people.
To be reliable means having an impeccable relationship with your
time and obligations. When you tell someone you’ll do something or you’ll
be somewhere, you follow through and back it up with action. Making empty
promises and casually throwing out a yes to appease people breeds weakness
and flakiness.
When you bring consistency to something like being reliable, it creates
a profound sense of confidence in yourself. You come to know—in your
bones—that what you think and what you say, you can create and you can do.
I can’t think of anything more powerful than that. This is where you truly
start to feel like you can do anything you set your mind to.
There’s really no way to communicate how it feels when you start being
more reliable. It’s like changing the way you experience colors. You can
describe it, but being on the inside of the experience is really the only way to
truly get how profound the shift is.
What does it take to be reliable? You have to have a sharp awareness of
your schedule and commitments because you have to know what you can and
can’t do. In order to deliver on things and show up places, you have to
control the amount of things you take on.
You have to have the courage and self-respect to be able to say no.
A lot of people don’t know how to sit in the uncomfortable position of
telling people that simple word. They’re so afraid to disappoint others or
never learned to stand up for themselves, and they just say “sure” to every
request that gets thrown at them. They don’t know what they want or what
they stand for.
What they’re left with is a graveyard of broken promises and half-assed
results. They’re overwhelmed and can’t fully give themselves to any one
thing.
Start the practice of being reliable now. Because as you start to get
some success, that little drip of requests can turn into a constant tsunami.
People will be hitting you up for your services, or your money, or your time.
You can’t give it to everybody. If you give too much away, you become
spread out and ineffective.
Stay concentrated. Stay impactful. This is the benefit of reliability.
If you want to have solid relationships in your life, reliability will also
get you there. Too often people get caught up in the hustle and begin to let
their partners, family, and friends start to slip. They flake on plans and start
showing up late everywhere they go. The damage this causes is not worth any
success you think you’re getting. Trust me.
I pride myself on being on time. You know why? Because I don’t want
people to waste my fucking time. So if I tell you I’m gonna do something,
I’m going to do it. I’m gonna be there. And when I get there, I’m hoping you
understand what it took for me to get there, so I’m hoping that shit will be
right when I arrive. Because you have one time to fuck up my time. I don’t
give my time up. I value and understand and appreciate time.
If I’m on a movie set, guess what? I have respect for the studio that’s
paying for the set. The studio is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on
this movie. They don’t have time to wait for me, whether I’m the star or not.
Let me get my ass to set on fucking schedule, because in conversation you’re
never going to be able to say that Kevin Hart has no respect for other people
and their time.
Being on time is the key to success not just in any job but in everything.
The world operates on time. Ask yourself, Can people rely on you or are you
always in question? “I don’t know, man, I don’t know if we should fuck with
Jay because you know Jay ain’t gonna be here . . . nah, nah, nah, I ain’t tryin’
to fuck with Jay—he always got some shit that came up.” “Nope, don’t invite
Brenda because Brenda ain’t gonna get here till an hour after.”
Are you the person who, if we all gotta get on an airplane, we gotta lie
to you and tell you the plane is taking off two hours earlier? Are you that
person? Are you the person who, if we’re all gonna meet up for dinner, we
gotta lie to you and say dinner’s at six o’clock when it’s really at nine
because we know you ain’t gonna get there?
That’s sad if you are. That’s fucking sad. Because that’s something that
you control and you can change. Reliability. Be reliable.
 People tend to gravitate toward reliable people because they can trust
them, while they subtly avoid the unreliable people. All the unreliable people
have left around them is other unreliable people, because hanging around
each other makes them feel comfortable in excusing and normalizing their
shitty habits and broken promises.
I’ve said, the only person who can change anything about your life is
you. But if you can’t rely on yourself, what hope do you have?
You know who else relies on you? Children. If you have kids, reliability
is that much more important. Your life is already an important and good
enough reason to be mastering your mental. But if you have other little lives
and minds depending on your mental game, you’d better develop some
reliability.
Everything you do is a demonstration of how to live life. Everything
leaves an imprint. If you don’t show up for them, they don’t feel like they
matter. And that’s the ultimate message any kid is constantly trying to get
from their caregivers: “I matter.” How well you deliver that message has
more lifelong impact than anyone wants to admit.
Your kids can look back and say, “Was Mom/Dad there for me or not?
Did they really care?” Your mental game informs their own mental game in
life and how they feel about themselves. How you decide to show up in life
impacts a whole lot more than just you.
 5. DETERMINATION

D
etermination fuels everything. It’s going to keep you doing the hard
work and choosing the path to success. It’s going to keep you
consistent when you don’t feel like being consistent. It’s going to
push you through and around the obstacles when you feel like there’s no way
forward.
On the road to victory, and all your wins, there’s going to be one upset
after another. It’s going to be hard. And you’ll never make it if you don’t
accept that and bring a whole lot of perseverance and persistence.
To be determined is to be committed to your best self, your dreams, and
the expression of life, enough that you will not throw in the towel. You will
not give up. If you choose a life of work, impact, and success, it will be an
unending gauntlet of tests and trials.
You will not prevail without determination.
With determination, you can look back and say, “Oh shit, you know
what? I did it my way. And in doing it my way, I achieved things I never
dreamed or imagined that I would be able to do. I also failed and didn’t do
some things, but I went back and redid them because I never gave up.”
All right, so where does a durable sense of determination come from?
Determination is about the appreciation of your individual journey.
The respect and admiration that you have for your grind, for your will,
your effort—your blood, sweat, and tears—is what creates determination.
Because it all ultimately comes down to you living your life for you. The
endgame is being able to look in the mirror and say, “I’m proud of myself.”
If you value yourself enough and the gifts that you have to offer, and get
present to the very limited and fragile opportunity we have to express them in
this life, your resources for determination will become a bottomless well.
Determination is everything: If it’s there to be gotten, I’m determined to
get it. Determination is about fire. It’s a will and want to get what you want.
 I love the word determination. I love the definition behind it. And I love
to see people who have it. I love to see that competitive fire. Some people
have it in entertainment. Some people have it in athletics. Some people have
it in . . . thumb wrestling—I don’t fucking know. It’s something that you
either have or you don’t, and if you don’t, it’s something you can learn to
have.
I’m going to be honest with you: I did not have it out the gate. I did not
have it when I was forced to swim. I did not have it when I was in middle
school or high school. It was something that was developed. But when I got
it, I fell in love with it because nothing and no one stood in between me and
my goal.
We can all get this kind of resolve. So if you don’t have it today, that
doesn’t mean that you can’t have it tomorrow. Be determined to get
determination. Let’s keep it going.
 6. COWBOYING UP

A
t times, This one can be the hardest thing to do. Cowboying or
cowgirling or cowpersoning up means taking ownership. Taking the
bull by the horns. It’s sitting tall in your saddle and taking
responsibility not only for your words and actions but for everything in your
life. It’s lying in the bed that you—and life at large—have made, and being
okay with it.
Transformation starts there—with ownership. You can’t change shit if
you don’t own it first.
The trouble is so many people run around avoiding things their entire
lives. It’s just too uncomfortable for them to look in the mirror at the roughest
and darkest parts of themselves. Or they’re terrified of spending five seconds
looking bad and saying, “You know what, I fucked up. This is on me. I didn’t
do this or think about that, and so this happened. But here’s what I’m going
to do to help, and here’s what I’m going to do next time.”
And you take any consequences on the chin. You shoulder them
because you know nothing can make you buckle.
What people don’t realize is that discomfort is temporary. What
happens after that discomfort is the immense sense of power and freedom
that comes from having been able to do something about it, to be able to
replace things that aren’t working with things that will.
Very few people want to admit that they’re carrying some bullshit and
don’t see everything clearly. They’re so damn committed to being right about
everything, including what other people mean when they say and do certain
things.
When you apply ownership to your life, you see that it takes two to
tango. Any fight or misunderstanding is cocreated. They’re never one sided.
People love to tell each other, “You are out of your goddamn mind!
Why are you acting like such an asshole? I’m sitting here minding my own
business. I didn’t do anything to you, and here you come attacking me for no
good reason. I’m right. You’re wrong.”
I know that game well. But now, when conflicts arise or shit goes
sideways, instead of attacking someone by saying, “You did this to me!” I do
my best to cowboy up and stop and think, Hold on a minute . . . How did my
behavior help create this situation? What information, needs, or boundaries
did I not communicate that caused this misunderstanding? What could I have
done differently that would have created a better outcome?
You have to take responsibility for your bullshit. Your shit is your shit.
Own up to it. It isn’t going to change or go anywhere until you do. It will
keep affecting your life and holding you back until you decide to recognize it,
admit to it, and correct it.
And let me tell you this: your greatest strides in evolving your
psychology, your circumstances, and the health of your relationships will
directly follow the times where you take ownership.
Beyond their actions day to day, people also don’t want to take
responsibility for their lives on the whole.
They want to act like they’re not the only person who can change their
situation. Think about that: you are the only person who can change a
goddamn thing about your life.
Until you stop wishing things were different, accept the way they are,
and take up the sole responsibility of doing something about it, nothing will
change.
Leaders take ownership. Champions take ownership. People are
inspired to follow other people who take ownership. It earns respect.
Ownership shows strength and humanity.
When you take ownership of something, the subtext you’re really
delivering is, “Hey, I’m not perfect, and I’ll never pretend to be. But I care
about my integrity and my relationships enough to admit when I’m wrong
and make it better. I’m not going to lie, and I’m strong enough to handle any
repercussions. I acknowledge my sovereign power to decide, and I will never
surrender that.”
Try and tell me that’s somebody you wouldn’t trust or want by your
side in battle.
I remember watching Tom Brady in a football game where he played
horribly—threw a bunch of interceptions, fumbled. It was just not Tom
Brady–ish. Tom Brady did the postgame interview and they asked him a
question, and Tom simply said, “Today’s loss is on me—not my teammates,
but me. It’s my job to lead us. It’s my job to go out there and put us in a
position to win football games, and I didn’t do that today. I failed my team
and I must do better. I will do better.” That’s cowboying the fuck up.
Michael Jordan played in a game and had the fucking flu. I forgot who
the Bulls were playing. It was either the playoff series before the finals or the
finals. But he played the game and they got the win. Mike almost fucking
passed out at the end of the game. And Michael never brought up the flu in
the postgame interview. He cowboyed the fuck up, and got out there and
played the game. Win or lose, he was willing to take the repercussions that
came with it and not blame it on a circumstance that was out of his control.
You take the fucking chance. You take responsibility. Your flaws are
your flaws. Addressing them means that you’re okay with them. I got caught
cheating. I cowboyed the fuck up. I did. I’m wrong. I apologized. I gotta do
better. That’s what cowboying up is the fuck about. Lying in a bed of mess
you made for yourself and being okay with that because you know that you
are capable of change and capable of doing better.
That’s the good that comes out of the bad when you cowboy up.
 7. TEDDY BEARING

Y
ou’re probably rolling your eyes right now, thinking to yourself, Teddy
bearing?! What in the hell are you talking about, Kevin?
Here’s the thing: teddy bears are all about comfort, safety, and
affection. They have high levels of likability. They make people feel good.
So “teddy bearing” just means being likable, personable, and pleasant. I just
figured it would get your attention more than any of those other words would.
Look, life is all about relationships. These don’t just help you on your
path to success—they’re what bring you fulfillment in all the moments along
the way.
Feeling good, and helping those around you feel good, is one of the
quickest ways to bring happiness and harmony to your life. It feeds back into
your positive mindset to expand and strengthen it even further.
Teddy bearing is the outward social expression of your positive
mindset.
It does something to your heart, and it does something to the hearts of
other people. It’s the best thing I ever do for my soul. There’s something
healing and deeply fulfilling about it.
Don’t confuse this as acting strategically to get people to like you.
Because that’s fake. It’s not something that a person who’s mentally strong
and confident does. It’s a fool’s game that’s about manipulating people from
a place of insecurity. It’s throwing away your power and lowering yourself to
playing pathetic social games.
Here’s the thing about likability: Oprah Winfrey once said something
that was so good, which is, “Not everybody is going to like you.”
And it’s okay.
Everybody’s not going to believe in you and think your dreams can
come true. And it’s okay. Everybody is not going to want to make time for
you or enjoy your company. And it’s okay. She was basically just saying,
“Give yourself permission to be you, and let go of the anxiety that comes
from the impossible pursuit of being liked by everyone. It’s so liberating.”
So when I’m talking about likability, I’m not saying the goal is to be
liked. That’s external. You can’t control whether people like you, and you
sure as hell don’t want to worry about it. I’m saying be likable. That’s
internal. It’s something unconditional, radiating outward from within. One is
weak, while the other is powerful.
People with a weak reality are influenced by other people and outside
events. People with a good, strong self-image are influenced from the inside
and immune to external opinions.
I know people who stay up late reading every tweet and YouTube
comment about them, or every review in blogs and newspapers. They give
themselves nightmares and lose sleep for weeks. Why the fuck would you do
that? Why would you subject yourself to the faceless, heartless, vicious
hatred and negativity on the internet?
It’s not even about you. It’s just what people like to do online.
But they read all this shit because they care so much about what people
think. They care about how they’re received and whether the public thinks
they’re good enough. They’re not even living their lives for themselves. This
is why the higher you climb, and the more attention you start to get, the more
you need to master your mental in order to survive.
If people don’t like you, it’s not the end of the world. And if everyone
did like you, then some people are still going to get jealous of that and want
to tear you down. So it’s going to happen either way.
But no matter what they say, remember that it’s not about you. The
negativity and nastiness coming out of people’s mouths tells you more about
them than you. But, you? You can’t be fazed. You can’t be riled. Your cool
can’t be fucked with. Be the teddy bear.
Teddy bearing is a way of conducting yourself. It’s an expression of un-
shake-ability and un-messable-with-ness that comes from a solid core of
valuing yourself and others.
Now, it just so happens that when you radiate positivity, life showers
you with good people and opportunities. It’s not because of some quantum-
mechanical “the secret of manifestation” shit. It’s because the energy of
positivity is so rarely felt in this world that when people come across you, it
feels like an oasis in the desert. They’re just drawn to you. They want to
affiliate with you, and help and support you. That’s not your main
motivation. But it’s a phenomenal side effect.
At any given moment, you can step outside yourself and ask, “What
energy am I giving off right now? How am I treating other people? How are
other people receiving me? Am I giving and grateful to my environment, or
am I taking and negative? Am I letting other people’s negativity get the best
of me? Am I bringing the teddy bear–ness?”
Reengage your positive mindset, make a new choice, and watch life
respond.
 8. DISSATISFACTION

T
his one is easy to misunderstand. I’ve been telling you to stop
complaining, accept what is, and be grateful—and now here I am
saying be dissatisfied and miserable.
But that’s not it. This kind of dissatisfaction isn’t coming from a place
of being ungrateful, or being unhappy with the way things are, or never
feeling good enough.
This kind of dissatisfaction is coming from a place of being okay with
what is and then saying, “Okay, cool, this is good. But you know, I think I
can still do better. I really think we can make this better.”
It’s a healthy desire to keep seeing what you’re capable of—to
continuously grow, develop, increase your capacity, and improve your life
and environment.
Everything in nature is in a state of growth or decay. It’s part of the
cycle of life. Things are either generating, on their way in, or they’re on their
way out. There’s nothing wrong with either; it’s all part of it. But you have to
decide which state you want to be in.
If you’re not living in a state of growth, then you’re acting like you’re
on your way out, and your emotions will follow suit. You might have already
noticed that happen when you’re living your life from a place of stagnation. It
does not feel good.
Like a river, you are meant to be continuously moving and flowing.
Sometimes very slowly, sometimes very rapidly.
If you want to keep growing, expanding, and improving, then you’ll
need a little hint of dissatisfaction in the back of your mind. If you’re not just
a little dissatisfied, you’ll never push past your familiar limits and do bigger,
better things.
Again, there’s a big difference between being dissatisfied because
you’re curious about what more you can do and being dissatisfied because
deep down you feel like you’re not good enough and nothing you ever do
will be either.
It’s not that what you do isn’t good enough. It is. You are. It’s just that
you love the feeling of getting even better over time. It’s addicting. It breeds
happiness.
Living with a little dissatisfaction engages the circuitry in our brains
that’s wired to reward us for seeking novelty and moving forward.
Every time you try something that’s a little more challenging or
something different, and you succeed, your brain dumps out a bunch of
chemicals that make you feel pleasure.
When people stop moving in life, they stop getting these internal hits of
feel-good chemicals. They have to start relying on other ways to artificially
stimulate them, like video games, alcohol, smoking weed, social media, or
watching porn. We get addicted to these things in a desperate attempt to
compensate for the fact that we’re not really living our lives.
Dissatisfaction keeps you at your edge—and that’s where you feel the
most alive.
We as people should always be asking ourselves the questions, “Am I
truly applying myself 100 percent? Can I do more?”
Instead of getting up at 9:00 a.m., can you get up at 7:00? Instead of
studying for an hour, can you study for two hours? Instead of practicing twice
a week, can you practice four times a week?
Dissatisfaction is always asking yourself, “Can I do more?” And nine
times out of ten, the answer to that question is always going to be yes. But it’s
hard to do more. Because people are satisfied with not doing more. It’s hard
to want to do more. But if you want to run the mental marathon, you do.
Happiness is knowing that you can do more.
Happiness is knowing that you haven’t reached your limit, that you’re
capable of more. That’s happiness. If you’re done, that’s not happiness. You
can be happy knowing that you haven’t reached your full potential yet,
because there’s so much more to give. That is happiness. If you’re done,
that’s death.
An example of dissatisfaction that I can give you comes from a personal
story, of course. After a rough start, the movie business began to grow for
me, and my opportunities got bigger and better. And there was a moment
when I was offered a major movie role that I would have been really excited
to get years earlier, but I felt like now this film wasn’t an example of
progression. I felt like me doing that movie would have been me standing
still and being content with the same level of success and not really
challenging myself at this stage of my career.
So I chose to say no to the movie and instead look for the next step up. I
chose to look for the movie that would act as an example of growth for me
and my career. And the movie I ended up taking instead was The Upside.
This was a more dramatic type of role for me, and it put me around a
different group of actors and actresses where I had no choice but to step up to
the occasion. I had to not only come in prepared but also come in with a
different tone. I had to not be the version of myself that I’ve been in
everything else. I had to show up on set ready to be directed and to take
constructive criticism.
In return, I wanted to deliver a great performance that inspired others to
say, “Wow, this guy’s got talent. This guy’s capable of doing more of this.”
Because that’s the way I feel about myself in the space of acting. But if I
don’t make it happen, then it may never happen. So I chose to not be satisfied
with the first reasonable offering that came in. I chose to grow and stretch
myself, and that choice ended up being the right one.
The movie ended up being successful. It showed me that I was capable
of working in a dramatic space and taking on more serious acting roles. So
now guess what? I’m not satisfied with that moment. I want to elevate even
more and continue to progress by asking myself, Can I do more?
So the same questions that I’m suggesting you ask yourself are the exact
questions that I ask myself. That’s it. I’m giving you people gold here. For
the price of a book. You can’t get a better deal than that.
Unless you’re dissatisfied with this deal, in which case you can keep
pushing and find an even better one.
 9. NONREACTIVITY

T
his tool is more crucial now than ever.
We live in an outrage culture. People love to get angry about shit
and try to make other people join them in their indignation. Your
outrage often means more clicks for a news site or social media profile,
which means more likes or money for them. The world is constantly trying to
get a rise out of you and spark a negative reaction.
With so much going on and so much stimulation, the stuff that gets
attention has to get more and more ridiculous to stand out from the sea of
noise. When it works, people mimic this, and more ridiculousness and
heightened emotion ensues.
Nonreactivity is remaining centered in the eye of the storm. You are the
calm, still emptiness among the chaos. When you overreact, whether it’s to
the news, a friend, a partner, or worst of all, your own child, you flip the
switch on an unintentional and unconscious course of action, emotion, or
thinking.
You lose your cool, which means losing the power that comes from
being able to perceive accurately, think clearly, and respond intentionally.
And often, you violate the boundaries and dignity of the person you are
reacting to.
People are always asking me, “How can you walk around acting like
nothing fazes you? How do you stay so cool?” I can act like nothing fazes me
because, on the inside, I’m not letting it faze me. The surprises of life are
going to keep raining down whether I like it or not. Other people are going to
keep operating from inside their own reality and mental game. None of that
means a goddamn thing about my own.
Nonreactivity keeps you centered, in control, and on track.
People spew negativity for a reaction. That’s the only reason behind it.
They’re looking for a reaction. If you give that, then you feed into it. When
you’re nonreactive to it, then the point of attack has no return. Be
unflappable.
“Fuck you, Kevin Hart—you not funny!”
“Sorry.”
“I can’t stand your fucking movies.”
“I apologize.”
“You ain’t tall. You’re a short ass.”
“Sorry.”
“Look at your fucking hands! You got some ugly-ass hands.”
“I apologize.”
“Fuck you, man!”
“You’re right.”
“Look at your goddamn face. Ugly ass.”
“Sorry.”
“I know those are kids’ clothes.”
“You’re right.”
I don’t care. I’m nonreactive. You got nothin’—unless I give you
something, and that’s not just me. Nobody has anything on you unless you
give it to them. Your emotions, your response, your anger—those are all
things controlled by you. When you’re nonreactive, people are wasting their
time when they try to fuck with you.
I love to snap. I love to tease and make fun of my friends. It’s what we
do. We’re all comedians—we joke on each other. One of my friends has a
funny thing he says: “Well, that’s not gonna hurt my feelings. No matter what
you say, it’s not gonna hurt my feelings.” And it’s the funniest shit in the
world because he’s playing, he’s being silly, and we get to come at him as
hard as we can. But there’s a real meaning behind it. Basically he’s saying
that he’s intact no matter what—“Imma be good.”
“I know you’re not gonna wear that dumbass shirt outside.”
“You’re not gonna hurt my feelings. This is the shirt I chose today, and
I’m gonna wear it. Nothing you say is going to hurt me.”
That’s the best response to anything. Practice it: “You’re not going to
hurt my feelings.” Nonreactive. These are all fucking key tools. Key tools.
Gems. Chicken nuggets. Golden, crisp chicken nuggets. Gems droppin’ outa
my butt. Let’s keep it moving.
10. SELF-GENERATING POWER

T
o truly succeed, you have to be your own power source. Waiting for
energy and motivation from the outside is a loser’s strategy.
In this game, when you break down, you can’t sit on the side of
the road waiting for a tow truck to get you somewhere. You need to be your
own tow truck.
For most people, motivation is temporary. It’s something they
occasionally get from the outside. They start a workout plan for a week and
drop it. They buy a domain for their blog, and it sits unused. But to bring
consistent enthusiasm and action every day is a choice you have to make for
yourself.
A long time ago, I realized there’s no magic current that takes you
places in life. I had to propel myself even through those times where I felt
like sitting dead in the water, where I wished I didn’t have to keep paddling
and someone else could just take over for a while.
Self-powership means being a self-starter. It’s the ability to pull energy
and grit out of yourself at will and decide to keep putting in the work. That’s
self-powership. That’s strong, self-generating power.
I ran a goddamn marathon, the New York City Marathon. In mile
fucking twenty, it felt like somebody shot me in the back of both of my calf
muscles. They call it “the wall.” My body shut down.
First of all, my dumb ass ran in some long tights and a long-sleeved
shirt because I like to be warm when I run. What I did was sweat like
nobody’s fucking business. The more you sweat, the more your body is
dehydrating. Everything I had in was coming out. So when I cramped up, it
was like nobody’s fucking business. I couldn’t walk; I couldn’t move. I was
ready to say to my running partner, “Fuck this shit! I’m about to tell them get
a goddamn golf cart and meet us at the next stop. I ain’t doing this.”
I didn’t say it out loud—there were too many people around watching.
Instead I said to myself, Goddamn it, Kevin. You ran twenty miles. You ran
twenty fucking miles. You’ve been training for this marathon for months, and
now you’ve cramped up like you’ve never cramped up before, and you’re
ready to stop and be okay with knowing that you didn’t finish. That’s not
acceptable, Kevin. You ain’t out here running for a gold medal. You’re not
out here racing nobody. You’re out here doing this for you.
I was doing this for me. I challenged myself to do a marathon, and the
first shot I got at it, I got hit with an unexpected batch of cramps and was
ready to quit. I finished my last 6.2 miles with the ugliest running form that
you can possibly imagine. It was a run-limp-walk-run-hop. That’s what it
was.
I would get an occasional burst where the cramp would go away, and
the minute I would start running, that shit would start up again. They had
places where you could stop and get Biofreeze and rub it all on your legs. I
was bathing in Biofreeze, drinking buckets of fucking Gatorade and water,
trying to do whatever I could to put something in my body so I could finish.
I pushed through. At about three miles left, my body started to become
numb to the cramps, and I was able to start running again. I finished my
fucking marathon. I finished it because I pushed my way through it by myself
using self-generating power. Using my own energy source, my own energy
bank (and a little Biofreeze), to get me through the thing that I told myself I
would do.
It was nobody else’s fight but mine. I used my energy, and it probably
was the best feeling I ever had in my life, knowing how I got through it, how
I endured, what I pushed through.
Self-powership—we all got it. My suggestion is for you to tap into
yours.
You know, a lot of people in this town where I live expect other people
to do it all for them. They hire a manager, an agent, a lawyer, whatever, and
expect those people to just make them successful. But that’s not how it
works. No matter who you hire or work with or work for, it all still comes
back to you and what you’re willing to do.
I got a team of fifteen to twenty people, and all those individuals serve a
valuable purpose. But guess what? If I don’t match the energy of their work
ethic, then they’re wasting their time. If I’m not willing to go and do the
things that I’m supposed to do, then I’m wasting their time.
As an example, there are some actors who despise marketing a movie
but expect the results of a box office success. There are some actors who
don’t want to do promo at all, and then a movie goes out and it fails, and they
look at the studio and go, “Why did y’all fuck this movie up?”
Work still has to be done regardless of the people you put around you,
because anything that you do, you need to be proud of. You gotta be happy
with your effort. You gotta know that you put 100 percent into it. I’m not
comfortable with blaming my team. I’m not comfortable with blaming my
managers or my agents. I blame myself, the same way I give myself credit.
Your future rests on no one else’s shoulders but your own. So learn to
carry a bigger load, and you’ll have a bigger life.
 11. SPONGINESS

Y
ou want to get ahead and continuously improve beyond where you’re
at right now? Get spongy.
Eagerly soak up knowledge from people around you and those
who are better at what you’re trying to do. An insatiable curiosity about the
thought processes and execution strategies of other successful people will
serve you endlessly.
You can’t know how to do everything. And what you think you know
about anything is massively incomplete. Stepping inside the minds of other
people starts to fill in the chasms in your own understanding and gives you
completely new ways of approaching things that you would never have
conceived of in your entire life.
In fact, you couldn’t on your own. Because it had to have been
generated inside another brain with a radically different set of wiring.
If it weren’t for this skill, I wouldn’t be where I am today. It was
learning from people smarter than me, who had some shit figured out and
already made their own mistakes, that put me in a position to succeed. I’m
just here trying to return the favor.
I wouldn’t understand the importance of trying to build a brand, and
become a brand, if it weren’t for people like Oprah, Tyler Perry, Jay-Z,
Beyoncé, Rihanna.
You gotta listen. You can’t be afraid to learn. Be a sponge and soak up
information. I wouldn’t know that I could do comedy outside the country if I
hadn’t listened to Chris Rock when he told me about how comedy is global:
“Don’t just do comedy for one place and one group of people. There’s a
world out there that you should be making laugh. Be global, Kevin. Be
universal.”
I wouldn’t know to promote movies outside the fucking country if it
weren’t for Will Smith and Tom Cruise. They promoted movies like
nobody’s business all over the world. They embraced their fans in every
territory. That’s why they became global successes. So when you look at
Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson and you look at me, we go fucking everywhere
when it comes to promoting a movie. That’s because we’re following the
blueprint that was given, and we understand the importance of showing your
fans that you love them. You show that by getting your ass on a plane and
traveling eighteen hours to go to a red-carpet event, and shake hands and say
hello. It goes a long way. I wouldn’t know that if I didn’t soak up that
information when it was given.
I wouldn’t know the importance of relationships in this business if I
didn’t listen to the people who felt like they fucked up relationships and
that’s why they can’t work today. I wouldn’t know the importance of being
good to everyone and treating them well. You want people to be there for you
and help you if and when you’re on your way down. So while you’re on your
way up, treat everybody with fucking respect. I was being spongy when that
information was given to me.
Be spongy, people: you don’t know everything. The smartest person in
the room never says they’re the smartest person in the room. The smartest
person in the room lets everybody talk, and they listen so they can get even
smarter. The smartest person in the room is the spongiest. Facts.
 12. RELATABILITY

U
se your your sponginess to breed another important quality, which is
relatability.
When people get more committed to their path, their obsessive
tunnel vision can turn them into a silo, which separates them from other
people. Everything becomes about what they’re doing, and they close their
mind to other parts of life and people.
Soaking up knowledge from different individuals in different fields not
only makes you a more well-rounded and creative thinker, but it also allows
you to relate with more people as you move through life, which in turn
encourages more personal growth.
It allows you to be more socially agile and adjust to any room. Being
able to carry conversations and make connections with a greater range of
people opens up doors to ideas and opportunities you wouldn’t otherwise
have if you stayed narrow minded.
I realize that this is a short section. But I’m also short. So I hope all
short people related to this section.
 13. EYES-ON-THE-PRIZE-NESS

T
he world is constantly trying to influence you and tell you what’s
important, what you want, what you need, who you are, and what you
can and can’t do.
It will constantly dangle carrots and tinsel in your field of view, trying
to distract you from your path so it can get as much of your time and money
as possible. That’s the nature of the game.
Sometimes those distractions come from inside your own head. You
may try to throw yourself off because a part of you wants to avoid the hard
work, the discomfort, and the risks of failure, criticism, or self-criticism.
Don’t listen. Don’t look. Keep your eyes on the prize.
What is the prize? Well, that’s for you to decide. You can’t keep your
eyes on something you haven’t defined. And that’s one of the biggest
problems for most people: they don’t know what they’re after. Or they’re
chasing after someone else’s prize without an authentic hunger in their belly
for it.
You can’t summon the self-powership and determination necessary to
push yourself down the path if you don’t know what the path is leading
toward, and feel a burning drive to get there.
And you can’t make the hard decisions in life if you don’t have
perspective on the bigger picture of where you’re going to help guide your
thinking. You can get thrown so far off track because you’re getting pulled
into opportunities and people that take you away from where it is you want to
go.
When your eyes are on the prize, you can think, Hmm, will what’s in
front of me right now help me move toward the prize and be the person I
want to be—or build something that will help me do that later? Or is this
getting in the way and throwing me off course or making me compromise on
being my best?
 Nobody can define your prize but you. Only you can know what it is
you want to achieve and how you want to feel.
At some points we’ll try out other people’s prizes. That’s fine. It’s only
natural. We think, That looks good. Damn, maybe they’ve figured it out.
They’re getting attention. They seem to be happy. Maybe that will make me
happy too.
Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, we come to realize—at some point
or another—that’s not it.
But one of the quickest ways to get closer to learning what you
authentically want is through the contrast of experiencing what you don’t
want and what doesn’t work.
It’s a process of trial and error, but there are no shortcuts. Sometimes
you’re possessed by an idea of what your prize could be, and you’ll never
know if it’s the one until you start moving toward it, or once you have it in
your hands and feel nothing inside.
One of the biggest things that takes people’s eyes off their prize is
comparison.
Because people often aren’t solid in themselves and don’t have their
mental game right, they’re constantly looking around wondering, How do I
look? Do they think I’m cool? Do they like where I’m headed? Is it going to
get me laid? What are they doing? Shit, maybe that’s what I should be doing
too.
As I move through life, I’m not comparing myself to what else is going
on or who else is doing what, when, and how. I’m only comparing myself to
me. And when I feel good about myself, I also feel like I can do anything.
Because only I know what I’m truly capable of.
So I’m keeping my eyes on my prize. I’m not looking around me
worried about what other people think of it or whether their prize is better.
The other thing that takes my eyes off the prize is wasting my time
staring at the obstacles in my way. All that does is slow you down and have
you thinking about the problems rather than focusing on the prize on the
other side.
Where you look is where you’re going to go.
With the concept of “eyes-on-the-prize-ness,” understand that you gotta
be talking about your prize. It’s not about somebody else’s prize. My eyes
have never left my prize, ever. Because the moment you take your eyes and
apply them to something else, you have veered off the road. You’re heading
somewhere else.
I truly believe in staying on course. Just be aware that while you’re on
course, things can happen, roadblocks can be thrown, sometimes walls appear
out of nowhere. It’s your job to weave, jump, roll, and swerve around them.
Because your eyes are on the prize. Nothing should take your eyes off it.
However, your prize can evolve and grow over time. For me, the prize
used to be just getting on stage. And then it became getting to a larger stage
. . . a bigger audience . . . a comedy special . . . a TV show . . . a movie . . . a
bigger movie . . . and so on. That prize just grew with me, hence the word
prize-ness. Prize-ness is a lot of prizes in one, so keep your eyes on the prize-
ness.
 14. PUT-UP-WITH-NESS

I
f you’re going to go any kind of distance and take on the challenge of
unleashing everything you’ve got, you’re going to have to put up with a
lot of things.
Without the capacity for put-up-with-ness, you’re going to fold at the
first sign of adversity or give up just before the finish line.
Without patience, you also won’t be able to withstand the amount of
time it’s really going to take to realize your vision. Nothing will happen
overnight. Even if it looks like it does for other people, it almost always took
years of work for someone to reach that moment or put themselves in a
position for something to happen.
It takes time for trees to bear fruit.
It takes time for plans to come together.
It takes time to learn and pivot after each attempt.
Your ability to succeed and accomplish your goals is directly dependent
on your ability to deal with adversity and time.
There’s a reason why champions are champions. There’s a way that
legends are made. It’s because these are people willing to do what the
majority of the world isn’t. Legends and champions are willing to put up with
more discomfort than other people. They’re willing to make big sacrifices to
get what they want.
Are you willing to sacrifice a high level of fun and comfort in order to
be great? I am. I have been. And I still will be. Because I’m not great yet. Nor
am I comfortable. I won’t allow myself to feel comfortable. Because when
you feel comfortable, you relax. When you relax, you get lazy. When you get
lazy, life passes you by.
A life of greatness is like a boxing match with unlimited rounds. It’s
one test after another of your technique, timing, mental sharpness, and
stamina.
 For some people, the idea of looking at life like an endless boxing
match seems like an exhausting punishment. They’d rather throw in the towel
than put in the effort.
If you’re stuck thinking like that—about how you have to keep putting
up with so much friction and hardship still to come—flip the frame like this:
it’s not even about putting up with discomfort, it’s about refusing to put up
with comfort.
I refuse to allow mediocrity. I refuse to put up with anything less than
my best. So anything that I have to withstand in pursuit of my best isn’t even
a task. It’s the obvious choice. When the alternative is dying with the regret
of knowing I wasted my life and my potential . . . slap some motherfucking
Vaseline on my face and get me back in, Coach!
There is nothing on this earth more terrifying to me than that.
It’s either put-up-with-ness and deciding to stay in the ring, or quitting
and sitting for the rest of your life with the knowledge that you gave up on
yourself.
Understand that put-up-with-ness is a talent. And I’ve had to showcase
this talent a lot. Every time I bring a new person onto my team or my
company, there’s a level of put-up-with-ness that has to be displayed.
This person may not know what to do or may not fit in at first, so you’re
the one who has to shape, mold, and fix. You gotta put up with whatever the
BS is or may be before it gets to a place that makes you happy.
This is especially true with my team, because we’re friends—and when
you mix friendship with business, sometimes those lines get blurred. So I
have to be patient and have a high level of put-up-with-ness with the
problems that occur. Nothing’s easy. When you understand that, you’re able
to move and maneuver better—plain and simple. I wish I could tell you that I
didn’t have to use a high level of put-up-with-ness, but I do. You do too.
Another example of put-up-with-ness that can happen is that the minute
you think that you’ve done something right, there’s always someone who
thinks you’ve done something wrong. I remember when I bought cars for all
my friends after I toured.
You would think that would be the best day in the world, but there was
one friend who was like, “Man, I mean, this is cool, but I wish you woulda
just gave me the money.”
Huh?
I had to put up with the fact that this was an ungrateful goddamn
comment, and I had to simply say, “Oh, I’m sorry. The next time I’ll try to
ask you before I surprise you.”
I had other people that work for me say, “Are we getting cars too?”
“No!”
But I can’t say that. I had to put on my put-up-with-ness face and say,
“No, nobody else is getting cars. That was just for the guys on tour.”
I had to have a high level of put-up-with-ness to not get upset about
some of the responses. It’s a lot better than thinking, No good deed goes
unpunished, which is a terrible way of thinking and responding. That saying
lacks put-up-with-ness.
Put-up-with-ness comes in different ways, shapes, sizes, and disguises. I
haven’t always been equipped with it, but I am now. My put-up-with-ness
game is strong. Get your game strong too.
If you love the game, that means that you love the fight. If you love the
fight, you love the constant triumph over your own mind. You gotta beat
yourself—that’s who you’re boxing. You’re going twelve rounds with
yourself. So whenever you find your mind leaning into the direction of giving
up, you gotta get your brain back in the corner, give your mind a pep talk,
throw some ice on your face, make sure you shake off any tiredness, and say,
“Give me one more round.” And then next round, you better throw
haymakers and knock that motherfucker out. Of course, I’m talking about
whatever obstacle is in front of you that’s preventing you from moving
forward in life. You gotta knock that one out cold.
For example, I hated history. I couldn’t stand history when I was in
school. I thought it was a bunch of useless information. The reason why is I
lived in North Philadelphia: Why do I need to learn history? I’m around a
bunch of abandoned fucking houses and empty apartment buildings, and I got
a couple local Chinese stores and liquor stores on the corner. There’s a
McDonald’s three blocks down. There’s a KFC not that far—Popeyes is a
longer walk. Couple public schools . . . What the fuck I need to know about
history? Ain’t shit historic about where I live. Killing here, killing there—we
lucky to make it out.
That’s all I felt like I needed to know, because that’s all I was around.
Holy shit, then we cut to Kevin Hart now, and he realizes that the lessons he
was given back then are valuable—because as much as I travel, the most
interesting thing about it is attaching these destinations to historic
understanding. The education that I once overlooked is now embraced. I
embrace knowing. I didn’t know that this was coming. Young Kev didn’t see
the future of Old Kev. So sometimes you can be negative simply because you
don’t know. Instead, embrace and understand. And be patient, because you
never know what will be valuable in your future.
These are nuggets. If you haven’t already noticed, little nuggets just
naturally drop out of my butt—little information nuggets. I suggest you pick
them up as I goddamn let ’em out, ’cause that was a nugget. I think this has
been a good book.
I really just said that to myself. I had a moment of realization to myself
that went, Kevin, you’re doing a really good job.
You know what that is? That’s me being mindful of what I’m doing and
me not being afraid to congratulate myself to motivate myself to keep going.
If this was a boxing match, this could be round eight. I could be tired. My
arms could be getting sore. But you know what I just did? I just gave myself
a little pep talk that made me want to keep going. I just gave myself a little
put-up-with-ness.
 15. HUMILITY

O
n our journey forward, one thing that we have to realize is this:
success can be a drug. It can take hold of you and turn you into a
junkie, lead you to do things you don’t want to, and turn you into a
person you don’t want to be.
When it comes to getting wealth or the spotlight, a lot of people want it.
But very few can handle it and maintain their sense of self and sanity. Is it
because of the feelings that come with it? Is it because of the finances that
come with it? Is it because of the pressure that comes with it? Is it because of
the change in the individual?
I would say all of the above, which is why the most important thing in
the world is humility. You have to stay connected to what really matters,
which is how you feel about yourself and your immediate surroundings.
Other people’s opinions of you—positive or negative—don’t mean shit.
And what you have doesn’t mean shit either if it’s about putting on a show
and not rooted in what makes you feel happy and whole.
No matter what you achieve and accomplish, you’re not better than
anyone else. You do what you do because you want to do it.
When you stay humble, it’s hard to lose yourself in things that don’t
matter or things that feed the ego. It’s harder to get lost or be taken for a ride
by people and opportunities that want to exploit you in exchange for petty
things like attention.
Sometimes you don’t know how to be humble until you get put in a
position where you see that not being humble really makes you look
disgusting.
I’ve had moments where I wasn’t humble—a few possibly in this book.
But I learn from those moments. I’ve had moments where I wanted to be the
guy. I wanted to walk into the room and have everybody say, “Oh my god,
there’s the guy.” And when you are that guy, you try to do the shit you think
the guy should do.
But then you realize, Fuck, I’m not even being myself. I’m not even
being close to who I really am. Right now I’m performing when I’m supposed
to just simply be me. Oh, wow. So because I’m trying to become this other
thing, I’m forgetting what the real thing is. And the real thing is just being a
genuine nice person. That’s what matters, and success can make you forget
that. Instead, you start asking for dumb shit:
“I need Starburst, and I need y’all to cut the corners off.”
“What?”
“You heard me. All red, no corners. I need them in a bowl, no wrappers.
And if they’re not here, I’m not going onstage.”
“Uh, okay, Mr. Hart.”
“Chocolate chip cookies, but do me a favor and take the chocolate chips
out of the cookies. So I want a chocolate chip cookie but with the chocolate
chips removed and put in a separate bowl where I can just eat the chocolate
chips.”
“You know we can get you a bag of chocolate chips—”
“Did I ask for that?! Take the chocolate chips out of the cookies!”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Hart.”
“I want buffalo wings, but I want them fried hard, and I want the
goddamn buffalo sauce on the heel of the wing.”
“I don’t understand.”
“What the fuck did I just say that was confusing?! Put the sauce on the
heel, bitch! I like to eat my buffalo wings from the heel first.”
This is shit you just start to make up in your goddamn head. No, I have
never asked for those things. No, I have never wanted to do anything that
exaggerated, but I know people who have. I’ve seen people do even worse
things. I’ve seen people run other individuals through the wringer just
because. So these examples that I saw made me say to myself, I never want to
be like that. I don’t want to do that. I want to be as humble as I possibly can.
And God, if I’m ever not doing it, please check me.
If you take nothing else from this book, take away the fact that you are
no better or worse than anybody else. You have your grind. Other people
have theirs. And no two grinds ever need to be in conflict. We can all grind
each other up to a better place.
I think that made sense. If it didn’t, that’s because I was too humble to
show off by ending this book with a big, fancy idea.
 NOW GO USE THESE TOOLS

T
hese fifteen items are not just tools. They are a foundation. They are
the core of a personality, an outlook, and a way of being. They are a
window through which you meet the world and it meets you back.
If you can embody just these traits alone, your life and relationships will
be amazing. The result is getting to be a great, effective human being. It is the
engine out of which your life springs.
From this foundation, go forth and have fun building your best life.
Make sure to let me know how it goes. Share your success so others can be
motivated to learn these tools as well. Pass them on to your children, to your
neighbors, to your baristas, and to your pets. So we can all live happily
together.
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Photo © Kevin Kwan

Kevin Hart is an award-winning actor, a comedian, and a number one New

York Times bestselling author. His films, including Jumanji, Captain
Underpants, and The Secret Life of Pets, have earned billions at the box
office, and his stand-up comedy tours have sold out arenas and football
stadiums, leading Forbes to name him the “king of comedy.” His novel
Marcus Makes a Movie was an instant New York Times bestseller and was
published to great critical acclaim, with Kirkus Reviews praising it as “a
charming read . . . that celebrates the gifts of authentic friendship” and
Publishers Weekly calling it an “energetic love letter to the artistic process.”
In the laugh-out-loud sequel, Hart delivers a sincere message about the perils
of sudden fame and the importance of sticking close to the friends and family
who helped get you there.
Hart is also an entrepreneur, a television producer, and the chairman of
the Laugh Out Loud Network and CEO of HartBeat Productions. He lives in
Los Angeles with his family.