REAL Mentors Podcast

Gerardo Santana served in Afghanistan, taught high school in the Bronx for seven years and was good at doing what a lot of men are good at pushing everything down and keeping it moving. Then his daughter was born and the emotional breakdowns started happening in the middle of the city and he could not explain them and could not make them stop.That was the beginning of the real work.Gerardo is the founder and host of the Dad’s Group Chat podcast, a platform built on the conversations men never have with each other. Not sports, not current events, but the real stuff. What kind of father do you want to be. What kind of father were you given. What do you have to unlearn before you can give your kids something different.In this episode Gerardo and Sean get into machismo culture, the pendulum swing from hard parenting to soft parenting and what it actually looks like to dismantle what your father gave you while you are still in the middle of raising your own kids. They also get into why the people around you are the last ones you should be going to for advice when you are doing something brave.If you are a father, a son trying to break a cycle or a man who has been pushing things down for too long this episode will hit home.This Episode Explores:✅ Emotional breakdowns in the city that came out of nowhere and would not stop✅ Serving in Afghanistan and coming home with a military mindset that was quietly destroying him as a father✅ Teaching high school in the Bronx for seven years before realizing he had never dealt with his own childhood✅ Why having a daughter dismantled the machismo he did not even know he was carrying✅ Going to the VA for therapy and telling his father to wait in the car so he would not get triggered✅ Why therapy can become too much and what taking breaks from it actually taught him✅ The pendulum swing from hardcore parenting to super gentle parenting and finding the real balance✅ Building Dad’s Group Chat as a space for the conversations men never have with each other✅ Why you are still going to the wrong crowd for advice and what that is costing you✅ Breaking generational cycles your grandfather never faced your father never faced and now you have to face alone🔗 Connect with Gerardo SantanaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/thedadsgroupchatpod/Follow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Anthony Lolli was driving a Rolls Royce and living in a mini mansion in Brooklyn when he was slowly eating himself to death. He knew it. His wife Tereza knew it. His kids knew it. Nobody could make him stop until the right combination of accountability, ego and a two and a half year old daughter who did not know the word fat but found one that hurt just as much finally cracked him open.What followed was a 125 pound transformation documented on a cell phone that became a global phenomenon on Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV. Then came skin removal surgery, competing in six back to back bodybuilding competitions together in five months with no cheat meals and the realization that if they could do that together they could build anything together.Today Anthony and Tereza are the co-founders of Biohack Yourself Media, one of the fastest growing independent health platforms in the world. They produce documentaries, run a national magazine in 5200 retail locations, launched Health News Network as a Netflix for health and built Zanzi.ai as a guided intelligence system for biohacking and longevity. They also produced the MAHA Ball for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. This is what happens when a personal health crisis becomes a mission.In this episode Anthony, Tereza and Sean get into obesity as addiction, what functional medicine revealed about their son after seven misdiagnoses, why the current medical system is 50 years behind the science and what it actually takes to build a wellness empire with your spouse without killing each other.If you care about your health your longevity or what is actually possible for your body this episode will change how you think about all of it.This Episode Explores:✅ Why Anthony calls obesity suicide by food in slow motion and what finally made him take it seriously✅ Documenting a 125 pound weight loss on a cell phone that became a documentary on Amazon Prime and Apple TV✅ Tereza’s journey from putting herself completely on the back burner to becoming a two time bikini world champion✅ Six back to back bodybuilding competitions together in five months with zero cheat meals✅ Their son being misdiagnosed seven times and how Tereza spent two years and $250,000 becoming a health detective to find the real answer✅ How functional medicine revealed mold infection being confused for autism and what that taught them about the broken medical system✅ Why the current medical industry is practicing medicine based on science that is 50 to 60 years old✅ Building Biohack Yourself Media into a national magazine streaming platform documentary studio and health news network✅ Producing the MAHA Ball for Robert F. Kennedy Jr and what the Make America Healthy Again executive order actually means✅ Why they call themselves delusional optimists and why that is the only way to build something nobody has built before🔗 Connect with Anthony and Tereza LolliInstagram: Anthony https://www.instagram.com/anthonylolli/TereZa https://www.instagram.com/terezalolli/Biohack Yourself Media: www.biohackyourself.comFollow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Don Donneruno grew up in New York City during the graffiti movement of the early 80s. Every year in school when they asked what he wanted to be he wrote artist. Every adult around him told him that was not a real career. So he spent decades doing everything but that until his early 40s when a friend called and asked him to help make a King Kong cake.He had never made a cake in his life. Ninety seconds after posting it online someone wrote forget the Cake Boss you are the Cake Tuck. By the end of that first day strangers were messaging him for orders. What followed was a spot on season four of Buddy Velasco on TLC, his own bakery, 18 months of being his only employee, missed mortgage payments, panic attacks, depression and suicidal thoughts all while chasing the only thing he ever actually wanted to be.Today Don has made custom cakes for Cardinal Dolan, Elon Musk and some of the most recognizable names in the world. He got there by putting the trauma in a backpack, freeing up his hands and never stopping.In this episode Don and Sean get into absent fathers, the internal work it takes to stop being driven by a ghost, what a four day guided medicine experience in New Mexico did to his ego and why authenticity is the only competitive advantage that nobody can take from you.If you are a creative entrepreneur, a career changer or anyone who has ever been told their dream is not realistic this episode is exactly what you need to hear.This Episode Explores: ✅ Growing up in the New York City graffiti movement and spending decades burying his identity as an artist ✅ Quitting his career in his early 40s to chase art and what that decision actually cost him ✅ Making his first cake and getting flooded with orders within 24 hours of posting it online ✅ Landing on season four of Buddy Velasco on TLC and what happened when the cameras stopped rolling ✅ 18 months as his only employee missing mortgage payments while battling panic attacks and depression ✅ His father leaving at five years old and never coming back and why he now speaks of him only with gratitude ✅ The backpack metaphor that changed how he carries trauma and freed his hands to create ✅ A four day guided medicine experience in New Mexico that dissolved his ego and changed everything ✅ Making cakes for Cardinal Dolan Elon Musk and some of the biggest names in the world ✅ Why comparison is the thief of joy and why none of his competitors can ever replicate being him🔗 Connect with Don Donneruno Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the_cake_don/ Website: www.thecakedoncreations.comFollow REAL Mentors Podcast Instagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcast Host Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Steven Edisis grew up in Edison New Jersey watching his family scrape by through the entire decade of the 1970s. By college he was throwing black paint parties on tennis courts for five dollars a head, promoting nightclubs in Miami and eventually moving into a house the Real World cast just vacated and charging a hundred dollars a head at the door. He figured out how to monetize fun before he ever figured out how to build a business.What followed was three decades of massive wins, massive failures and the kind of hard lessons that only come from doing it with no mentor, no roadmap and no one to call. He did not find himself until he was 40 years old. Everything before that was figuring it out.Today Steven is the founder and CEO of Dynamic Capital, a company that has deployed over a billion dollars in working capital to more than 15,000 small businesses across the US and Canada. He serves the businesses that traditional banks turn away — the mom and pop operations, the minority owned businesses, the women owned businesses, the ones with cash flow but no collateral. His philosophy is simple. The businesses that survive long enough to become great are the ones that never run out of cash.In this episode Steven and Sean get into what it actually takes to build from nothing, why the CEO must always be the number one salesperson in the organization and the three non negotiables every founder needs to lean on before they build anything else.This Episode Explores:✅ Growing up in Edison New Jersey watching his family transform from lower income to middle class in real time✅ Throwing paint parties and promoting nightclubs in Miami to blend fun and finance in college✅ Buying bars on Washington Avenue and learning that early success without systems will knock you on your ass✅ Why he did not find himself or his real path until he was 40 years old✅ Founding Dynamic Capital to serve the businesses traditional banks refuse to touch✅ Why minority owned and women owned businesses were the first ones he chose to fund✅ How Dynamic Capital looks at gross revenue instead of net profit and what that means for small business owners✅ Why the CEO must be the number one salesperson in the organization and what happens when they are not✅ Don't let a little success cause a lot of overhead and the other rules he lives by as a CEO✅ The three non negotiables every aspiring founder needs before they build anything else🔗 Connect with Steven EdisisInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/stevenedisis/Dynamic Capital: https://www.instagram.com/dynamiccapital/Follow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Shawn French earned an athletic scholarship to LSU, became a top 1% performer in medical device sales and built one of the top 0.5 percent ranked podcasts in the world. By every external measure he was winning. He was still empty inside and it took him until his mid forties to understand why.It started in the third inning of a baseball game when he let a ball go between his legs and his father criticized him from the stands. That single moment set a program running in the background that quietly drove every major decision he made for decades. The need to prove himself. The relationships where he constantly asked are we okay because deep down he never felt safe enough to just exist. The career achievements that never filled the hole they were supposed to fill.Today Shawn is a high performance coach, keynote speaker and creator of the Determined Society podcast ranked in the top 0.5 percent globally. His upcoming book Blood Type Determined is about building the grit, resilience and accountability that nobody hands you and that you have to fight for yourself.In this episode Shawn and Sean get real about father wounds, breaking generational cycles, what it actually costs to chase external validation your entire life and why the so called midlife crisis is really a midlife reinvention for the people brave enough to do the real work.If you are a high achiever, entrepreneur, father or creator who has ever wondered why success still does not feel like enough this episode will hit home.This Episode Explores:✅ Earning an athletic scholarship to LSU and what chasing validation through baseball actually cost him✅ Becoming a top 1% medical device sales performer and still feeling completely empty inside✅ How one Tony Robbins clip led to a phone call that repaired his relationship with his father✅ Why his seven year old daughter is here to heal him and what she is teaching him about empathy and active listening✅ Breaking generational cycles deliberately so his children never have to break them themselves✅ Starting the Determined Society podcast alone recording audio in his car with no audience and no team✅ Why your friends and family will be laughing on the group text before they slide into your DMs as fans✅ The number one limiting belief that stops most creators and podcasters before they ever start✅ Why growing up in an unsafe environment actually prepares you better for entrepreneurship than a comfortable childhood ever could✅ The midlife crisis reframed as a midlife reinvention and why crossing into the second half of life with meaning is the real win🔗 Connect with Shawn FrenchInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/theshawnfrench/Determined Society Podcast: https://www.instagram.com/thedeterminedsociety/Book: Blood Type DeterminedFollow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Sam Tejada spent 12 years as a firefighter paramedic watching the same people call 911 over and over. Not because the system was failing them. Because the system was working exactly the way it was designed to, which is treating sickness, not preventing it. He watched people show up in the back of his ambulance with grocery bags full of medications that contradicted each other, prescribed by doctors who never talked to one another, for conditions that started with lifestyle choices nobody ever addressed.He could not keep being a product of that system. So he built a different one.Today Sam is the founder and president of Liquivida, a multi million dollar wellness company with a network of over 4,000 physicians and practitioners nationwide. He is the author of How to Win in Modern Wellness and the chairman of the American IV Association. He started it at 26 years old on his days off from the fire department out of a single room in a chiropractor's office that was collecting dust.In this episode Sam and Sean get into why longevity science is 25 years ahead of what your doctor is actually practicing, what the pharmaceutical system is doing to your hormones and cellular health without you realizing it and what prevention actually looks like when someone builds an entire company around it.If you care about your health, your hormones, your energy or what you are putting in your body this episode will change how you think about all of it.This Episode Explores:✅ Watching patients deteriorate and die on repeat 911 calls and deciding he could not be part of that system anymore✅ Working with longevity pioneer Dr. Robert Willicks and seeing disease get reversed through functional medicine✅ Starting Liquivida at 26 on his days off from the fire department out of a single spare room✅ Why the medical system is not broken. It is working exactly the way it was designed to✅ The algorithmic pharmaceutical cycle that puts you on one pill and creates five new problems✅ Why longevity science is 25 years ahead of what your doctor is actually practicing right now✅ What IV therapy actually does for your body and why the wealthy were doing it before anyone else✅ Testosterone decline, hormone replacement therapy and what happens when you do it wrong✅ Why the soil your food grows in has no nutrients left and why supplementation is no longer optional✅ How AI is accelerating medical research and what that means for the future of personalized healthcare🔗 Connect with Sam TejadaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/sammy_tejada/Website: www.liquivida.comBook: How to Win in Modern WellnessFollow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Max Mayes built a construction company to $1.6 million a month in under six months then walked away from it. He has raised over $30 million across venture, real estate and alternative investments and figured out early that once money stopped being hard to get the relationship with it changed completely. He hit $50,000 a month take home and realized it did not feel the way he thought it would.Today Max is the founder of GrowthGod, where he works with founders and investors on contrarian marketing, capital strategy and the systems that actually turn a good offer into an enterprise. His model is find the growth constraints, build the marketing team inside the business and only focus on what actually moves the needle.In this episode Max and Sean get into what most business owners get completely wrong about marketing, why your offer economics have to work before any marketing will and what it actually means to hire unmanageable people and make them your greatest asset. They also get real about what happens when financial success arrives before emotional maturity and why chasing more money after a certain point is just filling a hole that money was never going to fill.If you are a founder, entrepreneur or investor trying to scale faster and smarter this episode is exactly what you need to hear.This Episode Explores:✅ Building a construction company to $1.6 million a month in under six months and exiting✅ Raising over $30 million across venture real estate and alternative investments✅ Hitting $50,000 a month take home and realizing it still did not feel like enough✅ Why offer economics have to work before any marketing strategy will save you✅ The presupposition problem that kills most marketing campaigns before they start✅ Why broadening your market filter can dramatically increase your conversion rates✅ How to hire unmanageable lone wolf marketers and actually make them team players✅ The difference between a marketing agency model and what GrowthGod actually does✅ Why fulfillment is rarely the problem and acquisition is almost always where businesses are stuck✅ What chasing money costs you in relationships and what to do once you finally realize it🔗 Connect with Max MayesInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/maxmayes/Follow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Kelly Siegel already wrote the book on grinding through pain. Harder Than Life was the story of weaponizing poverty, abuse and addiction to build a successful company. Then he got to the top of that mountain, made the money and realized he still was not fulfilled. That is when the real work began.In this episode Kelly comes back to the REAL Mentors Podcast for a second time and goes deeper than he has ever gone publicly. He talks about the three beliefs that ran on repeat in his head for most of his life — unworthiness, unlovable and death — and what it actually took to rewire them. He gets into doing mirror work alone during the pandemic, couples therapy with his wife and finally learning how to listen instead of just solve. He talks about the difference between acts of service that come from love and acts of service that come from fear of not being safe if everyone is not happy.This is not a conversation about grinding harder. This is a conversation about what comes after the grind and why getting to the second mountain is the hardest climb of all.This Episode Explores:✅ Why scaling your business starts with your willingness to heal yourself first✅ The three beliefs that ran on repeat: unworthiness, unlovable and death✅ Five minutes of mirror work every day during the pandemic and what it actually did for him✅ The difference between Harder Than Life and his new book Happier Than Life and why they are polar opposites✅ Why people stay in comfortable misery instead of facing the unknown to live their dreams✅ What wiring for chaos looks like in business and in relationships and how to recognize it in yourself✅ Going to couples therapy as a fully healed version of himself and finally hearing what the therapist was saying✅ Why showing up and providing is not the same thing as making someone feel seen and heard✅ The second mountain is getting to the top financially and realizing success still does not taste the way you thought it would✅ Why manifestation without action is just a dream and presence without doing is not the answer either🔗 Connect with Kelly SiegelInstagram: @kelly.siegel.71YouTube: youtube.com/@harderthanlifeWebsite: harderthanlife.comBooks: Harder Than Life and Happier Than LifeFollow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Madeline Martinez was a teenage mother living in the New York City shelter system before she was old enough to graduate high school. She got her GED the same year she would have walked across that stage, enrolled in college and kept moving. Then life pulled her back under.What followed was fourteen years of addiction, an $800 a day habit, sex work, evictions, shelter system violations and a morning she woke up at 108 pounds with no shoes, people crossing the street to avoid her, and two kids she had somehow never lost custody of. That last part is what saved her.She joined the Army to escape the cycle, built a life in Arizona, watched it fall apart again and finally hit a bottom so complete there was nowhere left to go but up. She came out the other side with one mission, to make sure nobody else goes through it alone.Today Madeline is the founder of Boots Underground, an organization born from her own hunger and heartbreak, dedicated to serving veterans, single mothers and people fighting their way out of systems that were never designed to help them win.This Episode Explores:✅ Growing up in the Bronx and entering the shelter system as a single teenage mother✅ Getting her GED the year she would have graduated and starting college at LaGuardia✅ Joining the New York Army to escape a cycle she did not know how to break any other way✅ Leaving her baby behind to go into service and what that cost her✅ An $800 a day addiction and what it took to feed it✅ Hitting rock bottom at 108 pounds with no shoes and people crossing the street to avoid her✅ Never losing custody of her kids throughout fourteen years of active addiction✅ Why she refuses to judge anyone because you never know what road they walked✅ What finally made her stop and how she rebuilt from absolute zero✅ Founding Boots Underground and turning her pain into a platform that serves others🔗 Connect with Madeline MartinezInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/alwysmaddi3/Boots Underground: https://www.instagram.com/bootsonground_nyc/Follow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin

Adam Roth was smoking weed stolen from his mother at nine years old. His father taught him how to smoke crack. Anger was the only emotion he knew because at twelve years old he made the decision to stop feeling anything else. From sixteen to twenty he cycled in and out of institutions. Every single day he did not know if he was going to live or die.He got clean at 26 and never looked back. Today he is the Chief Executive Officer of We Love Walk, overseeing six addiction treatment centers across five states generating ninety to a hundred million dollars in revenue. He did not inherit that position. He built it from the ground up starting as an employee, bringing his expertise and his lived experience and growing into ownership over thirteen years alongside his partner Ryan who he met in juvenile detention when they were both sixteen years old.In this episode Adam and Sean get into what the disease of addiction actually is, why drugs are just a symptom and not the real problem and what separates the people who stay sober from the ones who keep relapsing. Adam also breaks down the KPI driven system that allows his company to outspend the competition while spending significantly less and what it actually means to master your internal world before everything else falls into place.If you are serious about recovery, entrepreneurship, mental toughness or building a data driven business from nothing this episode is required watching.This Episode Explores:✅ Smoking weed stolen from his mother at nine and being taught to smoke crack by his father✅ Anger as the only emotion he knew from age twelve until he sat in front of a therapist at thirty✅ Cycling through institutions from sixteen to twenty and not knowing if he would survive each day✅ Getting clean at 26 and building an entirely different life from scratch✅ Meeting his business partner Ryan in juvenile detention at sixteen and riding together ever since✅ Growing from employee to CEO of a six center addiction treatment company over thirteen years✅ Why the disease of addiction has nothing to do with drugs and everything to do with thought process and decision making✅ What separates people who stay sober from those who keep relapsing✅ Why vulnerability is not weakness but the actual definition of being a man✅ The KPI system that lets his company outperform competitors who spend three times as much✅ Going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm and why that is the only real business strategy🔗 Connect with Adam RothInstagram: [handle]We Love Walk: [link]Follow REAL Mentors PodcastInstagram: https://instagram.com/realmentorspodcastHost Sean Martin: https://instagram.com/theseanmartin