Inside Magic Johnson’s Billion-Dollar Empire | EP #163

Now, that's a moonshot, ladies and gentlemen. Everybody, welcome to Moonshots. During this episode, I'm going to be speaking to an incredible moonshot entrepreneur. His name is Magic Johnson. You know him as the NBA Allstar. You know him as someone who's overcome AIDS. But did you know that he has bought into dozens of companies? He had the largest franchise at Starbucks. He's been into Best Buy, Burger King, and a multitude of other companies. We're going to talk about his life. We're going to talk about how he overcame AIDS, what that was like dealing with telling his wife. We'll talk about his career in sports and then his follow on career in buying sports teams. Mostly we'll talk about the incredible lessons he learned. Now, this conversation takes place at the Lake Nona Impact Forum. It's an extraordinary conference in Lake Nona, Florida. It's where Fountain Life has its headquarters. And every year, the Lake Nona Impact Forum brings together incredible leaders from Jeff Bezos and President George W. Bush and other incredible world leaders. I'll ask my team to put a link to the Lake Nona Impact Forum in the show notes below. All right, let's jump into the episode with Magic Johnson.

I don't know if folks really understand the depth and length of what you have done there. You were the first person ever to franchise Starbucks, Burger King, 24 Hour Fitness, TGI Fridays, Best Buy, and Fatburger, with stakes in sports teams, life insurance, TV networks, and real estate. Where did that begin for you?

My dream was to make it to the NBA. That was my only dream. You tell me I can't do something, and I'm about to prove you wrong.

It's been 30 years since you went public with your HIV diagnosis. Your wife was pregnant.

Yes, with our son EJ. I told her, “I can understand if you want to leave me.” She stood up and smacked me right upside the head. True story. And she said, “We're going to beat this together.”

There's a big debate right now in our political system about funding public research.

We just have too many resources not to help people. This is not about Democrats, independents, or Republicans. It's not about that. It's about life.

Thank you, Peter. It's a pleasure being here with you as well.

Pleasure. You know, you give a new meaning to looking up to somebody. Before we start, I just want to say congratulations to Gloria and Ronnie for putting on this event for 13 years, bringing amazing people here every year. Let's give it up for them. Gloria, beautiful.

It is. It is beautiful.

I want to kick off with multiple congratulations. What an extraordinary year it's been so far, and we're just in it. First off, at the beginning of the year, former President Biden gave you the Presidential Medal of Freedom here, the highest civilian honor you can get. Let's take a look at this B-roll here of that event.

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Earvin “Magic” Johnson. With unmatched vision and versatility, Earvin “Magic” Johnson drove the Showtime era for the Los Angeles Lakers. He is a 5-time NBA champion, 3-time MVP, 12-time All-Star, Olympic gold medalist, and Naismith Hall of Famer. His honesty about his HIV status shattered stigma and saved lives. The first retired athlete to build a true business empire, he champions underserved communities. With a legendary will and smile, Magic Johnson rose from the playground in Lansing, Michigan, to become one of the most beloved athletes of our time.

Does that ever get old?

Well, it doesn't get old, but something like that—you can't even describe the feeling. The greatest moment I had was when my mother, who was 89, got a chance to go to the White House and witness her son, her baby, get up there and get the Medal of Freedom. To hear her and see her smile and cry and be happy about this moment, because the only thing I wanted to do, and still the only thing I want to do in life, is to really make my family, especially my parents, feel good about what I've done in life.

It was a great moment. My kids were there, of course, and Cookie. It was just a great family moment. I guess God is saying, “Hey, you know, this is what happens when you understand your purpose, give back to the communities—the underserved communities—and put people to work.” I never thought I would receive an award for doing the things that are on my heart, but it was a blessed moment for me.

That's beautiful. I want to get into purpose. I want to get into family. But before we get there, another magical event: the L.A. Dodgers take it for the seventh win. What was that like?

Well, it was an incredible moment. First, with Cookie and me being the first African-American owners in Major League Baseball, that is important. Second, what's important is the fact that when we took over the Dodgers 12 years ago, they were not where they are today, right? We built a really successful team that our fans just love. Everybody thought at that time, when we paid $2.2 billion for the Dodgers, that we overpaid and were crazy.

Now they see the 2 World Series rings that I have. We won our division every single season but once, and we're number 1 in attendance for 12 straight years that we've owned the team. I think that we've changed the fan experience. We included everybody because we have a big Latino fan base, African-Americans, and whites, and they all come together and cheer for this incredible team. It's a melting pot.

I'm just so proud of the fact that our guys are serious about baseball and that we could make the Dodger fans happy. They finally got a parade, because when we won during COVID, we didn't get a parade. This year we had a great parade, and everybody was able to celebrate in Los Angeles what we accomplished.

Well, as a fellow Angeleno, thank you for all that you've done. It is a great pride.

I appreciate that.

There are so many sides of you and what you've accomplished and will accomplish. I'm here talking about longevity over these next couple of days, so we want to give you another 65 years of life here. After you left the game—and actually, toward the end of your game career—you started pivoting into entrepreneurship, into business. I don't know if folks really understand the depth and length of what you've done there, and I'm going to dive into these separately. It's important to realize this isn't a one-shot success here.

We'll talk about Starbucks—you were the first person ever to franchise Starbucks. I want to hear that story, how you convinced Howard Schultz to do that. We'll get there. Then there's Burger King, 24 Hour Fitness, TGI Fridays, Best Buy, and Fatburger. You go from there into buying stakes in sports teams, life insurance, TV networks, and real estate. I mean, that's a conglomerate. I think it should be the Magic Johnson conglomerate of companies. What drove that desire? Was there an innate interest in being an entrepreneur and building businesses? Where did that begin for you?

Well, definitely back home in Lansing.

In high school?

Yes. My dream was to make it to the NBA. That was my only dream.

And that started how early, in terms of when you were a little kid?

When I was 5, 6, 7, or 8 years old, playing basketball and watching games with my father, I would sit on his lap or sit beside him watching the NBA. I always wanted to emulate the players. After watching the game, I would run out on the basketball court and emulate Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell, Bob Cousy—whoever was on TV at that time.

Did you voice that to your parents and your siblings?

Everywhere we went, I had my ball. It would drive my mom crazy. We would be in the grocery store, and I would be bouncing that ball all around.

Did anybody tell you that you couldn't do that, or did anybody tell you that you were going to go for it?

No, of course my parents didn't. My brothers and sisters—I have 6 sisters and 3 brothers—they never said it. But outside of that, they said I could never make it. I used that as fuel. Of course, I'm a very competitive dude.

I've heard that.

You tell me I can't do something, and I'm about to prove you wrong. Right? I was driven by that. My parents always encouraged me, but they also said, “If you don't get good grades, you can't play.” So, I knew I had to apply myself in the books as well.

But this is what really changed my life.

Please.

We were driving, my father and I, and I saw these 2 African-American men. They had this beautiful Mercedes-Benz. I'd never seen a Mercedes-Benz, so I said, “Dad, what kind of car is that?” He said, “That's a Mercedes-Benz.” I said, “A Black man is driving it, right?” And he said, “Yeah, that's Greg Eaton, and his business partner is Joel Ferguson. They own businesses in Lansing, Michigan.”

I didn't know that we could do that. They owned all these buildings and car dealerships, and on and on and on. I said, “Uh-oh, I want to meet them.” Sure enough, my father set it up for me to say hi to them when I was about 13 or 14 years old.

As I grew in basketball, they started coming to my games. Then they said, “Let's go to lunch. I want to take you to lunch.” They took me to lunch and explained what they did. At that moment, my dreams changed from just wanting to make it to the NBA to wanting to be a businessman like those 2 guys.

I think most of you know that the news media is delivering negative news to us all the time because we pay 10 times more attention to negative news than positive news. For me, the only news worthwhile that's true and impacting humanity is the news of science and technology. That's what I pay attention to. And every week I put out two blogs, one on AI and exponential tech and one on longevity. If this is of interest to you and it's available totally for free, please join me. Subscribe at diamandis.com/subscribe. That's diammandis.com/subscribe. All right, let's go back to the episode.

I think most people don't realize that dream was simultaneous with your sports career.

Yes, it was. But sports was probably 98%, and the dream of business was 2%, because I was still a young man at that time. Until I turned about 17, I asked them to give me a job in the summer. When you have 6 sisters and 3 brothers, your parents can't give you any extra money.

That's right.

So my dad took me. He said, “You want some more money to go to the movies? All right, let me take you to the garage.” He introduced me to Mr. Rake, Mr. Lawn Mower, and Mr. [?]. And he said, “If you want some extra money, here are the 3 things that can help you get that.”

That allowed me to understand that I have to have a work ethic, not only on the basketball court but outside of it. That helped me get ready. So I met them when I was 17 and asked them to give me a job. They gave me a job. They owned a 7-floor office building, and I had to clean it after 5:00 on Friday and between Friday and Sunday.

Peter, this is what really changed my life. I cleaned the first 6 floors, but the CEO's office was on the 7th floor. I'm a big believer that if you don't dream it, you can't become it, right? So I would bust into the CEO's office like I was pretending to be him. I would go up to his desk, recline the seat all the way back, and put my feet up on his desk.

I would hit the intercom button like I had an assistant out front. I'd think of some name, like Ruby: “Can you bring me some coffee and donuts and today's paper?” For hours, I would sit there dreaming that I was a businessman and the CEO.

Well, look what happened. God put me in this position, and here I am now, almost 50 years later. I'm the CEO of my own business, and that changed my life forever.

People talk about visualizing success and its importance, even in sports as well. Has that always been a go-to tool for you?

Yeah. Well, for me, it was being smart at basketball. I didn't just play the game; I was smart at the game. There were a lot of guys more athletic than me, and Larry Bird, right? We both could only jump this high, but nobody was smarter than both of us. There were other people who could run faster than us, but they were not smarter than us.

I've always leaned toward making sure that I was smart at the game, just like I lean toward being smart at business. That carried me a long way: having a high basketball IQ and making sure that I was competitive and disciplined. I enjoyed the process of winning as well as losing. You had to enjoy the process.

And Larry Bird—I have to give him credit. He made me a better basketball player.

It's nice to have someone to compete against.

Yeah, I hate that blond-haired dude, but I have to give him credit. He really helped me, and I think I helped him.

What people should really know is that game—Michigan State versus Indiana State—is still the number-one-watched basketball game of all time. That's 40-some years later, right? It's amazing. You'd figure someone would be able to do a better job by now.

Yeah, yeah. Now, Peter, I'm not a sit-in-the-seat dude. I like to be down. Is that okay? Because I like to be with the people. I don't like to sit. So I'm going to take the question, but I'm down because that's my thing. I didn't come all the way to Orlando just to sit in a white chair.

So let's go back to that moment when you were approaching Howard Schultz about Starbucks. It's one of the iconic companies on the planet. It's nice to have a legal drug you can sell people, and that's probably what it is. I swear I give more money to Starbucks than I—you know, it's insane.

So you walk into his office. Tell us the story of how you got the first franchise and ultimately owned 125 stores, which I bet you wish you still owned.

Yeah, well, not really, with where the stock is today. No, I'm not a guy who goes backward. I want you to know that about me. When I do something, I sell it, I'm done, and I keep moving. I'm never going backward. Only one time I went backward. Can I tell you that story?

Yeah, please. We'll come back to Howard.

Larry Bird and I were the 2 best basketball players in college basketball at that time. When I won the national championship against Larry Bird, all 3 shoe companies came to recruit me. At that time, it was Adidas, Converse, and this new company called Nike.

I've heard of it.

Yeah, yeah. Converse offered me the most money, then Adidas, and then this blond-haired dude with long hair came in from Oregon and said, “Hey, I can't offer you what Converse can offer you cash-wise, but I can offer you stock.”

I wish I was that Earvin Johnson back then. When you grow up poor, you take the most money. Peter, they just ran analytics about how much money my stock would be worth today: $1.5 billion if I had taken that stock in 1979 all the way to now. Isn't that something? But again, I don't look backward.

Just to put this in perspective, when you left the game, you had a net worth of around $40 million. Today, at least according to the various LLMs, it's about $1.6 billion. You had a 40-times increase. Not bad.

Not bad. Not bad. Not bad. I could have had a little bit more, but I'm not going to go through that.

So we're playing Seattle, and I always like to know who's sitting on the floor at the game from opponents, in case I want to meet somebody. They said, “Oh, man, Howard Schultz sits and comes to the Seattle SuperSonics games.” I asked their PR person, “What seat does Howard Schultz sit in so I can go over and say hi to him and introduce myself?”

He told me the number. I ran over there and said, “Hi, I'm Magic Johnson. I'd like, the next time we come back to Seattle, to take you to lunch.” He said, “That'll be great, but you don't have to take me. I'm going to take you.” I said, “Okay, yeah, you got more money than me. I get it.”

So I came back to Seattle, got together with him, and had an amazing lunch. I said, “Howard, I built Magic Johnson Theatres, and they're doing very well. We surprised everybody in the inner cities of America. Everybody thought there was no way they could be successful.” My first theater came in the top 10 highest-grossing theaters in the nation.

Extraordinary.

It proved everybody wrong that you can invest in the inner cities and make money. I gave Howard the information about that. He said, “Let's get together the next time you come back.”

So I went back up to Seattle. Sure enough, we talked about it. I told him, “I think Starbucks would perform very well in the inner cities. Latinos and African Americans like coffee, too.” He said, “Let's take a look at it and see how you operate your movie theaters.”

He came down on a Friday. Whitney Houston's first movie was coming out, Waiting to Exhale. I had 500 Black women wrapped around the corner to get in to see this movie. We sold out every theater. He said, “Wow.” He saw the cash register ringing and making a lot of money. Then he finally got inside and said, “Wow, you know, this is great.”

I forgot to tell him that we go to the movies a little differently than everybody else. As soon as the movie started, every woman in there started talking to the screen: “Girl, why are you still with him? Dump him!” He pulled me out and said, “Magic, I've never had a moviegoing experience quite like this.”

“You got the deal.” Now, why did I get the deal? A couple of things. He saw what happened at the theater. Also, I drove him around the community.

Yeah.

He saw these beautiful homes in urban America, well-kept, and some successful people living in those homes. Then I had to go before the board. They signed off. Then came the shareholders' meeting. Probably the thing I was most nervous about was the shareholders. They signed off.

So I built 125 Starbucks in 40 different markets across America, and they were all very successful. I sold them all back to Howard. So we created so many job opportunities.

And the last thing I think was one of the most important things: You brought jobs to the markets you care about, and that's been a consistent part of your life over and over and over again—bringing job opportunities, as well as giving women-owned and minority-owned firms supplier contracts to deliver goods to us, creating opportunity. Let's give it up for that.

Yeah. The only thing I had to change out was the music. It wasn't going to work, what they were playing in the inner city, so I had to bring in Lionel Richie, Earth, Wind & Fire, and Michael Jackson. We had to tweak it. You always understand your customer and how you can overdeliver to that customer.

So we go on from there to Burger King, TGI Fridays, and Best Buy. What are the characteristics of a company that you would say, “Okay, I want to own a stake, or I want to promote that company”?

Well, Burger King is headquartered in Miami. It was a situation where the owner had to get out, so I could get it for pennies on the dollar.

I picked up about 40 of them. I was able to take the bottom line of these Burger Kings and drive it up. Sure enough, I resold them and made a lot of money.

I would say the fitness business was more about minorities needing it because we didn't have any fitness clubs in our communities. It was a good thing to make sure that we had access to fitness clubs, and they were making a lot of money as well. But it changed people's lives and people's diets—the whole thing. People's connection to those clubs opened them up as something that was accessible.

That's right.

It proved to Fortune 500 companies that they could come into urban America and make money. That's also why I did it. I sold those back to 24 Hour Fitness.

I'm all about how I can change urban America and create jobs in the same communities that I grew up in, and then show people that people of color can be successful businessmen and women. I was able to do that for athletes as well.

Would you say that's your moonshot—to really impact and uplevel communities around the world?

Oh yeah, for sure. We've been able to do just that through all the different businesses and even real estate in Detroit.

I mean, you went heavy on trying to help with the revitalization of Detroit.

Yeah. Not only in Detroit, of course, but in Los Angeles and all over the country. I had a real estate fund. We did $300 million, and then we did $600 million. Then we raised $1 billion.

Again, it's all about real estate. How do we make sure that we either build hotels or build different businesses in those communities? They all had to win, because it's not just enough for me to build them—they have to be successful. I want other minorities to come behind me, and I was able to do that.

I opened up institutional capital to other minorities because they turned me down 5 times.

Okay?

When I went up to Seattle to raise money, people turned me down because they didn't believe in urban America. So I knew I had to be successful.

Hey everybody, Peter here. If you're enjoying this episode, please help me get the message of abundance out to the world. We're truly living during the most extraordinary time ever in human history. And I want to get this mindset out to everyone. Please subscribe and follow wherever you get your podcasts and turn on notifications so we can let you know when the next episode is being dropped. All right, back to our episode.

Let's pivot to the Washington Commanders. Tell us the story there.

Again, we have some images in the background. First, I think the NFL is a machine, and there's no league that can even keep up with or come close to the NFL, money-wise—the power that it gives you. This was an easy decision for me to make, but also because of the lack of minority ownership. So it was good for the NFL and good for the community in terms of Washington, D.C.—or, I should say, the DMV.

We took this franchise that had been losing under the previous ownership. It was tough. We've owned it for only 2 seasons, but look what happened. We drafted the right quarterback, Jayden Daniels.

We brought in 40 new football players, got rid of 40, and brought 40 new ones in. We went all the way to the NFC Championship Game. So we're really set up to have a long run. The fans love the team again, and we're excited about building this organization into a Super Bowl-contending team.

The one thing we had to do was raise the morale of the employees. It was low. So I told my team, "Let me talk to the employees. You guys handle the business." They all said something, but I said, "I've got to let them know that we're going to embrace them, respect them, and value them, but we're going to become a world-class organization."

Can you speak to the importance of having the CEO and the owners truly uplift and unify an organization? We have a lot of CEOs in the room here. Sometimes organizations are divided, and sometimes they're not performing at their peak. Did you bring those experiences from basketball into the organizations that you're owning and running?

Oh, for sure. You're only as good as your employees, right? Everybody sitting here today—the business is still running while we're sitting here. Each and every one of us, right? So we know we've got great people who work for us.

They want to be patted on the back. They want to be valued. They want to be respected. That's what we went in there to do: to tell them that we are here for them and that we will listen to them, because they gave us some great ideas, too, on how to improve everything.

The previous owners didn't put a lot of money into the stadium, the team, or the practice site. So we did all of those things, and we just got a great grade from the NFL on how we improved everything. That was very important.

We know that you want to bring some experts together who can do their job, but when we need to, we've got to high-five them. We've got to say, "Great job." I believe in that because I come from team sports, and when you come from sports, that's what it's all about.

But sometimes you also have to cut members of the team.

Oh yeah. I don't mind cutting them if they're not doing their job. I'm going to slice and dice them.

So you hold a high standard for them, and if they're not performing—

I tell them all the time, "I'm driven to win, and you have to do your job. If you're not doing your job, then I love you, but we've got to get rid of you."

Yeah. I think one of the problems is that a lot of times people just want to hold on and hope.

You can't do that. Listen, I'm the first one in. I get up at 4:00 every morning.

You beat me. I'm up at 5:00.

I work out for 2 hours, and then I'm in the office all day. I'm going to set the tone for my employees. I always have, always will, right? Then they buy into the vision that I set, and they know that winning is in my DNA and that I'm going to do things right. So they have to follow that.

Every woman and man in here—all the employees—follow that. I'm going to treat them fairly, pay them, and go out and hopefully win together.

That's right.

Well, we have to. We've got executive teams and management teams—all of us. We all have to win together. I don't have to come up with every strategy because I have great people. They can come up with strategies to help us win. If it's a good strategy, we're going to roll with it. I don't want to be the only smart guy in the room.

Magic, I'd like to turn to health next. We have a lot of people in the health industry here, and it's been 30 years since you went public with your HIV diagnosis. I'd like to take you back there. We're going to roll a quick video, and let's talk about it.

First of all, let me say good afternoon. Because of the HIV virus that I have attained, I will have to retire from the Lakers today. I just want to make clear, first of all, that I do not have the AIDS disease, because I know a lot of you are concerned and want to know that.

You're in your doctor's office. He comes out and gives you his diagnosis, which for the last part of a decade had been a death sentence. What's going through your mind? How do you go home and tell your wife, Cookie?

I think that was the hardest part at first. I thought I had done everything the right way.

So, to answer that, I'm going to tell him Magic is right here. I could have told him you were busy. You were hanging with me.

Getting that news was devastating. No question about it. You have to spend probably an hour just sitting there trying to comprehend this.

You're at the peak of your career. The last thing you expect to hear.

Yeah, the last thing I expected to hear. We had just been to 3 straight NBA Finals and won 2 of those. We lost that one, and then I'm receiving this news.

And your wife was pregnant.

Yeah, with our son, EJ. The hardest thing, Peter, was not me dealing with it, but actually going home to tell my wife. We had just gotten married, and she's pregnant. As soon as I hit the door, she knew something was wrong. She already knew it.

She said, "What's going on?" So I sat her down and began to tell her I had HIV. Of course, she started crying, not knowing what it meant for her and the baby. I let her really digest what I had just told her.

Then I told her, "I could understand if you want to leave me."

Yeah.

It took about 5 minutes for that to register with her. Then she stood up and smacked me right upside my head. True story. She said, "We're going to beat this together."

Yes.

At that moment, that's when I knew I had a chance.

That's amazing. You're a lucky man.

Yeah. No, I understand that. To beat anything like this, you need your support system. I needed her, my parents, my brothers, and my sisters. So we just dropped to our knees and started praying.

From that, I'm a guy who always has to know everything. I started researching and found out that Dr. Ho was one of the leading doctors in the world. I called him up and went to see him in New York, and he really gave me a great regimen of drugs, but also educated me.

He educated me about the virus and what it meant to me. So here I am, 33 years later.

And I have to say, you're looking amazing.

I mean, compared to your video from 30 years ago, I think you look even better right now.

Everything is good. I get in that gym and take my meds. But the main thing was, I have to give credit to a lady who actually died: Elizabeth Glaser saved my life.

While I was doing my research, I had Dr. Ho, but then she was the face of it at that time. I went to see Elizabeth, and she told me, “You’re going to be here a long time because there are so many great drugs coming down the pipeline.” She said, “But I need you to do 1 thing, and that’s become the face of it and get involved.” So I did that, and not too long after that, she passed away.

Then I met Elizabeth Taylor, and that was her whole mission. So we partnered up, and for 20 years we raised money for HIV and AIDS. I’m still doing that today, and it’s extraordinary. It’s been a blessing. But what a journey.

Are you still using the same antivirals?

Yeah. It’s the same thing—a 3-drug cocktail. Nothing has changed until Dr. Ho tells me to do something different.

You and I said there are some great things coming, so I’m going to lean on you, too.

Sure.

I know one of our speakers tomorrow, Lou Reese, has a company called Can of Life[?], and it’s a monoclonal. One of the biggest challenges—I don’t know if you think about this—is multidrug resistance. The HIV virus continues to mutate, right? Being able to solve that is an incredible challenge. Their particular monoclonal has been 100% resistant against all viral mutations.

Beautiful.

It’s on the cover of Nature this week. I think science is doing extraordinary things for humanity.

Oh, yeah, in all areas. That’s why this conference is so important. Let me thank all of you, because you’ve helped people like myself live a long, productive life.

When you think about the science, the doctors—I should say the scientists—and everybody coming together to help so many people around the world, not just here in America, it’s been amazing. Just think about this: when I think about going back 33 years ago, ACT was the only drug. Just think about that—1 drug, right? And now what? It’s over 40, I think.

Somewhere around there. I lost my best friend in the early ’80s to HIV. If he had just been able to hold on a little bit longer, timing is everything.

Exactly.

There’s a big debate right now in our political system about funding public research and public health. Is there a message you want to send people about that? I’m just curious, because so many people depend on that public funding.

No, listen, I don’t get into politics. This is not about Democrats, independents, or Republicans. It’s not about that. It’s about life.

When you think about the federal government, state government, and local government, we need that funding, because a lot of people are going to be hurt and may die because they can’t pay for their drugs. That’s what this is about. I don’t want anybody to think that it’s anything other than that—we need to help these people.

Listen, at this level of society, with the level of abundance that we have, we owe a debt of gratitude and the ability to uplift everybody together. That’s all it is. I’m hoping that the funding is there, that we can continue to help people who can’t afford to pay for their drugs and meds.

I work with different organizations that supply the drugs for people who can’t pay.

Yeah, and it’s been beautiful. I know we’ve done a lot of that work through the Magic Johnson Foundation as well.

So we hope that we get that funding. It’s going to be important. We’ve got too many resources not to help people. We’ve got to all be about that: How do we help people? How do we give back to people? How do we help communities?

That’s what America is built on. It’s what gives life meaning.

Yeah. At the end of the day, no one gets points for dying with the most money.

You get points for supporting and uplifting the most people.

Exactly. And, see, we’re dealing with that. I’m still dealing with the LA fires.

I have 2 last questions. Let’s dive into that one. Governor Gavin Newsom just appointed you to help revitalize LA.

I’m still out of my house. We live at the Santa Monica–Pacific Palisades border. We’re one of the lucky ones: our house is still standing, but we’re going through 2 months of remediation and incredible damage.

I’m very proud that one of my organizations is called XPRIZE. We put up these large cash prizes to solve problems. We’ve got one for reversing aging by 20 years, which I hope we’ll all benefit from. We also have a $1 million prize for wildfire detection and extinguishment.

To win this, teams have to monitor a city or region. If they see a fire that’s 2 m or bigger—if it’s bigger than you, right?—they have to put it out automatically within 10 minutes. What’s your vision for where LA is going?

Well, I live there. When the governor called me and wanted me to help, he had somebody who was going to handle Pacific Palisades. He wanted me to deal with Altadena, which is probably an 80% African American community.

He was concerned that those people were selling their land and that people were taking advantage of them. Their land is worth millions and millions of dollars, but they were selling it for only a couple hundred thousand. They’re scared. They don’t have anything.

What I did was make a couple of PSAs to tell them to hold on to their land. If they’re going to sell it, they need to make sure they know what it’s worth and get that money. Those are some of the things we’re talking about. There are so many other things they need—clothes, food—so we’re dealing with all of those things.

I love giving back, man. I’ve been blessed over and over and over again. My whole mission in life is, How do I bless other people? These fires have devastated 4 or 5 communities, and I’m going to get to work and try to help those people as much as I can. I’ve always been involved anyway, so this is just another thing I’m going to be involved with.

I want to close out with a combined question. You’re going back to a younger version of Magic: What advice would you give yourself as a kid and in your career? The other part is that you got so much from your parents—your mom and your dad—the work ethic, the attention to detail, all of those things. What advice do you have for parents? I have 2 13-year-old boys, and I’m always looking for great advice. Can you talk about the advice you would give yourself and what advice you suggest for parents today?

I have 3 kids and 2 grandchildren now, right in that age—16 and 13. It’s so funny: We come to dinner, and all 5 of them have their cell phones. I make them go all the way back out the door and put their cell phones up. You’re going to give me 2 hours, because if you go into restaurants now, nobody’s talking.

When we used to have a great time at restaurants, nobody was on cell phones; they were just talking. I tell my kids, “I just want to know what you’ve been doing, how you’re doing, how school is going,” and on and on. It’s the hardest thing to get out of my kids.

I have a rule: When we go on vacation, they have to leave their phones. They just have to leave them. What happens? Everybody is talking, playing games, and having fun. You can give me 2 hours. “Oh, you want to be on this vacation? Oh, you’re going to give me 2 hours?” I know how to get them.

“Oh, you think you’re going out tonight? There’s only 1 credit card in this family.” They say, “Okay, Dad,” and then they turn out to love it. Now they do karaoke nights with each other, and we’re sitting there. We’ve got to bring us back to the family.

When I think about how I grew up, I was so blessed. We were poor, but we never knew we were poor because there was so much love in the house. My parents always encouraged us to dream big, but you need an education. Education can take you anywhere you want to go.

Four of my sisters are teachers, and they love to teach and give back to the kids. I never regret anything. I never look back. My childhood was excellent because I had my parents.

My father worked for General Motors for 30 years. He never missed a day and was never late. Guess who’s built just like him? My guy here told me what time to be here, and I was early. I’m always going to be early. I get to every meeting 1 hour ahead of time. I’m a very disciplined man.

I got my mother’s smile, and I got her heart. My mother taught us this. Peter, I couldn’t believe this. When you’ve got 10 kids, my mother would go around to everybody’s plate and take a spoonful from everybody’s plate to make 4 or 5 other plates.

She would then wrap them up, put them in bags, and say, “Junior”—she called me Junior—“go deliver it. Deliver these to the lady across the street. She’s 75; she can’t cook for herself. Go down the street and deliver this one.”

I said, “Mom, we don’t even have enough.” She said, “You’re going to go and learn that you have to give back and help people.” So she taught me that as a little boy.

So, what am I doing now? Helping people and giving back because of my mother. I just want to say to all of you, thank you for your heart. Thank you for what you do. You are leaders in this country doing great things.

It's like the double bottom line, right? I believe that you can make money, but you can also make an impact by giving back, and that's the double bottom line to me. So continue to do what you're doing. Ladies and gentlemen, let's give it up.

Everybody, thanks for listening to Moonshots. You know, this is the content I love sharing with the world. Every week I put out two blogs. a lot of it from the content here, but these are my personal journals of things that I'm learning, the conversations I'm having about AI, about longevity, about the important technology transforming all of our worlds. If you're interested, again, please join me and subscribe at dmadness.com/subscribe. That's diammadus.com/subscribe. See you next week on Moonshots.