Today on the podcast:
Dre Baldwin is a mental toughness coach, former professional basketball player, 4 times TEDx speaker and author of 29 books.
In just 5 years, he went from his high school team’s bench to a 9-year professional basketball career. At the same time, Dre built a content publishing empire.
Blogging since 2005 and publishing videos to YouTube starting in 2006, Dre has published over 7,000 videos with his content being viewed over 73 million times and has over 137,000 subscribers on YouTube. Dre’s daily Work On Your Game Podcast has over 3 million listeners and he has also given 4 TED Talks.
“Dre Teaches The Discipline, Confidence, Mental Toughness & Initiative To Your Work & Life That Puts You In The Top 1% Of Performers.”
Episode Outline
- 02:50 Dre’s backstory
- 11:57 The link between discipline and building self confidence
- 14:38 How discipline works in both negative and positive directions
- 19:49 Why you should never “fake it until you make it” and what you should to do instead
- 26:13 How to rewire your negative self-talk
- 37:18 How to avoid being a PIG (professional information gatherer) or mental masturbation
- 43:09 Shiny information syndrome, not getting distracted and getting clear on your end goal
- 48:45 48 hours positive thoughts challenge
Key Points
- Everybody wants more confidence, very few care to become more disciplined. The truth is, confidence is sourced from discipline. In other words, the more disciplined you are, the more confident you become. After all, confidence is fueled by the belief that you are capable of a certain thing. You can’t have that belief if you don’t have the discipline to build it up in the first place. And that discipline must be your idea, not anyone else’s.
- “Fake it till you make it” is an oxymoron. That is, the idea is correct, but not in the way most people interpret the saying as. When you tell your brain that you are faking something, that you are pretending, then your subconscious mind understands that that pretending, at some point, must come to an end, and you have to come back to where you were before. What you can do instead is to become the person you want to be.
- In order to avoid being a PIG (professional information gatherer), build the action bias habit. An action-biased person is someone who is more inclined to take action than to think about taking action. Basically, this is the habit of implementing a lesson beyond just nodding your head or writing it down. Hearing something is one level; writing something down is another level; actually doing something about it is the third and most important level.
Powerful Quotes by Dre
- Discipline is number one, because that’s the starting point. That’s where everything else comes from.
- Discipline must be your idea.
- When you tell your brain that you are faking something, that you are pretending, then your subconscious mind understands that that pretending, at some point, must come to an end, and you have to come back to where you were before. That’s the problem with “fake it till you make it”.
- The most negative things that each of us hears in our own minds is not coming from a hater; it’s not coming from an internet troll; it’s not coming from some negative person on TV—it’s coming from you.
- There’s nothing wrong with getting information. It’s implementing that information that people get stuck on.
Guest Info

Dre Baldwin
Books
- Work On Your Game: Website | Amazon
- Buy A Game: Download FREE | Amazon | Audio
- The Mental Handbook: Website | Amazon | Audio
- The Super You: Website | Amazon | Audio
- Dre Philosophy Vol. 0: Website | Amazon
- 55 Daily People Skills: Website | Amazon | Audio
- 100 Mental Game Best Practices: Website | Amazon | Audio
- 25 Reasons To Quit Worrying: Website | Amazon | Audio
- 25 Conversation Starters: Website | Amazon | Audio
- Ask Yourself A Better Question: Website | Amazon | Audio
- The Seller’s Mindset: Website | Amazon | Audio
- The Mental Workbook: Website | Amazon | Audible