Robert Rodriguez
speaker
1,180 appearances
3 recordings
3 series
first heard Apr 2025
last heard 16 Nov
Robert Rodriguez’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Nov 2025 with 1.
Appearances
I'd call in sick. And then when he did get me, I'd be like half-assed in the workouts, you know, because I hated it. And then one year, it was just torture. I knew I had to do it, but... So this is my point, is that sometimes it's not a lack of desire. So when people really want to become something and not get in it, it's not because they have to change their minds.
There's something that goes with it. I have plenty of desire. I was painting this guy. I wanted to get in shape. I didn't want my back going out anymore. I had the desire. I was missing another key element. that I figured out, and it's a lesson I already knew, which was stop aspiring, but I forgot it. So this woman, a friend of mine from Mexico shows up. She's a production manager.
I said, well, you're gonna go back to smoking because you just told me that's your identity. You've been doing it since you were eight. So right now you're a smoker. who's not smoking, eventually you're going to conform to their identity. You have to change your identity. You have to say, I'm a non-smoker. I'm a non-smoker. Because what does a non-smoker do? They hate smoke.
They get sick of the smell of smoke. She was like, okay, I'll try it.
She really talks like that. So then I go, wait a minute. Shit, I used to apply to filmmaking, but that's all I was back there. Where else in my life can I do a 180? And it's got to be a 180. Because if it's just a matter of degrees, it's bullshit. It's much easier if it's just opposite day. So I went, oh my God, working out. I hate working out. Of course I hate working out.
Because I tell my trainer and everyone who will listen how much I hate it. I'm an athlete. I'm an athlete. The last thing I would ever call myself, Mr. Cartoon Guy. I'm an athlete. By the next day. What does an athlete do? Loves to work out. Makes time to work out. Eats right. And it's got to be opposite day. It's much easier.
One goes to lay on the couch and they just kind of, no, I'm going to go work out. Or there's a donut. Not going to cut it in half and eat half. That's bullshit. Those degrees fuck you up. Opposite day. There's a donut? No, I'm going to reach for an apple. Not only was I able to work out, this was 14 years ago. I didn't need a trainer again, ever.
I would just be like making myself do it because I'm an athlete. That's how powerful the mind is. So I'm saying if someone says, oh, I want to go do this thing on the weekend. You might have the desire, but you've got to get the identity too. You've got to say you are that. And it sounds a little awkward. Like I asked somebody, Alex Friedman, I said, do you consider yourself a creative person?
And he went, well, you know. That's a good impression. I said, you're stuttering there, man. You're stuttering, you're stuttering. He goes, I know, I know. I said, no, no, no, you got to say, are you technical? He goes, yeah. Okay, you're technical and creative. That was the first thing that stuck in my ear. It's also what Jim Cameron is. It's also what George Lucas is. Technical and creative.
When I first had my first job, my dad had a friend who owned a Photoshop. And he said, go work for my friend Mario for your summer job when I was 16. I went to work for Mario.
processing film for photos and he gave me a camera and film and said go home and take pictures with this because i need to know how to use that camera so you can help me sell the cameras so i went home and i'm from a family of nine kids i mean 10 kids nine siblings taking all these pictures of them doing cool stuff go back he looks at the pictures and he goes whoa these are really creative you're creative
You gotta now learn how to be technical, because most creative people always need technicians, and technicians always need creative people. Now it's against your, it's just a gift you have. They can never really be creative, they'll just be technical, but because you have creativity, if you apply yourself, it's against your nature, but if you apply yourself and learn the technical part,
you'll be technical and creative, and you'll be unstoppable. And I was like, whoa, unstoppable at 16. He goes, here, go, go. I know, sometimes, and I'm going to ask you about who did that for you. Who was, because if you look at, all the different turning points in your life, there was probably somebody who sent you in a direction. It comes through them.
Because if I were to go back and ask that guy, hey, that advice you gave me, he'd be like, what did I say? I don't remember saying that. It kind of just came through him at the time. So he pointed me that way. And that's why I went and made a mariachi by myself. I didn't want to take anybody because I wanted to learn. I didn't know how to use that camera.
But if you go ask somebody to do it for you,
your i need list if you make a list of all the things you need before you can make your dream happen the longer that list is the less that's going to happen you got to reduce it down to nothing me my hands my bootstraps this camera i'm going to figure it out on the day be technical and creative so i told lex now you got to own it when i say are you creative yeah i'm creative And I'm technical.
And I don't blink. I'm gonna create a body of work. He's like, walks out of there supercharged.
And it's nice to be self-deprecating. It's kind of a joke. A little bit. But the words you use in yourself are very powerful.
The words you use, and you're doing that to yourself. Yeah. The guy throwing cabbages at you on stage... Look close. It's fucking, it's you. You're doing that to yourself.
I talk to some of my kids and we just laugh about it. I go, okay, when shit fucks up, when shit's not going right, Don't be down about it. Don't feel like you're in a slump because now you just stuck yourself in a grave and it's gonna be hard to climb out. Right. When shit isn't going right. Oh, the tire's flat. Oh, I got fired. I call that baseline. You're at baseline. Anything above baseline.
Showing 261–280 of 1,180 · page 14 of 59
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