Rob (McDojoLife): [00:00:00] if they're gonna lie to your face right when they first meet you, I promise you they're gonna lie about other things
Riley: today I have my friend Rob from Mc Dojo Life, and I'm super jacked to have Rob on here. Um, he's got some crazy cool things going on and I just wanna, man, I wanna welcome Rob to the show.
Rob (McDojoLife): Um, thank you man. I appreciate you having me on. I love Talking Shop and I appreciate the opportunity to, uh, to chit chat about anything usually. So it's cool with [00:01:00] me.
Riley: Well, that's, that's rad, man. Tell, tell the audience who you are, what, what you do. You've got a very special niche in the martial arts world. And, and yeah, I want 'em to understand who you are and again, what you do
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, man. So, uh, I run a, a entity, I guess you could call it, called Mic Dojo Life. Uh, and a McDojo typically refers to like a fraudulent martial arts studio. Um, and I've kind of tried to expand upon that, but technically what I do is I call out fake frauds, phony conmen, pedophiles, sex offenders, and cults in the martial arts industry.
Um, sometimes short form, sometimes long form. It just kind of depends.
Riley: when you, when you say frauds and, and fakes. Explain that. 'cause I, I, I don't think people understand if they're not in the martial arts world, you haven't seen some of this, you know, no touch knockouts and some of the just wild crap that goes on. Um, explain that a
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, for sure. Well, so like [00:02:00] when I first started martial arts, the term mc Dojo had been around, well before I ever even, I think, was even born, like the term Mc Dojo obviously comes from like the term, like I can't actually legally say where it comes from, just to be honest. 'cause people have been sued over that.
But ultimately the term refers to like people who were just handed black belts. Um, the problem is, is that's very subjective. So while running Mac Dojo life, I had to define what a Mac Dojo was because there wasn't a universal definition. And during the time of like looking up cases and trying to figure out what bad things were happening in the industry, it started to expand my ideology of what that really meant.
And I think that a lot of people will just go with their very first instinct instead of actually doing research or looking into what the problems are in the industry, which is why those problems still arise. So when people talk about face. Like that's one of the rules of my page. I have five rules that I stick [00:03:00] by.
Um, they were pretty much developed within the first like year of doing Mac doja life, but they've been expanded upon and changed, um, as I go. But the first one is don't lie about your belt ranker or fight record. Um, that's typically the first thing that your martial arts instructor's gonna talk to you about whenever you walk into the door.
So if they're gonna lie to your face right when they first meet you, I promise you they're gonna lie about other things and that's not conducive to you becoming better as a martial artist. Um, the second one is, uh, sex offenders. I don't believe sex offenders should be in positions of authority over anyone, especially in the martial arts industry where there is zero regulatory bodies that encompass all martial arts.
There are niche ones, right? You have like the I-B-J-J-F or USA wrestling. But you don't have to belong to those to start a martial arts studio. You don't need anything in the United States. Not even a background check. So there are a lot of sex offenders who do come into the martial arts industry because who's gonna check no one?
Um, you [00:04:00] hope that maybe the student base might check, but then you're putting that onto people in an industry where honor, integrity, respect are the pop culture, like pop words that come to people's. And so they're just like, oh, he is a black belt. He's gotta be a good human being. And that's a problem, is that's why a lot of people have gotten away with it.
Um, the third rule is, uh, unsafe training practices or cult-like behavior. Um, so unsafe training practices, you'll see in almost every martial art, it's more like a instructor to instruct your case. Um, for instance, if it doesn't benefit you to do it and it doesn't harm you and your training not to do it.
Then it's not beneficial. It's, it's, it could be harmful. You see this a lot in the Middle East. Will, they'll have a, a guy standing there while the coach like cracks them in the face with right hooks. 'cause they're conditioning their brain. That doesn't work that way. That actually makes it so that way eventually it, you are easier to be knocked out.
And obviously it just creates horror. But you even [00:05:00] see it in legitimate martial arts, like with like jujitsu. You see people do the gauntlet where people get their belt, they'll take off their shirt and then people will just whip them. That's the stupidest shit I've ever seen in my god life. And then people are like, yeah, that's great.
It's tradition. It's not really tradition. It's, it's your tradition. You can start your own traditions, but it's not traditional. Like the founder of Juujitsu, the founder of Judo, wasn't like, you know what, let's just whip people. Let's just see how that goes. It never happened. Why? Yeah, like this seems like it'd be a good time.
Um, and so that, that's harmful. That does not help or benefit your students. And in most cults it's actually called flagellation. So like if you look up cult flagellation on Google, you'll see all these different cults that participate in that same thing. And that's very much cult-like mentality. Um, and so when you do that, or when coaches tell you you can't go train somewhere else, like that's a cult-like mentality.
Like, if I wanna get better, right? I'm paying you for a service. I can do whatever I want. I'm a grown ass man. Like, but when they [00:06:00] tell you you can't, and then all of a sudden you're like, well, they'll get mad at me. Fuck them. Like, do what you want. It's your training, get better. Um, the fourth rule is shady business practices.
Um, so if a martial arts instructor wants to charge a million dollars a month and they're upfront with you about that, and you decide you're gonna pay it, who cares?
Riley: Right.
Rob (McDojoLife): Who cares. That was your decision. Exactly. Um, but if they say, Hey, it's gonna be 9 99 a month, they're like, man, that's a good deal. Then all of a sudden you go, oh, by the way, there's this extra fee I didn't tell you about.
Oh, by the way, you have to change all your gear when you move up belt rank. Oh, by the way, there's a black belt program we didn't tell you about, but it's gonna be an additional fee that you have to do in order to get your black belt. Those are shady business practices. Um, and I've even heard of martial arts instructors, one here locally who actually strong armed, strong armed people for their pay.
Like he'd show up to their door if they were a day late and he'd be like, Hey, you owe me my money. Like, that's shady business [00:07:00] practice. So, um, and then the final one is mislabeling technique or obviously pretending to have any type of magical abilities or powers, right? So mislabeling technique is very common, and you'll see that a lot on my Instagram page.
Where someone will say, this works. And then clearly like under pressure it does not work. Uh, but it could be as simple as someone lying to you that you could be doing a cardio kickboxing class and then the coach says, you're gonna be the greatest kickboxer ever by doing this cardio class. No you're not.
Um, there's so much more that's encompassed in being a good kickbox or including sparring, which you're probably not gonna do in a cardio class. So that would be mislabeling a technique. And then of course that goes along with the cheap power stuff because they're labeling this as something that works and is real when it's absolutely not.
You can't knock people out, you their mind. I've been doing this for 28 years, I've invited anyone and I still have an open invitation to anyone that I have ever called out ever about their [00:08:00] technique to common pressure. Test it with me. And as of right now, I have only had one person ever actually say yes.
Actually two. There's two. One guy is in Orlando. And then he was talking to me and I was like, I'll do this. And then he went li he went online to say that I was a coward and I wasn't gonna come. And I was like, that's not true. So then I offered him to be in my documentary about frauds and then he just ghosted me after that.
So I'm assuming that that's a no, I,
Riley: uh, I wanna, I wanna dig into that a little bit more. You said you've had two say yes, but that's just been words so far, right? It hasn't, they hadn't actually taken you up on it.
Rob (McDojoLife): no, we actually recorded one. Uh, I will say like we, we did film stuff for a documentary, uh, which I can talk a little bit about separate, 'cause that's not the same thing, but when it comes to Mac Dojo life, uh, online as an entity online, um, yeah, I did have a guy, he went online and he was posting techniques.
That he was learning [00:09:00] online. And he openly admitted to saying, I learned these online. And he wanted to prove to the world that you can be a great martial artist by just learning technique online, which I think you can get so far with that. And I do think that there are people with natural talent, but it wasn't the fact that he was just doing it.
He was actually teaching people with him, having zero experience. And the things that he was doing were actually gonna harm himself or others if people followed through with what he was saying. So I, I said, Hey, if you really wanna prove that this is something that's viable, that you really can apply this and be better at self-defense, just online, sign up for an amateur fight.
Here's a friend of mine, his name is Mitchell Chamal. He runs Combat Night in, uh, in, along the East Coast, mostly in Florida Pro and amateur. Sign up for an amateur fight and then test it. Well, I didn't expect him to actually say yes. Um, and he did. And then, so I found out from my buddy, he was like, yeah, he actually signed up.
I was like, oh my God, I'm gonna get this guy killed. And so, because he, [00:10:00] he definitely was not gonna win that fight. So I, I contact him and I let him know, Hey, since you're, since you really wanna do this, before you actually follow through with the fight, why don't I come down? You can show us some of your technique and then we could do like some light, very respectful sparring.
And that was very true. I wasn't planning on harming anyone. And then we can see if you still wanna follow through after that. And he agreed. So I drove down, uh, he taught me and a buddy of mine a class. And when he taught us the class at one point he was throwing a round kick without turning his post foot.
The foot you stand on when you kick. And when you do that, you can tear almost everything in your knee because how you're throwing your body over your leg. If your foot still stays forward and you throw everything over and you mess up, you're going to tear your knee. And so I saw at once he got to that part of the class, I was like, Hey, let's go ahead and stop there.
'cause. A, B and C. Like, these are the reasons you're gonna get hurt or harm others. So we put on the gloves again, all of this is filmed and it's on our YouTube channel, and it's called, uh, Mac [00:11:00] Dojo Breakdown Art to Miss. And so during the ti, during the, uh, sparring match, I have the full video behind the paywall.
But during the sparring match, you could see I only posted the clips of any hit that landed, whether it was his or mine, and the only hits that landed were mine. Um, and so like we're talking like two, three minute rounds, one boxing, one kickboxing, and he never actually hit me. And I am not a pro fighter. I am some dude who's been doing martial arts for 28 years.
I do have fights, I do have experience, but at the same time, if I haven't been training hardcore to be ready for a fight in a while, imagine what happens with him versus somebody who was in a cage with him who actually wants to do him harm. And so after that, he actually went. He completely apologized to the public and said, Hey, you know, this is my mistake.
You know, I really do not know what I'm doing and I think that, you know, if you wanna learn, don't learn from me. Um, and I thought that was the [00:12:00] best thing ever. And so I told him any help that he needs, if he needs to go to a gym, I'll help him pro bono, go to a gym and hopefully they'll take care of a year and, uh, you know, you can actually get real training.
And it was very positive.
Riley: That's incredible, man. I to, to have a guy actually come to the place where he would admit it. kudos to him real. That can I wanna put that, uh, link to that video in our description if we can. I'd love people to
see it
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, for sure. Let me, uh, I can pull it up while we're chi uh, chitchatting, if that's okay. You want me to send it to you during, for a text or you want to send it? Uh,
Riley: Yeah. Yeah, that'd be
Rob (McDojoLife): for sure. I got you.
Riley: what, what inspired this, this whole thing? What, what, at some point in life, something got under your skin to inspire you to, to pursue exposing the, the fakes and the dangerous, dangerous pedophile type folks.
Rob (McDojoLife): Uh, it's odd 'cause it wasn't like a, like mission, you know, it was a conversation. [00:13:00] I was teaching a noon class at the Juujitsu Academy that I was working for. I was a striking coach there at the time and also a program director. So I, I kind of had, was a jack of all trades, helped with the kids' classes, did the, uh, did all the striking for all the fighters there.
Um, taught the striking program and worked the desk. So I was doing a lot while also running my own martial arts studio. So I, I apparently don't like sleep. Me and sleep apparently just don't get along 'cause I never actually seemed to hang out with sleep. Um, but yeah, noon class rolls around and I'm on the computer.
I'm just inputting new people who just signed up and my boss calls me and he goes, Hey man, I'm not feeling very well. Will you teach this class? Which in all honesty, I, I'm still training there when I can, but he's never before that and never after that ever been sick. That was the only time I ever actually remember him being sick.
Like, this is one of like, my instructor is like a, he's awesome professor Roberto ero. [00:14:00] And, uh, he is just such a like down dude. And when you think about like a martial artist and somebody who like lives what he's saying a hundred percent, like he is down. He trains still, he trains with everybody. He still rolls, you know, and he still beats the shit outta me.
So, um, he's, he's good. So when he called in, I was like, damn, that's weird. Okay, I'll teach the class. So I taught some basic stuff. But because it was a noon class, either people didn't have to go back to work or they were going back to work but weren't in a rush. You know, it was like a, one of those deals.
So I'm sitting there talking with the, the guys as, as the class was over. And there was a guy there who, it was his first official class, like he had, he had signed up with us. So he had already done one class before, but now he's an actual student and he's just listening to the conversation. And we got on the topic of Mac Dojo's, which like we talked about before, is a term that's been around forever.
And he listened and everyone left, but he stayed behind. And when he stayed behind, he pulled me to the side and he goes, Hey man, I'm a little embarrassed. I don't know [00:15:00] what you guys were talking about. I don't know what a Mc Dojo is. Could you maybe explain that to me? And I explained to him at the time, the best of my ability, what I thought a mc Dojo was, because obviously it's changed drastically.
And uh, he goes, why doesn't anybody do anything about that? And I was like, huh. Don't know. I don't know. So I like went home that night and I couldn't get that outta my head. I was like, that is such a white belt. Basic question. I was like, that's such a good question. That's somebody who truly is curious.
And I was like, well, now I'm curious as hell. And why have I never thought about this before? Because, you know, I've been, I've been in the martial arts 28 years. I started Mac Dojo life like 13 years ago, so I'd already been training for like 12 years of my life. And so I'm sitting here going, why, why doesn't anyone do anything?
So I started looking it up online and the only thing I could find was like a, a website called Bullshit Forums. And uh, when I looked updo forms, it's basically a website where people just talk shit. That's like, it's a [00:16:00] forum where people would go back and forth making fun of different martial arts stuff.
But I noticed that no seemed to have a definition. I noticed that no one really seemed to want to solve the problem. And I noticed that people were arguing about things that had nothing to do in reality. It was all semantical arguments. Like for instance, people like that costs too much. I'm like, well that's subjective to the individual.
Like it would cost too much for you. But there's somebody out there paying triple that and has no problem paying that. Um, it's also counterproductive. People will make fun of guys who are asking for more money, but then turn around and say, fighters don't get paid enough. It's like, well, why don't you shut the fuck up about people like, or like people charging too much then like, what?
You can't have your cake and eat it too, brother. It's like, so it's got, money's gotta come from somewhere. Uh, it's just strange. And then people would complain about how long it takes to get a black belt. I'm like, well y'all, I don't see y'all talking shit about BJ Penn, at least now, or at least then, you know, I was like, [00:17:00] y'all don't care that he got his black belt for years.
But this guy from Met and another art got his black belt in three years. You know, nothing about his pedigree. Know that he got it in three years, but because he doesn't do the art that you do, then you get to make fun of it. And that seemed counterproductive as well. So that's where I started working on the rules and trying to define a Mac Dojo.
Riley: That's pretty cool, man. Seeing the, how those moments just kind of hit you. We talked about on a previous episode that we recorded where our, our tagline is going and Your Salt came from, and it was one of those similar type deals. You know, the guy was just in the, in the gym one day and finished up a hard roll and he says, man, I should earned my salt today.
And that was it, man. That was like, that's the moment, man. I, I own that now. Yeah. That's awesome. Um, talk about this documentary you've got going. Um, I just put my hand up there and ruin the focus here.
See if I can get my
Rob (McDojoLife): I noticed that like as your focus [00:18:00] change,
Riley: Yeah, it's funny, it happens once in a while. There we go. Get me back.
Rob (McDojoLife): You did it.
Riley: I'm gonna write down that timestamp and then we'll cut this section out. But, um, but yeah, talk about your documentary, what you've got coming up. 'cause it's, uh, this is an exciting thing. You, you, you and I have talked about on a personal level a couple times and it's, it's gonna be
cool.
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, we started working on the documentary now, getting close to five years. And I know my biggest issue when I started was I was so excited, the idea that the first day, the day one, we were like, we're gonna do a doc, or I was like, I'm gonna do a documentary. I announced it, I was like, I'm doing a documentary.
And then like, it was, it didn't take long for people to be like, where's the documentary? I didn't understand that. People thought like, oh, it takes time, effort, work, and energy to actually make a legit, uh, but apparently the masses don't [00:19:00] understand that getting people almost after the first week going, where's the documentary?
I knew you wouldn't make it. What the fuck are you talking about? Like, it's not like I just snapped my fingers and poof, voila. Documentary exists. We're talking work, like real work. And uh, so the first three months after I made the announcement was dedicated to figuring out what the crowdfunding tears would be and also figuring out what the, uh, what the crew would be.
So I reached out to Master Ken first. Um, everybody knows Master Ken, but a lot of people might not know that. He's like, first of all, he's a legit actor. Um, legit. And then second of all, he went to school for film. So like he is legit, as legit. Could be that, um, master Ken just happened to be a bit that he did that just kind of stuck.
And he's a great dude. I really like working with him. He's very sharp on the cuff, he's very funny. He's very intelligent dude. So I thought he'd be perfect, but I didn't know he was working on his own film at that time, which I think it's called Cop versus Bad Guy. Um, and that's actually, we [00:20:00] could watch that.
Just a shout out to master Ken. He's awesome. And so he, he was like, no, I can't do that. But he couldn't necessarily tell me why. And I was like, okay. I had worked with the guys from Voto Studios and they are phenomenal. And the videos guys are the guys who did, um, uh, Mexican martial arts, so that bit of Mexican martial arts that's theirs.
And their production was so good
Riley: What was
Rob (McDojoLife): these guys, these guys know what they're doing. Yeah, master Jesse. Master Jesse.
Um, so he's still around. He actually, like, you know, he had to move, so he was in Fresno, California. I think he like moved and then because of that, he was no longer at the studio's location, who, those guys also moved.
So like, basically it was just like PIN studio and him were working together very close. And then he stepped away and then they had to step away. they're still buddies. Like they are some people, like they're close friends. [00:21:00] Like they let me stay, won't, uh, in Fresno they let me stay in the basement of their, uh, their production, which actually had a legit room and everything.
Um, so that was cool. But that first three months was brutal. And then we figured it was like, okay, well now we have another three months until a McGregor fight. We were going to announce, Hey, we're gonna start doing this because his live streams were so big and they still do well when during a fight.
'cause he stays in character and he'll like commentary on the fight. And people just love him because he's such a wholesome dude. He doesn't cuss. He's very clean humored. But he's, he's great off the cuff. So then that happens. Well then we were able to launch our Indiegogo that day. Well, when you launch Indiegogo, you have 90 days before they cut off your funding.
So they're like, basically you have 90 days of crowdfunding. That's it. It's not like a GoFundMe. But we found that GoFundMe almost sounded cheap and we found like Indiegogo almost sounded more professional. So that's why we were gonna go with them [00:22:00] instead. So now we're nine months in from the, my first announcement.
And then after that we were like, well, let's go ahead and take what we have, which we only raised 20,000 out of the 200,000 we needed. Um, for that particular. So then we were like, well raise nearly as much. Do we just give this back or move forward? And then, uh, the crew and were like, well, we just won't get paid.
Or I said, I just won't get paid. And they'll basically work for pennies, which is what they were doing. So I gave them all that money. I was like, here you go. Take it. Let's, let's go from there. And then, so I went, I went to go drive to Fresno, and the time for the, again, was another three months. They weren't available until then.
So I was like, alright, let's go ahead and plan that. I think it was about a month before that happened that COVID happened. No one saw that coming. And so that stunted the production for two years.
It just masked on, like, martial arts studios were like basically pretending they weren't open. Like we couldn't film unless people [00:23:00] had masks on.
Like, so we were like, well, we can't film that way. That's just, that's not going to be good. That's gonna be a period piece and this is something we wanna have as a long impact. So then two years and nine months later, uh, finally able to film. So we filmed for 30 with the 20,000 that we had. And anybody who's in film knows that 30 days on 20 k, almost damn near impossible.
So we were working for free. Luckily I was able to stay in their production studio and they were still working on the side. So we're just grinding. Uh, we filmed some great stuff, amazing footage, like even experiments where we brought in a fraud to teach a seminar, which is hilarious. Uh, we have a guy, uh, we also did the opposite where I pretended to be a complete fraud.
Taught a class complete bullshit just to see if they'd fall for it. And they did. As a matter of fact, they praised me and said that they felt so much safer after that, which was a kind of a, oh, eye opener. Then we edited for another two months, so like, here we go. So now we're like three years [00:24:00] in total now, I think at this point.
So now then we were like, well, our trailer sucks ass. Our trailer was so bad that like we went over and over and over again with a fine tooth comb. We brought in a new director. We got Jocko Willink as an executive producer. We got, um, one of his, uh, producer buddies as a silent partner to come in because we, the director, fixed the trailer.
And then right around that time we had a production studio come in and say, Hey, the new director, by the way, said, you need to make this better with a better budget. He's like, what you have here is good. Do not settle for this. And so we were like, okay, what's the new budget? He was like 780 something thousand dollars.
And we were like, Jesus Christ. Like we, and then apparently in terms of like film that's cheap, that apparently in terms of film is a very cheap budget. And so like we were like, okay, well let's figure out how to get that. So that's when we got Jocko. That's when we got other people. But then we had a production studio roll around, and I won't say their name, but they were like, we'll fund the entire thing.
[00:25:00]
Rob (McDojoLife): And we were like, this is it. Like finally after like years and I mean we're talking now at the four year mark, like of [00:26:00] grinding. And every day me getting heckled, even though we're going, we're talking to Amazon, we're talking to Hulu, we're hearing, no, no, no, no, no. And I'm still pushing forward. I still have people online going, you're never gonna do it.
You suck. You took these people's money. First off, suck eyeballs, stuck 'em however you want from the left, right up, down. I don't care how you do it, but you can suck 'em one at a time. But I promise you that we've been working hard on this and like. When it came down to like getting that done, and then this company comes along, we were like, that's it.
But the problem was, is they wanted full business control. They wanted full creative control. They also wanted to fire my entire team. And I was like, you're never gonna fire my team. They've been with me since day one for four years of this grind. They have, they want to be a part of this and there's no way I'm gonna let you take that away from them.
They were like, well, they're not a part owner of the ip so we can, and I was like, okay. We had a meeting and I actually made them all part owners of the IP came back to the table. I was like, now you can't fire 'em. Let's have a conversation now. [00:27:00] And then they were like, okay, well we still wanna have full creative and we still wanna have full business control.
Meaning that we literally would have absolutely no say so in what this film would be. So we came to a compromise and we were like, well, as a compromise, why don't you tell us. And a and a form, everything you wanna do with this film, and then ahead of time, if we agree, you agree, we'll sign off on that, but you can't make any changes to that.
And they were like, okay, that seems fair. So they sent it over and nothing was what we wanted it to be. I mean, nothing, which was super strange. I mean, you figured at least one thing we'd line on, but we're talking four pages where we were like, red line, red line, red line. Um, one of them was, they wanted to make it a film about, um, absentee fathers.
And I was like, what the fuck does that have to do with martial arts con artists? I was like, I've been doing this for a long time and that's not a pattern in this. I was like, if it was, I would've covered it by now. But it's not. Most of these people are actually learning from their, their [00:28:00] parents and they grow up in these cults.
It's nonsensical. So we basically, after a year of negotiation, like when, it's very difficult when somebody says, Hey, by the way, we're about to give you three fourths of a million dollars. To say no, that's not an easy no. Um, but we had to say no. They even tried to bribe me with an extra $80,000 signing bonus.
If I would've done it, um, I probably would've stemmed to make maybe about $450,000 baseline off of it if I would've signed that deal and hung my people out to dry. And don't get me wrong, that would've been nice to have that money, but that I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna give up what we're trying to do here for some money.
Um, and then now here we are. So now we're talk. We got co a company called Big Media. They came on board, um, which is great. So now we're talking to a couple different distribution companies. Uh, so we're gonna see who it lines up with, uh, what distribution platform. And then we're finally at like the light at the end of the tunnel of all this.
Like, it basically just comes down now to like a hundred K for us. And [00:29:00] we're almost to that point. So the grind is important and I think that most people don't make film or aren't successful at it because either they don't try. Or they don't understand how in depth it is to really make a film. Like, it's not, it's not an easy feat to make a good one anyway.
Riley: Yeah, that's an interesting point. You're, we always see films when they're done, right. And we don't realize, yeah, they've been working on this for four years prior to the time you get to actually see the finished product. And so yeah, we feel like, because we became aware of it yesterday, that it was started yesterday, but man, it was, that's the years in the making.
Right. I love it.
Um, Rob, you
Rob (McDojoLife): Also, it's different. Making
scripted, uh, scripted film is much different than documentary. So with a documentary, you have to actually document and you don't get to pick and choose how the documentary goes. And so the old [00:30:00] saying, there's a, a quote that says, when you make a movie, the director is God. But when you make a documentary, God is the director.
And like I didn't understand how true that was until we started filming because like things sometimes fall in your lap and the story that you thought you were gonna tell is not even close to what it ends up being. It's, it's kind of a wild ride. I did not expect it to be as hard. I was like, yeah, we'll make a documentary that seems like it'd be easy.
I'm a moron. I should have like, made a script and just done a scripted film and I would've been done years ago.
Riley: Well, I'm, I'm really curious, um, of, gimme an example of what you're talking about when you say this. The story changed, the story you thought you were gonna write ended up not being the
one.
Rob (McDojoLife): Well, like, one thing I didn't expect is like, during the filming I got sued by a guy who hired a registered sex offender and I did a story about that for Mac Dojo life, not even for the documentary. And he sued me. And then like that was two years of that. And obviously that's, that's gotta be a part of the film in some way.
And that was [00:31:00] not something that we expected. Um, we did not expect that that would actually be a thing. Um, and that was like a wild ride, like having to go through that. I won by the way, uh, like, 'cause I don't put out stories that I don't do my research on. He was just trying to scare me and I really don't think that when he sent the cease and desist that he realized how many cease and desist I get.
I actually have a drawer full of them. I call 'em, I call 'em cheaper.
So
just a, just a few.
I call 'em keepers, keep 'em. Somebody told me that one day I should take all my cease and desist letters and I should like, make a collage and put it like in a piece of art. And I was like, one day, don't you worry. I was like, I still got a few more collecting to do.
Yeah. I got, you know, something nice, classy.
Riley: thing. mentioned in in just a, just a minute ago, you mentioned that pretended to be a [00:32:00] fraud and put out, you know, taught a seminar with bull crap information and people bought into it. What do you think causes that? Man, because I've been in those situations before where, I'll give you an example.
I took a church security, you know, class one time and we were, we were discussing, and the guy in there was really into wrist locks and controlling people with th wrist locks and pressure points and those kind of things. And, and I had him practiced live on me and man. Some of the pressure points, just some of 'em hurt if I stand there and take it, but you're never getting that if, unless you can 100% control me I, I remembered, I didn't really say much at the time, but I, I questioned him in there where it got uncomfortable. And what do you think it is that keeps people from questioning those kind of things in a, a, public setting
like that?
Rob (McDojoLife): Well, like we to, to kind of piggyback off of that might be a better explanation. So we [00:33:00] interviewed a guy who works directly with a man named Bishop Baron. And Bishop Baron, for anyone who might not know is the second most famous Catholic, other than the Pope. So like you have the Pope, you have Bishop Baron.
And so this is one of Bishop Baron's, like guys, his like assistants or like, I don't know what you would call him, but he's like a higher up in the Catholic church. And with him, he actually studied legitimate cults. And so he had a wealth of knowledge about cults and he was a fascinating interview. As a matter of fact, we didn't really have to ask him questions because every time we would ask him a question, he'd be like, I think this is probably a better way to ask that question.
And he would like change. He would like be like, okay, well, that we will ask that question. We will go with it. And he would say an answer, so concise and so well delivered that. I was blown away by just how intelligent this man was. And I couldn't stop praising him for it. It was very, it was very wild. But one of the things that he talked about was the root word of culture is cult.[00:34:00]
And so when you look at our society, we're actually made up of a bunch of cults. We just don't really call it that. And when most people think about cults, they think about religion. They don't think about the cults of other things. You can have a cult of personality, a cult of money, a cult of politics, which you see a lot more nowadays, which is so much more on the nose when I think of a cult.
And to give you an example, like again, how many people go online and they'll turn any post into a political post.
Riley: gosh.
Rob (McDojoLife): on there and they'll leave a political comment of literally anything that person's in a cult, because clearly their mind is 24 7 on this one topic, this one subject. And you cannot, they cannot be wrong.
And like the, that's one of the. The founding tenets of a cult is like your leader doesn't get questioned. Your leader is the guy. The leader cannot be wrong. You cannot question them. And anyone else else's outside opinions are that are gonna be counterproductive to what the leader says are not welcome.
And you could be excommunicated, and that's scary to people. [00:35:00] But when you walk into any room, there will always be somebody who is in charge of that room. When you walk into any, any room, it doesn't matter. Like if I walk up and all of a sudden I walk into a bank, I understand that the bank tower in charge of that room than I am.
I understand that his manager is in charge of that room. If you walk into any room where you're all just sitting around and something bad happened, they'll automatically be someone who takes the lead. They'll automatically be somebody who doesn't want to. So I think giving up authority is more comfortable for most people.
So when you walk into a room where someone says that they're an expert, you just believe them. It's, it's not okay. I believe you, you have to show me why you're not an expert. And the only way that I'll know that you're not is if I actually have some knowledge in what you're talking about. But if I walk into a room and have zero knowledge, why would I question it?
I'm paying you money because I believe you're the expert. I wouldn't show up unless I did believe that. And then you set the ground rules. As soon as I walk in the [00:36:00] door, why would I speak out against that if I have no clue what I'm talking about? And then, so a lot of people realize, especially when you're in the martial arts, you adapt to understanding reality and martial arts very quickly.
If you are in a reality based system, like, but when you're not in a reality based system, it's easy to be be manipulated to believing that you are. And I think that most people don't understand how easy it is to manipulate people because it hurts our ego.
Riley: Yeah.
Rob (McDojoLife): We don't want to believe we
scammed or con. We all can be scammed or conned.
I could be scammed or conned. You could be scammed or conned. We all can be. And I found that especially doing research with Mac Doja life, the people who are the easiest to fool are the ones who are the strongest willed and believing. They can't be fooled because they think they're, they're in charge.
And think about like sparring. When I'm sparring someone, right? If I can make you believe it was your [00:37:00] idea to do a technique, and you do that technique for me, that opens up the submission or it opens up the shot that I need. So you believed it was your idea, you believed it was the right decision, and then you got punched in the face.
I could do that to you over and over and over again. It's gonna take you quite a while for you to realize, oh, you're baiting me. Like, oh God, like I am doing this to me. Like, but that takes a while. And we're not talking about getting punched in the face consequences. We're talking about slow notches over a long period of time.
That slowly manipulate people into thoughts, patterns of behavior, um, how they treat other people. Then add on top of that, this is your social structure friend group. This is your mentor, and the longer you're in that, the harder it is to get out because you believe you're gonna lose your social structure friend group or mentor.
So like, it's not hard to manipulate people.
Riley: Yeah, that's, that's, we could go down that path for a [00:38:00] while. Um, I, it's funny, you, you, you brought up the, um, recognizing bad technique and I'll, I'll get asked because people know I'm in the juujitsu world and you know, I'll, I'll get asked periodically if I can teach you, say a, a junior high girls self-defense class. I'm like, man, yeah, I can. But I think what you're asking for is this like magic move that I'm gonna teach that 95 pound little girl how to beat up a 250 pound guy. Um, that's not what you're gonna hear here. I'm gonna tell 'em, don't go to stupid places of stupid times of stupid people and do stupid things, and that's gonna take care of 99% of your, your problem, you know?
But, but as far as, you know, these magic moves, I, I think it's appealing to people, but, but it, man, it just doesn't really exist. You know, I'm a jiujitsu guy, but there's limits to that
too.
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, for sure. Like, and there is, I don't believe there's an end all be all art because I don't believe everybody has built the [00:39:00] same. And like for some people, you know, they are fantastic strikers and like they have a track record of being able to defend themselves in the street using that. And for other people, they're fantastic at Juujitsu or even mediocre juujitsu, but they were able to utilize that to be in a fight.
I believe the best art for you, no matter who you are, is the one that helps you reach your per personal goal. Because when it comes down to like defending yourself. You're never going to use the techniques that you didn't train. You're not gonna magically understand a rear naked choke if you've never done a rear naked choke.
Like you have to actually apply it. You have to understand what it's like to rest under pressure with someone else who's trying to also heart you. And, uh, which I love about Juujitsu, it is a very pressure test based system. They're constantly pressure testing each other all the time. But what if I tell somebody, juujitsu is the best martial art for self defense, and that person goes to a Juujitsu class not standing.
That juujitsu isn't all [00:40:00] encompassing universally the same. Every school you go to is going to be different. Every instructor you go to is going to be different. And I tell somebody, jujitsu's the one for you. And then they go and they're, I know, sexually harasses them. They're probably not gonna go train JIT and they'll.
Because I said jujitsu didn't give them the caveat of the truth, which is you're gonna be the best at the art you actually show up to. So if they go to karate for instance, and there's like over 200 different forms of karate, but let's even just say sport karate. 'cause that's the one that most people like to pick on the most and they train it and they're there every day and they're grinding every day.
They're still learning, round kick, front kick. They're still learning how to throw jab cross. They're still learning how to move and have good foot, have good timing and distancing. And an average person comes up to them, same size, same weight, same height, all that good stuff. That person's gonna fuck that other person up.
And it's not because the art itself, it's because they put in the [00:41:00] time, effort, and energy to actually train like, and I think that that's where people make mistakes is that they think as they did a certain art. Magically that's gonna be the end all be all for them because of the art they have to do with a lot of factors.
And one of those factors is you, are you actually showing up? Are you actually training? Are you actually applying? And if you do those things, no matter the art, you're gonna be better than the average person in self-defense.
Riley: yeah. We say dumb stuff like, you know, size and weight doesn't matter and athleticism doesn't matter if you have enough technique. And I'm like, yeah, bull crap man. I pressure tested that too. It matters,
you know,
technique
may overcome in the end,
but It.
Rob (McDojoLife): It. Yeah, man. Of course it does. Would you rather be hit by a bicycle or a bus? Uh, would you rather be hit by a bicycle or a bus? It's like the, I would rather be hit by the bicycle. Like, I think I'll live that one. Right? I want the bus. Like, again, it's not the only thing that matters. They matter a lot. [00:42:00] That's why we have weight classes.
In combat sports. There's a, there's another trope that I find hilarious, which is from the self-defense guru. Self-dependent guru is my favorite fake martial artist because nine times outta 10, they probably aren't getting in street fights all the time. 'cause they'd either be dead or in jail illegal to just get in random street fights all the damn time.
Right? So they'll be very competition. Like there's no rules in the street. Yes, motherfucker, there are. There are calls. They are there and they bear consequence. Just like if you break a rule in a tournament, like there are no rules in the street is such a horse shit thing to say. There are s if I stab you in the neck with a knife, right.
While there was no rules set, we didn't decide how this fight was gonna go or what the parameters of our equal be. They're still rules. I can't just kill you without some kind of consequence and you can't just kill me without some kind of a consequence. And just like in competition, [00:43:00] if I don't get caught, I don't get in trouble.
Like if I poke you in the eye and the guy's like, oh, he poked me in the eye and they're like, I didn't see it. Well you don't get in trouble for that now, do you. Like you get in trouble when it actually gets caught. And so it's the same thing. The rules are always there, whether you believe it or not. Now the rules set, right?
You are just basically saying what you're both, you're both under the assumption that we can do whatever we want to each other here, and we have to understand what our consequences may be within the law. But are the rules of the street. Everything else is, did you get caught by?
Riley: Man. Um, let's switch gears here a little bit. I want to talk to you. You've got your fancy YouTube plate up there, and, and that's where I first became aware of you is through YouTube. you mentioned earlier in the episode that you had been, was it 13 years? Is that what you said? You've been at this?
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah. Mc, Doja life has been about 13 years.
Riley: That, um. I want you to kind of [00:44:00] discuss what that's taken to build, because I think sometimes people can discount the amount of effort that goes into building a social media brand. you talk about that? I.
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, so it started off with Facebook. 'cause at the time, Instagram wasn't really a thing yet. Uh, it probably was around, but it wasn't like, like what it is now. Um, and at the time, even when it first start, Instagram was only photos. So like you couldn't put any videos on there. And then eventually when that was available, I think that 10 seconds maybe was the max.
Um, now obviously it's, it's expanded, but the only thing I really was doing at the time when I first started was doing long form essays on Facebook. So I would talk in great detail about why these particular schools or systems are. Uh, instructors had issues and I would do basically what I'm doing now on YouTube, but I was just doing it as a, a [00:45:00] essay instead of like a, a piece of content. Um, and that wasn't getting any traction at all. Like, you have to start like everybody else from zero. You start with zero followers, you start with zero people and stuff. You start with zero comments, zero likes, and you just work and you keep working and then you keep working. And then like when that fails, work again.
Like you have to keep grinding through that time. Dill will always continue to grind. It never, that will never end for you. That's what brand and a platform is, is a consistent grind. And if you want to get good at anything, consistency really is the key. You just have to stick with it. Like are you are to, are people gonna be better than you?
Worse than you? That's gonna be the case in anything. But fuck everybody else. Worry about you. Stay in your lane and say, am I better than I was yesterday? Did I grow from yesterday? I didn't. Why? And you just keep asking that question until you figure out how to fix [00:46:00] those holes. And so. So I figured it out by accident, what my problem was, because there was a lot of gatekeeping, at least at that time, media space.
You couldn't just reach out to the guy with a million followers and be like, can you just teach me how you did that? They would laugh at you and then they would ignore you because they're not gonna give you their secret sauce because a lot of people thought that their success would be hindered by your success.
So it's not the case. And now everybody shares information. But I, I walked away from my computer one day and I just put up a video and just some goofy, funny video and like, none of my stuff at that point had any humor and injected in it at all. It was just like, all right, typing essays, these are the facts, and move on.
I didn't realize boring as hell, like that is so boring. People just sitting there reading it and I was like, this is interesting to me. Well, it's not about me, and I didn't know. So then I posted this, this video and it got more likes, more comments, more views than anything I had done. I was like, I'm doing this [00:47:00] wrong.
I realized my mistake was I was not leaving enough space in my posts for conversation and dialogue. I wasn't asking other people their opinion and creating this back and forth with my audience. And then over the years, you start working on that Instagram thing, you go over and at the time, like people on Instagram, who started there at that time, that it was just a meme page because I can only post photos.
So of course I was posting meme all I could post. No one's reading the, the description. I promise you that still they don't do that. Um, but then on Facebook it was a different beast. And I was eventually built up to where I was like reposting resharing on YouTube. And I got like a couple strikes, okay, I can't use YouTube, they're gonna tube down.
I have to wait for these strikes to go away. And then I realized how to make a rich tent. And then you fi figure out like how to grow your brand and you just like trial and airway forward. And then I got lucky enough that some people in higher up in our martial arts industry actually started [00:48:00] noticing what I was doing.
Um, and then they started talking about it. And then like eventually, like I got out on Joe Rogan and then he kept doing it. Then he was sharing my stuff on Instagram. Like it was a really big jumping point. But like, I already had, like, at that time, by the time Rogan had shouted me out, I had a hundred thousand subscribers on Facebook.
And I had like, I think I was like thousand on Instagram. And then, um, then my Facebook came down completely. So I've had to restart on Facebook. Now I'm back up to like 80 something thousand there. Um, but then, you know, Instagram was blown up, 700 something thousand. Um, YouTube, I, you know, I learned a lot. I was able to get up to like over 160 something thousand there.
And so like you just keep grinding. Every social media platform is different. Your audience is even different. If you go to Reddit, for instance, your audience is very cynical, very cynical. So you have to [00:49:00] understand, you go to Twitter, which is X. Now you have to have conversations by typing like sentences.
Your photo, unless it's porn probably isn't gonna do right? So you have to have like these, these are my thoughts or reactions to other people's stuff. And so I'm just now starting to dig into that. But it's, it's a lot of work. I don't think people ran how much work.
Riley: Yeah, I think that's kind of the point that I wanted to bring up is just how much work it is, man. I, I see you as, uh, you know, from a distance, right? But it seems like you're involved in more stuff and just when you say the grind, I don't, I, I really don't think people understand. Um, which is kind of a segue here to other stuff you've got going on.
Um, you've got, a building you, you purchased that's, uh, gonna put some fight events in. You described that to me in the [00:50:00] past. I don't think I fully understood the scope of it. Um, but I'd like to hear a little bit about that. And then I
want you to talk
about
Fight Con
that's
coming up
too.
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, for sure. Well, like
the [00:51:00] building was never officially purchased, so the building, we were going through the, the motions and while I was working on getting the building taken care of, I needed a primary sponsor to be able to get that off the ground. Well, while the primary sponsor I was talking to, one of my other sponsors, shameless Plug, uh, cage Punch,
so they're like purpose, like cleaner for like mats and gloves and all that good stuff, but it's like all natural chemicals.
Um, so yeah, thanks Cage. Uh, but yeah, like, uh, when I was talking to the owner, the owner actually ran like multiple comp and so he was naming off all these companies that he ran. His name's Rob Scott. Go figure Robs. And uh, I was like, I run multiple companies. I was like, let's talk a little bit about what you do.
And we, he got to the thing working about a fight come, and I was like, dude, I have been working with a friend of mine named Matt from a company called Epic Role. And me and him had been working on an idea of starting a [00:52:00] martial arts convention, like a Comic-Con style martial arts convention. And we've been working on it for years, but we just never like, were able to get it across the finish line because it's so ungodly it.
To start there, there was no way we would be able to do what we wanted to do. We would have to start on such a small scale and build out from there. Well, this guy Rob, he already did like last year, so I'm, I'm talking to him and I'm like, dude, can we talk, like, sit down and have a legit meeting? We have like a three hour meeting and I'm just giving, he's talking about what he's doing and then come to find out he's looking for somebody to legitimately run it.
And I was like, man. I've been working on trying to get this building, but I was like, if I get that opportunity, I would rather do this. Right now I just like important like, and while my building, I can just get a smaller building and do things I still want to do. But like with this, I think there's a real opportunity here to grow the industry as a whole.
You don't have like the Comic-Con style [00:53:00] launching point that like you'll see with Marvel, Marvel movies coming out. You hear about it first at Comic-Con and if there's like a new anime, it's first like it's the, every big announcement is made there and it's such a big deal. We don't have that in martial arts.
Civil did a deal with Hi Abu, we didn't have this like big announcement on stage. It's basically like if you didn't follow Hi Abusa, you just didn't know. And that was so sad to me. A how important moment could have been for our industry. That crossover. And we could have all jumped in on that and we could have all expanded this industry because of that, but we don't have that platform.
So when he told Mike come, I was like, fuck yeah, I want to do that. So like now, this year it's gonna be October 3rd and fourth in Salt Lake City. They're gonna do it again, uh, in the same venue next year. And then basically from day one all the way through, I will be running it. And so I have so many ideas about how to make this work and how to make it run.
Um, this [00:54:00] year we're just getting some stuff on stage. So like we have Sensei Seth coming out. We have Rokus, uh, who did the martial arts, uh, ultimate Martial Arts, our self ship. I apologize. So the Ultimate Self-Defense Championship on YouTube is this incredible show that he made where he put all these martial arts through the ringer to see who was the best at self.
So good. Um, and then we have, uh, Shane Zen. Shane Zen's gonna be doing a seminar. Uh, you know, we have, uh, Zeta Zang, who was a WWE EI think she was like the first female, uh, signed with the WWE e if not the first Asian female. Like, you know, it's like, uh, she was also an MMA fight. Tony, who's gonna be coming in.
Tony is a fantastic stunt coordinator, so he's gonna be like a stunt workshop. So we're trying to create the Comic-Con of martial arts, not just combat sports, but everything in our pop culture from TV shows, movies, video games, music, [00:55:00] uh, books like technique from how to wrap your hands, how to be an MA fighter, how to be a referee.
Occasions for all of that. And just make it an event where if you are a fan of martial arts, whether it be martial arts, film, or fighting, you would want to go to it.
Riley: Dang man. Um, super Jack, my company, salt electrolytes is gonna be there, um, as a, as a vendor. And so I'm, I'm really excited to get involved in this thing. See what, where you guys take this. It's gonna be great. Um, switching gears a bit here to just some lighter stuff. You would, if you, um, you have a book that is
something you'd
recommend
anybody read,
what would it
be?
Rob (McDojoLife): Uh, other than my book,
Riley: Let's talk about
Rob (McDojoLife): like,
Riley: it.
Rob (McDojoLife): you know.
Like, well, I wanted to get to your que like, uh, before, uh, before my shameless plug. Um, I would [00:56:00] say like, uh, probably How to Win Friends and Influence People. Like, it's probably like my hands down favorite book. Like I'll go back and I'll read it and there's just like, forget like how to interact with human beings sometimes and then you'll go back and be like, I probably should be a little better at A, B, and C.
Um, but How To Win Friends and Influence People is probably one books ever. I actually got given that book by my first instructor and uh, it just always stuck with me as like, you know what? This is actually fantastic and I, you know, me in high school as a teenager reading how to Win Friends and Influence People.
Like, it's just something that every once in a while just go back and read and remember that maybe are things that I should do in my life a little better. I think that it's pants down the one I would suggest.
Riley: Us about your
book though. I don't, I
don't
want you to get
outta here
without your
shameless
plug.
Rob (McDojoLife): Yeah, please. I got, uh,
let me see if I still have it right over here. It's over here somewhere. I don't know if I put it [00:57:00] away. Um, so it's, it's on my dad middle of all of this pile, I'm sure. Uh, so it's called Senses, bars and, and, uh, it's literally about those three things. So it was a very easy, um, but when I was senses, bars, and scars,
uh, it's about sensei's bars and scars. Like, uh, I have scars on my face and I was born palate, uh, cleft, lip and palate. And so because of that I was picked on and teased in school a lot relentlessly. And, uh, finally I got jumped outside of, uh, my gym class in like eighth grade. Um, and they beat me for five minutes.
And the only know that was, is 'cause they beat me from the bell to the bell, which was like five minutes between classes. And I remember two teachers, um, standing there just watching the entire thing. I mean, I still have like a scar on my finger from a kid trying to stab me with a pencil. And I went to go blind and stab me in the finger instead.
Thank God not my face. Um, and [00:58:00] then beat the hell outta me. My glasses broke. They, they cut my face up and I'm just laying there taking a beat. And like, thank God for adrenaline. You know, after, after the first couple shots, you just don't feel anything at all, but you damn sure feel it the next day. I can promise.
So after the bell rang, all these kids scattered and I'm laying there and I'm looking in the distance and like, I can't see shit. And then my friend, uh, the only real friend that I had in the school, he came over and he was just late for that class and he walked over and he picked me up and he walked me to the nurse's office.
And as he walked me to the nurse's office, we really didn't say anything. I mean, I was really busted up. And he hands me a card and it was like a free trial martial arts card. And he said, you need this. And I remember grabbing it and putting it in my pocket and not thanking anything of it. And at home I read it and it was like a free trial karate class.
So I'd asked my mom, I was like, Hey mom, I'd really like to do this. And she was always worried. [00:59:00] That if I got into sports, it would mess up my surgeries that I was still undergoing. She's like, I don't want you to get hit in the face with a baseball. Like, I don't want you to get, you know, hurt in football.
Like, she, she was very concerned I was gonna have to go through surgeries again, which she was paying out of pocket and they were not cheap. And, uh, so, but that next month was my birthday. I come home, school, uh, I come home to a cake that she had made and a box and a card. The card had some cash in it.
Love you son, blah, blah, blah. Thanks for the, and then, uh, I opened up the box and then was just a piece of paper in it. And the piece of paper, I was like, what am I, and you know, I'm a 12, I just turned 12, so what am I gonna do with this piece of paper? She goes, read it. And I read it and it, she had paid in full for my martial arts class higher year.
And she said, your uniform's waiting for you, your first classes tonight. And so every year now I celebrate. My is a new year in the martial arts industry, which makes it very easy to keep up with. Um, but I, I just was, [01:00:00] I was hooked the first class I was hooked and I loved it, thank God. 'cause she had paid in full for a year.
So if it sucked, that would've been a terrible year. But like, you know, the book starts from there. Um, it starts about that and then it goes all the way pretty much until, um, I start Mac Dojo Life. And it's mostly about my teenage years because right around the time, um. The book ends. There's a huge gap before it goes to the Mac Dojo life stuff.
But yeah, as a teenager I would fight, I I'd fight in bars, a local nightclub called Plush had what they call patron boxing. So they would take a ring, put it in the middle of this nightclub,
and they would be like, Hey, whoever
to fight can fight.
And you just weigh in in the back. And if y'all were about the same size, you could fight.
And that, that was the entertainment for the night. So they did one-on-one fights, two on two fights, two on one fights, three on three fights. They did something called Thunderdome Rules, which is one round. Oh man. And it didn't end until somebody like got knocked out or quit like it was a thing. And my instructor was like, yeah, I'll let you do this.
[01:01:00] 'cause I asked. He goes, but it's a 21 in nut club, so you have to fight first. And then once you fight, then you have to leave. And I was like, but also he made mine a permission slip. And I, I went to my mom thinking, no way. She's signing this shit. So I was like, mom, can I do this? Well, who's gonna be there?
Like, who is, is everything gonna be saved? I'm like, I'm like, yeah, sure. And then so she signed it. And so my first fight was me at 15 versus like a 30-year-old man. We just happened to weigh the same. And, uh, it was just a very wild experience. My instructor set himself on fire in the nub. I did a two on two fight, which you can actually see that on YouTube.
Like I, it was an in, but it was a very wild one through my teenage years
Riley: Hey, this is called the Go Earn Your Salt Podcast. And when you hear that, that phrase go earn your salt, what comes to mind?
Rob (McDojoLife): Hard work. Like hard work is what comes to mind. I think that if you're gonna do any, you know, you gotta put in the hard work and like any guy sweat, you know, [01:02:00] like that's where that salt comes out. You know, I feel like it's very similar to like, you know, earning anything. You know, if you're gonna work, you're gonna put in the time, effort, energy to do absolutely anything that you're gonna have to sweat.
You might have to bleed and understand that that's you earning your right to do what you do. And like there's a lot of people who think that they, they can just be and that that magically by them just existing, that they're gonna be successful in anything. Like, if you don't put in the time, effort, energy to sweat and to work hard for what you really want in life, you ain't gonna fucking get it.
Or luckiest son of a bitch on the planet.
Riley: Oh, that's good stuff, man. Um, me this, what is your favorite pastime outside of martial arts?
Man, I love movies. I love a good movie. Like, other than like, I like, I like being social. Like I, I think I was just born to be a social butterfly and in high school, middle school, you know, I was never so, like, I [01:03:00] always felt like self-conscious, but like once I got out I felt like, I was like, dude, I can just exist and people aren't gonna fuck mess with me.
Rob (McDojoLife): Like, that'd be great. Like I can, we'll have a conversation. It'd be cool with each other. Like, I'm not used to that. I kind of like, I love traveling. And getting to meet new people. Um, absolutely love it. It's so fun. Like I'll go hang out with like groups of people wherever I go. Um, you know, it's just fun to interact with people and just be sociable.
But if I am by myself, I got nothing to do. I love watching a good movie. I like, love everything about it. The cinematography, like how they write the script, how well the movie is acted in, you know, like the storylines like movie is like something that I really love. It's, it's just something so cool to see somebody.
And, you know, the, the hard dedication they put into this, to something out there, to the masses, I mean, that's impressive to me. That's a, that's a fun thing. So either I'm hanging out with people or, uh, I'm, I'm watching movies. That's usually one or the [01:04:00] other.
Riley: . It seems like you're right in the zone where, um, you're talking about filmmaking and all the, the video stuff you do to, to have that fascination with, with movies, it's right in your wheelhouse. Scariest moment in your life. You mentioned being jumped. Is there a, do you have a moment in your life that's scarier than that?
Rob (McDojoLife): Um, when I saw my instructor get set on fire, um, that's the scariest moment I think I've ever had in my life. Um, I was, this was before the, the Friday night fights I was talking to you about in the, in my book. And, uh, I used to go to this thing, uh, club Five, which is in Five Points at, uh, Jacksonville, Florida.
And so my instructor at the time used to be a referee for another fight night, like the first fight night in Jacksonville, which was the same patron boxing, but it was run by a [01:05:00] guy named Bruce Chambers. And at that time, since my, uh, my instructor was a referee, he would do like a halftime where like halfway through the, the night we would actually get in there as like a martial arts demonstration team and do martial arts demos.
And this night, drunk people. So we used to do these like awesome black light shows. We would take these giant six foot black lights and put 'em around the ring. We'd turn off all the lights in the nightclub, so it's pitch black, dark in there. And then we would do these performances with like, nunchucks leave these patterns and trails, Lars, or like fire.
And they were like, people really got into it, especially since they were probably drunk or on drugs. And so like. I was fort and I started helping do that. And so I would come in, we'd do the demonstrations in the nightclub and then we would leave. 'cause we were, you know, us were under, under age. And one day we decided that we were gonna do your better show.
Like, and the bigger and better shows Devil went down to Georgia. And so we were like, devil went [01:06:00] down to Georgia and make this like entire like martial arts demonstration around that and play it out that way. 'cause the song just kind of tells us, and so let's do this demonstration. And there's a part, the song goes, he laid the golden fiddle at Johnny's feet.
And for us we were like that opportunity for us to like have fire, which we had done nunchucks on fire demos for years. It's nothing to us. Um, but usually we went outside. And so in order for us to do this correctly, we had to have a paint can, like a, or a paint pan. And we set that inside the, the ring with the nunchucks and still some fluid at paint pan.
Well, when you like put the, the, the, the Coleman's lantern from these nunchucks, right? With these big wicks, what wound up happening, and actually I have one, right? So wild. So they look like this, right? I, I didn't even know. Like there's this giant wick and then you put Coleman's lantern fluid on there [01:07:00] and then you just start spin them and it's just a big ball of flame, right?
And in all honesty, it in itself isn't as this, as it kind of probably looks like was excess fluid in this. And so when my instructor grabbed the pan to start doing his thing, uh, that ex a little bit got on the ring and when it got my other instructor who was also in the ring went to go stamp that out.
And so when he went to go stamp that out of the ring, he accidentally was pan full of Coleman's lantern fluid all over after. And it was a lot. And it set completely on fire to the point where it actually burned the ceiling. And, uh, because this was a ring, there were people all around the ring. So when he got hit with this, it only hit him.
I mean, if, like looking back at the video, a list a little bit, got on the rope, uh, the ring rope a little bit, got on one guy's arm and he was like so drunk or enamored with what was going on. He [01:08:00] didn't notice and then he just like wiped it off his arm. But other than that, no one else got hurt. But my answer was like, I'm a 20 foot fireball.
So he's freaking out 'cause he's on fire And um, he went, he wiped his face 'cause he couldn't see and he also couldn't breathe. He was inhaling fire. So he is wiping his face to look around to see where to go. And luckily he saw where the table was, where the bell is. And that's also happens to be where the medics were sitting.
He runs, jumps over the top rope, hits that table, and then he dive rolls and he's laying on the floor and everybody's trying to put him out. And this is a VIP off section so nobody else could get in there. Everybody's trying to put him out and like while everybody's trying to put him out. Like some guy, I guess he had like maybe a shot of like 1 51 or something, like tossed it on my instructor and that spot lit back up because whatever he was drinking was so shatter.
It was flammable and it like put him back up [01:09:00] spot. So one of the medics, which we were all very close, but one of the medics turns around and says decks that guy right in the face and who he had done wrong. And so he was just like, oh, I'm so sorry, but he was just drunk ized and so they finally put him out.
But like when you're 14 years old. And you're there and you watch somebody who for the last two years of my life at that point was your mentor, was somebody you looked up to and you were pretty sure he's gonna die and you smell burnt hair and burnt skin and burnt clothing. It's not something that ever really leaves you.
And you see him laid out screaming in pain and you can see smoke coming off of him when they finally get that taken care of. And then you have to go to the hospital after that with your whole team and the doctors don't know if he's going to live. That's scary shit. And so like that's probably the scariest moment of my life is seeing my mentor and really a was going to die by getting set on fire, which is probably one of the most horrific [01:10:00] ways to die.
And so like never forget what burnt her and Burton Skin smells like, I can promise you that. And I'll never forget, it was like to hear like somebody I was very close to screaming. Um, and like, you know, that feeling of in your gut when you just know someone's gonna die. Um, and then ly just as a, a positive note in all this, he doesn't die and you think like, oh, well his burns were so bad that there's no way he's ever gonna look the same.
Some miracle, I guess he had almost no damage to his face, which is in incredibly wild. He had his body because he was wearing a GI top or whatever. That actually kind of saved him a little bit. So he didn't have a ton. His legs did get tore up, but he had a couple skin grafts. And to be honest, they told him he was gonna lose some of his fingers.
Um, and then he didn't. Um, he was, and you're a martial arts instructor, you kind of need that. So like, especially with doing nunchucks and stuff. So it was a, it was kind of [01:11:00] a, a pretty wild miracle, but that was the scariest, that was scary.
Riley: That's wild, man. I, yeah, I can imagine. 'cause yeah, as, as a 14-year-old kid, that's, I mean, that's, bad enough any time, right? But as a, as a 14-year-old, what do you do? Uh, I can't identify with that man. I'm, I'm glad I've never experienced Yeah. not recommended. I Yeah. I was growing up, my I, I woke up in the middle of the night to, you know, lights and sirens and emergency vehicles to the house across the street from us.
And the neighbor kid had been out there huffing gas and they lit a cigarette up and actually killed him. But I didn't
witness it right. It was, I found out the
next
day why all those emergency vehicles were there. uh, that's scary stuff, man. Scary stuff. Um, Rob, bucket list challenge. What's something you want to do in the [01:12:00] future? When I turned, I just turned 40. I turned 40 in April.
Rob (McDojoLife): And uh, you know, I was like, you know what? Like
I wanna accomplish 40 things
in my forties,
right? So like, I got, I got a decade to accomplish a bunch of, a bunch of stuff, right? But I was like, in my forties, I wanna accomplish 40 things. And one thing, I want to break a Guinness World record.
Um, I don't really care what it is. Most likely. Obviously it'll probably be a martial arts challenge, and anybody that knows me, most likely, it's probably gonna be something to do with nunchucks. I know me as well, and I know that if I break one, especially when it comes to like nunchucks. I won't stop there.
I will find every goddamn ledge there is and break every world record that I can that involves those say that even if they don't stick that at one was the absolute greatest at that thing. Um, that would be, that would be one. Um, I wanna run a marathon. I've never run a marathon. [01:13:00] Uh, this year I really got into running, uh, I was doing it at first, like almost like as a recovery, like.
Uh, my body just doesn't recover like it used to. And I was like, on a rest day for me, instead of hitting the gym, I was like, you know, lemme jog. And now that's been like very like therapeutic. It's weird, like when you're running you're just heavy and you know, you turn on your music and you're just in the zone and it's relaxing in a way.
So I've really kind of gotten into that recently. Plus I had like gotten to like two 30 when I was filming in Fresno because the only thing that was around was a damn Taco Bell. So I was eating Taco Bell, like breakfast, lunch and dinner and like we were editing, so I wasn't even really exercising. I was sitting in a chair for like 15 hours a day writing notes on the movie.
So I was like, well damn, this sucks. Now I'm a big fat bitch. Maybe I should actually do a pushup or two here. So like, I started getting into running and that really helped too. Um, so, and then, uh, you know, there's a couple places I'd like to travel, but. You know, those two things are like pretty big on [01:14:00] my list.
Like, I definitely wanna do a marathon. I definitely want to accomplish things I've never been able to accomplish in my forties, so 40 new things in my forties.
Riley: So really important question. If you go to a restaurant and you get a hamburger and they put the veggies below the beef patty, is that acceptable? Yeah, you just flip the burger upside down. you're one of those. Holy crap. I don't know what to do now. I had a, I had a
conundrum happen the other day, though. I got, I got, a burger and they had the onions on the top and the lettuce and tomato on the bottom. I, I didn't even know what to do with that. I was like, you know, I. Confusion. Awesome, man. Yeah, it's, it's a. tell us this as we kind of close out what, uh, or where can you be found. Yeah, for sure. You can find me at Mac Dojo life on most every social media platform. [01:15:00] Um, the main ones anyway, Instagram X, uh, you know, Facebook is the Mac Dojo,
Rob (McDojoLife): um, because I got kicked off and had to restart. And then, um, YouTube is Mac Dojo life. In all honesty, I think that if people just follow on Instagram and follow on YouTube, they'll probably get the majority of the content.
A lot of content that I post is on Instagram only, and a lot of post content I post is on YouTube only. So the, if you're looking to actually truly get a grasp of what I do, check out the YouTube channel.
Riley: Yeah, to just have fun and like just kind of giggle every once in a while, check out the Instagram.
that's great, man. All right, my friend. Well, I'm honored to have you on the show. Um. dude, it was super cool having you. Your story's amazing. hopefully we can do
it
again in the future, in the meantime, Of course.
[01:16:00]