Ed Latimore is a former professional heavyweight boxer, a competitive chess player, and a bestselling author.
Ed is a force in the world. If you search him up on social media, you’ll see how prolific he is. It’s amazing.
Ed’s writing focuses on self-development, realizing your potential, and sobriety — all of which he approaches from personal experience, overcoming poverty and addiction.
Ed is an inspiration and was so much fun to connect with. I think you’ll enjoy this one.
Listen in here:
Subscribe: Apple | Google Play | Stitcher | Overcast | Spotify | AmazonIn this episode you’ll learn:
- What Edward Latimore does
- How Ed found purpose in writing and teaching
- Some Lessons from Eds path and boxing career
- Why you should avoid negativity
- Some advice on how to pursue meaning
Resources Mentioned:
Ed’s website
Ed’s Twitter
Ed’s Instagram
Software Generated Transcription:
Dan: Ed, Welcome to The Meaning Movement podcast. I’m so excited to have you here with us today.
Ed: Hey, thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here.
Dan: So the question I always like to begin with is how do you begin to talk about the work that you do?
Ed: sometimes I start kind of tongue in cheek and I tell people that I get to be myself for a living, but, but then when I, when I get to dig deeper and talk about it more really at, at the heart of things, I’m a, a writer and a teacher. And what I teach are the things that I’ve learned. Through my life experience.
I think my life has been, I, I don’t, I don’t wanna say completely unique, but it certainly had a, a large amount of struggle trial and tribulation. And I think I’ve done a, I’ve done a fairly good job of not just overcoming it, but learning from it and applying the lessons as I move forward. So a lot of my writing reflects that.
Dan: I love that. And I, you know, I think your story’s really compelling and want to get into that. But I think the, the, the question that, that I wanna ask just as a entry point is, look, when did you first think of yourself as a writer? Was that, how are there roots in writing early on? Or when did that, when did that piece of the identity come into focus?
Ed: well, you, you know, I remember when I was in like high school. But I, I went into high school, always being interested in writing. I used to take loosely from the paper and hand write things for people who, you know, are from that era of handwriting stuff in school. And I would write stories and it was always fascinating to me.
And I thought when I got to high school, maybe I wanna be a writer as well, but. I didn’t adapt to the, the school education of, of literature. I should have, you know, who I am now. I would’ve fallen in love with it, but then it just, it didn’t hit me the right way. I didn’t think I was a good writer. I didn’t have the confidence
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: express myself.
Probably didn’t have the ability either.
Dan: Mm.
Ed: But so, so, so it’s not like my whole life. I was like, oh, I am a writer. I was like, oh, I want to be a writer. And then I was like, oh, I’m not good at this at all. Let me go, you know, figure out and do other things. I mean, I’m sure that’s why I ended up, uh, when I went back to school later as an adult, why I ended up going back for, for physics and math.
Cause I was like, there’s no way I can touch this. Now that there’s a more practical reason too. There’s just, there were just more jobs when I thought that. That I was gonna end up working for someone else, but in terms of the identity now and where that comes from, and I wanted to give a, that backstory to show that, you know, it’s not something that you are born with and you have to go run with, but I I’ve been I’ve consider myself kind of a full time guy, this thing in one way or the one shape or the other for 10 years, I, I would, I would say, you know, the, the website was started.
Right. I remember I used to send letters back when I was in basic training because I did basic, I, I, I enlisted in the army later in life too, but I would send letters back to, to my friends, to upload to the blog for me, people I trusted hand write letters and have them go through, pick up the grammar and all that.
So I enlisted, I went in and. 2013.
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: yeah, the, the blog’s nine or 10 years old, but no, no younger and no older.
Dan: Yeah. Wild. So even while you were in trainings, when you didn’t have access to a keyboard, you couldn’t upload yourself. You were long form writing out the letters and having
Ed: Yeah. And, and
Dan: having other people lo load ’em up for you.
Ed: and here’s, what’s cool about that. I look back in retrospect, like that’s. You know, when you’re in basic training, you don’t have a lot of free time. In fact, you don’t really have any free time. You just, uh, but you, you do get 45, 30 to 45 minutes at night after you shower to fall asleep and everything.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah.
Ed: And so what I would do is I would I’d work on my, my post that I wrote at night. Or when I had to wake up and do fire guard duty for an hour, you get up at night and, you know, guard the hall and everything, and someone checks it. So, so, you know, if you wanna write, you’ll, you’ll find a way to, and I certainly find a way and you know, then, then other platforms just made the most sense to me, like trying out Twitter and Twitter’s been a, has, has been great.
And then Instagram has been great now as well for sharing some writing and then continually grow, continuing to. My website has worked out really well for me. So I, I keep, I I’ve, I’ve always been interested in the written word and communicating clearly making sure people, you know, are able to take what, what I want them to understand and get that across to them with this little loss as possible.
And that is accomplished through clear writing and, and that’s what I’ve always liked doing.
Dan: I’ll love it. Well, I mean, already, I feel like in your story, one thing that, um, is emerging that I’m impressed by is just how much you’ve reinvented yourself. We haven’t even gotten to your whole story yet, but you’re talking about, you know, being in the military and then going to school, physics and math, and then writing, like, like they’re, it feels like that’s a gifting of yours.
Um, do you feel like that’s true.
Ed: I feel like I. I’m a survivor and an adapter before all things. Uh, and, and I’ve always, I say that about anything, whether it be how I make a living, how I define myself, how, how I, even, how I live my relationships. you know, I have my goal and I know what I’m trying to do, and I know what I’m trying to not do and that what I’m trying to not do sets the bare minimum for, or what I’ll endure or what I’ll suffer.
But what that also does it sets me up to always be ahead of it. Like, you know, when we talk, we talked about a few things so far, like like going to school in the military, you know, a lot of people, when I tell that part of my story, they don’t, I have to remind them, I didn’t do those things.
I ain’t enlisted in the army when I was 28. Well, 29 because of the Tommy, I took the oath at 28 and shipped away at basic basic training at 29. So to, to make that clear or so there there’s that, but, and then go back to school. My first class was when I was, you know, 29, but shifted to 30 because my birthday’s in February, I’m 37 now.
I say all that to say, you know, I, I did those things to give myself more options in life. I didn’t like the options I had. And so I had to look and go, well, what’s the best way? Where are my skills at? What, what what’s the environment look like for me to really Excel? That’s why I chose physics and math because I did, I did the research and I said, well, all the jobs they pay.
Well, Uh, are involved with, and, and I’m not a good math student. I was not, I, I have an article on my site about this, where I talk about how bad I was. And I, I like pulled up my high school transcripts and everything to demonstrate that this was not a strength of mine. It wasn’t even a thing. I was average.
I was markedly bad at, at math, but I did the work to improve so that that’s, um, that’s where, where, what it comes down to for me, it comes down to. Always trying to be better identifying where the problems will be and then working to get ahead of those. And that looks like reinvention. And, and I guess in the pure sense of the word, it, there is an element of reinventing myself, but that’s not why I do it.
I do it because , you know, now with the, uh, now what that, what that also does that gives me confidence to take on how many things, you know, you know, I’ve always been kind of okay with language. But, you know, during the pandemic, I really took my, my Spanish to a, a useful level. You know, like when you learn another language you wanna say, oh, I’m excited.
I know it. And you realize you don’t know anything and you kind of shut up. Uh, well, well, the pandemic got me through the other side of that, where it, where I’m confident in saying. I know Spanish. And like, if somebody starts talking to me, I’ll understand and can say something back or like, you know, what you learned is like, when you say Ohla and then like ask where the bathroom is and they say something back in Spanish, you just go, yeah.
See. And as well, like, like, like, no, no, no. Now I can can program. So, so that, that was fine. Or like with my chest, you know, spending my time with chess and getting better at chess, because even though I’m not a natural at. It’s something I enjoy. I started boxing. I, I mean, you should see my, my initial even now, like I’m, I’m not an overly athletic guy in the sense of coordination.
I mean, I look like a guy with two left feet out there, but I, I put a lot of practice into it and that gave me the confidence. You know, people, I tell people all the time, the confidence I developed from, from boxing. Is what gave me the confidence to go fight it’s it’s not , you know, I mean to go do math and do physics, those things seem completely unrelated, but I just know that I can, I can, if I can pick it up here, I can pick it up there.
No issue
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. Uh, I, I love that. And it just, it sounds like you just have a lot of, uh, I don’t know, um, grit ability to stick with it and endure the hard
Ed: and, and you have to. Well, when you, when you come from a, a life like mine, how I grew up there, you, you get, you get kind of two lessons here. Uh, the first lesson is that, you know, no one’s coming to help you. No, one’s coming to save you. And what that does is, is that one that forces you to grow up. Very fast for better or worse, mostly worse.
In my opinion, I think people should spend as much time as they can being in kids. Because once you, once you become an adult, you can’t go backwards. You know? And, and that comes with a lot of real, a lot of responsibility, not just in the terms of like paying bills, but also like for your emotions and everything.
That’s when we say like a child’s lost or innocence, what we’re, what we’re really saying is. They’re no longer shielded from the harsh stuff of the world. Now, whether they’ve developed the systems and processes to deal with, that is a totally different story. And that’s why we say it’s a big deal. So there’s that one thing you lose, or one, one thing you get grown up the way I get, which is, uh, I, I realized there was no one coming to save me, so I had to be very realistic.
But the other thing you get , um, in that environment is you learn. Self sufficiency. you don’t just learn how to be tough. You also learn how to, how to take care of your life. And, and you don’t, if you don’t do it for yourself, no one else will. And so you have to be able to do it. So, so, you know, it’s just a matter what, what I wanted outta life.
So I I’ve, I try, I’ve tried to make sure I, I get it, you know,
Dan: I love that. I love that. Well, just to, let’s just rewind a little bit for listeners and, and just fill in some of the gaps. So we’ve, we’ve talked about, that just a reference to, you know, your boxing and, and what you learned there talked about military, but let’s, let’s just like, kind of rewind, like, so did you, what was your relationship with the.
Boxing, where did that begin? Why did it begin? Um, or, you know, wherever you wanna kind of jump in, jump into to, I guess that the, the, your, your younger years and that part of your story, I’d love for you to, to share some of
Ed: So P you know, I didn’t fight when I was a, okay. I fought when I was a kid, but I, it was cuz I had to the, the neighborhood I was in and, and you had to survive and do what you had to do. And then I ended up with a school across town, very different socioeconomic background and bracket. And I didn’t fight there.
I, I don’t think I was ever. In fact, I have not been in a fist fight since I was 14. 13 or 14, it’s just it, you know, street fighter. Anything of that nature is that, you know, one, because I wasn’t in that environment most of my time anymore. And, and two, you know, there, there are legal ramifications and health ones.
You never know who’s doing what you, you could easily lose your life. So, um, but, but, but I said, I’d say I didn’t, I didn’t fight when I was younger. I didn’t start fighting until I was 22. And the reason why I start boxing is, is that, you know, there’s this rough period. There are a lot of rough periods in my life, but this is one of them.
And from 18 to 22, I had dropped outta college for the fir you know, my first try at college, I dropped out and I was dating this girl. and I used to talk about how stupid college was. And part of it was sour grapes. Another part of it was, you know, a belief I still hold to this day, which is that college is really not for most people.
And most it is just, you know, but, but they they’re very, they’re, they’re predatory. They understand that people feel like they need to get these stupid degrees. And I, I have the same feeling. The difference now is that I have a physics degree. You can’t, you know, say anything to me when I, when I have this opinion.
Well, while at the time I didn’t have that degree.
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: uh, I, I would go off and talk about these rants to anyone that would listen. One of the people who happened to listen was that girl, I dated her mother who was a professor at the university of Pittsburgh. And so one day she says to me, she got, you know, she got fed up with, with, with this 22 year old, just rant all the time.
And she goes, well, if college is so stupid, show me what you’ve done with your life over the past four years, besides, you know, show up to my house and eat my food. And, and then she threw me. and, and I cried a little bit of a man tear, but, but after that I was like, you know, you’re right. And you know, it’s funny, that’s like one of the first instances of my life, someone gave me some real tough love.
Like, like not outta anger. I mean, I’m sure it was out of a little anger and annoyance, but like real, like here’s the truth. And it was somebody that, you know, and, and because of how I grew up, like I said earlier, I, I’m not, I never gave myself the luxury Believing in, in nonsense or believing in a fairy tale.
So I said, you know, you’re right. What have I done? So I started looking at some stuff. I said, I could go back to school, but I didn’t have the money for that. And I didn’t, and, and I was smart enough at that time to know that if it wasn’t in like engineering or computer science, it wasn’t worth going to school for the amount that it costs.
Uh, like, like the return on investment didn’t make sense to me. I could run the numbers and see. All right. So I got that said no way. And then I looked at going into the military I ended up going into the military anyway, but I would’ve, I would’ve done a instead of national guard, which is what I did when I finally enlisted.
And I said, ah, man, they, that was right. When the Iraq convention was really, you know, heating up and I said, nah, that’s, that’s not it for me. And then I looked at, this was back when YouTube was coming out. And it was, you know, I think it was fresh new. I think, you know, I think our first fight was 2007. You, I think YouTube came online at late 2006, man, like somewhere around them and, and it wasn’t what it is now, which is still what it was.
Then it’s just is a lot bigger now. And there were still, you know, some fight videos. And I said, you know, I think I can do this. Let me try this out. So, so I went and I found a. in the first year of training, I wasn’t even sure what I would do. So for the first year, and this was in retrospect, one of the best things I did, it planted a seed for me, for how to make real change in your life.
I did everything like six days a week. I was in the gym in some form or the other, uh, because I, you know, I, I did boxing three nights, a. Uh, judo the other three Brazilian jujitsu and MMA. I did it all. I even have two cage fights. So I was like, where do I took two cage fights, lost them, both and all, but, um, I had to figure out where my strengths laid and, and it wasn’t just what I was good at, but also.
Or what the landscape look like for the future of the respective sports, cuz I’ve always had the strategic mindset where I’m looking to see, you know, where am I going to be able to do? What is, what, what I’m good at, right? Where am I gonna be strong? So, uh, after, after a year doing this, I said boxing is, is where I have the best chance of making or having a real.
Advantage or impact making an impact and you know, how far can I go? What can I do? So, so I did that and I stuck with it and, and I had a really, I think if you wanna sum my boxing career with, with one kind of anecdote , uh, is where, you know, what do they say opportunity is where luck meets preparation.
There are, there are a lot of instances in my career. Where if I had started six, six months too early, or six months or six months earlier, or six months later, the, the windows would be closed. Uh, if, if I don’t make certain decisions that may have seemed foolish at the time that that I don’t get even close to what I, what I’ve done, but I I’m really happy with everything I did in boxing, both as an amateur and a professional.
I, I think I, I had by the books. And outstanding. We’ll say like top 5% amateur career. My, my professional career was a, was a bit less. Bit less impressive, but still pretty good, nonetheless. And, and I’m proud of every, every moment of it. And it really set up the like, for example, I mean, I think I’m an interesting guy and I’ve done a lot of interesting things.
But I know one of the things that really pops out when people go looking into my story is, is my 12 year boxing career. And they’re like, we gotta have this guy on this show. It, it, it continues to open up doors and to put this in perspective. I mean, we’re having this conversation right now. I have not competed professionally.
It’ll be six years. This.
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: it, but it continues to open up doors and now I’m, now I’m out, you know, coaching guys a little bit and, and it’s not something I think I’ll do full time because not because I don’t enjoy coaching, but the opportunity cause for everything else I could do is extremely high. And,
Dan: yeah,
Ed: you’re responsible for somebody else’s life in the sense, like I can’t, you know, If I can’t make you do what I need you to do and live the lifestyle.
Cause that’s a lot of what comes down to like, I can, I can teach you everything I’ve learned to know, but, but if you’re still going out drinking, if you, if you’re not responsible, whatever, you know, it’s gonna be very hard to turn you into what you should be or what you could be.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. well, thank you for, for all that. And, and it absolutely does like, make you stand out from, you know, other, other content creators online, like, wow, this guy was a boxer and he’s like, you know, I don’t know who there’s a stereotype of boxers. Like you get hit in the head enough that like, you know, like why, why are you in that?
Why are you in that ring to begin with? You know? Um, but like you’re smart, you’re articulate. And so you kind of, I think also like you’ll break the mold or the stereotype. Who who maybe the public, or maybe just
Ed: yeah. What the public’s perception? Well, well, you know, your, your perception’s not. Not incorrect or undeserved. I mean, boxing is not so, so, okay. So without giving you too much of a history lesson, because there’s like a, you know, a time limit and all that,
Dan: yeah, yeah,
Ed: of the things you have to understand is that.
Boxing is very few people’s first choice, at least in America. Because if you have real athletic ability, you end up on the, on the court, the grid arm, the baseball dominant, or the rink, right? If you, if you’re like a white guy, you end up in a hockey rink or the cross, I mean, uh, there are all these things that.
Have other opportunities that go along with it, like all those sports. I mentioned, forget the professional aspect where there’s just a lot more money. There’s the collegiate aspect. You get a real education out of this. There’s a real like structure. Boxing has. None of this boxing has always been, and this has comedy.
The appeal, boxing has always been the gutter sport. It’s a poor man sport. We don’t make a lot of money. It’s no, one’s real first choice. Uh, But if you stick with it, there’s a certain kind of romanticism that comes from it. There’s a certain perspective. You become a certain kind of individual, cause it is sport.
If you let it pure value,
Dan: Mm, mm. Yeah.
Ed: it that’s a hell of a process, man. The, the best, the best metaphor I can give. Is, you know, boxing to, to improve your life is like joining the Marines, learn how to fold your sheets. like, like you will learn how to fold your sheets. No doubt about it, but you gonna get a lot of other stuff that you probably don’t want,
Dan: Yes. And there might be easier ways to learn it, right.
Ed: married to, and now you’re married to the game you’re, you know, for better or worse.
And then that’s, uh, that’s. It is what it is. So,
Dan: Yeah. So do you feel like your turn to boxing? I mean, it sounds like it was maybe one, one part just like outta boredom or just looking for something to do. Was it like really, like, were you hoping to, to really make it? I mean, it’s like, I mean, so, so it’s like one in a million, right. That like actually can make good money boxing.
So tell me like about like what, what was that phase of your life? How did, how did you think about it while you were in.
Ed: so here’s how I thought what, when I first started. I said, I, I just want to do something, uh, because I was able to look around and see, you know, kind of what my peers were doing. Go to work, then come back, drink, watch sports. And now, now I drink, watch sports with work too, like anybody else. But I, I just, I I’ve always had this kind of arrogance about me, where I’m like, okay, I need something to set me apart.
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: and that’s kind of, you know, aside from like putting in the sweat equity into something in my life, that’s how it started is I needed something to set me. I stick with this and, and for me, cuz I’m, I’ve been realistic all my life. I, I have no choice. I’ve never, I’ve never been able to entertain fantasy. I said, all right, the odds of making great money at this, uh, is low, but I’m poor, right?
I’m from the projects I and was working minimum wage or slightly over it. Most of my twenties, I said, yo. You know, minimum wage works out to, uh, I think like 7 25 that works out to like 14, 15,000 a year. I said, yo, if I can fight six times a year and make three or $4,000, isn’t that the same? Let I may as well be cool as hell when I do it.
Right. So, so I never really thought about the money in the sense of making a bunch of it just as making it in a cool way. But, but also one of the big things for me, The mastery, because one of the things I realized at the tail end of my amateur career is that all of the stuff that that guys tend to get drawn to for boxing that can be taken away from you.
Uh, you can lose the favor of the people who come to see you. You can lose your physical abilities. You can lose, you can be suspended. Uh, you’re not gonna make any money, but the money you make, you can lose that. Uh, you can lose the adoration of people. If you, if you lose, you know, sir, Martinez has this great, this great quote, where he is talking about.
How, when he, he won the, the championship, he had like thousands of missed calls and all this, but when he lost it, he had one missed call and it was from his mother. And, and that really hammers home. The point, like all of this, this stuff you can lose. I can’t lose my enjoyment of mastery. I can’t lose my, oh my enjoy.
Of of the connections that I make in the sport. So it really became this, this something else that I would focus on. I’d focus on the connections. I’d focus on the mastery of the, of the, the learning, the training of my body. That’s what I got out of it. Those are the things I continued to this day in different areas.
But, but other, the other stuff doesn’t matter. That’s why like God’s asked me and they think I’m BSing. When do you miss anything? No, I, I, I miss absolutely nothing. Okay. It’s not true. I miss one. I miss being able to eat whatever I want and not have to worry. Like now I gotta like, look at stuff and think about like this.
But, but when I, when I fought, man, I could eat, eat Gar. I mean, eat a lot and have trouble keeping weight on. Uh, but other than that, like, I, I, yeah, I don’t, I don’t miss anything about the sport because all the things I got from the sport I, I get from, from writing.
Dan: Yeah. Wow. And so then when you decided to, to move on from boxing, tell me about that, that process and that decision.
Ed: So, so after, uh, so in 2016, I lost a fight in September 23rd. I just remember that date. It always, it burns forever and infamy in my memory. Uh, and I, cuz I lost it by knockout in the first round on TV, internationally broadcast. It was crazy. Right. And then I had one more fight later that year I fought to a draw and.
And then I told my, I told my, uh, coach, I said, I’m taking 2017. I’m taking it off. I’m gonna heal because I was, I had multiple concussions that I don’t think led heal. And I was showing up in other areas, I’m going to, I’m gonna focus on finishing my degree because I’m going, I went to school and fight at the same time.
And that was a very hard thing. Cause I wasn’t at a, at a degree you could just phone it in. I had to like come home and really. So I said, I’m gonna do all this. Uh, I had to figure out, you know, how to make money another way, which, which changed my life as well. But that’s another story. So I, I did all this and then 2018, true to form January 2nd, I was in the gym getting back at it, training, getting my workout in, getting my cardio and everything back up.
And, and I got an offer for a. In New Zealand of all places. And I was getting ready to take that fight. And I said, this is cool. We’re gonna go do it. And I went, but, and I went against my coach’s wishes and I went and sparred this kid. Cause that I knew I was cause I’m a better fighting him. He had just been fighting continuously for the past 18 months.
So he was a lot sharper than I was. So, uh, anyhow, we were sparring. He, he lands a shot over my left eye and it breaks the Orbi. underneath, and this is during spar. I’ve had this injury in my other eye and it was so bad. I needed surgery. Uh, but this one I didn’t need surgery for, but I still couldn’t take the fight.
So after my coach chewed me out for doing that, he said because he wasn’t, he wasn’t. I mean, I understand why he was so angry way better now than even, even then. And I’m not like. But he, he says, dude, look at what you’ve managed to accomplish in your life because cuz this was may, May, 2018 and May, 2018 was a big deal for me because that was first.
That was when I graduated with my degree, physics from a, from Ducan university. That was also, we have to take this exam in. And, uh, any, any physics major, I don’t know about other majors, but it’s called the major fields and it tests your knowledge like independently. How much did you learn?
It’s kind of how this, this is why stem fields are great because they keep themselves honest. This is how we know, so we can see okay. Or is everyone learning what they learn. And, and I went and, and I’m sure this was cause of the tutoring I had started doing a year ago as part of like other ways to make money.
I went and, and scored. I got the, the third highest score of all time for the school and the highest, the highest score that year, for everyone outta everyone. And this is from a guy who wasn’t good at math. Remember
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: to spend a lot of time to learn the math. So, and, and I was really proud of, I shared it and everything.
I was like, yeah, this is awesome. Uh, because I, I’m only a BA a BA that means that’s took a, a specific track, right. And focused on the whole GAM. That all BS students to really focus on. It’s kind of a background here. My, my, my, um, course at the 400 level I took electrodynamics and mechanics and solid state physics, uh, other one, you know, and then the other course, I would’ve taken quantum mechanics and statistical, um, mechanics or thermal mechanics.
Everyone look at it. All right. So, so I didn’t even have a complete knowledge for the whole major fields, but because I had went and been tutoring and studying on my own, I got, got a, a super high score. So there’s that, that was the first month that I made over $10,000 from, from the internet. My writing actually, I, I cracked 30, it was like 33,000, uh, that month.
And my coach was like, look at everything you’re you’re doing. You don’t need to do this anymore. Um, and so. I said, I, I said to myself, when I first started fighting as an amateur, I said, there’s only two reasons I’ll quit. One is if I get injured and I can’t recover from it like a detached retina or something, uh, or if somebody I know and trust says, you should probably do something else.
Dan: Mm.
Ed: And, and my coach is somebody that had really come to know and trust. And he said, dude, you know, I’ll coach you if you want to keep fighting, obviously, but you don’t need to do it anymore. Like, like you’ve got so many other things going on. So that was, that was when I officially stopped. Training it’s May, 2018.
Now I, I entertained the idea of coming back probably until I I’ll tell you when I stopped and entertaining the idea, I was helping Roy Jones Jr. Get ready for his fight against Mike Tyson. I was the sparring partner cuz my, my, my coach was also Roy, Roy Jones’ coach and I, and, and working for that, I said, you know, what’s.
I can have a bad day come home. And it doesn’t matter. Like when you, when you have a bad day at practice and, um, when, when you’re doing it for a living, that’s a problem, cuz it stays with you and you gotta come back the next day, tired, beat up, bruised and get right back in there. Like it was like, it was nothing.
And that’s cool. Like I think that’s very character building, but I’ve already paid the pipe. Right. I I’ve got my character. I can go build other ways without, without getting hit in the head. , you know,
Dan: yeah. Yes, yes, yes. So then at that, after that, you know, when you decided to. To stop. Um, you’ve taken fights. Did you just, at that point go full time. I mean, just focus on, on your writing and on the online stuff. Did you look for, you know, now that you had your degree, did you look for a job in the field?
What did
Ed: Oh, it was never, it was man. I, I decided I wasn’t gonna get a job 2017. Yeah, 20 before. In fact, I, I remember the exact moment. I said, oh, I think I have something here. November,
Dan: was that moment? Yeah. Yeah. I’d love to
Ed: Friday, I, I was doing an affiliates. Uh, I was helping somebody with their affiliate and I made $8,000 in black Friday week week.
That, that four day period, I said, huh? This is cool. Cause I used that money cause we, we went to, we went to Portugal for the first time cuz my wife is from Portugal. And so I went to when hung out and while, and then while I was there, the affiliate offers, I had set up on my site. I, I ended up breaking even because every day I ended up selling something that, that made back what I spent on the trip, but this was automatic for my site.
And I said,
Dan: Cool.
Ed: I don’t think I ever have to get a job.
Dan: Yeah. Was that,
Ed: Oh, you know, and like it.
Dan: moment was like, was that the moment when you’re like, all this stuff I’ve been doing is like really adding up to something.
Ed: Yeah, that that’s when it really became clear, I was like, okay. And, and then like, and I had another affiliate sale March. I think I cleared like 15 K and I was like, oh no, no, I didn’t clear that much. It was like, none. It was, it was a decent amount, but I was just like, I see how this works now. You have an audience, the audience trust you, you build something to satisfy audience need that they perceive you as an expert in you have a pretty good shot at having a great life.
And so that’s where that came from. Oh. You know, because look all, you know, I love physics. I love learning. I love that stuff, but, but I’m realistic because my classmates. Okay. So, you know how I said, I put a lot of energy into becoming a much stronger math student. I am better than at, at numerics and mathematical reason and quantitative reasoning than like 99% of, of, of the population that 1% is other physics students.
that, that I just can’t beat or, or be better. It’s not a competition. I just, I know I’m not as good at it. Now where I Excel is, is understanding the concepts and being able to break them down, explaining whatever that comes from the teacher in you. Uh, but, but, but to Excel in grad school, you have to, or, or any industry that requires that, that knowledge, you have to really want it and want to be there.
And so I, I know I’m not gonna go do that. If, if, if Ed was to go in, get employed by someone, I I’d probably take the skills I have now and use ’em. I mean, I I’ve, I’ve learned so much about search engine optimization and, and writing sales in a way that hits both that, that I think that I have.
You know, any, any I’ve actually had offers. I just, I’m not interested in them. Uh, any, any company would be, would be happy to have me. I think so, but, but right now I really enjoy what I’m doing. I I’m, I’m so fortunate and so blessed to have. The mind capable of, of figuring this stuff out and then also having the story to kind of throw behind it and the work ethic to do something with it.
I, I never take for granted that that that’s luck and in a pure sense of order. And I had no control over a lot of that. You know, my, my parents came together and the, the genes they gave me kind of worked out in that, that way.
Dan: Yeah. Yeah, but you put in the time and you’ve take taken what you’ve, you know, what you were given and, and you’ve, you’ve done some, some amazing things with it. How do you think about purpose, meaning, impact, legacy, whatever words you use to think about what you’re trying to do with your work? What, what does, what’s the, yeah.
The story that you want your work to tell when you kind of zoom out to the thousand foot level.
Ed: Well, well, first and foremost, I’m a big believer in negativa in that, you know, it, you can go really far. If you kind of have a few things you won’t do or that you’re trying to avoid. So one of the things I try to avoid is, is the vision and negativity. I would like the world, or, or as I say, you know, make the world a better place while you’re here.
But if you can’t do that, at least don’t mess anything up. Okay. That’s a that like, like if people just took that approach and used it on everything, They’d be good. Like, like that’s the approach I use when I, when I met my wife, I said, okay, I, I’m not gonna, I don’t know if I can improve this girl’s life.
And we were, you know, just, we just met, but I’m not gonna mess it up.
Dan: Yes.
Ed: that led to making certain changes that ultimately ended up, you know, making us a great match. I think so. Uh, that that’s the first step, what my work is, you know, don’t mess anything up. And then the next thing is like, you know, wherever you’re strongest, there’s a way to improve the world.
Dan: Yeah.
Ed: For example, you know, I used to have a real big complex about this because I thought that I would be able to make a real big difference quantitatively, you know, like, like I, I should be smart enough or I feel like I’m smart enough to really make a difference in the. About like discovering something or building something, things of that nature, you know, but now I know that, that my real strength, you know, I have an audience like, and I’m, I’m good at building that audience and nurturing it and it continues to grow.
That means I have a voice that, that is really powerful and you can do a lot with that. So I try to do something good with it. I try to make sure I put out useful pieces of information, things to make people think things, to make people, um, reflect. Or on their choices and all that. And so, and, and because of that, I’m also very responsible with what I say. it’s made me a better person. And then in turn, it makes the rest of the world better about following me and being interested in what I have to say. So, so, you know, that’s really my legacy. I, I just, I I’d like people to, or, or what I’m trying to accomplish is I would like to be a net positive on the world in some function and.
And that means not being negative or if I do cause for negativity, make sure it’s in the pursuit of something that will, uh, balance that out in a positive or, or exceeded slightly at least.
Dan: Yeah, I love that. I love that. I’m curious for people who are listening, you know, hearing your story, hearing you, you know, you’ve overcome so much. A lot of people are in a place where they’re up against something that, where they feel stuck in some way, maybe they’re in a job that they don’t like a career they don’t like, or, or just, they’re trying to figure out like what’s their, what’s their, what’s their thing.
And we’re curious if you have any, just words of wisdom from your own experience that you’d like to share, you know, just kind of speak straight to the audience, to people who are in that kind of trying to figure it out space.
Ed: Uh, you know, you, you have to remember a few things. Uh, one you’re gonna die one day.
Dan: Hmm.
Ed: I think, and, and, you know, what’s crazy. I, I was reading this thing where this guy said, you know, well, you wanna be technical about it. considering the average life expectancy, middle age is closer to, you know, your mid thirties, early forties, not like your fifties.
And I was like, That’s a really good point. Uh, so, so, you know, by the numbers, I’m about halfway done with my time on this planet. Now I personally think with my lifestyle into medicine, I’m going to, to be a very healthy 90 to 100 years old when I die, but that that’s neither here and nor there, the, the point is that we’re gonna die one day.
And so you have to start making choices to maximize your time on this. Because because whether you succeed or fail, you still gonna die. Right? Like, so you probably should, you know, since, since that part is a wash, right. That no matter what you won’t live forever, well, let’s maximize our time here. And that, that may mean enduring at a bit of short term discomfort, but,
Dan: yeah, yeah.
Ed: but ultimate it, but, but ultimately, um, it, it allows you to pursue meaning.
And then also, you know, meaning I think is directly related. To overcoming challenge, which means facing challenge, which means, eh, challenge, hardship, difficulty, all synonymous. Uh, that means that you have to, you have to go and do hard stuff, stuff that you don’t like, stuff that might seem painful initially, but you have to do it, you know, but like, like I, I felt trapped at one point in my life I was working.
It was right. Before I listed and went to the army. Well, you see how that changed, right. But, but I fell trapped. I was working at T-Mobile. I was selling cell phones for nine twenty eight an hour. And I didn’t have, I, I had so little money. A buddy was letting me stay at his house for 200 a month, which was cheap, but it was enough that I could afford.
And then I was, you know, drinking a lot too. And I said, I feel trapped and stuck. So I said, how can I get out of this? And that meant, that meant doing some, you know, that meant the list. And that meant returning to school because, cause that was the perspective. I thought, I thought it was gonna help me get a job.
It just so happened. You know, I wasn’t pursuing a job, but it generated enough positive externalities to where I was like, oh wow. Look at, look at this. when you’re trapped, you know, you, you, you look at what will UN trap you and you do it and you figure out, you know, that that difficulty you’ll manage it.
You know, you’ll figure it out. And, and worst kids, if you don’t you’ll die, like, like that’s why I brought that up first. Like, it really doesn’t like matter when you, when you look at it that way, then you go, whoa. Since I’m a Dyna way, I gotta make sure I, I get something out of this rock. Cause it does take long to.
I mean, it was just what I always said. My second birthday is December 23rd, 2013, because that’s when I stopped drinking.
Dan: Mm.
Ed: And, and that’s when I was broke. That’s when I was living at my friend’s house. That’s all that. Right. Uh, so it’ll be eight years, eight years or nine years this year. I’m not sure what have we tour?
Dan: Yeah. Nine, I think it’ll be nine.
Ed: be nine, nine years this year, you know, but the real change when it really happened, then I probably could have did it faster if I took a different path. Um, this, when I graduated from school at 33, so 33, that was 2018. So five years a change, not even four and a half,
Dan: Yeah,
Ed: four and a half years. So if you, if you go and buckle down, what is four years, four years, and you could do it even faster.
If you take a different path, I just happened to have a path that was. Kind of dictated by forces outside of me in terms of how long it takes to graduate and, and fighting and, and stuff like that. but that little bit of suffering, we, we, we buck long term happiness because we wanna avoid your term suffering,
Dan: Hmm. That’s so good. That’s good. So good. I just hearing that just how important it’s just to, just to take action, even if you don’t know, like sometimes I think we get so caught up trying to find the perfect action that we don’t take action at all. And what I hear from you, you know, what you’re saying is like, just go start, like take, take some good steps and then those are gonna open doors and that’s gonna take you where you need to go.
Ed: Yeah. It, it is. the best way to describe it is, is like this, you know, uh, you know, what happens if you stay then actually, I I’ll just, I’ll just tell you this story. I always always use this kind of, this, this, uh, scene from the matrix to illustrate exactly how I thought. And the first matrix movie, they, when they’re taking Neil to meet Morpheus, uh, he’s in the back of the car and they take that bug out of his stomach and he goes, oh, that thing’s for real, whatever.
And he’s about to take off running. Right. And, and Trinity is like, you know, you don’t want to do that, Neil. Uh, and he goes, why. And they, you know, the direction is beautiful, cuz it passed on this dark alley. And it says, because you’ve been down that road before Neil and you know where it goes and you know, you don’t want to be there.
All right. And, and he hadn’t actually been down that road. He, he just knew that going out, leaving the car would take him back where he was and he was dissatisfied where he was.
Dan: Yes.
Ed: Okay. That is the idea here. If you know, uh, where your at is already kind of garbage and you’re not happy and you’re suffering well.
Well, you know what happens if you stay it, it’s not gonna magically spontaneously improve. It never does. And no outside force is gonna come rescue. That never happens. So you have to go and be like, all right, what am I going to do here? What am I gonna do? It’s gonna be. Something good for myself.
Dan: I love that. There’s some deep truth there. Thank you. Thank you for that, ed. Really? Yeah, really appreciate it. I know we’re we’re up on our time here, but. You wanna say, thank you so much for just, you know, sharing your story for, for, you know, both here on the show, as well as just putting it out in the world and you’re writing, um, it’s, it’s an inspiration.
Um, so really appreciate you coming on and, and sharing with me today for folks who wanna, you know, connect with you, follow along with what you’re doing. Is there anything that you’d like to invite them to.
Ed: Yeah, I’m Ed everywhere, man. So check me out on social media, Twitter and Instagram are the two of big ones I’m on Ed is my handle there. Uh, if you don’t go to YouTube and type it at Latimore, my channel should come up. I’m not as active there, but, but you know, I, I have these spurs. My website is ed lattimore.com.
Come and check out, check me out. And, uh, yeah. And, you know, sign up for the newsletter while you’re there. That’d be awesome. Love to have you.
Dan: Awesome. Well, thanks so much, Ed. It’s been really great.
Ed: Hey, thank you. You have a good one.
