Macklemore: How You Can Overcome Your Darkest Days & Hardest Battles!

Macklemore traces his life from a six-year-old falling in love with music to a teenager whose first drink turned into 12 shots of vodka and decades of addiction. He details his moments of surrender, including his father asking 'are you happy' before rehab, and a devastating relapse the day he learned his wife was pregnant. He discusses how creativity flows when he removes ego through spiritual practice, service, and exercise, and names Same Love and Other Side as his most meaningful records. The conversation closes on his strained but loving relationship with his father and the regret of conversations not yet had.

• His very first time drinking escalated to 12 shots of vodka on a school night, running from police, and that pattern of extreme drinking never stopped.
  00:10:30
• His rock-bottom on OxyContin in Seattle: walking outside bawling because he could feel no happiness and felt the world wasn't for him.
  00:20:26
• His father pulling him aside at a family function and asking 'are you happy' became his surrender moment that led to rehab.
  00:21:59
• He believes there's a good chance he would be dead now if he had refused rehab that day.
  00:23:32
• He admits to gaslighting his wife during relapses, making her feel crazy, calling it the worst version of himself.
  00:51:39
• He relapsed and was high when his wife took a pregnancy test; he prayed for a negative result before hearing her cry, knowing she was pregnant.
  00:55:50
• During an early-COVID relapse his wife kicked him out and he feared losing his marriage and kids.
  00:52:10

• Michael Jackson's command of the stage in the 80s sparked his desire to perform.
  00:04:14
• He nearly got kicked out of high school in ninth grade but recovered to close his senior year with a 3.8 or 4.0 GPA.
  00:05:51
• When he wrote Other Side around 2009 he knew three people who had died from addiction; that number has since risen by 25-30 people.
  00:24:03
• He recommends Al-Anon, a free 12-step program in churches and community centers, for loved ones of addicts.
  00:13:39
• The records he calculated to be hits got two million views, while the ones he just made authentically affected culture for years.
  00:32:25
• His first daughter, born after that pivotal relapse, is named Sloan.
  00:57:56
• He runs a golf clothing company called Bogey Boys and a Seattle youth program called The Residency.
  01:01:03
• His sources of clarity are cardio, getting outside, service to others, and spiritual practice; chaos comes from ego and 'future surfing.'
  00:30:52