Thanksgiving Ep: Fresno, Gratitude, And Growth

We share a Thanksgiving reflection on gratitude, therapy, and protecting our peace while building a platform that lifts Fresno’s creatives. We talk about boundaries, legacy, and the gap between public success and private pain, and we offer support to anyone who needs to reach out.

• sponsor shoutout and holiday safety
• gratitude for Fresno, collaborators, and listeners
• advice for new creators to start and stay authentic
• revealing therapy and the hardest year behind the scenes
• defining the protector and learning emotional regulation
• setting boundaries with family and friends
• choosing peace and curating the inner circle
• legacy, digital memory, and purpose moving forward

If you ever need somebody to hear you out or need recommendations to feel better, hit me up in the DMs

Follow us @ brokeboyz_ff on Instagram and TikTok
Intro Music by Rockstar Turtle- Broke Boyz (999)
Christmas Intro Song by Nico

Chapters

• 0:00 Thanksgiving Setup And Sponsor Shoutouts
• 2:16 Gratitude For Fresno And The Platform
• 4:10 Advice For Creators And Staying Authentic
• 6:55 Opening Up About Therapy And Struggles
• 9:40 Hitting A Breaking Point And Setting Boundaries
• 12:50 Understanding The Protector And Healing
• 15:25 Choosing Peace And Guarding Your Circle
• 18:00 Family, Legacy, And Leaving A Digital Record
• 20:20 Purpose, Impact, And Holiday Sign-Off

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome back to another episode of The Broke Boys. I'm Martin. And today I want to bring you guys the Thanksgiving special. And I want to say happy Thanksgiving to every single one of you guys at home and wherever you guys are listening to this, or even if it's the next day. Let's go ahead and let's roll that intro. Hey guys, uh I know you guys haven't seen this in such a long time where I do it by myself, and uh I'm back at the studio in my original spot, you know. Uh you guys get to see the Funko Pops that I got back here. Um, the never trusted hats for my sponsor. Shout out to Aaron and JJ again. Never trusted. Go ahead and get you guys a hat. If you guys haven't, get come on, what you guys are doing? You guys are slacking. Get get it for your man, get it for your boyfriend. Even if you guys are dating for like a week, come on, just give them a gift. Um, go check them out. Link will be in the description. Um come on now, Christmas is right around the corner. Buy somebody a hat. Or they got stickers, they got all kinds of different things. Go ahead and check them out. I do want to say happy Thanksgiving. You know, I know I said it a few times already, but be safe. If you guys are gonna be, you know, drinking, smoking, whatever it is, be responsible, watch out for one another. Uh the holidays are you know extremely busy for people who are first responders, so uh please be safe. Every year I always talk about that. I want to do something big for you guys, and uh I want to do next level uh things. I originally had uh the thought of like, okay, for Thanksgiving, maybe we can go, you know, out to the beach or something, right? And then uh do a whole episode. You know, and everyone gets lives, you know, it gets hard and and scheduling gets hard. Um but at the end of the day, we are truly blessed to be where we're at. I am truly blessed to be here and be um able to represent Fresno in a different level. I'm extremely blessed to be here, extremely blessed to have this platform, and and for every single one of you guys to still stay tuned and listen to my dumbass. Uh it's uh it's a crazy, crazy moment. Um, you guys have been through the whole journey, you know, for people that have been listening for the past three seasons, like wow, how crazy it is to be where we're at today, and to be so blessed to showcase Fresno in the most positive way, in the most amazing places, and showcase in the city the way that it should, uh it should be. I'm extremely blessed to even have this opportunity and to be working with everybody in Fresno, content creators, uh musicians, artists, you name it. Every everybody has incredible backgrounds, incredible story, and everyone deserves to be showcased. And we're working on it, I promise you. I know um it's been super busy and super chaotic. Um, but I promise I'm trying my best to make everybody work because I want everyone there, and I want I want all you guys to be showcased on the platform. Um, but most importantly, I want to leave a message to everybody that's been listening, who's been here, who's been a supporter of my channel and of the platform. And I want to say all this and the success that it's it's coming along could not have been done without any of your guys' help. Uh, you guys have supported me from the beginning. You guys have been there for me from the beginning. It's crazy to see the amount of love and support that I'm getting from Fresno. And it's been a long time coming, but without any of your guys' support and help, I will I don't even know where I would be. I don't even know what would happen. Um, I've done interviews with Inside the Pod with Lou, with Grizzly Talks, I've done the interview with Between Pods with Caesar. Uh every every interview that I've done, I've made sure to put my heart out and to continue being myself. And you know, if you want to ever get into any of this, whether it's consecration or or YouTube or whatever it is, just dive into it. That's my best piece of advice. Nobody was there to help me when I started, and nobody really wanted to. Um, but I dove in without hesitation, without knowing what I was getting myself into. And look where I'm at, season three. Happy Thanksgiving. It is a beautiful, beautiful moment to be. And now look where we're at, and now look at where I'm at. Season three. This is an incredible blessing. All you guys, I'm truly, truly grateful from the bottom of my heart. Thank you. Um, I couldn't have been here, you know, and done any of the things that I've done if it weren't for any of your guys' help and any of you guys' love and support. And, you know, thank you for coming up and and taking pictures when you guys want to, or coming up and telling me you guys' story. Um, it's a blessing to hear your guys' story because you're not alone. You know, you deal with things and and it's it's okay to be vulnerable and it's okay to show uh show uh that soft side of you and being free to express yourself. You guys deserve that. And I'm I'm grateful that people you know are comfortable enough to come up to me and tell me that or even uh hit me up in the DMs, like, hey, I appreciate you guys. Um I'm never gonna, you know, what I what what's one thing being told to me, I'm not gonna be, you know, throwing it out there or you know, cheese me out about your guys' business. That's none of mine. Like I'm there, you know, simply because I've always said, hey, if you ever need somebody, if you you know need somebody to hear you out or whatever it is, or even be there for one another, I'm all ears. I've hit me up. You don't ever have to worry about it being out thrown out there in public. I'm not that type of person, nor will I ever be. Um I keep a lot of stuff private. As you guys know, like I don't really like to express a lot of things, a lot of stuff that I deal with personally. I talk to uh Grizzly Talks and I talk to inside the the pod with Lou and even with Caesar in between pods, you know, uh after we're done rolling, we always have this like after effect where we just talk and we just get to learn and and network, right? And I always open myself up in uh like in a very vulnerable state just to express myself and tell people like you guys don't know, like you guys know what I do on the platform, but you guys don't know who really I am. So I sit there and I and I talk and I express myself a little bit more, um, which now I'm blessed and I'm able to do it here. Um, so today I am gonna share. Like, you know, I've been going to therapy secretly for about two months now. Secretly. Um, I never wanted to talk about it to anybody. I've always preached it. Um, even Chango. Chango has preached it to me. Uh, my girl has been preaching it for years. Um, I went through a lot this past year, and nobody saw that, you know, and uh I didn't openly talk about it other than with DJ and with Kat, with uh some of my family members. Not even. Nobody knows. Nobody knows that I've been secretly going to therapy. Um it helps. You know, I'm still learning a few things, I'm still going through a few things, but it has been helping. There's a lot of things that you go through in life that you do need to deserve to express and talk to somebody about it and feel comfortable talking to somebody about it. It's not easy when you deal with a lot of stuff. So um what I will share to you guys today is you know, 2025 was the worst year for me. Yeah. Crazy, right? You know, seeing the amount of success that the platform had and seeing the amount of positivity and and love within the community, it's crazy for me to admit that it was the worst year for me personally. Yeah. A lot of long nights, a lot of times where I spiraled and broke down. And it was, you know, so many issues. You know, I had a rocky start in the beginning, um, almost losing my relationship, losing myself, um, going back to old habits and old ways. Um I wanted to deal with situations, the old version of myself, the angry version, the destructive version. But I got to a point where I was just like, no, that version of me cannot come out anymore because I let that go. I buried it, I moved on, I moved forward with my life, and I gotta continue moving forward. Um I held in so much, so much anger, so much hatred, so much pain. No one knew. No one knew about my dark thoughts, no one knew about me not wanting to be here anymore, you know, and that that hurts me to to say. And it's the truth, you know. I wanna be open and vulnerable with you guys like I've always been. It's okay to ask for help, and it's okay to be there with other people and and and allowing yourself to be open and vulnerable. It wasn't easy. Um I'm not gonna sit here and lie to you that it was because it wasn't. Um, I struggled and I still had to deal with everything, and I had to cut a lot of family off. I had to let those bridges burn because my peace came first. My peace always comes first, and I will always protect my peace. And it doesn't matter who you are in my life, I will protect my peace over anything. Trust me. Um it was hard, and I had to learn to navigate the pain and and still show up and give 120% to all you guys and everybody that's been in my life, right? So I'm not proud of this crash out that happened. Not only did it mess me up mentally, but I was also happy that it happened. Because, you know, a lot of people didn't believe that there's a problem, or a lot of people didn't believe that there was something, you know, going on within myself, and that other side of me was just like, okay, you don't believe it. Well, here it goes. And then I crashed out, you know, and uh and I didn't fully crash out, but I stopped myself from doing something that I would probably regret for the rest of my life. Um because I started seeing red. Like I said, the old version of me, the violent version of me, the scary version of me was bound to come out, and I couldn't, no, I had to restrain that, I had to hold that back, and it took so much for me to hold back, but I had to because I'm not gonna let let somebody win that power over me. So it broke me. That whole thing broke me and it didn't scare me. It more it was more of like it was too painful for me to deal with and know that to everyone else it's brush under the r to everyone else it's brush under the rug. But to me, it's deeper than that. There was there was a lot that I had to deal with, and no one saw that. So when it came out, it came out. I'm blessed that it came out. You know, I'm happy that it did because it needed to. You know, people needed to see that, hey, I got boundaries and you cannot fucking cross them. Hey, my peace is prioritized and I don't give a fuck who you are. I got love for you. But if I gotta cut you off for me to be in a different space, you know, to be happy and be and be able to move on, my happiness comes first, my peace comes first, and I'm gonna do everything I can to protect that, right? So I talked to my therapist about all this. And I love my therapist, man, because he's just like he's he he unlocked different things for me, and he always talked about like maybe I got this protector, right? Um that has to defend me for everything, and it's true. I think uh that's the root of my darkness and my anger, is that is the protector. Um, but again, I'm slowly starting to learn a little bit more about myself to be better and to do better for myself and for my family. I want to be there for my family, and I don't want to I don't want to have that feeling of not wanting to be here anymore. I don't I want to have that feeling of emptiness, I don't want to have that feeling of sadness and depression. Like, I don't want that feeling anymore. Um anxiety has been at an all-time high lately, and it's because of everything that I've gone through within the year. But no one, again, no one would have known if I didn't talk about it like I have been freely now in uh in other people's platforms. Sorry. So if you ever need anybody to listen to, sorry, if you ever need anybody for advice or help, feel free to hit me up in the DMs. Or if you simply just hey, I need some recommendations on how to feel better, whatever it is. I'm always there and I'm always willing to help and help others and help everybody. Um, I'm truly blessed to be where I'm at. I'm happy at where I'm at with the platform, and I'm currently working on trying to feel better with the holidays coming around and not being around a lot of family and doing things alone. It brings this sense of peace, and you don't have to feel on edge, you don't have to feel tension, you don't have to feel any of that. Like I feel so weightless, you know, like uh this huge weight off my shoulder where I can really just sit there and just focus on me and have fun with myself and just enjoy myself and enjoy my family and uh not have to deal with people that you know tolerate you rather than and not have to feel like you feel unwanted or people just tolerate you or people just just want you around. Like I'm very protective now with uh the people that I'm allowing in my life because I don't know about you, but seeing the attention that that's going on right now, uh people a lot of a lot of people recently have been having like the bad intentions with uh trying to get into my platform, trying to work with me and trying to to use me and utilize me in the wrong way. And a lot of people rub me the wrong way as well. So um I've been more selective on who I want in my life and who's gonna continue being in my life and who isn't. And I'm not gonna, I'm sorry, like I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna keep having people that are just dead weight and holding me back from my fullest potential and holding me from being the best version of myself because this honestly is the best version of myself, that I don't tolerate people's bullshit, that I'm able to enjoy my life and not have to worry about having to look over my shoulder, having to feel this tension between other people in the room, having to feel unwanted and and uncomfortable in certain situations. I feel blessed to to be at the I feel blessed to be the best version of myself now, and it's only gonna continue getting better, it's only gonna continue improving. So I'm grateful. I'm grateful for my mom. Sorry. I'm grateful for my mom, you know, and uh me having to step up and be there for her has been very challenging. I'm grateful for my little brothers. I'm always gonna sacrifice everything I can for my little brothers. I'm grateful for my nieces, my sisters. They're amazing, they're partners. I'm always gonna be rocking with them. I'm grateful for Kat. She's my rock, she's still here. I appreciate her every day. I'm grateful for the friends that I've made and all of you guys that have been a part of this journey, the whole platform. Grateful for all you guys. Um I'm truly grateful for Broke Voice. I created an entity. You know, I'm I had this conversation uh with Grizzly Talks, where um at the end of the day, this is a legacy that I'm leaving behind. You know, whether my nieces, future nephews, future kids, family, anybody. Anybody that knew me and you know, they can still see they can still see me digitally. It's like a video diary. I'm leaving the legacy behind. You know, tomorrow isn't guaranteed that I can, you know, God might have different plans for me the next day, and I might not be here. Maybe I do lose the battle, the mental battle. But even if I'm not here, my voice is still here. Footage is still here. I will still be here. I'm leaving memories behind. I'm leaving things behind for people to see and be like, wow, that that happened, wow, that was crazy. Um Broke Boys has made history with everything this year. Man. Broys from Fresno made history to continue making history for the podcast. Wow. And I'm super grateful because seeing everything that I've made come to life and seeing everything that I've created. I'm grateful. Man, I'm grateful. I know that my purpose is still being fulfilled. I'm gonna be an impact in this world no matter how big, no matter how small. I sure as hell fucking did it. Because everything that I've accomplished with the platform, everything that I've done with the platform, other people are gonna see that, and other people are gonna be like, wow, you inspiring me to do this, X, Y, and Z. It's my privilege, my honor to hear that. I've had people say that already, so it's like this is important to me. This platform is important to me. You guys are all important to me. So thank you. And be safe around the holidays. Happy Thanksgiving. I love you guys. Appreciate every single one of you guys, appreciate everybody that's been involved in Broke Boys. All this could not have been done without any of you guys' help and any of you guys' support. So, with that being said, I love you guys. Much love.