Producers’ Pick | Trey Gowdy on the Art of Decision Making

A radio show like no other. It's Brian Kilmeade. And then at the bottom of the hour, Trey Gowdy, wearing an untucked shirt without the little emblem.

I guess he could not get the sponsorship. Look at this. Did you see this, Jess? It's cool, right? Doesn't he look good?

Is that an untucked shirt or just a shirt that's untucked? Good question. That's my first question out of the box. It might as well be Trey Gowdy's here in studio. I have no regrets.

Okay, maybe a few. His book is now out. It starts, stay, or leave.

The Art of Decision Making. It's excellent. I got some great tips on it already.

Just got it yesterday. Went right through it. Trey, first off, you told me when you walked in on the conversation, it is not an untucked shirt, but it might as well be, because the untucked shirt was designed to go underneath the jacket when you do it and not get too long.

If it's too long, it doesn't work. How did you pull it off? I was forced to pull it off against my will. I really never wear an untucked shirt.

It's a regular dress shirt. So you went to a photo shoot? I went to a photo shoot.

Not only did I go to a photo shoot, they told me what I was going to do. I usually don't stand in a doorway. I usually don't do that. I'm either in golf clothes, gym clothes, or a suit. I only own one pair of blue jeans.

I see that I managed to find them for that particular photo shoot, but you've written a thousand books. They want the cover to kind of denote something, and I guess they wanted this cover to denote the fact that I didn't have time to tuck in my shirt. No, it looks good. I mean, if I didn't think it looked good, I wouldn't have brought it up, but I thought you looked great. But one thing that I did is I told my family, I like the untucked shirts. Now I get them. Every time I have an event, I'm getting an untucked shirt.

It has a little emblem on the bottom. Can I ask you a question about that? Is there a difference between an untucked shirt and a normal shirt? Absolutely. Yeah, in fact, if you see the story, it's a fascinating story that he used to think about it. The creator of 10 years ago used to think about this is what he thought about. You and I think about different things. The creator of Untucked City, I used to walk around, is there a shirt that looks good untucked that's not too long?

And he came up, he had a team of scientists that came up with this the right length. So that is the answer to the question. I didn't think we could be talking about shirts this much. Well, the more weight I gain, the more I am open to wearing my shirt untucked because there's a little more camouflage.

No, that's wrong. You're still in great shape. You love to golf too, right? And you're getting to golf now.

I'm getting to golf now, although the order I get, Brian, I don't want to play if the temperature is lower than my age. And it's more important to me who I play with than where I play. Well, you mean they have to be good?

Players got to be good? I find myself playing with the same people that I played with 30 years ago, lifelong friends. I love playing with John Ratcliffe. I play a good bit with Lindsey Graham primarily because he has the membership number at my country club and he comes over and helps himself to a round of golf and a meal and a shirt. So I figure if he's running up my tab at the country club, I might as well join him. And I would love to be in that foursome because the stuff that he knows and the stuff that he hears and consequential stuff.

One thing about Lindsey Graham like you, you guys didn't duck from the major stories. There are certain people you just never see, right? They just like, okay, do you need me here? Other people like, okay, Germany's not giving tanks. I'm going to Germany.

I'm going to demand they give the tanks to Ukraine. I wish I ducked more. You know, Patrick McHenry, he's the, he was the whip.

He's now, he gave me great advice when I got to Congress. He said, the mistake I made is I saw a fight. I joined in and then afterwards I said, what was that about? Don't do that. Pick your fights judiciously.

You know, Lindsey's been a friend for 30 years. He, you know, sees fights on a more regular basis than some of the rest of us. I like to, if it's not legal, if it doesn't involve the justice system or something, I know something about, I try to stay out of it.

Understood. So I love this book because it's not for the lawyer. It's not for the politician.

It's for the average American. It's to make those decisions that are big in the individual's life. So when you get to a certain age, where do you go for advice? And then does that person understand the question that you really have? Like how many people know the law and you have a decision to make for your law career?

Who do you go to? They have your best interest in mind and you're not exactly like anyone. So it's a formula for people to go through before they have to make a decision. And one thing you say, work backwards. Picture yourself getting what you want and then saying, is that, is that okay?

Am I happy with that? You know, Brian, I had a lifelong fascination with the federal bench. That was my dream job was to be a federal judge. And I made a ton of decisions in life trying to position me for that. And yet when that opportunity presented itself, it was really the pursuit more than the actualization. And I turned it down, but y'all walked in here this morning and I referred to you as the busiest person at Fox, because you're on air in the morning, then you do a radio show, but your decision to do the radio show, you could be doing something else, right?

You could be doing something else right now. So you had to decide, yes, I want to, you know, get up at four o'clock in the morning. I want to keep working.

I want to have a different schedule from the, from, from most normal folks that don't get up when you get up. Life is full of decisions. So when you talk about looking at the end, I started with closing argument when I was in the courtroom. And when I give speeches now, I start with the last paragraph. And then how do I want to get you to the crescendo? The people are far more likely to remember the last thing you said than the first thing or something in the middle. So you need to emphasize that.

So if it works with speeches and the court, why would it not work with life? What do you want that last picture to look like? And are you making decisions to get you there? So the one story that stuck out, stuck out with me that I read this morning that you had said you had somebody come up to me and wanted to be in Congress and they're going to join West Point. They had to get in Annapolis, had to get in West Point. And you thought, you know, you don't need to get to the academies in order to get your goal because he, that person was saying, if I don't get there, all hell is going to break loose, I'm going to be a failure. Just so you know, if you want that end game, you don't need to go to the academies. So understand the decision you're making might be putting too much pressure whether you get in or not. Well, you and I were just talking off air about, I got named Mike Pompeo. Not only did he go to one of the service academies, he graduated number one from that service academy. So let's assume, you know, that his ultimate goal is to be president.

I don't know whether it is or not, but let's assume it. I mean, does that get him any closer? Because there are other candidates that didn't do what Mike did. So it used to break my heart. It adds to the quiver.

He had no doubt about it. It's a good thing to have and say, yeah, I did that, but is it necessary? No. And I'll bet you that if you were to ask Mike, what does the final picture look like for your life? It would include the word honor, service.

It really wouldn't include a title. Right. So going to West Point did get him closer to his closing argument. His closing argument is just not that I was the president of the United States. It breaks my heart to talk to young people who really think their life is over if they don't get into a certain school. I mean, you and I got friends in the U.S. Senate that barely made it in and out of school.

Barely. John McCain was one of them. He only got in because of his name and he barely stayed in because, and I think he did OK. I was more thinking of Lindsey Graham, whom I'm still not sure. One to school at all.

Lowest SAT score ever in South Carolina history. You're just assuming that. No, he told me. He told you that? And usually when people say that, you think, well, that can't be true. But I never question him.

Yeah, you're probably right. Lindsey, you're telling the truth again. I truly appreciate that. So because you had to go through, I'll just tell you the decisions that I know you've made. Number one, you're in Congress. You got a pretty big name, national name. You become chairman of a committee.

And that chairperson, assuming high profile committee, Benghazi, you could have used that to launch it into a Senate run, a presidential run, who knows. But you go, check, please. I'm done. And then you come here and you're in competition to get a daily show. And you're like, you know what?

Happy run the weekends. This is the balance I want. Let alone what you did before you got to Congress, which you have a very successful prosecutor, which you say is probably the most enjoyable and satisfying thing you've done. So these are three decision points. Did you use those formulas to decide what's important? It took me a while, Brian.

It took me a long time to get to the point where I felt empowered to define success for myself, not what other people. I mean, people who are in the television business would look at you and say, Brian Kilmeade is a lot more successful than Trey Gowdy. He's on six out of seven days.

He's on television. And if that's the way they judge it, by how often you're on television, I would say they're right. I left Congress because it just wasn't part of my closing picture. It wasn't part of my closing argument.

You used the formula you put in the book. I want people to say he was fair, funny and fair. I don't care if they say he was smart.

I don't care if they say, you know, he had a really high conservative rating. I want them to say he was funny and fair. And if a job doesn't allow you to be fair, you probably don't need to keep the job. So interesting, too, because you talk about if people are also listening to say, well, how does this apply to me?

Well, put yourself at the funeral. What do you want people to say about you and work your way backwards? And who defines success in your life? Who defines losing?

I mean, there's a big difference between losing and failure. And I write in this book about some of the best known names in history. You can start with Jesus, who lost a voice vote to a guy named Barabbas. Dietrich Bonhoeffer lost and that he was executed by the Germans. Martin Luther King Jr. lost and that he was assassinated.

None of them reached the age of 40. So you can argue they lost certain things in life, but no one would argue they were a failure. So who defines success for you?

And it took me a while to get out of letting other people do it. It's interesting, Anthony Robbins wrote this thing where people have, they have some fundamentals of Think and Grow Rich, one of the first success books probably written by Napoleon Hill in the 20s or 30s. And then you have Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Positive Thinking.

But Anthony Robbins took it to a different level. He says, okay, you want to achieve this. Write your goals down, do whatever you want to do, intervene goals. Ask yourself, why do you want to achieve it? So when you get there, when you get there, you'll understand why you did it. And if it's doing it to prove to somebody else that you could do it, you're going to be wholly unsatisfied when you get there. Well, whoever said that's right, I used to follow the pyramid definition for success, that I need to do things other people didn't do. And then we have this temptation to follow the ladder approach, that I have to climb this proverbial ladder.

And you get to a point in life where you say, neither one of those are satisfying. I need the mirror approach. Do I like the person I see in the mirror and the people who are closest to me, my wife, my children, my parents, my closest friends, are they proud of what they see?

And I am blessed. I am married to, I think she knows I was in Congress, Brian, but I wouldn't put a ton of money on it. It's just not how she judges me. I think she was prouder of the fact that I helped homicide victims get justice than she ever was. In fact, she would watch some of the hearings on television and say, who is that guy? That is not the guy I live with.

So, I mean, obviously you don't cross-examine your wife or she won't be your wife for very long, but just whose opinion matters to you? And there's another chapter in there about Nathan, about finding someone who has your best interest in mind that you get advice from. And it's hard.

You're lucky if you have five people that will really give you the best advice for you. And I'll reverse it. That Nathan, when you reach a point in your life, when your satisfaction is gained from helping other people, you've reached a great point because giving back and helping other people is the greatest, my unofficial opinion. But Trey, I want that story about Nathan a little bit more.

We have a few minutes to the other side of the break. The name of his book, it's out today and he's kind enough to visit us on published day, start stay or leave the art of decision-making. It'll help your life right away. It doesn't matter if you're doing anything that we're doing, whatever you're doing, use his formula.

And I think you're going to be very satisfied. Don't move from the Fox news podcast network. I'm Ben Lowe. It's Brian Kilmeade. Hey, we're back.

Trey Gowdy's with us. We have this book that's out today. Start, stay or leave the art of decision-making and Trey, not to diminish your intellect, but I found it most interesting is this is so readable. Like you wrote this for the mass audience. This is not a law school journal, what you're capable of putting out to. I'm not sure I am capable of that, but I learned the hard way in the courtroom that if the jury can't understand you, it doesn't matter how good of a lawyer you are. You have to write it where people can understand what you're saying.

And I'm not that sophisticated of a guy, but I mean, if people can't relate to what you're writing, then you haven't been successful. I cut you off in the Nathan story. Just, can you tell us what, what you meant by that?

Yeah. I mean, Nathan, obviously, you know, we, you go to a sporting event and you hear, you know, you're the man of every time Tiger Woods hits a shot. And that verse is actually in the Bible. Uh, David committed, uh, a series of horrible crimes, sins, whatever you want to call it, conspiracy to murder Uriah over Bathsheba. And so Nathan was one of his advisors and he came to him and told him a story about a rich man taking something for report from a poor man.

And David just got so enraged and said, surely as I breathe, that man will die today for doing that. And Nathan said, you are that man. Do you have someone in your life that will tell you that you are wrong? Do you have someone in your life that will give you the best advice for you and not for them? We just showed up. Well, he's still on right now.

Tim Scott's on television right now. Uh, one of my closest friends in the world, a lot of people might say, Hey, I want you to run for president, uh, because it's in their best interest. You need someone in your life. That's going to say, you know what, tell him, figure out what's in your best interest, not, not what's in your friends or your staff's best interest. What is in your best interest? That's a great, that's extremely great advice because as you get older, less and less people around, uh, are the, in the circle of people that you trust. And then at the same time you become a parent and you think to yourself, it's easy in the beginning, put that down, it's hot, put that down, it's sharp. And now all of a sudden when it comes to college afterwards, relationships, like I really, I find myself thinking more and more about advice as parents because I realize they're really counting on you to be that voice of wisdom. And I haven't really figured out life. I don't have all the answers I pretend to.

I'll tell you what it took me a long time to figure out. Uh, and my, my parents' generation was different. If you were good at something, they thought that God gave you a gift and you had to use it.

And I have kind of pivoted to, well, if he gave you the gift, he should also give you the desire. What if your kids are good at something, but they don't like it? How to know how hard to push your children? I mean, my daughter was phenomenal in theater. She just didn't want to do it. So do you push her? Do you make her be Alice in Wonderland? Do you make her do this?

It's tough. Um, at a certain point, what they want, I mean, my wife is a beautiful singer. She just doesn't like being the center of attention. It's hard to be a singer and not be the center of attention. So consequently, she doesn't sing. Her parents pushed her to do it.

Her husband says, I'd rather you be home. I don't want you going to sing over that group anyway. But how do you know? I mean, you and I both know people who really, really, really want to do something, but they're not good at it. So how do we, as a friend say, I know you have the desire, but do you have the ability?

And how do you tell them that in love? Yeah. Forget you love, you sit her life love.

Oh, forget that. Stay out of that because you go, yeah, she's wrong for you. And then they end up getting married. Like, okay, I'll sit this running out. Lastly, and it's a big question, fast forward the end with the Biden situation. If I was to put pressure on you, where are we going to be with six months with these documents? We're going to be stuck at 30 documents and just these quiet special prosecutors on both sides. The sitting president of the United States is not going to be indicted.

Got it. The DOJ says you can't and they're minority views, but so you can put that out of your mind. It also to me ensures that former president Trump is not going to be criminally charged.

Gotcha. I want to know what documents they found, but people love motive. I don't love motive as much as others, but if you want to know the motive for why he took what he took, what are the documents?

That's where the motive lies is in the identity of the document. Start, stay or leave the name of the book, the order of decision-making and watch, watch Trey Sunday nights at seven. Thanks Trey. Thank you, Brian.