Clearing The Fog On Health & The Hill's We'll Die On w/ Brett & Harry | #372

Today we cut through the noise, misinformation, and general fog that seems to surround the health climate currently. We do our best to highlight exactly how we feel on what's real, what's not, and the hill's that we'll ultimately die on when it comes to your health journeys.

What we cover:

- Simplifying wellness practices for impactful change

- The rising noise and misinformation in health trends & where they're wrong

- The hill's we'll die on regarding health
- How fear-based marketing affects personal health choices
- The role of community, relationships, habits, and personal responsibility in health decisions

Timestamps:

(00:02) Health Philosophy and Lifestyle Change
(04:09) Nutritional Journey and Information Overload
(11:08) Navigating Health Information Overload
(15:30) Building Resilience Through Balanced Health
(20:25) Prioritizing Health Through Small Steps
(30:28) Artistic Approach to Healthy Eating
(35:15) Holistic Approach to Health and Wellness
(40:17) Debating Influencers' Impact on Health
(45:16) Debating Food Quality and Regulation
(49:51) Government Incentives and Food Regulation
(59:50) Revolutionizing Agriculture and Politics
(01:03:41) Impactful Initiatives for Health Transformation


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Creators & Guests

Host

Brett Ender 🥩⚡️

The food system is corrupt and trying to poison us... I will teach you how to fight back. Co-Host of @themeatmafiapod 🥩

Host

Harry Gray 🥩⚡️

Leading the Red Meat Renaissance 🥩 ⚡️| Co-Host of @themeatmafiapod

What is The Meat Mafia Podcast?

The Meat Mafia Podcast is hosted by @MeatMafiaBrett and @MeatMafiaHarry.

We're two guys who walked away from the typical path to carve out something different. Based in Austin, we’re on a mission to figure out what it takes to live a fulfilled life in a world that often pushes us away from meaning.

We have conversations with people we believe can help us, diving deep into the pillars of health, wealth, and faith, as the cornerstones of our mission.

Whether it's challenging the modern food system, questioning conventional health advice, or building something from the ground up, we're here to explore the tough questions and share the lessons we’ve learned along the way.

If you're tired of the noise and ready to find meaning, tune in and join us!

themeatmafiapodcast.substack.com

clearing-the-fog-on-health-whats-real-whats-not-hills-well-die-on-w-brett-harry
[00:00:00] Should we hit it? Let's do it. One clap for the edit? Yep. This is ironic coming from the meat mafia, but I think our show is much more than just you eating a hundred percent carnivore diet That's really not what we're preaching at all. There's people that will die on the hill that vegetables are toxic There's people that will die on the hill that animals are toxic I think the hill that i'm willing to die on is that Dude, we could have just summarized the whole podcast.
I really do feel like the wake up call has happened. I think just trying to really be people who are willing to like stand out, boldly lead, invite people in, create community. Like those types of things can change a city. I think changing a city could change everything, which is why it's so important for everyone listening to just get in the game, whatever get in the game means to you, maybe it's just sharing a podcast that you think is impactful or buying a grass fed steak and giving it as a welcome present to your friend.
He's a little. Dude, end up creating massive momentum. Yeah. Everything.[00:01:00]
All right. Meet Mafia. Welcome back to another episode of the one and only Meet Mafia podcast on today's episode, Brett and I dive deep into our general feelings around what is happening in the health and wellness space right now. We've talked so much about with so many amazing guests, just around How to get healthy, uh, brands that are going to help you get healthier, practical advice.
And honestly, this episode was really Brett and I just taking a moment to capture, uh, really our philosophy around what is truth in the health, health and wellness space and what is maybe some of the noise. So in this episode, you'll hear us talk about the power of simplifying your health to the point that you don't actually have to.
Think about it 24 seven and that you can actually just embrace the lifestyle of living a healthy life. Uh, we also talk about resiliency and flexibility, how to enjoy life, travel and social events without feeling [00:02:00] so restricted that you can't actually enjoy your life, but also weighing that with the fact that you want to be healthy and that you want to actually be doing.
These things that support great health. So this is an amazing episode. We talk about the culture, um, how we are truly just passionate about changing the culture around health right now, and just getting the conversation very forward about just being healthier and truthfully, this is our core mission is to just get people healthier and get people excited about the idea that being healthy is actually fun and And cool and enjoyable.
So this episode will spark a fire under you and make you want to be part of this movement. So we are very excited to release it before we get into the episode. I just want to give a quick word about some things that we've got going on. Most importantly, our brand noble origins, which is a beef protein powder that includes collagen colostrum and an organ complex.
Is back in stock [00:03:00] this week. Yes, we are going to be back in stock this week at the end of the week with chocolate and vanilla fully back in stock. We're so excited. This has been an incredible journey for us the last year in terms of building this company out, doing the podcast and just trying to grow into different roles.
So we're incredibly excited to get product back in stock. Go check out. Our site at noble origins. com to get your product today. Also, before you leave into the episode, we have an amazing community of people over on Telegram that is linked in the show notes. This is exclusively for our podcast members who listened to the show.
This is not something that we share on social media is exclusively for the airwaves and we just want to create a community of cool people who are listening to the show. So go check out that telegram community and we'll share all sorts of stories, pictures, things that we've got going on. So go check that out and also give us a quick follow on Instagram and Twitter.
We love you guys. Thank you guys so much. And now, for the [00:04:00] episode.
The first episode back in the new space. Dude, it looks amazing. I love it. Sky and the boys did a great job. Yeah, we're back at Squatch, which is uh, the gym that we've been going to for the last three years in the east side of town. Feels like a good home game. It's uh, Getting back on home turf. It's such a special place.
So many good memories here. In their studio, um, it looks amazing. Just redoing it, it just feels very homely. So just excited to be getting back here and just record some good eps. It kind of ties into what we're going to talk about, which is like, I feel like they just simplified this space so much. Like there was so much clutter in here beforehand.
Yes. And then they just made this space so simple, but it looks amazing. It looks great. Yeah. Excited to see what's to come. But. Yeah, I think simplifying and clutter is a really good choice of words to just describe just the overall nutrition space, um, the health and wellness space. We were talking in the car.
We had a [00:05:00] couple different topics that we were ideating on. And I think we're actually finding the more that we do this the more natural we keep it Where you're not super rehearsed ideas are just flowing you flowing to you organically. I think the better the conversation is definitely Um, and so we've probably been tinkering with our diets for what close to a decade eight probably eight years for me A little longer than that probably yeah, because you were I didn't really start tinkering until I went carnivore, but you were paleo in college, right?
Weren't you one of those freaks that was dialed in? My freshman year, I was like doing paleo and not boozing, and everyone was like, what's wrong with this guy? Yeah, I mean my high school when I was at so I trained at a gym called prospects and Tyson's corner, Virginia and It was like Eric Cressy. So the baseball performance coach Eric Cressy.
He made a name for himself really early It's probably the most science backed Performance coach in baseball and so he had a [00:06:00] lot of disciples and I wouldn't say that my trainer worked directly with him, but he took a lot of his ideas and inspiration from him. So all the training was incredibly functional, really focused on just moving your body correctly.
And in baseball, it's super important because all the movements you're doing are unilateral. Like, your swing is just one direction all the time. So you really need to train yourself to Work out different imbalances that are just naturally going to occur through playing baseball So they were really focused on that and I was like a sponge.
I was in there every day Loved being there. It was like a second home and There was one guy there. He was like a cheerleader at virginia tech and he was like All in. I mean, he was buying, dude, he was buying raw milk from the Amish back in 2011. He was a cheerleader. Dude, he was all in. He was probably a unit.
He was a unit. He was completely jacked. And he was buying raw milk from the Amish. Buying raw milk from the Amish and buying eggs from the Amish [00:07:00] and meat and like, he would drive to Pennsylvania, which is like two, like two hours away just to get all of his food. So that was like, I think that relationship, like I hadn't totally fully turned the corner on nutrition.
But I had been interested, I had done some like, I had read Tim Ferriss stuff. For Our Body. I think For Our Body came out when I was in college. But I would listen to his podcast a lot and he talked about fasting a lot. And fasting was definitely something I came to early on because it just always felt good, felt good fasting.
But I just say that because that was when like my wheels started turning back then, 2011, 20, 2011, 2012 around nutrition. And then. And I'd struggled with, like, acne in co in high school, which was, like, part of the reason I, like, completely ignored nutrition as a factor in that, but part of the reason why I started getting more dialed in on the nutrition front was, man, like, You know, I'd run into some health stuff really wanted to figure that out and then in college I was much more focused on the performance side of things just trying to get better and better So [00:08:00] that was a long way of saying like early college I was focused on nutrition and just by eating a paleo diet was I mean I was in insane shape I was working out all the time during the summer and just eating really clean and found That I was just like feeling as good as I possibly could at you know, 18 19 years old Which is a huge blessing at the time looking back just having that insight into the important things and just being able to dive into that so um, yeah from there messed around with You know, after my, I stopped playing after my sophomore year, so junior and senior year, I wasn't as, I really regret this, but wasn't really as dialed in on the nutrition stuff, was studied abroad and then was focused on working.
I worked my entire senior year and then graduated and just kind of, you know, didn't really focus too much on the nutrition stuff and then got back into it, um, you know, one or two years after, um, graduating, doing keto diet. [00:09:00] Animal base, carnivore, so just went down that whole rabbit hole, um, so. Yes. Long, long winded way of telling my nutritional story.
You just gave me the full biography on every piece of food you've eaten. Which I love. Any questions? Um, yeah, but I think the important thing is so is you, you've essentially been, Like tinkering and developing intuition for a decade And even when you think about I remember tim ferris was like the first guy to talk about the slow carb diet So like integrating carbohydrates whether you're training or not, which I think is a really good framework And I have a lot of respect for guys like that cheerleader at va tech that were buying raw milk back in the day Dude, like stan efforting was one of those guys too where he was really skinny and then he lived on You One of his family members farms and started like eating Uh drinking full cream milk and regenerative beef and all this stuff and it kind of helped him build that that blueprint Which is which is awesome But I mean the last few years with just the pace of social media [00:10:00] and the amount of content.
I feel like there is So much good Where people, there's almost like this food renaissance that's happening where people are waking up around topics like meat and saturated fat and connecting with ranchers and experimenting with different diets and biohacking practices and things like that. There's like this, this incredible awakening and then I also feel like Maybe due to the low barrier to entry of social media.
There's just a lot of noise out there. Yeah. And there are a lot of people that I think almost, there's, there's incorrect information. There's a lot of fear porn, a lot of fear mongering. And there's people that are also making, I feel like health and wellness become the sole part of their identity. I don't know if I'm describing that the right way.
But my point in saying this is like for the, for the average person, That is trying to just push themselves in the right direction, whether it's like lose 20 pounds and get their hormones, uh, better, increase their energy levels, their testosterone, whatever that is. I think it's really tough for a [00:11:00] lot of people actually to, um, like grasp the right information that they need.
What do you think about that? Do you think there's truth to that? Uh, 100%. I think when you're over inundated with information, at least myself, I get like paralyzed with that stuff. You know, it's like, all right, you're just throwing too much stuff at people who are just looking for the basic answers. And Instagram is just a great place to go.
Like I think a lot of people probably have. phone where, you know, they go to Instagram and they don't even realize what they're consuming, but it's just like constant. The fear aspect of what you're talking about stands out to me the most just because I think on one hand it's influencers or people who are trying to grow a following.
Realizing that fear plays online. So they're just doubling down on that. But then on the other side of that, it's just Consumers kind of almost getting off to the fact that like some of the things that they're being told It's like validating some of their ideas around like, oh everything out there is like You know, bad and poison, [00:12:00] poison and all this stuff is really negative, a negative lens on health.
And I, I think that you and I are definitely of the thinking that we should just approach this whole topic of conversation from a completely different lens, trying to just be the light and focus on the things that are most important and applying that 80 20 principle to health and wellness. Because.
That's really where, like, when people, when we're talking about people seeing transformation, the 80 20 principle is where that will happen. And then, you know, maybe once you kind of fix a few of the big pillars, then you kind of go down some of these other rabbit holes and start fixing some other things.
What do you think about that? I think you make a good point. And I think we maybe were unintentionally guilty of this, more so because when we started, I think we were. learning so much we were bursting at the seams just to tell a lot of people these fundamental stories or things about the about the food system that explain why We're so metabolically broken as a society But I think it's easy to I think once you learn about human psychology and you realize [00:13:00] that fear porn scare tactics storytelling that stuff Absolutely works.
It's like you're telling these statistics around You know, 85 percent of the beef supply being monopolized or 10 companies controlling all the products in the grocery store. That's more so, you know, the stakes and the stakes aren't great at a macro level, but the most important thing that should give everyone hope is that you ultimately have control over every single bite of food that goes into your system.
So it's more so like you understand. the context of the situation, but then there are so many different things that you can be doing to ultimately have that resilience, which I think that's probably the biggest thing that you and I have shifted in terms of our thinking is developing resilience. And trying not to get into the, um, the labeling of just the different diet cultures.
I think it can be really toxic and you start to like wrap your identity around. This is ironic coming from the meat mafia But I think our show is much more than just like [00:14:00] you eating a hundred percent carnivore diet Like that's really not what we're preaching at all It's a tool and then there's so many other important things that you need to like factor in to what you should be eating um and Yeah, I just I don't think that the diet culture in general is healthy just because we stake our entire identity I think a lot of people stake their entire identity You around what camp they fall in.
Yeah. Yeah. It's um, it's something I've spent more time thinking about because I don't know if I would be sitting here in this capacity if it wasn't for all these incredible people, these pioneers that were sharing the playbook to follow a carnivore diet. Sean Baker's being one of them, the Chafee's, the Ken Berry's, and then all these kind of anonymous people on Reddit that were quietly following this diet for like 20 years before I'd ever done it and I Really tapped into those stories and my thought process was well if conventional medicine is pulling me in this direction I don't feel great and i'm on all these drugs, but these people are going a different path and they're getting [00:15:00] off those drugs That's ultimately the outcome that I want to engineer for myself And I think a lot of people because the podcast is called meat mafia and because people remember stories So people will gravitate towards a story like mine You They blanket assume that I'm carnivore 24 7, which I completely understand, but maybe we could talk a little bit like When you hear the word resilience because it's something you and I like whether we're on camera or off like when we're living together Whatever and we talk about resilience.
What does resilience mean to you in the context of health or life? I think it's having more multiple pillars of your health that are Growing and working together in tandem at the same time. So like when I think about resilience from a health standpoint It's the just doing some of the basics really well Like having those non negotiables of how many steps I'm gonna get just being really dialed in on Getting the right amount of sleep and I'm saying like steps and sleep.
I think if you're [00:16:00] 90 percent of the time, 80 percent of the time, focusing on just doing those things well, so much of your health outcomes from there are just going to be better. Like if you're getting, if you're walking, you're getting outside, you're like blood sugar is probably more regulated because you're just getting a low level amount of cardio in.
Um, and it's like not any extra strain on your body. Yeah. Um. Yeah. So I think having these those basic pillars just really dialed in I would add community to that too like I think if you're around like healthy people and have healthy relationships like it just Feeds into this equation of resiliency and then Yeah, I think like those three as a starting point, um, just making sure you're rested, you're moving a bare minimum amount every single day, and then you also have other people in your life who are kind of just leading the same life and have similar values.
When you're speaking, it just reminds, I think this is so true. Literally, every [00:17:00] facet of life, like, I think it's so important to, when you're going through tough situations, or you're trying to improve your health, or you're trying to figure out this business decision that you need to make, literally break it down as if, like, a five year old tries to understand the situation.
Well, that's, luckily, I have the IQ of a five year old, or, like, the mental capacity of a five year old. So. But it's, everything we're talking about is very simple. It's simple. The execution. is not the easiest thing in the world. And to piggyback off of what you're saying, when you're speaking, I'm thinking, resilience to me is this feeling of having great energy from the time I wake up to the time I go to bed, where I'm not overthinking my meals, like I genuinely am enjoying the taste of them, I'm enjoying the function.
Of the meals they're nourishing my body. They're high in protein They're high in these different types of micronutrients. I'm not overthinking. I'm not stressing I'm able to work out one to two times a day if I want if I miss my workout I know that my playbook the blueprint that I built for myself [00:18:00] is still so good Um, just like baking in 15 000 steps, you know throughout the day Whether it's like the first 15 minutes when I wake up 10 minutes after a meal for digestion Maybe I take one or two walking calls You And then the kicker is taking out the shame and morality around these, like, non tribal foods.
So resilience to me is you and I doing the right things when we live together throughout the week. So I can go, we can go to our buddy's wedding in North Carolina, have a couple drinks, get a crappy three hour night of sleep. Maybe I go back to New Jersey and have a, have a couple slices of pizza. And it doesn't, it doesn't bother me because I know that God has made us to be unbelievably resilient and you take care of yourself automatically throughout the week so that you can actually go enjoy your life or maybe pull an all nighter or have a couple extra drinks.
Like, yeah, I think this um, this over rigidity is what causes a lot of people to then binge and make these diets not sustainable. Yeah, like part of me really [00:19:00] resonates with like the machine brain where it's like, Oh, I'm just going to like, You know, optimize to every single, you know, every single extreme and operate a certain way like in every single occasion.
But I do, I just, I feel like life should, is meant to be enjoyed in certain areas like the wedding. It's like, you should be building resiliency through the week to be able to go, you know, once a, Once a quarter to go and have an amazing time with your friends, um, and that doesn't need like that can also be done in a healthy way too, you know, you don't need to necessarily stay up until 2 3 a.
m. to enjoy that time or get completely plastered, but, you know, having a few drinks and being in the moment is definitely better than being the guy who's like, no, I'm not gonna have like a piece of the wedding cake or, you know, because I think people do Walk themselves into those types of corners and in extreme situations, maybe it makes sense.
Like I don't want to like rule that out, but I think for most people it's like take care of yourself six days a week [00:20:00] so that on that seventh day you can maybe loosen up a little bit. And I don't think, I think for me it's like if one day out of the month I'm able to just like kick it and enjoy myself and do like go, I don't even know what my guilty pleasures really are, like go get some ice cream, then I'll go do that.
Yeah. But there's no, you're not sitting in shame though. Yeah. Because Harry knows that he's doing the right things. And dude, like something in you, something that you and I really bonded over when we first started the brand was like this kind of like love and wonderment for the way Anthony Bourdain lived his life.
Definitely. And I love watching his videos and there are so many comments that will, people that just miss him so much and he had this rare quality where you felt like you were best friends with him even if you had never met him before. Yeah. And I feel like One of the things that I've admired about you is that you've traveled a lot and you've lived in Europe and all these different countries And I remember when I was really dialed in a carnivore I was so mission [00:21:00] focused on healing and then I also had this love of Bourdain and I'm like so Like when I go to if I want to go explore Italy or some of these villages or travel around the world Like, am I not gonna eat all these, like, pastas and tomato sauces and gelatos and have a, have a beer and, I don't know, I was just, like, I think life is just very, very short at the end of the day, and I think food, whether it's super healthy or not healthy, is just this bonding experience, and I think one of the things I've decided last year, and you have too, is like, I don't want to live my life without being able to chase those experiences as well, and I'm not saying that as an excuse to, you know, Eat like crap, but I want to take care of myself so I can reward myself and see all that the world has to offer Before my time on the planet is done, dude it's such a good point and as you were talking I was thinking about my time in italy because You know, I was living with a host family over there and culturally It was very different around the just culture around food was very different Like you would a hundred percent of the time sit down [00:22:00] and eat breakfast with your family and you would And the breakfast would usually be insanely small.
It would be like an espresso and like a lot of times it would have like a little biscuit with it. That's it? Dude, or like a piece of fruit. Something incredibly small but just to like get your day going. And so even there it's like you think about the American breakfast. A lot of people are either like maybe over indexing choosing not to eat breakfast at all, which I actually enjoy like you know that.
That's worked really well for me, or, you know, they're eating some like Pop Tart or something that is just going to cause them to crash for the rest of the day. Um, but the element of it being like a meal with your family at the beginning of the day, That's small. You're getting a, a coffee in there too.
Like, it was just, it was something that made me pause. I was like, wow, that's really different. And then, you know, they'll have a light lunch back at home. So breakfast and lunch are very light. And then they'll have a dinner that is [00:23:00] usually like protein centered. Like fish was often on the menu or like some sort of meat dish and then like pasta on the side But it was never eating like I just remember the portions always being like very appropriate and they walk a ton You know, they're outside a ton.
They they hang out Um, you know, after work, they'll go get a beer with a friend and they won't, they won't drink to excess, but they'll go sit outside, walk around. Um, you know, there's just a different lifestyle over there. And I feel like just the U. S. it's, it's tough to live that way. But if you can be mindful of it, you know, there, they're just like born into it.
They don't, they don't know any different. Yes. Um, but I think they're in general a lot healthier. Well, one of the things that you've said is that there's almost. No option. There, there's the only option when you're in a country like that is to be healthy because these healthy practices are just baked into the culture.
[00:24:00] Yeah. It's like whether you're thinking about it or not, like you're having a black espresso, something small, so you're in a caloric deficit, you're eating real food, some pasta, some grains, whatever, but it's all really pure quality food. And from a macro nutrient perspective, you're probably maintaining or you're in a deficit, but.
I think moving your body is so important and I do think that there are a lot of people in the health and wellness space that are like, it's all nutrition, don't worry about exercise. Exercise can even be detrimental and nutrition is such a massive lever to pull. But I think that's one of the things that we've both really figured out the last, the last year is it, dude, it could be so basic.
And I think because there's so many choices, it's so difficult to bounce from thing to thing where if all you did was get. shoot for 000 steps a day, which is probably an additional 500 to 800 calories burned, and just pick some type of like resistance training, whether it's CrossFit, whether it's Barry's Boot Camp, whether it's [00:25:00] bodybuilding style training at the gym, whether it's a personal trainer, whatever that program is, if you stick to something and you get those steps in and then you get the protein dominant foods, Dialed dude, you are gonna make you're gonna be unrecognizable in six months.
Yeah, totally I mean Einstein said the eighth wonder of the world is compounding and I think most people when they enter the health and wellness space they're Looking to bite off more they can chew. Yeah, make the complete change overnight, which works But I think it it really takes a select person to make that work if you're looking for the long term, you know Transformation that lasts forever.
It's just small things. It's like 20 minutes on the elliptical in the morning that you just don't miss and like that's like your movement for to get your day started. Yeah. Or, you know, just like really being mindful of where you're getting your food from, cooking your meals, things like that. Like just, I just think the little things are where [00:26:00] it compounds the most.
Yeah. So you're, you're kind of looking for like, what are the big levers to pull? Yeah. Or if I cover those levers. Um, I'll be good, but then also if I start pulling these big levers first, I'll naturally want to gravitate towards these smaller levers. So what I mean by that is like, I think if all you did was shoot for the amount of sleep that you need, a lot of people say eight to nine hours, I think some people operate really well off of six.
I do pretty well off of six. I know you do really well off a low amount of sleep. The amount of sleep that you need, gram of protein per pound of body weight, ideally from an animal based source. Um, source your food super well, 15, 000 steps a day, um, cook a lot of your meals, bang heavy weights. I think if you just do those four to five things, all these other micro levers to pull of around like, Electro, uh, electrolyte consumption, supplementation, blue light blocking glasses, all these other [00:27:00] pieces will fall to place, but if all you did was, was cover those big bases, dude, if you just do those for three months, like you will do whatever you want.
Yeah, I really think of it too, is you, you need to get that momentum going and feel like the biggest, you know, the biggest leap in your health is going to come from you making those big change or little changes in the big areas. That, you know, it gets you a little extra sleep, you feel more rested, or, or you're just going to bed and waking up at the same time.
I think that's actually more important than getting more sleep. Like, just go to bed at ten and wake up at four every single day. Your body just gets in that rhythm. And, you know, that's six hours of sleep, but Uh, like, you can operate really well off that, as long as you're getting to bed at the same time.
Yeah. Um, yeah, I think it's, I think just simplifying the equation in general for most people is, is challenging though, because, you know, everyone has different, different things going on in their life, so I think really trying to, Prioritize these things early in the morning too is [00:28:00] key. I don't know how you feel about that just like when do you kind of implement some of this stuff from like a daily perspective and then like Even like just thinking about some of this stuff on a weekly basis like, you know, should I be prepping my meals?
I know you've done some meal prep stuff, but time blocking is definitely really important So you get this stuff done and you feel the benefits of it during the day. Yeah, it's uh, it's It's such a good point and then there's there's the questions around well So do I go in the morning? But then Huberman or these other people say oh, I should really sleep and then I actually will lift heavier in the afternoon I think we all intuitively know the way that we're wired I think both of us share that that similarity and this is something I've taken a lot from you or you inspired me Like, I don't really care what the science says.
I know that if I can get some type of a workout in, I don't care if it's weights, I don't care if it's cardio, I don't care if it's a combination of both, even if I'm not as well rested as I would like to be, that's gonna set me up for so much success. Cause then I've already put [00:29:00] that big win on the scoreboard.
And then, and that momentum is gonna take me throughout the rest of my day where, You know, I feel like I'm more productive and more enthusiastic at work getting more out of my day. And then maybe I'll carry that momentum in where I'll get like an additional workout in the afternoon. Or if I don't get that workout in the morning, I just feel like I'm trying to play catch up all day long.
And then the excuses just compound. But if you're not a morning person, don't push a square peg into a round hole. The only caveat I would say is that if you think that you're not a morning person, But there's something inside of you that's like, Damn, I would love to be that person that could wake up early and go to the gym.
I think that that's something you need to think about and explore. And it's 100 percent possible. If you could just do it for three days. And I think that the key is, you hinted at it, I think what pros do is I think pros set an alarm to go to bed. And then they just put their phone in the corner of the room and they get off their phone by a certain time.
Like, if you can just get, if you can get to bed at 9 o'clock, anyone can wake up at 4 o'clock in the morning. I really believe that. Oh, 100%. You'll be waking up [00:30:00] whistling Dixie. What do you think about this frame of looking at health through the lens of, like, an artist versus a scientist? And the scientist is the person who's over indexing, like, counting every single thing.
It's good. It can definitely be effective. But then the artist is someone who's just mastered certain processes. And they just like they've gotten to the point where They can just weave this stuff naturally into their lifestyle. Does that make sense to you? It does I think um, I think in the beginning There is benefit to taking a more scientific approach so for me, um Like actually understanding caloric intake, you know, grams of saturated fat in certain foods, the amount of calories I was consuming, what was I burning, like just having a smart watch has always been super helpful for that.
It kind of just bakes that mindfulness into it. Because like, At the end of the day, I, I, I think that thermodynamics do apply, so you could eat the most nutrient dense foods ever, but if you're [00:31:00] eating 4, 500 calories of ground beef and raw milk and eggs, but you're only burning 2, 600, you are going to put weight on, too.
So I think just understanding those thermodynamics and the science and You're resting heart rate and the amount of steps that you're getting, that's great. But I think the goal over time is to kind of like, intuitively become an artist. Um, where you start to be able to like, eyeball your plate and be like, Alright, this is the amount of fat that I need.
This is the amount of food that's going to make me full. This is the amount that's going to nourish me. I could go to the gym and kind of just like wing a workout because I understand what muscle groups go together And then if you ever deviate off that path, the science is always there to pull you back on the path Yeah, I really like that.
I'm thinking about just the artist like how does an how does like amazing artists become an artist and it's just repetition But they're also, they do have that, um, consistency around the process of what they're doing. Like, I don't think any artist, you wouldn't find any artist who doesn't [00:32:00] have some quirky little things that they do that are part of their, like, I'm going to get myself in the right space to just do all the things the right way, um, and then it just comes very naturally.
And I think that's, I think where we're trying to steer people is become the artist of this whole experience of becoming healthier. Like, you should have the capacity to free ball and eyeball, you know, most of the meals that you're eating and like, you shouldn't think twice about it, you know? Yeah. Um, I just, I really just love the idea of living without this.
This feeling of shame or guilt or just like too much um over indexing like I think it's it's good to accomplish certain things and obviously like you need to measure certain things if you have certain goals, but Um, I do think like the artist mindset just allows you to breathe life into other things outside of you Just focusing on you know your health which should be the backbone or the foundation of all the things that you're doing [00:33:00] Yeah to your point.
Um just being able to Ask yourself the question in the morning, at night, throughout the course of your day, maybe it's once a week, maybe it's once a month, like, do I feel good or do I not feel good? If I'm doing a carnivore diet, but my energy level sucks, and I don't have any pop to wake up in the morning, and I don't really feel like my lifts are good, and my arms feel flat, and my gut's kind of messed up, okay, well maybe you shouldn't keep pigeonholing yourself to that diet.
Like, do you care more about the identity of fitting into this group, or this animal based group, heh. Or do you just care about feeling good as much as possible? Like the reason why I love carnivore is because it really worked for me. But if it didn't work for me, I wouldn't have identified as a carnivore.
And I don't know, I think it's just a mental thing of like, I think a lot of people, I know we know so many people that have successfully done carnivore longterm. I think as I'm getting older, I'm realizing that I think it's an amazing tool. And I think, yeah, you could absolutely [00:34:00] thrive on a carnivore diet.
Yeah. But there are so many amazing foods that are out there that if you do have autoimmune or something long term That's been plaguing you and you're able to correct that and get the inflammation out of your system I think that it's important to experiment with different food groups because other foods are amazing And why would you deprive yourself of those things if if you don't have to totally I think so much of it, too Just we've recently been working on a project with a new butcher grocery store concepts in town called radius and he's hyper focused on the sourcing and getting really high quality ingredients and finding the best sources for all the different food groups out there beef raw milk chicken and What I've learned through that process is that Just knowing like how most food is made and how that food is procured and made There's such a wide range in terms of quality out there So I do I do feel like we are fighting a bit of an uphill battle when it comes to quality But I do think that you know, some people have [00:35:00] probably experimented with the same food group And gotten like different results and I think that you know, it's just important to continue down that path of just exploration and and really trying to educate yourself on where your food is coming from like Ultimately, I think the best thing you can do for your health is buy locally and cook most of your meals It's very hard to do that a lot of that.
I think there's a lot of barriers for most people but if you can do that, it will introduce you to the concept of just like Knowing how that animal has been raised and I do think that that, that does help in the long run. Yeah, yeah, there's, there's people that will like die on the hill that vegetables are toxic.
There's, and we've done episodes on this before, I think there's people that will die on the hill that animals are toxic. I think the hill that I'm willing to die on is that the food system is broken, there's way too much consolidation, monopolization. I think the meatpacking industry is broken too, um, I think [00:36:00] that everyone should make an effort to source the best quality food locally where you have a direct relationship with your rancher.
I think everyone should make an effort to prioritize animal protein and get enough animal protein and enough nutrients that work for your specific body. Again, it's like, I think a gram of protein per pound of body weight is amazing for people. Um, I'll die on the hill around getting 10 steps a day. I'll die on the hill of everyone resistance training, regardless of your age, especially if you're getting older.
Grip strength is so important, so being able to improve that is actually a longevity predictor. Um, and I'll die on the hill that, you know, Healing and getting healthy is there's also a mental spiritual component that is impossible to quantify By traditional science and until you make that Mental belief that you can heal or you can achieve the ideal body outcomes or the ideal hormone panels I don't think you're going to achieve those things But those are the hills that I'm the most passionate about because I think those are the bigger Biggest levers that will fix a lot of things for people dude We could have just summarized the whole [00:37:00] podcast Are there any levers that I missed that you Man, that was so well said I don't think so.
I I think you hit the nail on the head there's and I I do want to like emphasize the spiritual component of getting healthier because there should be Changes that happen to you as a person, not just physically, as you start getting healthier. I'm just envisioning even just like a version of myself, you know, five to 10 years ago where I wasn't doing all the things that I wanted to do in life.
And my health was suffering from it. And it's more of a spiritual conversation where, and I were talking about it before, like there's fear in the food system and how we're kind of being educated on it. And I think that the less you can allow fear to enter into your life in general, the better. So you overcome that through taking ownership and learning that we do have so much agency over all of these things.[00:38:00]
And. We don't need to necessarily have all the answers, but the biggest thing that we can do is just continuing to keep our aim on, you know, day by day getting better and better. And then what I've experienced is that as you see change happen, you just have more energy to pour into the other buckets and start to make better decisions about.
You know, things that you were fearful of before. I think like there's just an empowering nature of getting better, feeling better. And then ultimately that is just like an uplift to your entire spirit and how you treat people, your energy throughout the day, the things that you're able to invest into.
It's all transformed just by how you treat your body. Yeah. There's a, there's this interesting dichotomy even with, um, almost like this holistic, um, this like holistic living movement. And I think the ethos of it is so good, of like, you know, all cotton and wool clothing, really good quality regenerative beef, mitigating your exposure to 5G, um, [00:39:00] you know, wearing blue light blocking glasses, consuming everything out of glass, not consuming tap water.
It's like, those principles are so good in practice. And if you can implement as many of those as possible, that's amazing. But at the end of the day, it's like you can wear all the cotton and linen clothing that you want. If you want to go to Italy and enjoy a trip or go to Dubai, like you're going to be getting on an airplane, you're going to be in the airport, you're going to be exposed to blue light.
There's probably going to be periods of your life where you're not able to drink out of that glass bottle. Like, and that's where I think resilience comes into play. Like, accepting the stakes that, because of the way we've evolved as human beings, perfection is impossible, it is off the table. So I would rather be resilient and be as healthy as I can be, and accept the fact that I am going to be exposed to some of these things, um, And I'm actually okay with that because I'm just taking all my power back in these other things.
I love it. Is there anything you, you wanted to touch on on this topic of just like clearing the fog? Anything else there that stands out to you as [00:40:00] important? Any other pillars that, um, that we didn't talk about? Because I do have a, I have a topic that I want to throw out there. It's a little bit, a little bit related, but it's a little mix, a little mix and mash.
Yeah. Um, I think that overall we're heading in the right direction. I think that because there are so many non credentialed people in the space, including ourselves, I think there's a yin and a yang to it where I think the negative is that you have people that can really optimize for the algorithm and there is a lot of fear mongering and there's frankly probably just some misinformation that's being spread there too.
And then the yin, the positive of that is that this whole alternative health movement, all these different practices, modalities. legalization of raw milk, connecting with local farmers, waking up to what's going on. That's also a byproduct of the space too. So again, it's like there's, there's more optionality.
There's more choices than ever before. And then you just pick those, those things and implement them into your [00:41:00] big levers. And dude, just let yourself compound that, that eighth wonder of the world that you're talking about. And you'll, you'll be unrecognizable in six to 12 months, guaranteed. 100%. 100%. I think it's also keeping your North Star, like there's always going to be more things that you can incorporate in, but just continue to focus on those basics.
Yeah. For me, it's always just like, if we've said the thing about success is a feeling of your head hitting the pillow, but also dude, the best feeling in the world is loving what you see in the mirror. And just continuing to move in the right direction where maybe you finally got yourself serious and you started weighing yourself every single day, and maybe all you did that one week of eating really clean and going to the gym again is like, you lost a pound or a pound and a half or like a little bit of water weight or something, it's like, dude, those roots are planting under the soil and you can't see it, but if you just let yourself compound You will become, like, transformation is possible.
I just think we've forgotten that God has literally created us with the [00:42:00] ability to transform, not get incrementally better, but we all have the capability to, uh, to transform. I think that's so cool. It's unbelievable. Yeah. Yeah, seeing just, yeah, seeing people take, Control their health like I love when I see a friend and they've just come back and they're just in like Totally different.
They look totally different. Yeah, they Have lost a bunch of weight. You can see their mood is elevated. They're just in a totally different mental state That's like man. That was all accessible to you this whole time Yeah, their aura their posture a lot of people it's like the eyes the way that they look in their eyes changes, too Totally you can just feel it.
Oh, the eyes are the eyes are definitely where You I feel like most people's health, you can just kind of like look into their eyes and see whether or not they're radiating that energy or not. Definitely. Um, all right. The topic that I wanted to throw out there, Mr. Beast's Lunchables, lunch, lunchly. Yes. So I'm curious to get your take on this.
We haven't talked about this at all and it's a total, total left turn [00:43:00] of this conversation, but I feel like it's on, on topic this week. So I wanted to touch on it. What are your takes on what they did with the Lunchable? Um, well, I just think that. When you look at the body of work, more so of Logan Paul, but there is some stuff with Mr.
Beast. When I looked at that post on Twitter and I saw the three of them, the first thing I thought of was Satanic, to be honest with you. Where it's like, you have three guys that have built unbelievable personal brands. They have so many 10 to 21 year olds looking up to them and admiring them. And like imagine if they had the stones to be like, Hey, we're actually going to create like a better for you version of Lunchables or Hydration, etc.
And they just completely turned to, they just resorted to taking a Lunchable concept that works and is extremely profitable. They're saying it's healthier, but if you look at the ingredients, they're complete dog shit. And they're just pushing it. On kids and just going for the quick [00:44:00] buck and they I guess from a capitalist perspective they have every right to do that I don't know.
I just the vibe the word that came to my head was satanic Hmm. Yeah, even the colors like they're just like trying to lure you in with these like flashy colors The neons and all that the I saw So, Mr. Beast commented under a tweet and he was saying that, oh, this is a better for you version of the Lunchable, and like, in some ways it is, but I really do think it begs the question, like, guys, you could have done, you could have gone so much further with this.
Um, so, yeah, it's, it's frustrating, because I feel like there's this whole message that, like, it is healthier in very, very small ways. Do you know anything in particular about the ingredients that you observed? So that looks healthier than like a traditional lunchable. So it's lower in sugar. Yeah, lower in calories Which [00:45:00] doesn't necessarily innately make it any healthier and then they Made it with real cheese And lunchables can't even call their cheese cheese.
So I guess that's a step in the right direction like substance Yeah, but then you look at the ingredients and it's you know, like I think sunflower oil Um And it's just like all these artificial flavors and the prime drink in general is just like loaded with crap. So I just, I, yeah, it makes me wonder, you know, they, they basically saw the opportunity like, Hey, Lunchables are cheap and not healthy for you at all.
Can we move the needle like 10 percent better, healthier, and just market it as, it is a healthy Lunchable when really it's, it's close to the same crap. Yeah, like again slight incremental tweets but those guys [00:46:00] all three of them have the pockets where if they really wanted to come out and make a statement and Do something with grass fed jerky and grass fed cheese and like a truly beneficial Hydration drink with a good like a true electrolyte profile of sodium, magnesium, potassium They could 100 percent do it and the thing is is like in this capital freedom driven society that we live in You I guess in theory they have every right to do that.
We could obviously go down the rabbit hole around like food regulations and replicating Europe. The way that I view it is, you just have to make a decision of, as a man, do I want to stack the bag or do I want to actually make Real impact and be an embodiment of what God has created us to be and just be a good steward of his creation on This earth and it's it's easy to armchair quarterback and say that but I think as I get older These things are just black or white It's like do you want to just stack the bag and make money you can do that or do you want to make?
Do you want to actually try and drive change and you can also stack the bag by doing that too the margins might be lower It [00:47:00] might be slower, but I would rather You Be a steward of, of God and the, the amazing world that he's like programmed to be a part of and just try and be a leader. Yeah. Yeah, I think I wanted to tie this into the, the fog conversation just around health and wellness too, because I do think there is some fog, like in the marketing angles that some of these brands take where it's like, they're labeling that as healthy, but it's really, it's not, it's not nearly better enough to call it healthy.
Yes. Yeah. Just because you're taking a. Dog shit product and making it slightly less dog shit. It's still shit. Yeah Yeah, it's exciting because I feel like these conversations like when the product launched I think like five years ago that product might have been like Way more well received it got so much pushback.
Like so many people were commenting underneath it just It was mostly negative, so it's cool to just see the consciousness of what people are aware of and talking about when it comes to [00:48:00] health has been elevated to the point where it's like, like, I don't think that, and hey, maybe they do just like come in and wipe Lunchables off the market.
I don't know, maybe, and if they're just replacing Lunchables, hey, that might be a marginal win. Um, but I still think the conversation is just so much further down the field that people need to be having when it comes to getting healthier. Yeah. A lot of people probably don't know this, but before we had ever ideated on a product, the first thing that you and I ever talked about was like a better for you, like a truly better for you lunchable for kids that incorporates, you know, grass fed jerkier, biltong, um, some grass fed cheese, some nuts, um, some type of beverage that's actually like hydrating and nourishing for kids.
And I still think that there's. Massive potential in that so maybe I'm just speaking this into life in the future, but I couldn't think of anything more important Like if you nourish your kids with the right food and you help them develop a relationship with God at an early [00:49:00] age I think a lot of these problems that we're facing at a macro level just will will disappear.
Definitely. Yeah teaching your kids those basic Just like, who are you and how to operate? How do, how do you wanna operate in the world? Yeah. On just like a, a basic level of just taking care of yourself is so important. Yeah. What do you think about just, you just made me think about it with just some of these ingredients.
I go, I, I really go back and forth on. Um, just food regulation in general, like, it even makes me think about, I was asked this question on our buddy Shane Larson's podcast around, um, Florida's decision to ban lab grown meat. They, um, they took a page out of Italy's playbook. Um, you see Europe banning these certain ingredients that are, that are legalized in the U.
S. It's like, It's a it's a it's a not an easy question to answer I would say Yeah, I think the problem starts with the incentives on the food production side of things Yeah, like I don't want them to be able to regulate [00:50:00] away red meat So why would I allow them to regulate away beyond meat? So from that standpoint, I don't want my government to be able to tell me what I can and can't eat But then on the back end You're seeing these ultra processed foods basically being subsidized by the government's dollars because they're incentivizing people to grow corn soy Wheat the cheapest ingredients possible and then those are getting sold to these big big food companies that are then making highly processed ultra palatable ultra processed foods So from that perspective, you know I think that's part of the beauty of living in the United States where like You know, the States can regulate some of these things and come in and intercede.
Like, I definitely want there to be a world without like beyond me. Like I just don't, I don't think there's a utility for it and there wouldn't be a utility for it if we didn't have this broken incentive system on the back end [00:51:00] and broken monetary system where, I mean, they just received so much funding from so many people on this pipe dream that they're going to be able to convince large amounts of people that this vegan diet.
is the only way to be healthy and that in order to reduce your climate footprint, you need to stop eating cows, you need to go and start eating only food from an industrial factory that, you know, isn't proving that it's any more climate friendly at all. And they're using massive amounts of input. So it's a much more industrialized process to, in order to live that way.
But they're trying to convince you that, Hey, this is the healthy way to live. And that industrialized system. To me, it's just so much less healthy, um, and I just don't see it in, in a free market. Like they've all, all those products have gone to zero, you know, you've seen them all go public, raise tons of money, throw so many celebrity marketing dollars behind every single brand and all of them have ended up in the gutter and it's like, there's just not a market for it.
So [00:52:00] I do think at the end of the day, the free market speaks and that's the beauty of what Shane's kind of alluding to is like, yeah, that stuff, you know, people are. At least aware enough. So, you know, I have hope that people are aware enough to spread this information so that people don't fall for it. But, yeah, there's definitely a part of me that gets excited about the idea of, you know, someone banning lab grown meat.
But I think, if I'm being honest with myself, the idea of banning foods It's against what I believe in. Um, I, I just believe, you know, this goes back to like the raw milk conversation. It's like regulations around raw milk are so backwards and I think a lot of that just got twisted up and a lot of complicated problems.
They were looking for a short term fix to milk getting industrialized in a lot of ways. And in that industrialization process um, The milk was not good, it got a lot of people sick, they started pasteurizing milk, raw milk got demonized, and then from that point forward, raw milk has just become this bastardized [00:53:00] stepchild to the, the dairy industry because the dairy industry now is so much bigger than the raw milk industry.
They have all the lobbying dollars to keep their incentives, you know, flowing towards pasteurized dairy, making it seem like raw milk's unsafe, but raw milk in actuality is One of God's most amazing creations, it's such an incredible food. So, long winded way of saying, I think regulation in food is really, really tricky.
I would be pro none of it. I think we had an amazing conversation with Joel Salatin about this, just regulation. I think we asked him the question, I think I asked him straight up, Hey, if you were elected as the secretary of, you know, the FDA. What would you do? And he said, oh, I'd just shut it down.
Literally, literally, he just said he would just shut it down. So, I think there's something to that. Mmm, I think that's well said. Ugh, I think my, my brain is in a blunder right now because I'm just thinking [00:54:00] how easy it is to buy Hot Cheetos. Yeah, and how hard it is to get raw milk even in a state like Texas.
Yeah, or we could go to ten convenience stores five minutes away get hot Cheetos like it's nothing and then even with raw milk The closest raw dairy farm is probably 45 minutes away And then even at these at these places in Austin you can get it They're just pickup points like you can't sell it out of an actual retail store like just the difficulty of getting You a single ingredient product that's made by cows, that's made by God, versus something that you know is probably gonna cause metabolic dysfunction, autoimmune disease, etc.
Like, I don't know, it just boggles my mind. Yeah. Well, the subterranean element of that, the area that, like, most people don't see is just like, So many government dollars are going towards those Cheetos being made without the Cheeto. Without Cheetos necessarily receiving any of those dollars. Mm. Those dollars are going towards the farmers who are making the raw ingredients for [00:55:00] very cheap foods, and then those foods need to go somewhere.
Because corn is so subsidized, you're saying? 'cause it's so subsidized. There's just a massive, I mean, there's a massive trade off to, you know, you can sell a bag of Cheetos for what, like 99 cents or like, you know, a dollar 50, whatever it is. It's insanely cheap to make that. If you had to actually make that without government dollars backing it up, like, the whole economics behind the system would flip.
Yeah. You know, those Cheetos would be a lot more expensive, and then you would be making decisions based on, you know, alright, this 5 bag of Cheetos makes me feel like crap. And I can go get a steak for, and then maybe, you know, people are feeling better. This is my like utopian vision of the future. It's like people, we get rid of a lot of the incentives that are steering people towards highly processed foods and start to subsidize regenerative farming that allows for minimally minimal inputs.
So, you know, no chemicals, no. Uh, herbicides, pesticides, anything like that. [00:56:00] And there's an abundance of product that ends up being flooding the market that's good and prices kind of self regulate from there. So like these really high quality ingredients that make people feel great are then ultimately more available at a lower price.
But I do think that like we've really fallen, we're like very numb to the, the industrialized food system at this point where convenience is just such a hard thing to just like replace. Thanks. Like the fact that you can just go to the grocery store and get really cheap food is really, I mean, it's, it's a luxury.
It is a convenience. It's, it's amazing in a lot of ways and really is a great thing. But also, you know, the convenience is part of the problem. It's a big part of the problem. If the convenience is poison, that's a problem. Yeah. So you just touched on like. Probably the most fundamental piece to this, and I think a lot of people don't understand this, um, because the margins are so tight for a [00:57:00] lot of farmers, if they're growing certain crops, notably corn, wheat, soy, a few other things, they're legitimately being subsidized, they're incentivized by the government to grow those things, and that then fuels this entire industrialized food model.
What's fascinating is that there are really no subsidies at all. I don't think there are any subsidies that encourage regenerative practices. Which is so crazy because anyone that knows anything about regenerative knows that it's the most nutrient dense product that's going to nourish the consumer.
And it's also potentially the seeker that's going to ultimately fix the environment and be able to like sequester all this carbon out of the atmosphere that we've polluted into it. And I remember Will Harris from White Oak Pastures, he wrote that amazing blog post where he, he applied for this, um, this environmental grant.
Tee hee. And he had this, like, sheep, regenerative sheep grazing program that incorporated solar panels, it was super interesting. He didn't get it, Microsoft got it, Target got it, all these massive companies got it. Yeah. So I understand why RFK is [00:58:00] so attractive, because you're like, You have this guy that has absolute balls and he understands regenerative practices like I would be so like what happens to the food system over 10 years if Regenerative practices are actually actually like heavily subsidized by the government.
That's fascinating to think about like those ripple effects from that Well, the model would flip on its head. I mean you it's which I think for most people There's so much money at stake that a lot of people are, I think, like, willfully pessimistic because they just don't believe that that world can ever exist.
And they are partially being compensated and benefiting from some of the things that are existing in this, this comfy world that we live in. So the idea of creating that change in that real food system, I think, is, A little bit daunting. It is daunting. Like there there would be so many cascading positive effects if we could Incentivize regenerative practice.
I mean people would quit their job if we [00:59:00] were incentivizing people, you know, hey, here's a hundred thousand dollars to go Uh start a small homestead in, you know, whatever state it is. I mean that that could have that could feed small communities everywhere. And when we talk about like food deserts and stuff, like we have a massive problem with certain parts of the world, certain parts of the U S just not having any access to any food, almost any food at all, but any high quality food.
So I think like from that perspective, if we start incentivizing some of these things, it will flip the system. Like the system. I hope it, you know, it will be like a slow transition, but it will move so much money and attention away from ultra processed foods towards the real stuff. Yeah, it'd be interesting, um, like to be a fly on the wall in a closed door conversation between RFK and Trump and to see if he could bend Trump's ear.
And get [01:00:00] him interested in regenerative agriculture and breaking up the big packers and stuff like that. I would be so curious how he feels about that. It probably, it's probably similar to his perspective on Bitcoin because we were fortunate we were able to go to the Bitcoin conference in Nashville this year.
And him being there was just like such a massive statement of a former U. S. president being there. I don't think he knew much about Bitcoin at all. But just him like being there and being engaged with the crowd and trying to learn I think was awesome. And I'm guessing his perspective on regenerative agriculture is probably similar to Bitcoin where he knows it's good.
I just don't think he understands the logistics maybe of what makes it tick. And I could be completely wrong. That's just a, just a pure assumption. Yeah, and I think RF I think RFK is kind of like a Trojan horse in a lot of ways, like, if he could get into If he can get into close quarters with what the Trump administration could do And he actually had trump's ear and could implement some of those changes I mean, I would be incredibly optimistic for what the [01:01:00] next 10 year 10 20 years could look like it's really interesting though, because I Still feel like there's so on both sides of the aisle.
There are just so many people who are captured by Big industries that are really hard to change like the dairy industry. Like what do you think the dairy industry? Votes, I bet you they lean far right or not Not far right, but I bet you it's like 70 30 maybe. So like that industry is going to be lobbying for Trump to like hush up this whole conversation around raw milk.
Like they, they don't necessarily want, they're not incentivized to want that to happen. So that, just making that point because it is, I think it's just like wading through this bureaucratic system that we have where all of these industries feel incredibly protected by just the amount of dollars that they spend on lobbying and making sure that, you know, You know, no policies change.
We don't want, we don't want any policies to change because that would completely disrupt our business. But I think RFK has a spirit of like wanting to break some of that stuff up. I don't know of another political candidate where [01:02:00] You know, he's been to White Oak Pastures. He's been to Mark McAfee's, uh, Raw Farm.
He's talking about vegetable oil. He's in, he's in amazing shape, like, if that doesn't fire you up and get you encouraged, like, I don't know what will. And what we're talking about is such a, it's such a non political issue that should, both parties should be so passionate about when the cost of our healthcare system is 16 percent of our U.
S. GDP. Like, when you think about cutting costs on a balance, on a P& L, like, Why would you not start there? Especially knowing that a lot of this stuff is highly preventable too. Yeah, like you're basically asking, you're asking the people of this country to like take control of their lives. Like to some extent, like you're basically saying, you know, there are going to be healthcare costs that are just, unavoidable, you know, getting older, you break a bone, you get in a car accident, whatever it is, those things relatively unavoidable, those are going to happen, but the stuff that's really concerning is the stuff that's rising the fastest is chronic disease and obesity related illnesses that [01:03:00] are largely preventable and are largely just a product of industrialized food.
Yeah. So. Yeah. I think, I think a lot about our, our future generation and there's like the one version of the five year old that has a bowl of Froot Loops and he's numbed on an iPad and I'm very interested to see where that five year old turns out in 30 plus years and then there's also the five year old who's raised in a household of steak and eggs and maybe reading a book or he's outside playing, um, as he should be as a child and I'm very interested to see where that, that cohort grows to be in 30 years and I think the question is like, Which version of that ends up becoming normalized?
I think will probably dictate the direction of where we go as a country. Yeah, I think the my the realist in me sees a parallel economy being built alongside of the existing system that, you know, in this parallel economy we're focused on Like keeping people healthy preventative health care [01:04:00] incentivizing the right things um, you know a lot of the ethos that we hear when we talk about things with our like bitcoin friends is just like You know personal ownership and you know I think a lot of those trends too will be like maybe not vaccinating your kids as soon as You know, giving them the 72 vaccines or whatever it is, you know, within their first two years of life, um, do they need all those things?
Um, you know, questioning a lot of the incentives in the insurance model, like we talked to Andy over at CrowdHealth. Why do we need to be subsidizing this insurance model, which is kind of the wrapper around, The entire system that we live in right now, like it keeps that whole thing in check. Why do we need to be subsidizing that and paying, you know, 900 bucks a month out of our paychecks when we could be paying 150 bucks and then 150 bucks a month.
And then, you know, when those incidents do happen, you've created a system that can support those costs. So. I think that there will be kind of a parallel like [01:05:00] almost a schism that you could draw delineate back to COVID where there's kind of just more or less two camps and the one camp will continue to compound in one direction and the other camp will continue to compound in the other direction.
I think, uh, to me, that seems like more realistic outcome than the existing system completely overhauling and changing. Yeah, it'll be fascinating to see over the next five to ten years if we can pull back from the brink and, um, course correct or is America, our buddy Nick brought this up, is America just too big to be able to pull in a lot of these, uh, principles that our founding fathers kind of baked into this country when we were, when we were far smaller?
Yeah. Interesting question. Yeah, I think it's about not letting the idea of America die, but the current model of America is just, I don't think the founding fathers would even, they'd be like, [01:06:00] I have no idea how to relate to this. Like, this is so different than what we had envisioned. There's so many positive aspects of it.
The freedoms that we have, this is the best country in the world to be born into. But just like the political climate right now, the current state of health of a lot of people. You know, I really do feel like the wake up call has happened and people are either gonna wake up and, and really start to like, think about getting out and starting to write their own path, um, follow systems that are actually healthy and make sense, or you're just gonna be subject to a system that is like very much wanting to control and keep this population sick and unhealthy so that they can profit off it.
It's kind of dark kind of black pill, but yeah, I think it's good to play out the the different possibilities too and I think I think the important thing is like You're alive, you're living. 1776 really wasn't that long ago. Dude, it wasn't long ago at all. And you can change [01:07:00] everything within, not everything, but you can really move the needle in five to ten years too.
And just realizing that if you're listening to this and us having this conversation, you You play a part, you have a vote, and your ripple is, your ripple effect that you can have in your local community or with your family or with your friend group can be insane. And I think just we need more leaders, I think we need bolder people, I think we need more courage and just people that are confident speaking the truth and not worry about the negative repercussions that could come from that.
Because if we don't speak up, what 10 years? Yeah. It's good. 100%. Yeah. Yeah, I think about how the how all this conversation relates back to you and me to like what we're doing in Austin Like I almost want to just like cast our umbrella to Austin because I think we can make such a big impact just here And then that impact can be shared in other cities by replicating the model But like I really just want to focus on [01:08:00] The people that I see on a daily basis, you know, investing into good conversation with people, leading people in the right direction, like just having the impact on a local level to me is so much more important than getting lost in kind of what's happening all across the U.
S. Like, there's just so much noise. Again, coming back to the original, like idea of the, of the, of this podcast, which was like the fog that's out there in the nutrition space, there's just so much noise in general. And I think just trying to like, Really be people who are willing to like stand out boldly lead invite people in create community like those Types of things can change a city and I think changing a city could change.
Yeah everything Yeah, I mean you think about where we started because this is I would say this is like a small to niche show So on a good month, it's 35, 000 downloads, right? So think about, like, when we first started, you were just putting out content into the ether and almost no one was seeing it. It spread to the point where, you know, there's 35, 000 people, give or take, that could listen on a [01:09:00] monthly basis.
The ripples of those people that are consuming this content and making changes and spreading that, dude, that could be over 100, 000 people a month from our show, let alone these massive podcasts that exist. Even with our journey with faith, we've talked about this 10 times, but our triathlon coach Natasha told us we should start going to church.
You started going to Thrive in Austin when I was living in San Diego. You went super consistent, had this incredible transformation, got re baptized. And now with the first appointment, you've probably had a hundred different guys come over the last year. Probably a lot more than that. And think about the ripples that's created too.
So I think we just play down a little bit of like what, you know, difference could I really make? And when you look at it from a ripple exponential perspective, dude, this could be culture changing stuff, which is why it's so important for everyone listening to just get in the game, whatever, whatever get in the game means to you.
Maybe it's just sharing a podcast that you think is impactful or inviting someone to church or buying a grass fed steak and giving it as out. As a welcome [01:10:00] present to your friend that just moved into their new house instead of a bottle of wine or a jar of beef tallow. Like these little ripples, dude, end up creating massive momentum.
Yeah, I think about, I don't know, I just, I feel like a lot of times I'm speaking to a version of myself, you know, several years back that felt a little bit more stagnant. Like I wasn't initiating a whole lot of, um, just meaningful, fruitful things in my life that I think now we're just in full builder mode.
And that's like really all we've. See, like there's just so many things that we've just spent time energy trying to build And there's just like even through the podcast We have so many people that we can connect with and invest in and through noble same thing And so it's like I just ultimately at the end of the day want to like see These changes and transformation happen, but they don't happen Unless you initiate like initiating the contact of reaching out to a friend You To invite them to go [01:11:00] for a run and then you have a good conversation with them and it changes their whole week like let those things like be an initiator and let those things compound over a long enough period of time and you'll just see this network of people that have somehow come into your life because you've initiated.
Simple invitations to, hey, come to this cookout we're doing. Hey, come to this room we're doing. Hey, I want you to be a part of the business that we're building. So many things that can just like come together, um, through simple initiation and, and invitations. One of the things I've been praying for, you just made me think of this, is Based on, um, our buddy Sean, who spoke at our Bible study, I've been praying to be a, I'm like, Please, Lord, I don't want to be a spectator anymore.
Please just let me be a laborer. And if you're listening to this, like, having that mindset, I would, I think everyone should pray for that. And dude, having that mindset shift of spectator to laborer, all it takes is one laborer, dude, to change everything. Dude. So be a laborer. Yeah, the harvest is plenty.
[01:12:00] Harvest is plenty, dude. Yeah. Um, well bro I think that wraps it up for today my man. It's been great. Good combo. Talked about a lot. Um, again, life is amazing. Dude. Love doing this with you. Only up from here. Only up from here man. The show, I think, where we're at with the show is so fun, like, taking a little bit of the pressure off, you and me just doing more one on one episodes, like I, I couldn't love this more.
Dude, appreciate you brother. Until next time. Alright brother. Alright.