Respectful Parenting, Eye Movement & Physical Training For Infants, Co-Sleeping Pros & Cons & Much More With Joseph Anew & Emilia Run.

My name is Ben Greenfield and on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life.

Podcast, one of the guiding principles is trying to reduce. I want him to trust the world. I want him to be confident. And so if he's hearing no too often, I don't remember the statistic, but the number of times, it's some wild number every day that the average toddler hears the word no. And so this idea of the safe space, it's truly, it's 10 by 10ft. And in there there is nothing that can hurt them. There is nothing that can go wrong.

Faith, family, fitness, health, performance, nutrition, longevity, ancestral living, biohacking, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the.

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Well, folks, my guest on today's show, I actually have two guests, but the first guest has been on my podcast several times now. I don't even know how many times.

Joseph, how many times do you think.

You'Ve been on the show? Like maybe three, four, ten?

I don't know.

Three or four, Ben. Three or four?

Yeah.

Okay. All right, so just to give you.

Guys the background, Joseph and I first met way back when I was doing Spartan racing and actually I think even a little bit before that at an ancestral health symposium. And he was basically like the coach and the go to guy for Spartan Fitness. And he worked for years and years as the head of sport and training at Spartan Race. And then he went on after that to found this event.

All right, folks, it's time for bubs. That's right. Glenn and Sean, the co founder at a company called Bubs, were both coaches at Seal Fit in Encinitas owned by Navy SEAL Commander Mark Devine. They put on this fantastic event called Kokoro, which was like a Navy SEAL style hell week for civilians. These guys as coaches got to know each other and tragically what happened was that Glenn, who was a best friend to hundreds, wound up laying down his life saving Americans in Benghazi, Libya. And he was always about self improvement, about helping other people. And so what Sean wound up doing was founding this company, Bubs Natural, as a tribute to Glenn. As a matter of fact, Bubs donates 10% of all its profits to charity in Glenn's honor. And what does BUBS make? Well, Bubs has some of the best collagen you'll ever have. Collagen is like the glue that holds your body together. It's truly unflavored. But extremely soluble, so you can put in anything. And it's better than a lot of the collagens out there because they use the purest form of collagen. Sustainably sourced from grass fed and pasture raised cows in southern Brazil and Uruguay. They also have an MCT oil that pairs very well with the collagen. It's actually the only MCT oil in the world that's Whole30 approved, meaning it is super clean. They make apple cider vinegar gummies, which are actually pretty amazing for just like quelling your appetite at night, healthy digestion, blood sugar management. And then they have their fountain of youth collagen. They take their really good collagen, they blend it with vitamin C and biotin and maquis berry, which is a Chilean berry, very high in antioxidants. Put all that together, you got Bubs naturals and it's supporting a very good cause. Glenn, who was a larger than life personality, glowed with enthusiasm. He loved to feel great and do good and that's what they created Bubs to allow you to do so. Bubsnaturals.com b u b s naturals.com use code BEN G to save 20% on Bubs Naturals.

Hey.

So whether you run, ride, hike, swim, lift, whatever, you understand what it means to push harder, to reach farther, to go the extra mile. That relentless drive runs in your blood, literally. There's a company called Inside Tracker. They actually let you track your blood and they give you a personalized plan to build endurance, boost energy and optimize your health for the long haul. They created this with leading scientists in aging and genetics and Biometrics that analyzes your blood, your DNA and your fitness tracking data to identify where you're optimized and where you're not. And then it gives you a daily action plan with personalized guidance on the right exercise, nutrition and supplementation for your body. And when you connect it with your Fitbit or your Garmin, you unlock real time recovery pro tips even after you complete your workout. So it's like having a personal trainer and a nutritionist right in your pocket. Takes all the guesswork out of your blood work and and you get 20% off the entire InsideTracker store. Just go to InsideTracker.com Ben that's InsideTracker.com.

Ben well, folks, my guest on today's show, I actually have two guests, but the first guest has been on my podcast several times now. I don't even know how many times.

Joseph, how many times do you think.

You'Ve been on the show, like maybe three, four, ten.

Three or four, Ben? Three or four?

Yeah.

Okay. All right, so just to give you.

Guys the background, Joseph and I first met way back when I was doing Spartan racing and actually I think even a little bit before that at an ancestral health symposium. And he was basically like the coach and the go to guy for Spartan Fitness. And he worked for years and years as the head of sport and training at Spartan Race. And then he went on after that to found this event that's this cool, epic, intimate, health and wellness style private event that a limited number of people attend called Runga. And the doors open to that a few times a year. And me and my family usually go to it to present and help out and just go through this whole cool, epic experience that currently takes place down in Austin, Texas. And if you're interested in any of that kind of stuff, I'll make sure I link to Runga and the events that Joseph now puts on. If you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com anew It's Joseph's last name. A N E W BenGreenfieldLife.com anew so Joseph on this podcast is teaming up with Amelia Rune, who is his wife. Emilia is a plant based chef. She's a Kundalini yoga instructor. She's a mindfulness meditation teacher. She's also a big, big part of the Runga event. And she went to law school and then wound up pursuing her dreams of working in food. And now she has a private chef and cake business and makes these delicious organic spreads and raw desserts, many of which I've probably consumed too much of when I've been at Runga. But nonetheless, she is quite talented in her own right at yoga and meditation and making these amazing cacao things that I just still have difficulty wrapping my head around how good they actually are.

But they're amazing.

So anyways, perhaps more fittingly for this podcast, I should mention that Joseph and Amelia have a son. And as I watched them go about preparing to bring their son into the world and also went on to witness their interactions with him and the way that they've been raising him, and the conversations that Joseph and I have had about his role as a father and my ability to be able to see Amelia as a mother when I've been at these Runga events, all of that inspired me to actually feature Joseph and Amelia in my new parenting book, Boundless Parenting. And they have just a fantastic chapter that they contributed on raising a healthy child and some really interesting educational concepts that might be new to you and different ways to interact with a young human being in a way that, that really brings them into the world in a very mindful.

And just, I think, in many cases, very outside the box way. And so they have a wealth of knowledge. And even though they're new parents, relatively speaking, compared to some of the parents in the book who might have children who are 20 or 25 or 30 years old and beyond, what they're doing with their son is extremely mindful and I think is a great example of how to raise a kid. So I thought it'd be cool to get on and not necessarily talk about fitness and raw cacao bites, but to also talk about fatherhood, motherhood, and what the boundless parenting journey looks like and has looked like for Joseph, Ben, Amelia. So we're gonna do this. You guys ready? Joseph and Amelia.

Yeah. Great intro. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Ben.

Awesome. All right, so I wanna kick it off as I do with a lot.

Of these interviews I've been doing about parenting and just give you a humble brag moment to tell me about your son.

Well, his name is Leon Thor, and I think he's amazing.

It was funny, Ben, when you were talking about, you know, our conversations at Runga, what came up was when you actually taught him to foam roll at the last event. He's, he's two and a half. And you know, it was, it was as a father, for me, watching you foam roll with my two and a half year old was just so beautiful. And he's so, you know, as you experienced, he's so receptive to learning. And, you know, he's probably the only two and a half year old that's taken a nice bath. And he's, he's, he's got this, like, you know, this amazing, you know, we'll dive deep into respectful parenting and some of the sort of, you know, kind of principles that we raise him with. But I think also being exposed to fathers like you and, and people at Runga and some of the activities and biohacks, it makes me wonder, you know, what happens in 20 or 30 years when he's been doing ice baths, red light, foam rolling since he was two and a half. So I appreciate your contribution to him as well, Ben. And you've been an inspiration for me as a father.

I can tell you what's happened is he's going to totally rebel against all this health crap and wind up being like some kind of a chat GPT, AI programmer, creating fantasy video games, living.

With a neck beard, in your basement eating Cheetos.

That's probably what's going to happen.

I hope not, Ben. And that's a good segue. So I think Leon Thor is. He'll be three in May. And he was, you know, it was. It was amazing from the time he was born. You know, Amelia and I were so aligned on our intention and how we were going to do things, and that was a real. That was a real blessing. But part of our parenting style and part of what has made him into the person he is now and that he's becoming is this highly respectful parenting style. So it's really amazing when, you know, I don't. I don't necessarily, as an example, pull him into the red light with me in the morning. I say, daddy's going to do the red light. And he'll often say, can I come, too? And I'll say, sure, bud. And he'll sit there with me. And so there's a certain. And it's a challenge, and I know we'll get into this more, but, you know, I recently, you know, as a parent, it's about, you know, from a physical standpoint, you know, what sports, what activities, you know, what do we want to get him involved with at a young age. And. And so I went and signed him up for soccer. And when we would take him, when I would take him down to soccer, I had this vision of what it was going to be like, and it was very challenging to just keep him anywhere close to the field. And I know he's only two and a half, but that's part of our philosophy, is that we're going to expose him to things, whether it's red light or cold or soccer or anything else. But we really allow him to kind of meander with purpose so that he develops a healthy relationship with the activity. And it's never forced and it's never pressured. He's very free to come and go, and. And it's challenging as a parent, mostly because in the context of a lot of the more conventional parenting styles, when I'm not forcing my son to sit and, you know, put his head on the soccer ball, when I'm not forcing him to stay for the duration of the. The soccer practice, and I am allowing him to meander and maybe end up at the playground halfway through, through the soccer, it's, It's. It's a little bit challenge. You explain to parents why we have that approach when they're not kind of in the same space, but to your point, making sure that he develops Healthy relationships. You know, my first gym way back was with high school baseball athletes. Many of them had scholarships on the line. And baseball dads are probably the most notorious for twisting their, their, particularly their sons arms into practice and throwing a certain amount of pitches each day. And the kids, what I would hear is that a lot of those kids did begin to resent the sport and they were in it more for the father. And so that has been, for me as a dad, it has been a major pillar in how I want his and I relationship to kind of unfold.

Yeah, that's something that I've tried to do with river and Taryn as well. Based on what you just brought up regarding resentment. Rather than requiring them to do a certain activity or shoving something down their throats, I try as much as possible to lead by example. And of course that has to be married to this idea that sometimes kids don't know what's going to serve them really well later on in life. So there are certain elements of education like say math or reading or writing that they might not really want to do, but that you require of them on a daily basis, you know, from an educational standpoint. And you don't just say, hey, Dad's going to sit down and read some books for a while. If you feel like joining me, you can, like, there's actually a certain amount of reading that they're required to do each day, you know, as part of their curriculum. But then I think for a lot of these softer skills, like whatever, baseball or foam rolling or let's say breath work, for example, a lot of people hear that river and Taryn do breath work with me regularly, but it's never required. I mean, usually what it looks like is, hey, Dad's heading down into the sauna to do breath work. Do you guys want to come with me? Or sometimes I'll just announce that I'm going down in there and see if either of them show up. And they consistently do like 95% of the time. And I think that at least for a slightly older child, sometimes marrying that to the positive or negative consequences of whether or not they're going to join in the activity is important. Like right now, when I go down into the sauna to do breath work, I also mention to them a couple of times a week, hey, this is really, really going to help with our upcoming freediving trip that we're going to go on in May. The longer your inhale and exhale times are, the deeper you'll be able to go, the longer you'll be able to stay in the water and the better the experience that you'll have. And so they understand that it's not just about joining with dad to do breath work, but there's going to be some positive consequences down the line. So with Leon, though, are there certain things that are like, non negotiables that you do that you would say you do have him do? That would kind of stray outside the idea of this respectful parenting concept.

Yeah. And before Amelia takes this one, I just want to add. Thank you, Ben. You're absolutely right. And. And one of the concepts that my wife, who's about to kind of chime in here, has really taught me is about age appropriateness. So putting ourselves, you know, our son is two and a half. And so as it relates to the, you know, river and Terran as an example. You're so right. You know, you have to make sure they can do. There's the, I think you said the hard and the soft activities. And so at his age right now, I think it's a disproportionately soft because. Because his level of understanding, you know, when I look at.

Kids his age that they just don't quite understand, why do I have to play soccer? Why do I have to. You know, we're in the realm of soft activities right now, but as he gets older, and you can, with your sons as an example, you're communicating and they can, they can cognitively process the value and the reward and make an informed decision. And so I think you're absolutely right, and I'm so glad you layered that in, because the more as they age and develop and their perspective expands, it's time to add some structure. So in answer to your question, though, the sort of hard things for me, and then I want Emilia to chime in. Leon and I get up most days and we always have a glass of water before we do anything else. It's one of our hard activities because I want that to be something. You know, I try to get him outside as soon as I can after he wakes up. So I'm slowly, you know, they're, again, they're a little loose. It's just, let's have some water, let's go outside. There's no quantification or qualification. It's just sort of these habitual routines that I'm trying to ingrain in him from a very young age. And I'll defer to Amelia here.

Yeah. And by the way, if I could jump in real quick about the water thing. Yeah. I think from a Health standpoint, there are certain things that I do tell river and Taryn to do. I don't get up in the morning and announce, hey, dad's going to go have a big glass of water. Anybody else want to have a glass of water along with me? I do that same thing.

That I think you might have just alluded to, Joe, to where I have a glass of water and I tell them, hey, get your water right? And they drink. That one's not like an option just because I know it's so important. It's a habit that's really going to serve them well in life that they might not think of doing on their own or understand the science of why they need to do on their own. But I mean, I don't know about you, Joe, but I wish I'd have grown up just understanding and knowing that starting my day with anywhere from 20 to 32 ounces of water is one of the simplest and most crucial health hacks, if you want to call it that, that you can start your day with. So I think there's some things where you just say, hey, do this along with me versus I'm doing this. Do you feel like having water too?

Right on, right on. Do you want to chime in? Em?

Yeah. All I wanted to say with the discipline is actually it doesn't stray away from respectful parenting. I mean, there's lot of age appropriate discipline and when I say discipline, what I really mean is boundaries and expectations that we have of our children. So it's actually very, very consistent with the respectful parenting approach to have a lot of these boundaries. We can get more into what this looks like. But, but yeah, it's really very respectful of both of you to have these things that are non negotiables. I think it just comes down to what are they, you know, ready for, what are they willing to understand? And then there's things like the water, the health, things that you can over time start to teach them about the benefits of. But I definitely think it's consistent with Rye for sure. Everything you're saying, Ben.

Yeah. And Ben, you know, it's, it's. And I know you, you know, on the anti aging side, you know, I think on Twitter you've shared a few times, you know, there's always the article of like the 120 year old person and they always like when they're asked how they lived so long, it's always like such a distilled truth. It's like, you know, I've taken a cold shower every day since 1943. That's the secret. You know, I've. I've had, you know, a dozen eggs a week. And so in part, as well, you know, with our son. And again, he's so young that, you know, the communication, the boundaries, it's. It's. It's more. They're softer, but it's more about, you know, developing, just making that his normal. And as you said, you know, it's. You know, we know it's going to be important when they're later to kind of add context. But if at this age, you know, he begins this habit, he just knows the first thing he does when he wakes up in the morning is take a glass of water. You know, I don't. I don't need to pressure him to have a certain amount or anything else. It's more that habit. So when he's 100 years old, he says, for as long as I can remember, I've started every day with a sip of water. And that's kind of my approach, too, with, you know, when he comes out into the garage with me to do the cold. I've got the white plunge out there, and I do the, you know, the. The cold plunge every single morning. And he'll come out with me, and I don't put him in there. It's just too cold. But I'll often say, do you want to put a hand in or a foot in? And he'll say, I don't want to do it. And then I'll say, one, you have to pick a hand. And I'll only make him just touch the water with his hand or foot. And then that. Then he runs in the house and he says, mommy, I did the cold. I did the cold water. It's just such a beautiful experience. And just. Yeah, I'm just. I'm really going at this age for just habit, just planting the seeds and making sure he's a very willful participant.

Yeah, Yeah. I love that Jedi mind trick tactic of giving, making them feel like they're in charge by giving them an option. I've done that all the time with river and Terror. And, like, do you want to do whatever A body weight workout, or you want to put on a backpack and go for a walk with dad? Or do you want the sardines or the avocados?

Or do you want to read this book or that book? Even since they were about nine years old, I have a book assignment. And typically that book assignment occurs every one to four weeks, depending on the length of the book. But I'LL often choose three to four books. Set them on the dining room table, call them down on a Monday morning and say, okay, which book do you want to do your book report on for this next series of weeks? So you always give them some amount of ownership over the task. And you guys mentioned a couple of times an acronym. I think you said RE when referring to respectful parenting. I don't think we actually define what that is. What's RIE stand for?

So RISE stands for Resources for Infant Educators. It was founded by Magda Gerber, who learned with a woman called Emmy Pickler, who had her very unique approach to parenting. It was actually caring for children in a joint care setting was how it was initially developed. And Emmy Pickler was a doctor, I believe. And Magda Gerber brought this philosophy. I'm not an expert in the history of it, but my understanding is she brought the philosophy to California, founded an institute of some sort there. And that's where I was exposed to it as a nanny, because there were some ride classes and workshops that I had the opportunity to participate in.

Is it very popular? Because I hadn't come across it until I was reviewing your chapter in the book. I mean, it seemed very intuitive. But is this like a new thing, or has this been steeped in certain educational principles or countries for some time?

I believe packaged this way, I would say it's relatively new. It's not very well known if you think about respectful parenting. Like this idea of respectful parenting, I would say, has been around for a long time, especially in mindfulness circles. But rye as a whole, I feel like, is beginning to gain more and more popularity. And what it really is, it's basically a guide for the first two years, you know, setting a foundation for a really beautiful relationship. And it's really effective, but it's also not so rigid that you can't make it your own. I can tell you a little bit about it. So, like, basically, we're focused on what's most respectful, starting from day one. So as an example, the first way we communicate with infants is through touch. So touching, really gently, very lovingly. You know, that's a language of its own. And we're communicating with our infants through that. And then our words, you know, the one, the other first principle of the RYE is just asking for permission. You know, even way before a baby has the capacity to respond, they learn to anticipate changes in their environment through our work. So stating, I'm going to pick you up now, and then leaving a pause for them to process you know, they start to anticipate your actions in a way that can lead to a lot less overwhelm. So, yeah, there's a lot of tools like that, and there's, you know, different tools that apply at different ages. And, you know, even toddlers can get overstimulated. So, like, there's so much here that actually leads to a very just, beautiful relationship with your child. And it's actually also based on this idea that what infants and babies need, it's actually what every human being needs, and that's to experience someone's full, undivided attention. And what's also true is that no one can pay full attention all the time. So it's this idea of balancing that, you know, it offers us this framework and this opportunity to witness how these, like, two competing values, like what we need, what they need, how they can actually be consistent with each other. You know, that balance between being together and being apart and meeting both baby's needs and your needs. So that's why, as a nanny, I fell in love with it, because the families I worked with that did Rye, it was a completely different experience than the families, you know, with babies and toddlers that did not work within that framework.

So was there like, or is there a book or website or curriculum if there are people listening in, whether a grandparent or a grand or a parent or an educator who would want to learn more about what Rye is and how to implement it?

Yeah, my favorite book is called Dear Caring for Infants With Respect. This is like the main book by Magda Gerber. There's another one called your Self Confident Baby. Those are the two top ones. And ironically, when I was given this book by one of the families that I worked with, I let it sit on my nightstand for two months before even picking it up, because I was just kind of uninterested. I felt I was very intuitive with the baby that I was with at the time, and I did not expect to resonate so deeply with what was being shared.

Yeah, Ben, it was really interesting. So, you know, when Amelia was doing some nannying in LA and she was attending these classes and these programs, you know, for me, kind of coming from a more conventional understanding of parenting, you know, it made a little sense, but I wasn't super convinced, I'll say at first in some of what I was hearing. And then we went to a birthday party and there was a three year old, and she was the most self confident. And Ben, from a. From a. You know, you. You know, you and I both are so into the physical body and, and just how it functions and how it connects with the ground. It looked like this three year old, it looked like you wouldn't be able to push her over if you wanted to. She was so, I could just see in her physical body and the way she walked that she was so connected, just so confident. And as you know, you know, the outside body, the external body is a reflection of the internal body. And so just to tack on, that's what really convinced me. And I said, oh, my goodness, I've seen a lot of kids in my life and I've never seen a kid, a child act with the, again, the self confidence and the, and the just stability and groundedness of this little girl. And to just piggyback what Emilia was saying when Leon was born, you know, for me, you know, at first when I heard that we're going to talk to him the day he's born and let him know we're going to pick you up now and we're going to give a pause so that, you know, once he develops, he's used to that pause, he will have the option to object at some point. But when we, when we put it into context, you know, a child doesn't have, you know, a child goes from a fish to a person in an instant right when they're born. And so they're getting used to this world and they don't quite understand it and they're, they're just trying to find safety. And if you imagine that, you know, this little, this little soul is, is seeking safety, seeking nurture. And if we just, when he's, he or she is just relaxing, maybe playing or lying on the bed, and suddenly someone just picks him up. Like we can put ourselves into the baby's eyes or into their mind and say, that might be jarring. That might be quite jarring. And they're not gonna, most importantly, they're not gonna trust their environment. They're not gonna trust their environment as they age because at any time they might get picked up, they might get disturbed, they might get, you know, their diaper ripped off them. And so this respectful pause to, to me, has probably been one of the most profound insights of this program and this concept that Amelia kind of brought into our world.

Yeah, that's interesting because if you look at it from a physical development standpoint, a lot of animals tend to physically develop at a slightly faster rate than humans, such as dogs and cats, and so their motor development is more advanced. And so they might be able to display this physical reaction a Little bit better than say a newborn baby who's just in many cases.

A lump of flesh. But if you pick up a puppy or a kitten that's very young or not very far after newborn status, they do struggle when you first pick them up. A kitten might be clawing and scratching and a puppy might be struggling and trying to get out of your arms. And so you see this in other species. And if you approach, say a puppy or a kitten, at least in my experience, in a very kind of slow and controlled fashion, they almost get this warning sign that they're about to be picked up or touched. There seems to be a lot easier transition to being able to physically interact with them. So it makes sense. It makes a lot of sense. And starting from an early age, even before they might be able to, like a human baby might be able to physically display the resistance or the shock effect of physical interaction or something you might say to them, kind of getting ahead of the curve does really seem to make sense. And it seems to relate a little bit to this idea of slowness. I think you guys even have a quote from Magda Gerber, one of the ride developers in the book, about slowing down, how a parent can never go too slowly. So what does that exactly mean? Like the part about slowing down and slowness as a parent?

Yeah, absolutely. It's exactly what you're saying. It's this idea that babies and toddlers get easily overwhelmed, overstimulated and you know, we even know what that feels like to get overstimulated sometimes. So, you know, whenever we had any sort of struggle, you know, it was always an invitation to slow down because I remembered that quote from Magda Gerber. And really what it is is it's quality time. Because if we're, if we're moving too fast and our child is being overstimulated, then we're not enjoying the time together by moving too, too fast for him. I'm also getting stuck in this idea of this outcome based idea of our time together. And in ride the really one of the cornerstones of the philosophy is this idea of quality time. And it's broken up into two categories. There's want something quality time where you pay, you know, you're paying full attention, but you also have expectations. So that's like bathing, feeding, diapering. And then there's wants nothing quality time. And where slowness comes in, especially when you have expectations in this want something quality time, there are these moments that you actually are going to be spending with your time, your time with your child. Anyway, I was actually reading the other day that on average a baby gets diapered six or seven thousand times in their life.

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For people who aren't parents, when you say diaper, do you literally mean like changing their diaper?

Yes. Yeah.

Okay. You said six to seven thousand times.

From what age just on in their lifetime? I don't know. I don't know what that stat was like. You know, Leon's not in diapers anymore, so I don't know how, how much time that is in terms of, you know, before they get potty trained. But it's this idea that's a lot of time that you're going to be spending with your baby and making these moments of quality like a time of quality time and connection. It allows you to start cherishing these moments and it also makes it less likely you're going to have struggles in these areas, you know, like with lack of cooperation and slowness is just a key ingredient because you know, when we're moving slow enough for them, we actually get to enjoy the time. We also can enjoy the moments of playfulness in between. They're still children, you know, I don't define cooperation as being doing exactly the task at hand quickly. I have age appropriate expectations. So you know, even if he teases me or, you know, puts his pants in his arm or something when he's getting dressed, I think that's totally age appropriate and can be playful. And I also hold the cards and that I can invite him back to the task at hand at any time. But me giving myself permission to be slow and spending that quality time with him, it just makes it so nourishing. It actually, it fills both of our cups. So that, that is our part of our one on one time. And then, you know, we also have one on one time when we're together and we're playing and I'm responsive, you know, being there, not entertaining, but still there, present with him. And that allows us to step away when needed. And when he was a baby, I mean, he was very, very young. When we were leaving him alone in his safe space, he was probably, I mean, as soon as we moved into this house, we set up a, a gated safe area in our house and he would be, he would learn to play in there by himself. And it was, it's funny because parents would come to our house and they would, they would see this, this space and this enclosed area and think, well, you know, I, well, I've had a lot of conversations. I don't know what everyone thinks, but I have had conversations with parents where they say, well, I want my child to feel free. And it's so interesting because babies are natural explorers, limitations on their space actually offer a sense of safety. Because you have, yeah, yeah, you have this idea like you don't say no if they're not hearing no all the time.

That's the big thing for me to chime in on this is I'm very aware of, of any time I say no or make him wrong. And with that as kind of the, the guiding, one of the guiding principles is trying to reduce. I want him to trust world. I want him to be confident. And so if he's hearing no too often, I don't remember the statistic, but the number of times, it's some wild number every day that the average toddler hears the word no. And so this idea of the safe space, it's truly, it's 10 by 10 or something like that for most people, 10 by 10ft. And in there, there is nothing that can hurt them. There is nothing that can go wrong. There's nothing they can't play with. There's nothing they can't climb. And sometimes I as a parent am in there with him and he might be playing independently, which is kind of how we've, how we've trained him. But I might be in there with him reading a book and just being not, not present with him. He doesn't need me in there. But other times he'll play in there for an hour or two by himself. And you might find it interesting. Ben. Sometimes I play with music with him and when I put on, I have this. There's a YouTube channel called Meditative Mind and they have a three hour ocean sounds audio track on YouTube. He plays twice as long independently when I have that on softly. And so there's a powerful idea here to train our kids to be independent, to train them to play by themselves. And also quote biohack, I suppose their safe space with things like music and things that add to the sense of safety and calm of the space.

So.

And this is.

Yeah.

Oh, sorry, can I just add on a little bit? This ties in with our meeting our own needs as well. Because then when I need to go to the bathroom or I want to make dinner, I want to make some tea, I can actually step away and know that he's safe.

You know, it really made sense when I read that, like in the book, I think you call it a yes space. And I don't know if you had mentioned in the book how many times that an infant hears the word no and how that can kind of cognitively program them in a negative way. But it seems so readily apparent and intuitive and makes sense to just have a parent set up a space in their house where kind of like nothing could go wrong potentially, and the child's pretty protected and they just don't have to constantly hear the word no. And of course, it's far easier than like Taylor fashioning them a giant bubble suit that they can walk around in and go everywhere without hearing the word no. It seems far more sustainable than that. But yeah, just a small yes space. It's such a cool idea, but you don't hear about that too often. Well, I was thinking a couple things. First of all, the 6 to 7,000 opportunities for diapering and the advice that you've given to go slow during those moments is probably directly influenced by a child's diet, because the shittier the diaper stinks, the more likely you are to speed up. So maybe it's a sneaky way to get parents to teach their kids or to feed their kids healthy food so that those diapering moments can go by slowly without you having to implement a nose clip. But the other thing I was thinking about was when it comes to slowness.

And the idea of safety. I remember when I was being trained by you, Joseph, for my kettlebell certification, and you had me doing these death by carries, long periods of time with the kettlebell overhead and then racked at the chest and at the side. And one day you told me I should try putting a popsicle stick in my mouth.

And we can link to that previous podcast episode because you kind of get deep into the science of that and the effect on the nasal breathing and the humming and the increase in nitric oxide. But then you also told me to be breathing through my nose. Popsicle stick in the mouth. And we got into a little bit of a discussion about the cranial nerves. And I'm just curious, for example, back to the breath work. I don't recall where I learned this, but when river and Taryn and I do breath work, when we finish the session, which is often quite invigorating in the sauna and could almost be a little bit stressful, I suppose, or at least put you into a different mental space. When we come out of that and they open their eyes, I have them move their gaze to the left without moving their head and back to center, then to the right and back to center, then up and back to center, then down and back to center. And I think that tactic comes loosely from something called eye movement desensitization training, which is a way of reprogramming the brain, dealing with trauma, or shifting from activity to activity without much stress. And I'm just kind of throwing this out there. Joseph, I'm curious if you've come across anything in terms of eye movement or eye socating or training a child as far as the eye movements, where your eyes might go or where their eyes might go when it comes to slowness or decreasing stress.

Great, great question, Ben. And, and so, and I'll just say when you were chatting with em, I did a quick Google search and according to Google today, it says that the average toddler hears no 400 times a day. And so trying to get that down. Oh my God. Yeah, it's crazy. And so just to kind of add context to that. And so yeah, Ben. And you know what? So I'm, I'm a big believer in eye movement. You know, many years ago we have a ebook, it's still on the website, right? Breathe Better, Move Better. So we have an ebook that I'd be happy to share with you, Ben, and you can put it in the show notes called Breathe Better, Move Better. And one of the exercises in there or Two of them. One of them is an eye movement exercise. And just like you're doing with river and Taren, you know, it's. It's fun to assess people's vision in terms of, you know, can you stay to the perimeter of your eyes, perimeter of your vision, and do a full circle, or do your eyes kind of jump and skip and move? And that's kind of an indication of, of course, how we use our eyes, but also a little bit into the state of the nervous system. And. And we know that the suboccipitals, which are in the back of the skull, are directly influenced by eye movement. And the fact that, you know, in a modern world, us adults, we're looking down so much. We're looking at screens. We absolutely affect our body's perception of the world, our central nervous system. We disrupt our code, cranial nerves, for sure. Now, what's really interesting about Leon and. And the woman that I learned a lot of this from, her name is Lois Laney. I've got a couple of podcasts.

That's right. I remember you talking about her. I haven't interviewed her. But you have on your podcast, right?

Yes, I've done two or three shows with her. She's brilliant. She's out of Arizona. And we did some sessions for Leon when. When he was really young, because.

Yeah. So when he began. When he began walking. And I'm so glad you asked this when. When he began walking. And again, because I'm a, you know, an exercise scientist or an anatomist, whatever you want to call me, I don't think the average person would have seen any issue with my, you know, however old he was. Gait pattern. Right. But I said, there's something going on with his right foot. And call me crazy, but there's something going on there, and I don't think it's ideal. And I want to get a better understanding of where that signal is coming from and in terms of movement and everything else. Ben, you know, birth is a traumatic process for an infant. And so, you know, doing things at birth, you know, you can do. We did little exercises, what Lois calls the Swedish swirl, when he was born, to kind of activate some of the nerves in his mouth when he was born. But when he began to walk, and I saw a little bit of a gait disturbance, or at least that's what I felt. It was. I. Of course, I called up Lois. He did some sessions with her, and she did a lot with him on Zoom during COVID with different colors and different things. She was holding in her hands and moving his eyes around and getting him to focus on. We also ended up doing some work on the vibe plate, which we have in the garage with him, which is amazing. To reboot the cranial nerves and get things fired up.

Yeah, and the other thing that she did, she did, you know, we did some exercises and long story short, she did some exercises, she taught us how to do them. That involved his tongue and using a Q tip to kind of tickle different regions of his mouth that turned on these crazy nerves. And Ben, his gait straightened out. His gait straightened out. And over the course, as I was monitoring him, it was beginning to look like it was almost like a club foot, like a. Like a. It was going to be a. You know, he was going to have a stomp on the right and a normal gait on the left. And after, you know, how long did it take? Like two or three months of these exercises.

He's great. He's perfect. And it was just an amazing experience. And so I guess what I'm saying is as it relates to the cranial nerves, I think appreciating birth as a traumatic experience experience. And any traumatic experience can tune down some of the functionality or the connections or the order the cranial nerves are supposed to. Kind of like a Christmas tree. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. I believe there's 12. I'm a little rusty on this, but sometimes due to trauma, some of those switches get flicked off.

By the way, I can tell you it's on old Olympus, towering tops. A Finn and German viewed some hops. That was the mnemonic we used in anatomy back in college. So it's like olfactory optics, so on and so forth. But yeah, it's like 10 to 12 of them. But that's a total aside, cocktail party, Trivial Pursuit type of facts. But keep going.

Yeah, and I'll say that sometimes they get turned down, sometimes they don't fire sequentially. And all these things can create patterns in the body or in the mind. And so as it relates to you doing the breathwork, the nasal breathing, the Popsicle stick between the teeth, you know, your teeth are kind of. You could think of them almost as when your teeth are together, even if you're nasal breathing. But if you don't have a popsicle stick between them, they're. They're conducting electricity, more or less. And so when you are trying to reboot the system, putting that little tiny. On Amazon, you just type in like tiny popsicle stick. They're about 2 inches long. They work perfect for this. Keeping the teeth separated or wearing a mouth guard at night, especially if you grind those teeth, it's almost like completing a circuit when your teeth are together. And so as it relates to the nerves also being electric, you can get some really profound benefits and profound stimulation to the parasympathetic system. So if you're in overdrive, you know, kind of reducing the number of variables by separating the teeth is a great idea. Hummingbird is an amazing. Which I know and you've probably talked about at length on the podcast in terms of activating the parasympathetic system and of course, nasal breathing, both for the nervous system and nitric oxide production. And, you know, the mouth is kind of the panic button, so keeping it closed is just generally a good idea. And the last thing, Ben, I'll say is that. And I read this. There's. In one of the breathing books I read, it talked, this was years ago, but it talked about how Native Americans, if they ever caught their child sleeping with its mouth open, what they would do is just kind of tickle their, you know, above. Above their mouth and a little below their mouth, just kind of gently touch and it automatically, it taps into the nerves and the mouth kind of automatically closes. And so that's something I've always also monitored with Leon. Anytime I see him, if he is sleeping with his mouth open, I'll kind of give him that little tickle and his nerves will reflexively just shut his mouth and he'll start breathing through his nose again. And so, yeah, just all things to be kind of mindful of as parents, because you don't want to. You don't want to let bad habits go too long, I suppose, with the gait and the breath.

So, yeah, yeah, I suppose that's probably good. You're not mouth taping, Leon. I feel like that could possibly be a little bit traumatic. And by the way, the Swedish Swirl sounds like some kind of drink you'd order at a Northern European coffee shop or something. I can't help but ask, what is the Swedish Swirl?

So the Swedish Swirl is essentially. When we were in the hospital, I did it with my finger, but you could use a Q tip. And you're basically just tracing you're inside the lips. And just here I am doing it on the podcast.

You're just basically tracing and making sure that, you know, just touching something, just like touching above or below the mouth, is going to reflexively turn on some nerves and shut and seal the lips, doing the same thing inside the mouth with a clean hand and just kind of moving your finger around the outskirts of his mouth and then doing a little line down the tongue. That's the Swedish swirl. And it's just to get those cranial nerves that just went through a little bit of a trauma to hopefully sync back up.

Oh, fascinating. Now, I know you get deep into this stuff in your podcast with Lois. So if you're listening to the podcast right now, what I'll do is in the show notes, I'll hunt down those episodes. If you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com new a n e W, I'll link to those because I think they'd be a pretty interesting listen for a lot of my listeners. There's another interesting thing. I guess maybe it's from a disciplinary standpoint, but in the book you talk about redirects, redirecting a child's attention. I think the example you give if they were throwing sand was you said something that we don't throw sand, but we put the sand into the bucket like this. I'm curious if that's something you guys learned or if you can expound a little bit more on what this idea of redirecting the child's attention refers to and how it's done.

Absolutely. I should say first, it's not, first of all, redirecting. You know, the, the word itself sometimes has a negative connotation because it sounds like you are distracting. So we're not doing that, but we are allowing, you know, and, and basically allowing our son's natural urges as much as possible. And when we see something, you know, that isn't okay, maybe it's not sustainable, like it makes sense, too much of a mess or it's dangerous. Those are usually the two things that make me stop and come in and set a boundary instead of saying no. And of course, I did say no when he was really young, like in the living room, and there were off limits objects. Like, we really didn't have a lot of them, but we had, for example, our plants. And I didn't want him to stick his hands in our big plant and get dirt all over the place. So that was a firm no. But in the case of, you know, where he's doing something like throwing sand, that can be a really good opportunity to redirect instead of just saying no, which stifles that, you know, natural urge to be curious and explore and just to say, like, hey, you can't, you can't do it this way, but you can do it this way. And this is Such an incredibly effective way, especially under the age of 18 months. They don't even realize that you've redirected them. They're like, oh, great idea, mom. Like, that's like no struggle. There's no power struggle. So that is a really, really simple way to get what you need. And also you do have to be consistent. Like any time we set a boundary, we set a limit. You know, we don't do this, but we do this, but you can do it like this. You know, those types of things. You do have to be consistent so that the child naturally continues to, you know, play with that object in a way that's appropriate. And you also can do another thing other, other than redirecting attention. You can also put praise when they're doing something in a way that you like. And that's another way to encourage that kind of behavior.

Yeah, it seems to me that a lot of parents engage in, not that I want to throw a whole bunch of parents under the bus, what I guess you could call lazy parenting. It's easy to say no. It's easy to say eat this. It's easy to say do this. It's a little bit harder to creatively come up with options when you want them to proactively be a part of the choice making process or alternatives when there are better things they could be doing than say, throwing sand. And I think a big, big part of it is embracing creativity as a parent and understanding that despite. I don't know about you guys, but the way I was raised was very much, yes, no, do this, do that, don't ask questions, follow marching orders. And I think there's just so many advantages to giving a child in a creative manner, options and alternatives. And I think that honestly, if you think forward from a legacy standpoint as far as raising a child in that manner, not only, of course, are you ensuring that they learn some of those skills for their own children, but I personally been thinking a lot about this emergence of particularly things like GPT and AI driven algorithms and the fact that I think some of the more successful humans, particularly the creative humans, the makers of the world, so to speak, are going to be those who can write effective prompts to machines and robots and who can, who can delegate effectively and give instructions effectively. And so I think in kind of a sneaky way, perhaps when you raise a child in the way that you're describing, you're also enabling them. This might sound like a little bit of a far reach, but to interact with the emerging technology in the world that they're going to grow up in, in a more intelligent and creative way. I mean, I honestly have been thinking a lot about how I can teach river and Terran to delegate and write prompts effectively, because I think I can already see it's going to be a massively important skill for humans going forward in the next several years.

Yeah, that's so interesting. And what you said a little bit earlier makes me think of also this idea of discipline, really how we define it, because you're right, it's like this lazy parenting. But I think it comes from this idea that my children are my property and I want them to do as I say. And the problem with this approach is that it doesn't honor the whole child. And I come back to like, you know, what's really your goal? You know, you set, you set limits, but, you know, if the goal is to have a child that listens to you, you can, you're stifling a lot of these, like, natural behaviors, like creativity, like you said. But if your goal is, you know, self discipline, self care, confidence, and having a child who enjoys cooperating with you, then, you know, you don't get a child who enjoys cooperating. If you're not honoring the whole child and if you're not honoring his urges and his needs and his, his nature and also having age appropriate expectations, you have to make it easy for them and they have to be ready for the limits that you're setting. And in that framework, you can, you can really nurture this creativity and this natural exploration that, you know, they want to do. That's exactly it. It's going to set them up for, you know, being really creative in the future.

Yeah.

Go ahead, Joe. Joseph.

I'll just say that, you know, in a way, when I look at the sort of hypothesis of Rye and I'll say that, you know, if you're creating a scenario where, you know, we're saying no a lot as an example to the child and they're not, you know, developing, they're missing those opportunities for age appropriateness and to learn why, you know, they'll deduce maybe why sand throwing isn't okay if we say you can't do that, but you can do this over time, they'll start to make those connections. So I guess part of the hypothesis of this parenting approach that we hope pans out is just kidding, is that there's a little more work up front, a little more awareness, a little more intentionality, with the idea being that you're raising not only a confident kid and a stable kid, but a child that you really enjoy being with, that, you know, it's not driving you to drink a bottle of wine at the end of the day because you're exhausted, because you've said no 400 times. And so that's kind of just to kind of, I guess, set that. That frame. Is that the. As Amelia said, like, the. What's the goal? You know, the goal is to create a person that is independent and can function in the world. And that's. That's kind of the approach here. And I'll say, as Amelia said, I just want to reiterate the importance of consistency. And I've learned this as a dad when, you know, I let things slide and, you know, how quickly things can unravel, and this gets into, you know, really vetting childcare and making sure that they're on board and things like that, because it's, you know, you. The consistent boundaries and the consistent theme is really vital to the success of. Of this parenting approach.

Kids thrive on consistency. It's something that is probably one of the hardest parts for me as a traveling father is to maintain things like the morning and evening meditations and the Bible verse that we typically memorize once a day and the evening meetings to discuss the chapters in the books that they've been assigned, and the morning workouts and the later afternoon breath work. It's like, I know how good the consistency in these routines and daily habits and rituals are for young people not only to learn, but to feel like they're in a safe place and also to just kind of keep the family together. But it's actually hard. It's almost like gardening, right? You're always like, you're never done pulling weeds, you're never done organizing, you're never done managing, you're never done planting seeds. And, yeah, when I travel.

Especially in the past few years, I've just been more and more effectively using texts, emails, phone calls, video calls, really good communication with Jessa, so that if I'm gone six days at a conference or whatever, and I come back, it's close to us not having skipped a beat. But I just want parents to know. A lot of parents struggle with this, including myself. When you're trying to implement a lot of positive habits for a child with maintaining consistency, because it's easy to forget and it's easy to lose track, and it's easy to take that all or nothing approach of, hey, I just traveled for six days and we missed a few, so, oh, what the hell. It's all going to go to pot. But really, it's so important to maintain consistency with a lot of these habits. And I just want to encourage people listening in that you can do it. Everybody struggles with it, but you can do it. You just have to really proactively manage it in the same way that you might go to the gym each day or choose a healthy meal for breakfast each day. And I wanted to ask you guys, oh, by the way, Joe, you mentioned if it pans out, if it doesn't pan out and Leon winds up in juvenile detention, I'm just going to delete this podcast and pretend this conversation never happened.

Now, the rye approach. I recall there was a point in the book where you said that you do stray outside that approach, and you mentioned that particularly you do that when it comes to sleep. You said that you don't perfectly follow the right parenting method when it comes to sleep. Can you explain what you mean by that?

Yes. And I don't like to give sleep advice in general because there's so much. Sleep is a really hard area.

It's a controversial topic.

Yeah, we're still breastfeeding. He's almost three, and we're still not fully weaned. He's obviously not relying on it for nutrition. And I'm pregnant. I'm due in June, so I'm really trying to get that gone out of our routine before then. But I ended up just in this, you know, like a lot of breastfeeding moms, you know, you end up bringing the baby to bed with you. And I still think this is the most respectful way to sleep, you know, and at least for for us, this is absolutely what was the right fit for us. Because when a baby wakes up a lot during the night, if he's right there next to you, then you don't really, you don't have to get up. It's not a whole ordeal getting up to feed the baby. So that really, really worked for us. I do believe babies thrive being close to their mothers at night, if you're comfortable with that. Of course, there's safety concerns and there's also precautions you can take to make sure that it is definitely safe and the right fit for your family. But we are in this phase right now that interesting. And I think we are just kind of going with the flow. I love, like right now, like, the snuggles and the conversations, like when we're falling asleep at night and the cuddles, like, it's so worth it. And like, the intimacy and the connection. It feels so Good. But, you know, there, there were times, especially in the first year, where I was like, man, I need a sleep train. Like, I'm not, I'm not getting anything done. It takes me too long to put him down. And, you know, there it is. It's a big sacrifice. At the same time, I recognize being a parent is you do sacrifice things and that's part of it right now. It's so easy, our routine is so easy with the co sleeping that I'm not. And I don't need to change anything right now. But I think once baby number two comes, we're going to be changing some things up. I just don't know exactly what that's going to look like for us yet.

Yeah, you can only fit so many kids into a bed. But all joking aside, we know that heart rate variability syncs up when humans are in the same space. We have these unique sinking capabilities. You hear about how women's periods and menstrual cycles will sometimes align, possibly based on moon cycles, when a whole bunch of women are together in the same place for an extended period of time. Or you'll hear about how horse jockey's heart rate variability will sync with that of the horses when they enter into the stall, if they've established a trusted relationship with that horse. And we also know that the heart rate variability of a human emanates about 15ft out from their heart's area as an electrical field and directly influences the hearts and the brains of others around them. And I don't know if this has been studied, but I'm pretty confident that there's a certain amount of brainwave synchronicity that occurs between a child and a parent when they're co sleeping. And the reason I say this is not based on research that I've done, but some of the best naps that I've ever had in my life and siestas and sleeping periods I've ever had in my life were during the period of time that river and Taryn were co sleeping with Jessa and I. It was really odd. We just all fall asleep and sure, they wake up, they thrash, sometimes they cry, but particularly for naps, we would sometimes all climb into bed and normally for a siesta I'll sleep like 20 minutes. And I'd sometimes be scrambling with work and missed appointments because I'd wake up two hours later just because. And I think this is the case, there was some type of a brainwave syncing that occurred between the sleeping infant's peaceful brain and my own Ramped up stressed beta brainwaves that probably slipped pretty quickly into theta or delta with the kid right there in the bed. I just sense that's the case.

But you just hope you don't give your kid the beta.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Maybe it could flow both directions. Or maybe it's because there were two of them, they overrode mine. I don't know.

It's like, can I just have a coffee? Yeah, Ben. And what's so interesting, because the heart, Math, Science, the HeartMath Institute, they have some research, and I think it was. It wasn't on. I think it was on dogs. But when you bring the dog and the person together, both of their HRV and coherence sync. But when you bring them apart again, they drop below baseline levels. And so there's something to be said as well, just from a primal evolutionary perspective that what are the chances that a baby ever would have been left alone? Truly, right. In a. In a more ancestral way of living, they never would have been alone. We never would have thrown them, you know, in bed and let them cry and let them, because they have no, no, no protection. They have no security. We want them. So there's something to be said as well. And I think part of the reason I was opposed to certain types of sleep training, even though, I mean, there are experts and there are people that do this and, you know, swear by it, and they could be on the podcast and convince your audience of the other side of this coin. But for me, being such a sort of. I'm always looking in the. The more kind of what seems in alignment with the way we've been doing things the longest. And I just didn't feel that leaving a child alone, say, in their own room or leaving them to cry would be consistent with the level of protection and nurturing and security that they would have received in a more sort of wild upbringing.

Yeah, Yeah, I agree. I doubt our caveman ancestors had a separate cave for the infants with a, you know, ancient stone EMF radiating, wireless baby monitor in the baby's cave.

So I could have a podcast that. Ben. EMFs and the Bluetooth around it.

Oh, my gosh.

Yeah. Baby monitors and EMFs are a thing, folks. If you aren't aware of that, you should be. Now, I gotta ask. I know we're starting to run short on time here a little bit, but I've observed the mindful research that both of you have done with your parenting and the growth of Leon, and I've been very impressed with his stability, even down to his biomechanics, Joe, as you noted, probably due to that internal confidence when I've spent time with him down at Runga. Although he does need to work on his foam rolling skills. We'll work on those next time. But I gotta ask you.

What are your plans for education? What are your plans for school? Because certainly you've looked into this or thought about it. I would imagine.

Something. It's something that we have been kind of struggling with a little bit in terms of, you know, my initial instinct for, you know, wanting him to be in an environment playing with other kids was so that it would free me up a little bit because he still is at home with us. And recently we got a nanny who comes twice a week and gives me just enough time to, to kind of catch up with work. So for now I've stopped thinking about school. At the same time I do see, I think around the age of three, there's some farm schools in our area. There's a, there's a Walder school that is absolutely beautiful. We're really, really fond of it. We're going to be exploring those options a little bit more. I think for me what it's going to come down to is I don't necessarily, you know, I don't know when he's going to be ready for a full time program. I would love like a two or three days a week program and then have him at home, you know, doing things with me. This is such a great age to, you know, get them involved. Baking, cooking, cleaning, laundry. There's so much we can do together.

He made a cake yesterday.

Yeah, we made a chocolate cake. It's so fun and it's like, and he is learning and it's very age appropriate. There's so much to learn at this age as it is just, you know, getting dressed by yourself, potty training, cleaning. You know, there's so much that he's learning just about what it means to take care of a home. Even you know, my expectations, you know, he, he plays independently and he's often aware of like what's, what I'm doing. While he's playing independently, he's learning about that what happens in the household. What happens when daddy goes to work? He's, you know, he walks the dog, he takes care, he feeds the dog. He just participates so much in the household that I think that this time, the next two years, I think with a new baby are going to be very indicative of what we do schooling wise for him. But at this age it feels very Right. To have him as much with us as we can.

It feels right. And right now, you know, Ben and we've put him into a couple of schools and just, you know, we haven't totally aligned and so we've pulled him out again. But, you know, there's a Waldorf school here in Austin that we visited and we suspect he'll end up at. But a lot of the schools that are in alignment, you know, there's just long wait lists and things like that. And so yeah, I suspect the big thing, I think for me, you know, just to tack on with Amelia, the big thing for me is we're, you know, we have another one coming and so we want to make sure what we do with Leon is sustainable to the other children that we have in the future as well. And so, and so, yeah, that's, that's part of it.

And we have friends with homeschool co ops and like, you know, who are unschooling. Like we have friends doing a ton of different things on the spectrum of homeschooling. And that to me is just spending more and more time with them. I'm starting to get an idea of what my options are. You know, what can I do? Can I. I think a hybrid approach is probably going to be where we end up like in a two day a week program, maybe like joining a homeschool co op on one or two days as well. Just little things like that. I feel like Austin's a great place for us to be right now because there's a lot of families who are like minded doing things like that.

Might have to build a runga school.

I think that'd be cool. I'm doing kettlebells and ice baths and kundalini and meditation all day with the occasional organic farm to table dinner. Now it's interesting because river and Taren are enrolled in a program called Apogee A P O G E E. Every Friday they have a two to three hour mentoring session and Q and A with the new guest who's typically like a creative entrepreneur.

Or a Navy SEAL or an inspirational super athlete or something like that. And they just get to sit and be mentored by that individual along with about 20 to 30 other, in their case, boys who are part of this Apogee program. And then each month they have special assignments such as.

Creating.

A resume or going out into the local community and finding three people who they can conduct a 15 minute interview with about how that person got to where they're at in their current career, et cetera. And then they also have assigned workouts each day that all the other boys are doing and discussing in this private online workspace that they interact in. And it's a really fantastic program they've been doing for a couple years. But the guy that runs it, Matt Boudreaux, he co founded something called Acton Academy. I think he might have co founded with Tim Kennedy. Either co founded Apogee with Tim Kennedy or the Acton Academy with Tim Kennedy. Yeah. And apparently even though I don't have any personal experience having visited the academy, it does a fantastic job with extreme ownership principles with a child or a young student taking responsibility. The kids are typically grading each other's papers and speaking in front of the classroom just as much as the teachers are. And I've heard nothing but good reports of this Acton Academy. A C T O N. I think they may have a location in Austin. So that just kind of crossed my mind as you guys were talking about schooling options.

I don't have any experience with it, but I have been impressed with Matt's Apogee program.

So that sounds amazing the program that the boys are doing. And I have heard of Acton Academy. I haven't looked into it yet though, but I do know they have a location in Austin.

Yeah, yeah. And I don't know what the waitlist or anything looks like, but anyways, I know we're about out of time. There's so many other questions I could ask you. And of course in an act of shameless self promotion, I have to say you do have a chapter in the boundless parenting book which folks can find on my website. And if they want to learn more about your guys unique parenting principles, I think that your chapter would be a really good one to digest. Like I mentioned, Joseph has a podcast and I'll link to some of those episodes we discussed in the shownotes@bengreenfieldlife.com anew and then also this runga event, I mentioned the introduction that it's private, but what I mean by that is that each participant is vetted, is interviewed and typically you're surrounded by a group of really great people who Joseph and Amelia have reviewed and made a part of. This typically like about a three day event. And so if you're interested in that and getting to know Joseph and Amelia a little bit better, then I recommend you look into those runga events also. And let's see, am I missing anything you guys?

I don't think so. Well, I did want to say we have a very exciting shift to the model that I haven't even told you about Ben, but we're hosting our first ever conference in October. So it's going to be a micro conference. So still super intimate, 100 people and, you know, a lot of different experts, workshops, panels, keynotes, therapies, all the things that, you know, we've been doing over the last few years slightly on a larger scale. And the theme is going to be Gut health and inflammation. So we can really dive deep. And I think this is going to be life changing, especially for people for who you know those issues are pervasive.

And do all the attendees get microdoses, micro machine toys and small microcirculation recovery boots?

I don't know about that. I don't even know about that.

At the micro conference.

Yeah, all of the above, Ben.

All right, great, I'm in. Well, you guys, it's been fantastic to have a chat and to learn about what you're doing with Leon. I think this is going to be really informative and inspirational for a lot of parents. And if you're listening, you have questions, comments, feedback, anything you want to add or if you want to access the resources for this episode, you can go to BenGreenfieldLife.com anew that's BenGreenfieldLife.com a n e W and Joseph and Amelia, thank you so much for coming on and sharing your wisdom.

Thank you so much for having us, Ben.

It's always so great to connect. Thank you so much for all you do.

Thanks man. I appreciate it. And for everybody listening in, I'm Ben Greenfield along with Joseph, Anu and Amelia Roon signing out from BenGreenfieldLife.com have a wonderful week.

I am coming to London June 16th through the 18th and I'm going to be a part of the health optimization summit over there. And if you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com calendar you can check out that event. Fantastic. Kind of like biohacking meets wellness meets massive health technology expo. But while I'm there, I'm going to be in London with my whole family. We're actually going to head to to Italy afterwards and cycle through Italy. But I decided to put on a very special private, intimate VIP event with me while I am in London. It's at this crazy place called Hum2n. Hum2n. Like human except for the two. So Hum2n Labs, they are a creme de la creme biohacking facility. I mean the best hyperbaric chambers, amazing selection of IVs, super nutrient cocktails, cryotherapy, red light therapy. We're basically going to party and biohack and do a Q and A with me and the fine proprietor of that facility, Dr. E, who's a wealth of knowledge in and of himself at that event. It's Monday, June 19, so it's going to be private networking, live Q and A, great food, great cocktail mocktails, experiential biohacks, a variety of healthy gourmet foods is just going to be really amazing. You're going to get a swag bag too. Your swag bag includes super nutrient IV cryotherapy, red light therapy and hyperbaric oxygen. That's worth £750 alone. Then you got the H2MN supplements. They're going to give you their brain sharpener and their super blend protein. You get a travel voucher to take you to and from the event, meaning using a company called Uno. They will bring you to and from the event if you have trouble finding it or don't want to drive. So there's a lot more that are going to go into the Sway bag too. But right now I have to tell you, this thing is going to fill up fast. It's in London June 19th and you get there by going to BenGreenfieldLife.comHUM2N London that's BenGreenfieldLife.com HUM2N London and that will allow you to claim your spot at this fantastic event. So. So. BenGreenfieldLife.com Hum2n London.

More than ever these days, people like you and me need a fresh, entertaining, well informed and often outside the box approach to discovering the health and happiness and hope that we all crave. So I hope I've been able to do that for you on this episode today. And if you liked it, or if you love what I'm up to, then please leave me a review on your preferred podcast listening channel, wherever that might be. And just find the Ben Greenfield Life episode. Say something nice. Thanks so much. Means a lot.