55. Improve Your Health For A Happier Life By Doing These Things

Yesterday I was so happy I dropped a VM to my mate where I'm like, I'm like, mate, all this like money and investing and crypto being able to breathe, mate, I've never felt this wealthy.

Yeah, that's awesome.

It feels absolutely incredible. And don't be afraid to sacrifice your short and medium term goals for your long term goals. Your long term goals are the most important. And when I think about it now, like, how dumb am I? I want to continue like lifting so I can reach a goal. Right. I want to be able to dunk, I want to keep working out. But long term, if I have this, this is actually going to accelerate that and it's going to be a benefit for the rest of my life.

Welcome back to another episode of the Ben and Berg show with your favorite MBA and high school dropout. Today we're talking about doing the hard thing. Burgs has come back from getting an operation done. It's been away for a couple of weeks. So it's good to have him back. He's starting to sound a little bit human. So we're talking about the hard things. We've all got those hard things in our life that we keep putting off. I keep putting off a surgery I need to have and Berg's going to convince us as to why. By doing the hard thing, you're going to come out on the better side. Bergs, how are you man?

Mate, I'm doing well. I'm doing so much better. I'm feeling good and mate, I got to talk you guys through this. So I went in for some surgery. I did delay it once but that was only like a month kind of delay. I wasn't comfortable with a few things and they all got resolved. Spoke to the consultant, everything's all good. That was a timing issue as well. So let's walk you through this. Right? So first of all, why, why did I do this? Why did this happen?

What did you do? What did you do?

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so I had deviated septum surgery. Right. So the middle of your nose, the thing going up the middle is called a septum. And there were a few other bits and bobs going on, which I'll explain. But basically this was just so bent, so. Right. And I haven't been punched in the face, I haven't been kicked in the head, anything like that. It's just from birth. I've known about this for a while and basically on my left side it's you can breathe perfectly fine. On my right side it's like, 99 blocked. So I was never able to breathe properly. And this is a challenge because just in normal day is a struggle, right? I've got a few allergies as well, so that doesn't help. Like dust and pollen and stuff. But just in your normal day, you can't breathe properly through your nose, so you tend to mouth breathe a lot. It affects your sleep, sleep and it affects your recovery and it's just really hard. And a couple of my mates went, they had this surgery done. They're like, mate, it's life changing, you've got to get amongst it. So I was like, right, let's get this done. So let me walk you through the story night before, mate, and this is a relatively easy one. The prep is just don't eat food in the morning, night before. I'm like, I won't be able to work out for a while. I can't deadly for a month. This is gonna suck. So I get in, have like a massive workout the night before, feeling great, rock up, go to the hospital. And this hospital is, is actually really good. It's called. It was called Glengarry Hospital in Perth. Small hospital, only 100 beds. And, mate, it's like going into a hotel. You just like, you check in, it's real chill, you know, you've got this really nice fancy room. It's got like this reclining chair, all this, it's just so good. Like the whole experience managed end to end, was just brilliant. It's not like a big hectic hospital that I'm used to. Anyway, they come in, they do the forms, I speak to the. Speak to everyone, go to the anesthesia area, go to the surgeon. And he's an absolute lad. I think he's like just a couple of years older than me. And I helped him out with a few things back when I used to work and have a chat to him. He's like, bro, you got any questions? All right, we'll sort this out, we'll sort that out. Talking to the nurses. And it's funny, the same time I went from a procedure last time, just before you're in the room, you're in the theater and you're going to have anesthetic and they ask you, oh, so what do you do? And I'm like, oh, I used to work in health, we talk about that. I'm like, yeah, now I work in crypto, like, you know, teach people about bitcoin and stu. And they're like, oh. And then everyone's got a story. I start Talking about it and like, half a sentence in, I'm like, and then I wake up in recovery. Twice that's happened now, man. So anyway. So anyway, I'll walk you through this experience and what it's actually done for me. So I wake up in recovery. I wake up, like, great. They give me this, like, icy pole. Have the icy pole. Great. Go back to the room feeling really good. And I get to go home that night. The wife comes and picks me up. Get to go home. Now, what they've actually done is they've cut away part of my septum, straightened it, put some splints in, and then there's these things called turbinates that hang down. They're really big because I had a lot of space. So they've reduced those and done some sinus stuff as well. So get home the first night, get on the couch, and what they give you is like this basically, like a tampon thing you put under your nose because blood's coming out, right? And you got to put it, like, around your ears. So you're wearing this on your face. You're big, you're swollen, and you just, like, you got to sleep upright on some pillows. And I was just out, still under anesthetic. Night was fine. But you wake up an hour later, and you're like, what the fuck? Because you can't breathe through your nose. So in your nose, it's just filled with stuff, and it's all packing right up your nose. You cannot breathe through your nose at all. So your mouth breathing right as I'm on the couch, and I wake up, and my mouth is like the fucking desert man. Like, I, like, literally touch my tongue to the top of my mouth, and it's like sandpaper. What the.

So you constantly wake up every half hour going, oh, my God, I'm gonna die. And then you wake up, you come to, and then you drink some water, right? So the next day, this is when it gets serious. Okay, so this is typical salesman. All the surgeons are like, yeah, you know, the recovery is fine. There's not too much pain. This is what I'm going to do for you. They really focus on the benefits. They don't really give you the beans of what it's like, right? And you're not really prepared for it, so you have to do a thing called a sinus rinse.

And.

And for people that don't know what this is, you tilt your head to the side, you get, like, a small little bottle of water with salt in it, and you just pour it into your nose, open your mouth, goes up one nostril, comes out the other and it just cleans it out. Relatively simple, straightforward. Done it before in my past. Don't care about them at all. Now, here's the challenge. What they don't tell you. You can't blow your nose for two weeks. And you can't sniff either. Your nose is full of. And you can't do anything about it. And your instinct is just to sniff, sniff, and you just can't. And the whole thing about this is just. It's psychological torture of you just being uncomfortable constantly, right? And you have to push through it because in our lives we always go for comfort. We want to be comfortable, you know, we don't have to want to worry about stuff. And mate, there was just like a mental back and forth. So anyway, here's. Here's the beans. I go and do the sinus rinse and like, hardly any water comes out. I'm like, what the. So what's happened? It's all gone up into the packing and it's basically like a big sponge and absorbed it. And I got all this pressure in my head. I'm like, what the. And I'm like, I'm like. Every time you swallow, you feel the pressure and then like half an hour later you'd be sitting down, you feel it like come out your nose or go down the back of your throat.

Or something like that.

Oh, my God. It was completely. Anyway, that went on for a couple of days. Then, mate, the big goods are starting. So you've got to do these sinus rinses four times a day. You got to be on antibiotics for 10 days every four hours. And you've got to take just, just Panadol. The pain wasn't too bad at all, just a little bit of discomfort, like a one out of ten pain. So, mate, you go do the science reasons and you start to look forward to it. You start to become a sicko where you're like, it's your only relief that you get during the week is just to clear your nose with some of that water. So you do it and. Oh my God, mate, the, like the things that come out, it's like your brain's coming out these big guzzles, like, like you can pull them out and they're like. And they're like. It just looks like jam. It's so, so fucked, right?

But then the goods are snap off and you want to get it out and you can't. You're like. So anyway, this, this goes on. And day by day you start to get better, you start to get more coherent. You sound more like a human. But I want to, what I really want to talk people through is sacrificing for your longer term goals and then also the mental torture that you go through in doing that. And a lot of people, even in chess, I would call this a queen sacrifice where you never ever sacrifice your queen unless you've got a hope of winning. That's when you do it. And the path I was on, how I was training, how I was eating, it was just so good. I was feeling great. And then I'm like, no, I'm stopping all of that. I'm going back to zero. I'm not going to be able to lift for like a month, but that's okay because my long term goals are to just be a better human. And this is a huge optimization that's going to deliver a lot of benefit to me. But the psychological torture I went through, I put myself through because I'm a idiot. Like day two, three, four, five, six was just, I'm sitting down, I'm watching Marvel movies, I'm watching Curb youb Enthusiasm. I'm doing nothing. I'm a piece of, I need to lift, I need to be productive. Work needs me. Why am I not doing anything? And my God, it took me a solid week to get out of that mind frame and just relax. Even, even when you saw me. And you're just like, bro, you're so relaxed. Like before we did the episode with Bell, you were relaxed and you're like, you're a different human. Like normally you'd be freaking out, like, oh, we have to prepare, we have to do that.

So for listeners, just a quick bit of context. Like, you know, I, I'm, I just roll into these things, you know, like, and I just sort of make it up as we go and like, you know, I know what we're talking about. I, I deliver my best stuff unplanned, unscripted, you know, Berg's, Berg's the opposite, right? We need to, you know, and that's why Bergs plans these episodes. Just FYI, Burgess is the planner and usually when we have a guest, like that's, that's important, right? We're having someone on the show, we need to be prepared. I just sort of roll in sort of five minutes before, come up with a few things and just, I, I, I tend to just, you know, wing it. And, and in the past that has really caused some anxiety for Mr. Bergs over here. By coming back.

So what Ben, what Ben is trying to say is my back is sore from carrying team and he shifts his stress to me because he's a piece of. So, you know, one of us has to be prepared, right? Like if we're going on a journey into the desert, we're going to die. If I don't prepare, we're going to die, let's just put it that way.

But. But then something happened and I read a book called the Psychology of Money and we're going to do an episode on that next week. But there was one part in there where it just said, you're a human. You're a completely normal, screwed up human. And it said, don't be rational, rational, be reasonable. And that really stuck with me where I'm trying to be rational, rational me. And I got David Goggins in my head going, you're too soft, you need to do all this stuff. And thinking about CT Fletcher, who basically had a heart transplant and then was out a week later in the car park working out, and I'm like, I need to be like those guys. I'm like, why? Like, that doesn't need to happen. I need to focus on my recovery. This is what's important here. And from going a million miles an hour to slowing right down and focusing on my recovery, that mental shift was just so relieving and so much tension went out of my body after I had that shift and just focus on the one thing ahead of me and letting the rest of that go was just an incredible feeling. And you had a similar thing when you went on a week's holiday, right? Yeah, just, just getting out of it when you came.

Just getting out of the. Every day having a proper reset, a refresh, you know, I was active though. Like I wasn't, I wasn't going through surgery. And then afterwards, like sitting there waiting for you see, if I had to sit there for like two weeks, you know, because you're recovering and just thinking about everything, mate, I would be going crazy. No wonder you're having that sort of self talk. Like I was on Contiki, I was busy every day, like I was doing.

And that's, that's the other thing as well, where I finished work on the Tuesday night and then went for surgery on Wednesday. There was no break in between. So it's going a million miles an hour to basically zero.

Yeah, yeah, that's.

And it was just going, going. That transition was just really, really challenging for me. Mentally coping with it being unproductive was actually okay. And shifting that mindset of always having a goal, always working towards something, always trying to be highly productive and shifting that mindset. Yeah. And all the kind of psychology books and.

That that I've kind of read and all the philosophy books where it's saying the goal oriented mind, you will always suffer. Right. If you have a goal, you will suffer because you're going to be unhappy until you get what you want. Whereas if you just live in the present and appreciate what you have now, you'll be a very happy person. And this just highlighted it to me again. So it's been one of the biggest gifts I've been given to have that cognitive reframing over the last couple of weeks.

That's awesome. It's good to hear.

It's just been so good and. Yeah, and spoiler alert, here you go.

So you've been breathing in 4k ultra HD and I've still got swelling in my nose, I've still got like, you know, the mucus and all that kind of stuff. But mate, before when I was breathing and now when I'm breathing, it's just like, it's like I have even no nose at the front. The air just goes in. It is absolutely incredible. So even though it's only been two weeks, like all my mates have said this and I'm going to say it as well, I highly recommend if you've got a dodgy nose, a stuffed up septum, enlarged turbinates, all that kind of stuff, go and see an ENT professional and get their opinion. Because this can genuinely be lifechanging and the dividend you get paid is every single day. And yesterday I was so happy, I dropped a VM to my mate where I'm like, I'm like, mate, all this like money and investing and crypto, being able to breathe, mate, I've never felt this wealthy.

Yeah, that's awesome.

It feels absolutely incredible. And don't be afraid to sacrifice your short and medium term goals for your long term goals. Your long term goals are the most important. And when I think about it now, like, how dumb am I? I want to continue like lifting so I can reach a goal. Right. I want to be able to dunk, I want to keep working out. But long term, if I have this, this is actually going to accelerate that and it's going to be a benefit for the rest of my life. Yeah.

Good on you for doing the hard thing, man. I think we can all attest to the fact that we're pushing, pushing back. We don't want to do and, and taking that short term hit for long term gain is actually a lot harder to do in practice. I'm taking that on board. So I've got to have another hernia operation. I've already had one and I just know how it was. Two weeks I couldn't move and I've been pushing it back, pushing it back because I'm like, I don't, like I can't take two weeks off but it causes a lot of like discomfort and pain like most days. And I'm like, it's coming to a point now. Or like I actually I said to my EA the other day, I was like, let's push it back, I want to do this. And she's like, no. I was like, yeah, okay, good call. And hearing you say that and now.

Where you're at now, push it back a couple of times.

Yeah.

And think about it, if you look back, if you look forward a few years and you look back on this point in time, this is the thing you want to do, this is the important thing. But we get caught up in the moment. Like what is important for the next hour, the next two days, the next three days, all that you're not going to remember in five years, but you will remember this operation and your quality of life. Like you were even saying like some days you can't just do stuff because it hurts.

Right?

Yeah, it's, it's like you need to get that sorted. Yeah.

And also getting help and getting, talking to, talking to people that know their. Has been a big game changer for me recent times. So I haven't, I haven't had a surgery like Berg says, but I took that week off and I realized when I was overseas, like, you know, I work a lot. Like I probably, you know, realistically behind the desk or on the computer for at least 65 to 70 hours a week, I reckon. And I was getting sick. I was in this cycle of like going really hard. I'd start at the top because I'd be super excited and pumped and then I go so hard for the next two weeks that I continue to grind down all of my like my energy and my, my health. I wouldn't be eating well. I actually wasn't eating vegetables. I was eating burgers and pizzas and I was like sleeping and I'd be like hooked to dopamine and it was just like grinding, grinding, grinding to a point where I'd get sick. I got influenza in Thailand, I got really bad gastro here in Melbourne not that long ago. I had a bad cold, I was going, there's like three week cycles. And when I came back from Thailand I was like, I can't do this anymore. Like I, I. But I don't want to decrease the output, I actually want to increase output, but I'm getting sick. So I went and saw a, I went to see the GP and then went and saw a naturopath and I went and got a PT trainer. And in the last two weeks, this is when why you've been away actually Bergs, it's fascinating to, you know, like, we've actually, we've sort of overlapped in like improvements of life.

But this is, this is incredible where you were talking about asking for help. I'm very bad at asking for help. And you are the guy we just like, I'm fucked, I don't know what I'm doing, I'll go get some help. And instantly like, I come back, you're like, yeah, I've seen naturopath, gone to a gp, got a pt, got my eating done. Like, you just go out and you get it done. This is what you do, you take action, which is why you're successful. I want you to talk us through, like, why did you decide so you and actually, let's talk about your boom bus cycle because this is hilarious. This is Ben, right? So he'll go out, he'll work really hard for like a week, two weeks, three weeks. He's like, man, I'm human optimization. I've got this sales funnel, man. I've got these ad people in. Oh, it's so good. This is just pumping. Look at these numbers. This is so sick, mate. I couldn't even sleep. I was on this date and all I could think about were the numbers, mate. And then I was up at 3am and I was doing all this and I'm like, ben, you're going on turbo. And then like he's literally at the point of delirium and then he will, he'll get sick because he's doing so much, it'll get run down that it'll cop like an influenza or a gastro or something like that. And then he'd be like, oh mate, it's the sickest I've ever been. He'll be out for like a week or two still trying to work and then he'll come back, he's like, oh mate, I am human optimization. This just cycles.

If you map it out, it was a cycle and you'd message me like.

Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna do technical Analysis on Ben. I'm gonna like go through our slack channel and I'm literally gonna do time cycles in there and we'll just see where the peaks and troughs.

But it's like, I think for a lot of us, like a passionate about something or just want something so bad or wanting to succeed. Like you, you put your health aside, you know, like, that's like come second.

Yes.

You know, you, you, you were the same burgs and you've gone through like this fitness journey more recently and putting yourself, you know, at first. And like, you know, I'm starting to do that now too, because I realize it's not, it's not sustainable. And you go through these cycles, like, do you want to go to 120 kilometers an hour and then go to zero? Or do you want to, you know, run it 90 kilometers an hour for, for months on end? Like that for me, sounds much more sustainable.

Sustainability is the thing. And it comes back to sprinting marathons. Even when I was recovering, I needed to eat so much and sleep so much. And I start, I'm not working out, so I'm putting on weight and I look down and I'm like, oh, what the. Like, you know, I feel really. Because everything I've been building, but really it's like, think longer term, think multiple years. And this is what, two weeks, maybe four weeks out of it. And then you start to build back up. Like, it comes on quick and it goes away quick. Like, I will build through this and I'll be much, much stronger. Just because you have those setbacks, it's not that important. You don't need to focus on them. You just need to get back to your habits and your routine.

Yeah, so that's what I've done since.

You talk us through your pt, mate. So you come back, you got a pt, you got a diet, and you told me something about the way you're looking, mate, before this.

So basically I was over in Thailand, I did Contiki, basically just drinking, like every day, partying, so much fun. But like, by the end of it, I was like looking at myself going, holy shit, Ben. You need to, you know, you need to do something about this is you're not looking healthy, you're not feeling healthy. She came back to Australia and, you know, just wasn't feeling great. So I was like, right, let's just go back to basics. What am I doing? And literally had to go see someone like a naturopath and just get, you know, and I, I don't know, like it's fascinating you telling me that it's actually like it's kind of not normal for, for you or for potentially people to not go and get advice. Like that's just the first thing I do. Like if I need help with any, anything I just go like I just go get the smartest person I can get hold of and just, and ask them questions.

That's just, it is not normal. Like, okay, normally people just go out and ask questions, right? Like that is a normal human thing. You want to know something, you go and ask someone. I think, I don't know whether it's when you get older or the path I've been on or the way I've been taught the corporate world, uni school, all that kind of stuff where you need to be more self reliant, you need to show that you can do it yourself. Or maybe I trick myself into thinking I'm smart enough, I can do it myself. Or maybe, I don't know, I don't want to spend the money on it. I think it's expensive or it's not worth it or I'm. Don't be vulnerable or too afraid to ask someone. It could be all of these things, right? But this is a very, very common thing and I know in my head all I need to do is go and ask the person, go and do the thing and I will be streaks and streaks ahead. And that is something that I need to work on. That's something that you've got where you're like don't know shit. Or I hire this guy, let's go. And today you're away and you're already iterating, you're already improving whereas I'm still thinking about it, doing the dumb thing.

I might. It's fascinating. It actually probably comes down to a point of like one, I don't want to learn about it. Two, I don't have time to learn about. Three, I don't care about it. But four, I need to do it and I don't have time to fuck it up. So I just go to the person that's going to give me the beans straight away. Like I don't want all the bullshit, just give me exactly what I need to know. So sat down with the naturopath, got this whole, did this whole fucking survey and whatever she's like, right, this is what you need to do. This is what, this is what you're eating now. This is what you need to start anything. Bang, done. Then found a pt, which a mate referred me to by the way this is all referrals. I never speak to any. Actually, that's a lie. All the good people I've ever worked with are all referrals. Because the referrals are the best thing you'll get because like you've got someone else vetting them for you. Eo, naturopath, PT.

Therapist. Yeah, everyone.

Exactly.

All referrals.

Same with my surgeon. Yeah, it's from a referral from a mate. He's like two things. He said, I would enthusiastically recommend this guy and he's got the fucking hands of an angel.

That's what you want.

And you're like, mate, if you've gone through and his nose was more stuffed up than mine and if he's come through that and he's gone through that experience and he knows the guy, mate, what's better than that?

Spot on. So anyway, started seeing a PT and over the last two weeks I've completely changed my, my eating. I've gone from eating burgers and chips and parmies and big breakfast, big egg and bacon rolls and like drinking every night and like, you know, at events and all this right to the last two weeks I've been cutting back on my calories, moving away from carbs in the morning, having a protein shake for breakfast, having muscle chef meals. So having like protein in every meal. Protein and a carbohydrate for lunch with vegetables. Then, then dinner, having like a salmon or chicken or again a muscle chef meal as well. Like all rice and chicken vegetables, no alcohol basically apart from like on a week, like on a Saturday night I've had alcohol but every other night I've had soda water and then Mac. Mixing that with gym session four days a week, plus golf twice a week as well. So doing four gym heavy sessions an hour plus two gym workout, two golf workouts plus journaling every day I'm up to 17 days in a row, meditating twice a day. And my sleep I met my second meditation is when I go to sleep. I listen to a five minute wind down thing on Headspace and my God, my efficiency and productivity, Energy, happiness. Did you know 60 of your serotonin comes from your stomach? The that you eat influences how happy you feel. And I feel up and about and I'm like really? I know I've said this on the pod before but like this isn't like unsustainable energy. I don't think this is like genuine good energy.

I heard a comedian talk about this and he said.

I am people. This is how weird it is. We talk about gut microbiome and the bugs that you have. Your body is just all bugs. You think you're one person. There's millions of bugs in your body that are controlling the things you do. And he said, I'm depressed because of bugs in my shit.

And then you have to go and deal with that. And what he's talking about is how eating your microbiome influences your digestion, how you sleep, how you behave, your mood. All of those things can affect your outlook on life. And it's, it's just so incredible. And once you've experienced this and you do the things that Ben was talking about, like eating well, sleeping well, working out, the life upgrade is insane. And the challenge most people have is finding a way to do it sustainably because you could do it for a month or two, but then you either get bored or it's too hard or you get sick of it. But to keep that going, finding out what it is for you and keep that habit going, that's. That's the big challenge. And if you can, your life will be pretty awesome.

I found, I think the alcohol is the thing. That is what it was where my excuses come from, because I'll go to an event or go to a dinner and have a couple of beers and then in the morning I'm just so lethargic and tired. I'm just like, I can't be going to the gym. And then it all goes downhill where now I'm trying not to. In the last two or three weeks, haven't drank midweek, just had soda waters, drink on the weekend, and then come back and fresh during midweek. You're right. The challenge for me is going to be I start traveling again next week. I'm up in Bright Brisbane, Tassie. Then I go to the US Like, I've been in a routine, now I'm back on the roads. That's going to be the real challenge to see if I can maintain that. But overall, like.

Like, I genuinely, in terms of like a day to day, would probably have gone from like a 6 out of 10 on average. So like 7.5, 8 out of 10 on average. Feeling like just genuinely like happy and excited about life. Like, it's, it's fascinating.

That's awesome. And, and you got a life hack as well. Show us those little headphones, mate. You got to tell everyone about this.

For the light sleepers out there, I'm a real light sleeper.

Mate. 5am the other morning, wake up at this alarm. This isn't light. So you'd wake up. Oh, you likes it. For two weeks, someone dead would wake up at this, right? These are fire alarms going off, going absolute bananas. I get out of bed like I'm in an Airbnb, don't know what's going on. And there's a TV I didn't even know was like a little, little wall thing. TV on the wall. I said, what the is that on the bright light fire. Get up and there's this bloke, absolutely off chops out the front of the building. He's. He's punched in my number to my apartment and started calling me. And I'm looking at it going, who the hell is this bloke? Absolutely off his head, sitting there waiting to be buzzed up in the room.

And I was like, what a stitch up, mate. It's so good.

And I wasn't wearing headphones, but anyway, I got these Bose sleeping headphones. These things, these things are legit. They sit in your ear and you can sleep on them. Like, they sit right inside your ear and you can listen to, like, different, different sounds. So if you're light sleeper or like you're with a partner or someone that snores, like, this is like legit. So check it out. Bose sleeping headphones, they're good.

I might get that they're active noise canceling. But also, like, I would probably use them to listen to like a Headspace sleep cast. Dude, are you still doing Headspace?

Yeah, that's the.

That's.

I've been using hackers. No, it's a. It's game changer. So for those that want to meditate, Burger got me onto this. I was on the Calm app before. Headspace is a game changer. Like, it's got other. It's got different chapters that I think the speakers are better, the content's better, it's just. Everything's just better. So Headspace it is for if you want to learn how to meditate or you need help meditating.

So I'll drop my code in the bottom and that'll give you of the show notes. That'll give you like a month or three free, something like that. And the reason I recommend Headspace is, first of all, I love Andy. He's an amazing dude. You can go look him up online. He used to be like a Buddhist monk for a while. He's gone through a lot of stuff. He had cancer and a few other things, but he's just so calming and rational. There's no woo woo. And you can literally go on there. You can Press. You could go, you could do courses or singles for like stress, anxiety, whatever it may be. And he, the first minute, he just talks you through, like calm down kind of exercise. We talk a little bit about stress and how it works. You do the meditation, breathing, visualization. This is only over 10 minutes. And then a minute at the end, he'll give you something else to do or just reframe. And the way that they structure that and the way it leaves you feeling is just incredible. And headspace is incredibly cheap if you're a student. I think it might even be free. I'll drop that, give it a go, stick with it for like a week. 10 minutes a day is all you need. And it is life changing. It is such a relief. It is amazing.

So to wrap up that before we get in the middle of the week.

Hey, hey. What training are you doing, mate?

What's that?

What training are you doing in the gym, mate? Made me jealous. What training are you doing?

So, So I don't specify areas of.

The body flipping tires or what?

No, no, no, none of that. Like, I, I don't. We don't specify areas specific per day. Like it's a, it's a whole body each day. But actually the other thing I've implemented is stretching. So we did these tests before I started. Now I'm like, I've got like old, I've got like old man body and I don't stretch. So now I do like a 12 to 15 minute dynamic stretching in the morning. Man. And like I've been going like four days in a row now and feeling really good. So stretching's been a big help just to like keep the, keep the body like up to speed.

Yeah. So all office workers out there, if you sit in a chair for like eight hours a day, get into some kind of stretching. So I've done a bit of yoga. If I do yoga for a month, I feel like I'm 20. It's ridiculous. And even now, even if I just wake up in the morning, oh, you always wake up sore, right. Like I'm old, got old body all up. So I go and I'll like stretch. So I'll just get a foam roller. Yeah, that's it. My tech bond. Not, not enough to be a tech pro. Give it a couple months. Foam roller. Just roll my back and do some stretches for specific areas I know that get tight and like, and then have a shower. And after that I'm like a new person. It is unbelievable. And just. And again, these things are just daily maintenance. Like 10 minutes meditating, little bit of exercise, little bit of stretching. Just preparing those meals and just eating them and then having a good sleep in a 10 minute wind down. Like they're just little checkpoints and it's about doing the habit rather than these big sweeping things. Yeah. This is how we talk about making money as well. People think it's going to be this big bang event and it never is. It's a series of small little things about.

We all suck at it. Like, it just. It is what it is.

So good. Yeah.

Yeah, mate. So I'm doing all right.

Dumbbells, pull downs. Oh, mate, split squats, they're the worst.

Bench press.

Oh, pistol.

Yeah, mate, that's just the worst.

How are you doing your squats? Are your squats. Are you doing the like dumbbell machine or barbell?

I do barbell and then also dumbbell split squats. Yeah.

Oh, pistol squats are the worst. The split ones, even another thing, like there was a, there was a study done and it was single leg cycling. So athletes, like, they get them to cycle, but if you do it with a single leg, they can push 10 to 15 more and they get the gains. How weird is that?

I'm doing that.

It's brutal, isn't it? Right, come on, mate.

All right, let's do me all the way.

Let's do this. Let's. Let's get in to meal. Let's get into meal of the week. Mate, this is what I cooked while I was on leave. Have a look at this. Pork ribs, baby. Mate, they are so good. Hopefully you can see that on.

These. These are. What are they? I think they're fullback ribs. They're big chunk and pork ribs, they were delicious. So I got these on the smoker. I'm smoking them with pean just on the Weber there and I've got a rub where it's like salt, pepper, garlic, onion powder, cayenne pepper, paprika, cummin and a few other things. And this is just delicious. So this is probably after like, oh, hour and a half on the smoker and mate.

Holy.

After that you kind of sauce, this is the served one. So I've just got like token salad there and these ribs are just like thick. They're bite through, they're saucy, they're delicious. And this, this is them off the smoker, mate. Like just beautiful sauce. Oh, mate, I can't even describe to you. Like everyone just was silent. They had a smile on their face. There's something about pork ribs off a smoker. This is why my handle on Twitter is baby back from baby back ribs. I love ribs. Ribs are my jam. And then look at that, mate. Like, that is just perfection. That's just like the last five minutes on the smoker. You've just lightly sourced them and they're just getting that beautiful mahogany color. Oh, delicious, mate. Look, toot my own horn here. But 10 out of 10, I don't know how I'd improve these. Like, I do not know. And then I got this as well. This is actually from a while back, like a month ago. And I think this is the time when I had it. I've absolutely cracked it. I'm pissed off with everyone. I was like, it. It was 8 o' clock at night. I'm going for a drive to the beach. So I went to the beach within 10 minutes. Just listening to the waves, feeding the water. Just calm down. I'm like, that's what I needed. On the way back, I'm like, I want an ice cream. So I go through the HJ's, drive through, right? And I get, oh, can I have an ice cream? Yeah, cool, no worries. Go through. And then this girl brings me an ice cream. She's got this big, young girl, got this big smile on her face. I'm like, okay. And then I look at. I'm like, look at the ice cream. It is ridiculous, this thing. Look at how small that cone is and what she's done. She must be playing a game because it's late at night. She must be like, how big can I get these ice creams until they fall over, mate? This is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 layers big. This thing would be about, what, 15 to 20 centimeters big. Or one of those little Stokes. It was unbelievable. Took me about 20 minutes to eat. She was just so happy. She was beaten and it was just incredible, man. I was like, I've got to get a photo of this bad boy. It's so good.

Nice, man.

And. And mate, you've. You're on the pt, you're on the diet and you've been eating well, and this is your meal of the week, mate.

I'm on the grind. So for. For those that struggle with, you know, meal prep or like just eating well, I know your feels. I'm there all the time. I don't actually cook for myself, you know, I eat. I eat out every week and I've done the numbers on this, right? Per week, I'm spending probably 350 to 400 a week on food. Now that's like pretty high for like just a fun. For someone that lives on their own. But I pay the extra for efficient, for efficiency. So I don't meal prep. I don't do anything. I. I optimize for. For basically, you know, time. So these are the muscle chef meals and they are always have one protein and then a carbohydrate or some description. It tells you like how much protein and carbs or whatever. And then I get the frozen veggie like bags and then just heat it up in the microwave. So now I'm doing this for every lunch, sometimes dinner as well, sometimes breakfast, but usually I just get a protein shake. So, yeah, this has been a game changer for me because I didn't know. I didn't even know these things really existed. I was just eating. But this now I'm eating clean, it's healthy. I'm eating more veggies into my diet and I feel as though this is going to really help me not get sick and just continue to grind out big days.

This is amazing. I love to see this. And you answered a key question there, which is what are you optimizing for? And yeah, you're spending a decent amount of money on that. But what, you've got a lot more time, which is worth more than that money. And in life you either pay with your time or your money. And the home equivalent of this is. So I used to do this and I need to get back to it. In fact, I'm going to do it later today. I get my Weber, I'll get a whole bunch of chicken breasts, like 12 to 15 chicken breasts, put them around the Weber, put the coals in the middle, and I'll put a light dusting of the rub I mentioned before. Salt, pepper, garlic, cumin, paprika, whatever you want. Put that in there. And then I'll get like whole sweet potato, wrap it in foil, whole pumpkin, wrap it in four and put it actually on the coals. And all this takes about 45 minutes to an hour in the Weber. You just put it on, you leave it there, you take it off after it's all done, the sweet potato, you just scoop it out and it's just delicious and syrupy. And same with the pumpkin. And then you can either put them in little containers like that and freeze them and you've got over a week's worth of food there. Or I just vacuum seal them. So again, it takes maybe 20 minutes to vacuum seal it all and then I can just take that out whenever I want. There's a really healthy Meal prepared for me. Where you've got your protein, you've got your carbs with your vegetables as well. Yeah, it's absolutely the way to go.

Yeah. And you save. Just going right out. What do you got for us?

All right, we got. We got some memes, and I've got a bumper crop. I've got eight memes today. We'll punch through them because we haven't done this in a while. And they are in order of spy spin. So. Oh, look, if these are too spicy, it's Ben's fault that he hasn't cut them out. So let's. Let's just kick off with, like, a level one spice. So old mate, he's got it. He's got a backwards top knot. He's at. He's at the reception and he's like, hi, I've forgotten what room I'm in. And the lady at reception says, no problem, sir. This is called the lobby. And this cracked me up because this is classic. This is his where. He has no idea he brought this up on screen.

I read that before you even read it. I'm like, oh, my God. God, that's me. Even looks like me. She wearing glasses.

He has no idea where he is, no idea what's going on, doesn't know where his next meal is coming from. He's just trying to lie. And she stitches him up. So it's so good. All right, me too. So this is a crying guy in a hard hat. And then there's Jesus with a crown of thorns. The guy in the hard cat, he's just crying, and it says, stop giving me your toughest battles. And Jesus is like, dude, you ate 38 jalapeno poppers. Of course you're gonna yourself at work. And I love this because we complain so much, but the challenges we have these days are nothing compared to, like, 50 years ago, 100 years ago, a thousand years ago. Like, we've solved food problem. We don't have to hunt anything we want we could order on our phones. Yet we still complain about hard challenges. This just absolutely had me in stitches number three. This is from Introvert Memes. Really good follow on Twitter. My brain at 3am do you want to overthink things and create scenarios? And it's Morty from Rick and Morty. He's like, you son of a bitch. And this is me every day. 2am, 3am Wake up. My brain's like, hey, what about that? You and the mental struggle. And that always happens if I don't exercise and meditate and eat. Well, that will guaranteed happen. Otherwise, I'm out like a light.

All right, this is. This is saving you, my mates. Joe, this is you. If you're listening, it's a koala and a snail. And the koala's like. Or it might have. It's got a tail. It looks like a koala rat. Anyway, it says, I keep getting into fights. And then the snail's like, you should stop. And then there's like a scene where he's just, like, looking at the snail. And then the next one, he's just got his fists up. And this cracks me up because the way we are as humans, we are such fucking idiots. Like, Ben will tell me, like, he'd be like, burg, stop doing that thing. That thing's ruining your life. And I'm like, okay, I won't. Then I'm like, fuck you, Ben. You're exactly the same way with, like, going hard at work, where I'm like, ben, you need to stop. You. He's like, no, I'm human optimization. I'm going to hit 1000%. I'm going to look at those graphs. I'm going to have those numbers. And then you get sick. It's so, so good. And we've all got that fighty person at work as well. So this one cracked me up. All right, next meme, we're on number five of eight. This is an old school photo of a guy in a car with a girl. Yeah, Eight memes. That's all right, I love mate. And the guy's like, want to listen to Limp Bizkit? And the girl in the car's like, oh, aren't you 34 years old? And he's ditched her. He's got the backwards Fred Durst hat on. It's like, keep on rolling, rolling, rolling, rolling. What? And this just, like, cracked me up because this is from my shitty youth and this is hilarious. And there's probably about 50 variations of this meme with DMX and everything is going around at the moment. It is amazing. He dished her out of the car and she's pissed off. Outsider. He's just rolling.

Thank you. Everyone's back breathing in high, high definition. 4K. Hopefully, you know, you learned some things there about doing the hard thing, getting your health back on track. Bergs and I are going through that now. Definitely not perfect, but it's 100 helped. As always, we'd love for you to share this message with a friend. If there's someone that you know that is going through it, you know, maybe putting something difficult off or needs to get their health back on track. Send them this podcast. We'd love to help them out. Tell them Ben and Bergs needs to send him a message. And yeah, we'd love for you to share along, Bergs. Thank you very much. We'll see you next time, mate.

See you later. Great to be back. Thanks for listening, champions.

Hey, guys.