EP027 - Your Daily Decision - Anthony Astbury

So something different for you today. In this episode, we actually borrow the content from a podcast which we have been featured on. We're confident if you listen to this, you'll take value out of it in various forms and at various stages, even all the way at the end. And in fact, we actually include a challenge at the end for any man. The podcast was called the Daily Decision, which was based out in sunny California by a lovely guy called Michael Chabot. There's some really extremely powerful topics and some golden nuggets and it will really give you something to think about. And we'd like to say thanks to Michael for allowing us to share this with you. And we hope you enjoy listening and.

Watching, recording, and then we'll just get it going. All right, here we go. Three, two, one. Hey, guys. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Decision. I'm your host, Michael Chabot and today we have the pleasure and honor of having Anthony Asbury join us. Anthony is a CEO and co founder of the Whole Man Academy. In 2016, he left a 20 year career working as a trader and broker in the city of London to go off in search of a life with more fulfillment and impact. The journey of self improvement and personal discovery led him to specialize in coaching men to master their mindset at work and play and live an outstanding lifestyle. In 2018, he co founded the Whole Man Academy alongside BBC news editor Matthew Shaw. The Whole Man Academy is a fresh new initiative designed to get men talking. It's like a living, breathing magazine for men. It was set up to help men do life better, get their priorities sorted. In April 2020, the hole man Academy welcomed style icon David Gandy, one of the most influential men on the planet, as its first global ambassador. The Whole Man Academy connects with men through live and online events, a popular podcast, weekly newsletters, social media and online courses. Antony is also the host of the Whole Man Academy podcast, a series of interviews with inspiring men and women from all walks of life whose stories and strategies empower listeners to cope with the stresses of modern life and to become better men. With a great team around him, Anthony is intent on growing the Whole Man Academy to reach more men and help them to become more resilient, more confident and to do life better. Guys, please help me in welcoming Anthony to the show.

Thank you very much. Well read. Lovely introduction.

Thank you, buddy. That's some great stuff you guys are doing. You know, we're going to have some fun today. We're really going to break it down and what I love is you and I have a very similar mission. And I think it's amazing that, you know, you're in, you're in London, England, I'm here in the west coast of the United States. And the theme is the same for all men.

Yeah, right, yeah, yeah.

So we're on to something.

I think it's, I mean, that's the great thing. I actually spoke to a guy out in New Zealand last night via the medium of Instagram, which I always find it amazing how you can just get in touch with people, you know, so easily. And you can, you can, you can kind of connect with people that are like minded. And that's why when I first kind of looked at what you were doing, we're going to get a lot of requests for people that want to be on our podcast or the other way around. And for me it's about finding people that you look at. And I was like, this guy's trying to do good in the world. And that's what we're interested in.

Cool. Well, I appreciate you being here. I know you're going to give my listeners a lot of great knowledge today. So I like to start off with this question for everybody, which is when someone finds out what you do, where you're from, what question do they always ask you?

How I ended up living up in the Cotswolds. So at the moment, I mean, I'm a London boy. I was born and bred in South London and down in Kent, which is the deepest, darkest parts of South England. And I mean, the journey from working in the city meant that when I left, about six months after I left, the plan was to move out to the countryside to have kids. And I've got two, two little, little boys who are one's seven months old and just about sitting up and the other one's nearly three. And he's doing everything that three year olds should, shouldn't and should do.

Nice.

But they're always like, oh, how come you ended up out there? And I'm like, you know what? To go and live a life that was healthier and a bit more relaxed.

So let me ask you this. So I'm just going to dive right into it because I think it's so prevalent. Why do you think as men we get to a point in our lives where we kind of look up and look around and say, holy crap, like, how did I get to this place? There's got to be more to life than this instead of just always chasing a dollar, chasing success. I know that's deep to start off, but I'd love to hear what you think about that now.

I think there's a couple of points there. One is, it's interesting because I always say it's okay to be chasing the dollar or the pound over here, although with exchange rates, perhaps you should be chasing just physical gold instead. But when I was in my 20s, I was interested in the important things that I thought in life then, which was my career. Money, women, football, and going out and getting drunk and having a laugh. All good stuff. But I think for all of us, we go through phases of our life. And for me, as I know with many guys that work in the city and. Or just those that are professional, maybe, and that's the kind of guys we're working with at the whole man academy. Maybe when you get to your. And I was in my mid to late 30s, that you just start to reevaluate if in your career. Is that what I want to be doing for the next, I don't know, 15, 20 years? And maybe you've done the same thing. Look, I had pretty much the same thing for nearly 20 years, and I loved it at one point. But you just think, like anything, you can just get very tired of it.

Yeah, it's. My buddy coined this term, and he talks about the cup with the hole in the bottom. And basically, you know, I think just one day you wake up and you're like, man, I've been chasing and chasing and filling this cup, and no matter how much I chase and fill it up, it just keeps running out the bottom. Right.

Yeah.

So let's. Let's go backwards, though, and talk. So first of all, you know, you had a career as a trader and a broker. Right?

Right.

Let's talk about that. Let's talk about just quickly, you know, it was fulfilling. You were happy. And then talk about the moment where kind of you looked up and went, yeah, this isn't working for me anymore. I need to do something else.

Sure. I mean, I started. I always laugh because I started working for Glencore, you know, which is. Which is one of the biggest companies in the world, but because I was such a young pup and you didn't really have the Internet and stuff like that. I hadn't got a clue what company I was going to work for. And I laughed because if I had an interview at a company like that now I'd probably be really nervous. But I just went in there as a, you know, whenever I was 18 years old, completely relaxed, because I didn't know what I was going into. But to Set the scene. I mean, when I was there, I still didn't have a plan of what I wanted to do. I just was working as a junior, as most people often do, and work, you know, looking to work their way up in the company. And I spent a good four years at Glencore and learned a hell of a lot of moved on to trading and trading UK power, so electricity, and again, just learning at a rate because you hadn't studied this stuff and you were given these opportunities. And through that time, that's when you started to expand your network a little bit more and hopefully be seen as something that's good in that kind of role. And that ended up leading me on to the broking side. And of course, ultimately, that's being a people person, and it's being good at reading other people, understanding their mood, understanding what they want and being able to deliver it to them, and that being with the financial instruments that I was working with. So, yeah, it was great. And I would say for many years, you had your weekends in Ibiza and you went skiing for the weekends, and you went to very expensive restaurants and ate expensive sushi and did all this cool stuff that lot of people don't get to experience. But like anything, the novelty wears off. And, you know, you get to the stage where you've got a nice townhouse and you've got a nice car and you spend a lot of money on the holidays and you've got the suits and all the gubbins that go with it and the expensive watch, of course, and it's never enough. And then the company that I was working for in the market I was working in, was kind of slowly disintegrating. And it was around that time that I realized how toxic the company, not just the company, but the actual environment that you're in could be. And I would say you were purely judged on how much money you made, which is totally understandable. That's your job, is to make as much money as possible. But of course, one day you might make a huge amount of money and you feel like king of the world, and the next day you might make zero. So, you know, you feel terrible. And it was just up, down, up, down, and I just got bored of it. And you asked me, was there a particular moment? There's no dramatic moment, really, but I know I spoke on another podcast about going home, and my partner also worked in the same company as me, so she knew exactly what was going on and how it all worked. And I got home and she said, how was your day. And it was quite rare for me to do that, but I actually swore at her and said, I'll tell you when I've had a good day. Then I went upstairs and I, I just felt like a build up of pressure. You've got so much going on. And I just burst into tears, which I'm a fairly emotional, I'm not particularly emotional, but, you know, I don't care. I would, you know, I'd cry at my nan's funeral. I cried at. And you know, when things happen, you get upset, but that was one of those moments where you kind of find yourself looking in the mirror and thinking, this isn't right.

Yeah, I, I know exactly what you mean. And I think, you know, as you were talking, I was thinking to myself, it really starts as we're young men with our programming, right? We see all the images of what we're told we're supposed to want. Money, women, cars, yachts, planes, like all these things. And you know, it's, it's interesting because I'm a little bit older than you and I can remember as a kid, like here, growing up in the United States, like I wanted to be a fireman or a policeman. Like that was what I aspired to be. And then as the world changed, of course I changed. I was like, oh, no, forget that. I want to drive a Ferrari. I want, you know, so I think it starts, it starts as we're young men and I think you and I and those of us that are having what I like to call the awakening is it's our responsibility now to help mentor and teach the younger generations about finding fulfillment. And I know everybody talks about, Anthony, the word passion, and I don't want it to use it just in a generic term, but I really think, like, if you find something that you can really bring value to, that's where fulfillment comes. Do you agree?

Totally. I mean, it's a big part of why we started our podcast is trying to speak to interesting people, not just men, but interesting people across the world to help deliver messages around that. I mean, there's lots of other parts of our podcast, but one of them is we know that the percentage of guys is about 35% of the guys that listen to our podcast between 27 and 35. I think it is. And I think not the 27 year olds, but the guys at the higher end of that bracket, age bracket, are the ones that are starting to maybe think they're questioning they've spent 15 years doing the same job and maybe they're Looking for change or I mean the other thing is redundancy in a city or in many, many companies across the world now the bigger ones, computers are doing the jobs that some of us used to do. And like it or not, more efficiently, quicker, cheaper, less mistakes. Don't have days off sick usually, you know, aren't messing around with the secretary, aren't outside smoking every 10 minutes. Like some people aren't hungover some mornings, you know, there is no up down days. So you know, you have to get used to that. And at that point it can be frightening for guys because you may be used to earning a six figure salary, having all the trackings of success also being fulfilled in your job. Maybe you are and then that gets taken away from you and then you need to have a plan or you could be in trouble.

Yeah, yeah, that's. Wow, that's some good stuff there. There's a lot we could talk about there. But before we get to that, I want, so I want to go back to. Because I want people to hear, because it takes a lot of courage to walk away from a career where you're doing well financially and start over, which you did, you decided to go and become a coach and start coaching other people, other men. Right. And in our conversation that we had before we started recording a few days ago, you had talked about like, you know, guys that are still doing the job you did and they feel trapped, they feel stuck because they've got the big house, they've got the kids, they've got the cars, you know. Yeah, they can't follow their heart, but maybe they can. So let's just, let's chat about that a little bit.

Yeah, it's, I think that's one of the big, I say problems. You know, all problems are illusions. You can mask that as whatever you want. But I would say it's a challenge. And if you want it to be a challenge, it can be a good challenge. But of course, you know, you can have it. There's a good example of guys who have been firstly doing the same job for many years and getting well paid. So even if you haven't got anybody else that's depending on you, it can be tough to go onto something completely different, especially to earn anything like the kind of money you were. And there's nothing like having a six figure salary and then having it taken in half or quartered to see, you know, what kind of a man you become. Because maybe you associated your six figure salary with you being the man. And when you're working For a lot less than that to start with. It can be that moment where you think, I can't be. I'm not. I'm not doing that because, you know, I used to get paid loads of money. And it, you know, it can affect guys and it can affect their mindset. And that's why you're right 100% when you're. If you're looking to leave a job like that, firstly, you need the support of the people around you. And that isn't just. In my humble opinion, it isn't just the support of your. If you've got a partner and. Or, you know, your family, it's your friends as well. Because for a guy that might be listening to this, that is in that situation, if you're kind of living the good life, as it were, on paper, and when people think you might be going backwards, and I say going backwards to go forwards, but they see you going backwards and taking maybe a cut in salary or taking a risk, understandably, they care for you and they just want to keep you safe. So they'll tell you what you probably don't want to hear, which is just don't do it.

Yeah, they're going to provide some resistance.

Yeah.

Yeah. And like you said, I mean, they're not doing it. I think it's also part of their own fears, too. Right. I think sometimes people are envious because they see you stepping out of your comfort zone and doing something maybe that they dream to do but don't have the courage to do as well.

Yeah. And you've just said the word courage. You know, I think we're all courageous in different levels, but we're courageous at different times. And, you know, we're all very different in the way that we apply our actions around that level of courage needed. So I wasn't able to leave my job straight away. I had to, you know, stop. Think about it. I kind of got close to the edge of jumping off the cliff and then. And then moo. Walked back, got comfortable again. And it is hard because when, you know, I was speaking to a friend a while ago who had the same thing, but for someone who, if you're good at your job, and I'd like to think I was, I used to make a lot of money for the company that when people knew you were leaving, another company or another department would say, hey, come and work for us. Like, we'll take you. And you're like, okay, because you're scared. And it's kind of, you know, the carrot is being dangled but then one day, it sounds dramatic to say, you know, the pain has to be enough for you to say, I'm done. But at that point, you need to start, hopefully have been planning months in advance, not days or weeks.

Yes. And I think you make a really good point there, which is you have to have a plan for some people. Hey, I've seen guys, like, just go cold turkey and just quit and then figure out what they're going to do. That's not what we're recommending. What we're recommending is have a plan. You know, for me, I like that you say when you get to that point where you've had enough, the pain for me, it was in the loss of my daughter. I just. After I came out of my deep, dark depression, I looked around and said, man, there's got to be more to life than this. I've got to live a life of fulfillment. So, you know, the goal is that we can help as many people do what we've done right, and give them the courage to take that first step. So talk about, how did you get into coaching? Like, what's the first step? What intrigued you about it? And then I really want to get into the whole man academy.

Sure. Where do I start with that? I'll say this. It's a phrase I've used, and I don't know if anybody's ever used it before, but I say podcasts saved my life. And I would say that sounds dramatic, but actually, what was happening was I wasn't a very enlightened individual. Again, my priorities were my partner, going out, getting drunk, not every night, but just at the weekends like lads do, playing football, going to the gym, trying to look like a Men's health cover model. You know, that was it. But I wasn't happy in my job. So we will say it's like, you know, it's like the slice of man pie is that each one of those slices is a segment of your life, is your health, is your wealth, is your sex life, is your fitness, is your career, is your relationships, etc. Family. All these different things. Love that. And if one of them starts to drop off, then it might be very important for you to address that one, even if the rest are all doing you well. And I started listening to podcasts through my partner, Emma, and she said to me, hey, you should listen to podcasts. I was like, I'm not listening to podcasts. I'm busy. I'm busy being busy. Like, don't tell me what to do. Apparently, you know, women are sometimes right because she has, go figure. She, she recommended podcasts. I started listening to it. It was a guy called James Swanick who's actually out in the States, who has got a big, big podcast podcast out there. And he's an Australian chap and he is the, I think the co founder of Swannies, which are the blue light blocking glasses. And we've, we don't pretend I'm his friend. I've conversed with him on email a couple of times and he's a cool chap and I'd listen to his podcast and it was about Tony Robbins. And that led me on to listen to another podcast who's a guy in the UK called Andy Murphy who actually I think lives in the States or is in somewhere like Panama or somewhere around at the moment. But he's got a podcast called Mindset by Design. And those two podcasts, I started to consume them at an alarming rate, maybe for some people, but once you find something that you like, wow, you can, you know, you energy goes where your focus goes, etc. And you can flip that around.

Yep.

And long story short, that got me into Tony Robbins and I was like, hey, who is this guy? And Emma, thankfully my partner is, has got a, an inquiring, inquisitive mind and she's a nutritionist as well, so. And a proper one. Not one that has done a course for two days every weekend and thinks they're a nutritionist. She studied for three years, lives and breathes exactly what she coaches people on.

Love it.

But the two of us were interested in personal development, went to Tony Robbins event in London, unleashed the power within. I know there's maybe 10,000 people there, I don't know, something like that. And it was an amazing four day event. And very quickly I then signed up to a further package of his and you know, probably cost me 20,000 I think over the, over the different things. But it culminated in a 10 day event which is Date with Destiny in Miami. Man, that was good.

That's the one where you walk on the coals.

Well, the one you walked on the coals was actually the one in London and you did it right by the Thames. And it's funny because I'm trying to think what time of year was, but it was pretty cold out. So it was, and it was a, it was a crazy, crazy evening. But when we're in Miami, I went out there and stayed with a couple of friends who actually one of them is part of the whole man academy now, who's that doing our mental health stuff. And it was the year before that Tony Robbins recorded I am not your guru, which is the Netflix documentary, which is. Which is brilliant. And, you know, I had exactly the same as that documentary, but 12 months prior to that. And. And I mean, I wouldn't be with Emma if I hadn't gone to that.

That's powerful.

There's one thing for you, and it's interesting. When people realize how much money you spent on it, you say, was it worth it? And. Or what did you learn? You know, they want you to give them some golden nuggets. Tell me, you know, and how much money do you make from it? You say, you know what I tell you what I did get from it is two little boys.

Can'T put a price on that.

No, I mean, it feels like at the moment because they eat everything and poop on everything, and Hudson's just broke one of our shoe cabinets. But anyway, and I mean that one of the days was all about relationships, and we could go further down that route. But what I realized then was that there's levels of showing up in a relationship, and guess what? I wasn't showing up as the person I should be. And that's one of those things. So coming back from that, I signed up to the coaching academy, which is one of the biggest ones in the uk. And again, I always say it's a proper course that takes, you know, probably took me a whole year as opposed to now. You know, hey, for 10 bucks online, come with life coach. And you're like, look, life coaching courses aren't about making you a better life coach. I don't think. I think you've either got it or you haven't agreed. It just gives you structure and maybe helps you with the hardest bit, which is getting clients. It's not coaching. Coaching is so simple. Yeah, it's getting the clients.

Yeah, that's good. I love that. And I think before we transition to the whole man academy, I do want to touch on relationships because I think it's so important, especially for men. We're not taught to communicate. We're not taught to be vulnerable in our relationships. I mean, really, for the most part, we're taught to be alpha men, right? Alpha male, strive for success, like you said, look like a Men's Health fitness cover guy, drive a fancy car, live in a big house, wear expensive suits. That's what we're taught. And we're never taught to fill up this thing in here inside. Right? And so just let's touch on that a little bit because I think it's so important. And I love that you say you wouldn't be with your partner, you wouldn't have your two boys if, if it wasn't for that.

Yeah, certainly. I mean it's for, for the men growing up. I mean we see at the whole man academy we, we often talk about, I mean we do, we start doing live zoom calls because unsurprisingly, none of us can have our live events anymore. Yeah. And we have, you know, hundreds of guys on our email subscriber list and I think for a lot of them and our 12 events we've done in London since we started, a lot of the conversation can often be around how it's shaped us growing up in a world where we're not encouraged to talk about things. And I mean, if we take mental health as the example, let's face it, only the last three years has mental health, which is only part of what we deal with. As again, it's a, it's a segment, you know, it's a slice of the pie of man, his mental health, but everybody's got it. But that has become in the last three years probably kind of normal to talk about. So even going on from men talking about their feelings now, we're not saying you have to talk about your feelings if you don't want to. That's great. If you're living a great life and no worries, I mean that's absolutely brilliant. But if you're a guy who's saying, you know what, I don't like my job or I want to leave my partner or I'm struggling with stress or I'm crap with finances and, or I've got all these things, my fitness is low. We want to be able to help a guy with any aspect of that to help him do life better.

Yeah, that's important.

And growing up, none of that, you're not taught ready or you weren't to ask for help. And also it goes on, talking of Tony Robbins, it goes on to calling it personal development for men. And you know what, there's loads of it in the States because you've got your Tony Robbins events, but actually in the uk we're actually a little bit, we're a little bit more restrained and maybe we don't like so much of the Tony Robbins whooping and hollering and high fiving and I hated it when I went to the first event. I mean, I stood there with Emma very early in the morning at the Excel Centre in this massive Long queue. Because we bought the cheap tickets to be at the back, and that was a mistake. And there's these guys in red T shirts high five you. And I weren't used bad language. I was like, if one more person tries to high five me, I'm gonna have to get him in a headlock. And Emma's like, just chill out. Just chill out. But you know what? Two days in, I was probably up on stage dancing, so, you know, get involved.

That's pretty cool. Just to listen, right? Because I think most of us would have felt like, you like, oh, this guy comes by and high fives me again. I'm taking him down.

Ye.

And then you let down your guard. You opened up to it, and look where it led you.

Yeah.

You wouldn't be here if you didn't take that first step.

Yeah, yeah. And that's. That's the key, even for guys coming to our events. Now. We will say the hardest bit. It's a bit like going back to coaching. The hardest bit for coaching is getting clients. Or you can. You can dress it up however you want, but, you know, having clients find you getting clients, receiving clients, creating clients, whatever. It's getting clients unless you know what to do. But also with getting guys to come to an event, we've had to make the events cool events that we have at Giesen Hawks, which is, you know, one of the Savile Road bespoke suit tailors with a beautiful building that, you know, is one of the oldest buildings in London, down to one of the most famous roads in London. So you come to that event not as a, you know, a hotel conference room, which can be a bit soulless, but you're going to some historical beautiful place where we're serving the best gin and tonics from Savile Row gin. And you can get dressed up if you want. Don't care if you don't. You come in shorts and T shirt. But it's a night out. It's an event out. It's something that you would say, hey, I'm going to this. Not.

Yeah, I love that you're making it an entire experience. Yeah, that's cool. I could just. The way you described it, I could feel it. I could see it. I was like, man, I want to go to that.

Well, I'll tell you what, it's great you say that because that's, you know, the other reason we able to do podcasts and stuff is at some point, we'll go back to our events. But our very first event, we Had a Soho House which is, you know, the kind of private members club across the. Well across the world now. But forgetting it's a private members club, we hired the top floor and it is Chesterfield leather sofas, quite a lot of them are, you know, a bit beaten up and what have you. But that's, it's books. There was a really cool bar, some nice pictures and it was, you know, oak tables and what have you. And it just felt like it's a cross between a really cool space and a really nice kind of gentleman's club and hotel kind of reception area that's inviting and all these comfy chairs. So you're not sitting on a hard chair like, oh, this is. You're kicking back, trying not to, you know, snug down in his seat with your coffee and, and having a chat with, with guys and we'd have, I mean we had, you know, ex professional footballers and boxers, we had fight like Muay Thai world fighting champions there. Guys from Formula one, guys from the media, guys from abc. I think it's ABC News, you know, a reporter from there, all these different guys all talking about.

I love it. It's, it's a movement, it's an awakening in the world and you touched on mental health. Especially now, what the world is going through. Mental health and even more importantly, mental toughness is really starting to come into the forefront and I'd love to talk about that more towards the end of the show, but I really want to talk about now. We've been hinting and hinting and hinting, but let's really break down and get into the whole man academy because I love it. When I first heard about it, I was like, man, this is amazing. So just start and tell me how was it born?

Good. Matthew and I, Matthew's a good friend of mine and say he's the BBC News futures editor. So he works in London at the big BBC center, which is a really cool place. I've been lucky enough to have a bit of a tour of it, you know, standing up across the whole news desk and it looks, it looks pretty cool. And we had been friends kind of just through an acquaintance and long story short, Matt had seen that I'd written something on Facebook about kind of mindset, something like that. And it turns out that Matt had actually taken a long sabbatical from the BBC and had gone out to the University of Michigan and had been on, I'll get it completely wrong, but let's call it a course on mental health, which he'd probably Say, you've got it completely wrong there. But he wrote a kind of a paper on mental health in the workplace and won an award for it, I believe, and rightly so, because he's very good at writing. And the two of us, when he messaged me, honestly didn't even know he did for a job. I'd been friends with him, but I didn't have a clue. He worked for the BBC. So when he told me, I was like, oh, okay, I'm quite impressed about that. Anyway, we kind of said, look, let's meet up. And I've been over a couple of medicinal cocktails. We said, if we're going to do something together, you know, let's do something. But what? Well, the question is, what problem are you trying to solve? And for us, we said, you know, could we just start off by getting guys together to talk? As simple as that, no real agenda, Just see what happens. And I think I'm a doer, not a. I was gonna say not a thinker, but hopefully I think. But no, I don't want to just talk about it. I want to do it.

You're an implementer.

Yeah. So I'm like, right, let's pick a date. We'll worry about the details later. I don't care about the details. We pick a date and we'll work backwards. So we did, you know, it was the 27th or 26th of September, I think 2018. Got Matt's book, Soho House, and basically just started on social media, inviting friends and telling what it was going to be. We didn't have a clue what it was going to be. Of course we didn't. We're making up as we go along some of the best stuff you do to start with. And we had 20, 26 guys come along, all of them various friends and what have you. But, you know, some of them I didn't know because they're Matt's friends and some of them Matt didn't know because they were mine. And honestly, we didn't know if anybody was going to turn up or not. And I can only describe that as, you know, if you're having a party and you're. And you're worried that no one's going to roll up at the door with a keg. And what was funny was actually. And I can't remember if it was the first or second event we had there, but we. We got there early and just getting set up and we'd gotten your coffees and brownies and all these bits, and obviously it's an event designed specifically for men. The clue is in the name whole man Academy. And this lovely lady walks in with her and it's on a Saturday morning with her with her paper and a coffee and I'm like, okay. And I thought maybe she's just coming in to, I don't know, say hello and ask what we're doing. And she sat down in the chair and I thought, oh dear. Because maybe we hadn't been specific enough to say it's men only. And it's hard to say men only because then you'll have someone say, oh, that's not fair. And you're like, no, it's not unfair. There's women's business networks. Us men aren't like, I'm coming in. No. So we were like, listen, this is for the guys. Fact. And I said to her, oh, are you here for the event? And she said yes. And I thought, oh no. And it turned out thankfully she was there for the wrong event. She was like on a different floor. But that shook me to start with because I was a bit worried that we were going to have some awkward situation where you've got 26 guys arriving to talk man stuff and then there's this lovely lady sitting in the middle with a muffin.

Anyway, that's great.

Just, just a light hearted part there. Anyway, you know, first event was really good. We went for beers after, said, let's do another event. The next event was similar, bigger. And that's when things started to change because one of the chaps that had come to our event really liked what we were doing and said, I'd like to introduce you to some certain people and some certain companies. And one of those was Geese and Hawks. And very quickly they agreed or offered to sponsor us, which was always useful. And I would say it wasn't about the money. Actually the money wasn't particularly that much because Matt and I didn't have a clue how much we should ask for. So we lowballed it. Stupid. And they went, okay.

We're like, damn, we should ask for more.

Put an extra zero on. But here's what they did. They allowed us to have their space at number one Sabaro. And that is priceless. I'm sure you can pay to have it, but you know, for us we could never have afforded anything like that. And they allowed us to have it. I think we've had it four times. And they closed the whole store, move all the stuff out the way, all the expensive suits and all the lovely suits and all the Ties and everything. Let us have it and put drinks on. Champagne reception or soft drinks are available and it's just a really cool evening. And we've done four of them. And the comedy was that after our first event they said listen, we will throw you a. Not a party, let's call it a party. A party to launch what you're doing. And we were like, okay. And I said great. I mean that's so kind of you. How many people? And I'm thinking if they allow like 40 and that would be cool, you know, that'd be great. And they were like, well, try and keep it under 200.

Wow.

You're like, what? So, you know, we basically invited everybody that. I mean Matt's got some great contacts in London especially he's been at the BBC for 25 years. So you can imagine. And we had a whole string of either famous people and people like Jeremy vine who's on daytime telly over here and you know, people from Breakfast News and bankers and singers and all these different kind of sectors. And it was. We had a mixture of men and women coming along and it was just a great evening. But that, that was the first time a few weeks before that that we had the name David Gandhi dangled in front of us. And I'm sure a lot of people would like to have David Gandhi dangled in front of them, which that's not easy to say.

Yeah.

But that's the first time that he came onto our radar.

So tell my listeners here in the United States who aren't familiar with David, who he is, what he's about. Give them an idea.

It's probably make it easier for self by just going to Google and typing in David Gandhi because I would do it injustice. But David's probably, I mean, I guess the question is for most people is name a male model. And most people can't. And the only one they can usually is David Gandhi. Now he's much more than a model and he broke the mold on male models because around the time that he was call it discovered the men in the fashion industry that were modeling were very skinny. And that's not a true reflection of most men. Let's face it, you know, some guys are a V shape, some are skinny, some are chubby, some are big, some are small, some are wide, some are long, some etc. And he came along and he's got a, you know, he has got the Greek God body. I mean he looks amazing. And it was, I'll probably get this wrong but it was, it was one of the Dolce and Gabbana campaigns. I think that kind of set him, launched him where he wore some tiny little white DNG kind of swim shorts.

I remember that ad and as far.

As I know, I think it's this campaign. It was on the New York Times billboards in Times Square. You know, that's as an achievement I'd like to be on there, but probably not in my pants. And probably most people say, but you know what that means, you know, he is a style icon and a global face for men's style. And not just men's style. He's a businessman as well. He's so much more than just a model. He's a businessman, he's an investor, he's an entrepreneur. He's got a very sharp brain on him and you have to be to stay in the business and still be, I think, still the only person that anybody over here can name as a man model. Yeah, I mean, it's incredible really. If someone said, oh, in your market there's always competition, but there is none for him that has become a household name. So, you know, obviously it helps. These are very good looking chap. Therefore, when someone had said that they could introduce us to him, I was like, okay, that could be a game changer. And we wanted him to come to our party. And he kindly replied back and said, I can't come because he was away in somewhere like Beijing doing a cover model shoot for like GQ or something like that, I think. But what he did, he sent an email back via something else saying, is there anything else I can do for you? Can I help? You're like, would you come speak at one of our events? And he said, yes. And I really mean this. This might sound a bit sad, but, you know, I'm. I'm 41 now and this was probably what, a year ago? Just every year ago. But when I woke up that morning and I got the email saying Gandhi's in, I literally was like, yes, because I knew that that and I would say would get bums on seats and it would make people sit up and pay more attention to this little thing that we're doing. Because it's like, oh, hold on a minute, you've got David. Gandhi, you know, is kind of backing you, putting his name to you, whatever you want to call it. And we all sometimes need that little extra something, don't we?

We do, yeah. I mean, I think we're all, I think all of us as human beings are guilty of that. If somebody who we know from modeling, tv, whatever, we seem to be more open to doing things. An old business coach of mine talks about the idea of I think that I know you, right? Or I feel like I know you, meaning you see somebody enough on tv, in film, in print, and you feel like you know them. And so it brings that factor into it. So that's a huge moment. And so let's talk about. So what are the goals of the whole Man Academy?

Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, they've certainly changed again, because we, you know, we didn't set out this as a business, but it has to become a business to make money, to be able to do all this stuff, because it takes many, many man hours. And of course, if you're going to hire places, it costs a lot of money. If you want to have a great network of events and cool things that guys can come to and online stuff, it has to actually self. What's the word I'm looking for? It has to wash its own face, as it were. And so we're not shy and say we want it to become a great personal development platform for men. As we said, call it a living, breathing magazine for men. Whatever your issue is. And it hasn't. I don't mean like a mental health issue necessarily, but if you were like, you know what? I'm not doing great in my career. We want you to be able to come to us and either listen to something or read something or come to us and be coached by one of us, and we will hopefully give you a nudge in the right direction. And I say nudge in the right direction. No one's broken, no one needs fixing, no one can be cured. It's about your. How can I put it? You're like a twig floating down the stream. Perfectly lovely twig, strong, natural. And you get stuck in the reeds and you need someone to just give you a nudge and go on your way.

I like that. I like that a lot. Just a push, right? So within the whole Man Academy, so there's coaching available. So if you come, like a guy comes to one of your events and he's like, you know, I really like what you guys did here. I want to dive deeper so he can dive deeper.

Yeah. And the important thing here is, you know, the whole Man Academy is more than just me. Thankfully, I'm lucky enough to be the, let's call it the face of the podcast and the host of it. And I'm probably doing majority of the background work at the moment because I Have got a flexible job. You know, I get to decide when and where I work, therefore I can spend more time in it. Matt works at the BBC and that's a heavy job on the schedule. We also have a creative director called Scott McArthur who is. He's a good friend of mine and we actually met three, maybe three years ago and he's an extremely interesting guy who moved down here from Scotland and actually helped him lose talk about lifestyle coaching. But he, he first contacted me because he's a public speaker. He's done a couple of TED talks. He speaks around the world, but primarily in the uk. But he was. He was a couple of stone, well, three stone overweight. And I know for him, how can you be up on stage? And he's not talking about fitness on stage, but he's talking about performance and biohacking, what have you. I think you've got to, you know, the proof is in the pudding if you're talking about stuff but you're not implementing yourself. And therefore we started working together. You know, he completely changed his. Pretty much everything about how he was eating, how he's exercising, and he's lost pretty much three stone.

Wow, is that 30 pounds in the United States?

I'm absolutely rubbish at this stuff.

Don't worry about it.

It's a lot. I'm so terrible at this kind of stuff. It's like calling what's six foot or how many meters is it? And Edmond Partner would be like, what are you talking about? That's rubbish. But it's a lot of weight for a guy who's. Most guys keep it here and on their belly, unfortunately. And their belly can keep it well hidden. They've got a nice suit. But anyway, so Scott is into science, poetry, all of the arts. He's into stoic this and something that and flying to Mars and etc, etc. And I would say I don't find any of that interesting at all. But that's great because Scott does. So Scott is also. He does a lot of kind of, let's call it business coaching for some of the really big companies in the UK and he's worked with some of the massive companies really around the world. He's worked on the Olympic Games pitches. The Olympic Games, you know. So if you. If you said you've got. Got Scott, who. He's able to do coaching as well myself. We've also got our. Let's call him Wellness Ambassador. We haven't bought up a cooler name for him yet, but a guy called John Downs who I, again, I met through Tony Robbins events, and he's such a lovely guy. And it means that the three of us together can all offer a different take on coaching, but we're all equally capable of achieving a good result for a guy. And again, just helping nudge him in the right direction. Now, that might not sound powerful, sexy, but that's usually what people need is a bit of accountability and a bit of structure to whatever their challenge is.

No, I agree with you. I think that's the perfect word for it, because most of us have the tools. We just need to push in the right direction. Right.

Yeah.

So a couple things I love that you said way back, way back when you made this chart transformation and this decision, it really started with podcast listening. That's what happened to me. I was in a very deep, dark depression, and I discovered a podcast by Tom Bilyeu. Impact theory.

Right. Yep.

And that led me to another guy named Ed Mylett, and then eventually led me to Brian Rose with London Real. And those guys, they gave me my nudge as. As the same happened with you. And I think it's important to have a nudge you need. And it's really. I see you guys as mentors, as somebody to allow. What I say, Antony, is most of us walk around with a mask on. We are afraid to be our true selves. We're afraid to be vulnerable because it's looked at, especially for men, it's looked at as weakness. Right. And what we realize, you and I understand is it's way more powerful to be vulnerable, way more powerful to step into your true self. But I keep looking at. I wrote this down as you were talking, and I love the way you said it. Man pie. I want to go back to the man pie. I want to talk about the slices of the man pie. Do you mind expanding on that a little bit?

First, I'd love to. And secondly, it's. It's funny actually how, you know, I've mentioned it in several podcasts, and every guy that I've spoken to about it is like, can we just speak about this a little bit more? And they've all said, oh, I like this because it's. It's. You know, it's. I think it's a simple analogy that any guy can, you know, we all have pie of any kind, but hopefully it gives people a picture of, you know, what. What. What we're trying to achieve.

I love it. I mean, like you said, it's. It's a great. It's a great word for guys to latch onto because it's like, oh, man, pie. Okay, cool. So you don't have to give away all your secrets, but talk about just a little bit more about the slices of the pie.

Yeah, I mean, it's a bit like there's another exercise called the Wheel of Life. And you know, what amazes me at the Wheel of Life is I have been using it and have known about it since. And I don't mean for many, many years, because I only say I became enlightened around the time I met the Tony Robbins experience and the podcast. So, you know, for the first 35 years of my life, I was. Had my head in the sand. And what it says for me is, as we were saying earlier, that you are made up of many parts, and, you know, you cannot let one of them fall too much. So again, if we just said at the moment, you know, money, and money can mean what you're earning, what you're spending, what you're saving, you know, what you're investing. I mean, there's. There's, you know, you can break these down. So let's say money, then you've got family. You know, are you. Are you a dad? I mean, it's different for every person. If you're a dad, it put extra stresses on you because maybe you've got kids, you've got more money going out, and they may be older, so they're at university, and you've got all these fees. I mean, that's another rabbit hole to go down. Then you've got your health and your fitness and someone confused. Some people can confuse the two, that they're the same thing. And obviously, you know, very much as you think about it, health and fitness are two different things. And you can be very, very fit and very unhealthy. And you can take a, you know, a marathon runner who is the top person in the world. They've probably got a lot of information in their body. I'm not. I won't pretend I'm an expert on this, but I know a bit. And obviously I live with a nutritionist who is very, very good at what she does. So I soak up all of her podcasts that she listens to as well. You've got your health and your fitness, and then you've got your career, and maybe you're running a business and there's all the different bits and maybe religion. I'm not religious. But if you are, great. If that's what works for you, don't care what it is. If that's what works for you. That's good for me. And you've got, even to the basics, how you dress. I mean, who teaches a guy how to dress? And if you don't care about how to dress, that's great. But if, like me, sometimes you think you'll see a guy and you're like, that guy looks. Guy looks good. He looks sharp. And it's effortless. That for me is the holy grail. Effortless style. Not. I've had to, you know, it's too forced. And that's one thing that David Gandhi always just does, you know, he always looks good in what it helps. He's very handsome and he's six foot three and, you know, got very well. What I mean is a great outfit can make a guy look even better. And then you've got grooming. I mean, let's go with hair, facial hair, etc. There's all these little things that you can. All these kind of little segments that actually you want to be able to work on with people. One of the biggest ones for me is relationships, and that's with your partner, with your boss, with your children. I mean, there's, there's, there's another one for you, your relationship with social media. There's. Scott uses a great picture, which he's got on the back of. Scott has different business cards printed for all the different events he does, which I think is really cool because it's, it's memorable. You know, it's not just a business card. You'll go to the event that Scott's at and you'll pick up. You were like, oh, it's like, it's personal, it's, it's impressive. But it's got a picture of this guy who's kind of all sort of screwed up and his eyes are all like that. And he's got, I think he's got, you know, like an iPad, but he's got another one, another one. And it's like this. And it's like, is this you every night sitting in bed or on your sofa? And that's me sometimes.

Yeah.

So you can see I haven't even gone into more of them. But there are so many segments here that they haven't all got be perfect and they never will be perfect, I don't think.

Yeah.

But if there's somewhere where you can go firstly to just talk about life and chew the fat and shoot the breeze, whatever you want to talk about, great. But if you think, you know what I want to improve myself, then you Come to us.

What I love is you're giving men an environment where they feel comfortable. You know, like you said, you're not bringing them to a hotel ballroom where it feels stale and stiff. You're bringing them to a really cool place where they can maybe have a cocktail, relax a little bit, be around other men like themselves, and then really just like, say, yeah, man, this is what's bothering me. Like, here's what I'm struggling with.

Yeah.

It's interesting. I sent out a survey to some of my audience and you know, the biggest thing that most men that I surveyed said came back with that they struggle with confidence, voice inside their head.

Right. Yeah, Good luck with that one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I thought that was interesting. And. But I think that is voice and confidence tie together.

Yeah, right. Yeah. And it's you. As you said, it brought up a picture mind of being okay in your own skin, you know, and it. Not everybody can look like David Gandhi and. Or not everybody would want to, but, you know, sometimes guys have, as we said, you're all different shapes and sizes. And some people are blessed with COVID model good looks. Now, it doesn't matter whether you consider them good looks, but they're to the masses. They cover more good looks. But you show me a man who dresses well, is confident, stands up straight, you know, has got some purpose in his life, and there's a man that you want to be around.

Yeah, yeah.

And you want, you want next to you either at the bar, on the sports field, at your desk, etc. Etc.

Yeah. Maybe not at the nightclub if you're single, because.

Yeah. Be comfortable in your own skin.

Yeah, that's right. I know, I know.

But do you know what? You've just hit a really good nail on the head there. Sorry. Or you just mentioned a good point.

Yeah.

Also about teaching guys how to, how to attract. I nearly said the opposite sex. It can be the same sex. You know what I mean? Here.

Yeah.

Even how to date. I mean, there's. There's the books, like the Game, which I read and I thought they were great. It was probably like for a lot of guys, maybe it's the UK guys. I was still a bit like the peacocking and they're wearing a silly hat stuff. I'm just not doing that. Then I realized I used to go out with the luminous green trousers on and a black satin shirt. So maybe I was doing that stuff anyway. And I realized a lot of it, actually, I was doing. And what I mean is just the, you know, the giving kind of bantering with a girl and giving her a negative comment instead of being, oh, well, you're just so beautiful. I. I just want to sleep with you. You might say something and you, you might kind of learn not to stand right in front of her, but actually just be at the bar next to her and just be like, chatting about her friend or something. So you're not kind of, you know, you're not directly kind of staring them. Staring them down, but that's nothing. As you grow up, you're not taught how to chat up, you know, someone that you want to date.

No. No. There's no rulebook for it. No. Here in the United States, here's what we're taught. Go to school, get a good education, go to college, get a good job that pays good money. And that's it. That's what you're told?

Yeah. That's an employee. Be a good employee.

Yes. That is what you're taught. And, you know, I will tell you this, and then I want to talk about your podcast, but before, before I lost my daughter, I told all three of my kids all the time. That's how I was raised. And that's what I told them, like, hey, go to school, get a good job, get a master's degree. That way you'll earn more and you'll be happy. And then now I'm like, screw that, guys, I want you to follow your passion.

Yeah.

Dream of doing experiment. Figure it out, you know, so. So, yeah, I think that's.

That's so. It's so powerful to have a dad as they've got who's. And again, it sounds crappy to say become enlightened, but I can't think of a better word. But you know what? We were all brought up, and I was no one. When you're young, said options are go and get a job or, you know, go and hang around with an entrepreneur and try and learn your trade and maybe start a little side hustle and start a business. That never happened. It was you. You know, what career do you want? As in, you will be an employee. You're going to do it. And I'm glad you brought that up, because I've spoke about this on a couple of podcasts and actually, Daniel Priestley, who was on our podcast a couple of weeks ago or two weeks ago, you know, he said his advice there, and he's. We called him the entrepreneurial mastermind because he's, you know, owns various companies and he runs these fantastic events in the UK or, sorry, around the world. On, you know, business accelerators, let's call them that. And he said, I advise a guy if they wanting to kind of get into starting a business is go and find someone and try and just shadow them, hang around them, see what, see what it's all about. And I actually go on from that. And not that I'm adding to his, you know, I'm nowhere on the scale of an entrepreneur compared to Daniel, but my extra thought on that was that go and ask the guys what's the shit things about it. What's the, what's the, what's the stuff that you hate about this? Because when you do go off and follow your passion, firstly, as you say, you might not earn zero or a lot less money for a long time maybe. And if you're not okay with that, do not go and do it because that will affect you and affect how you see yourself as a man, possibly if you're linking your self worth with your network.

That's great advice. I love that.

It's dangerous.

Yeah, that's huge. All right, we're running long on time. I don't want to keep it too much longer, but I'm gonna keep me.

As long as you want.

Alright, so let's talk about your podcast and how it became, you know, how it came to fruition, what the mission is behind it. And I know it's, it's entitled the Whole Man Academy podcast, correct?

Yeah, Yep. Yeah. I mean we pre. Covid. Let's call it that. We'd been planning to start a podcast anyway, but like anything, we were so busy doing stuff that we hadn't got around to it. You know, we decided to spend money on a course and do it properly, which we have, you know, we launched as quickly as possible just to start getting our feet wet. Get, get, get some content out there. And it's, it's been a great already, it's been a great experience for us and we're only 20, maybe 25 episodes in. But I mean today we launched the episode with Bertie Gregory, who's a National Geographic and BBC wildlife filmmaker. I mean he's kind of chat that, you know, it's got. Again, we will say it doesn't come down to followers, but it always helps. And he's got 6, 700,000 followers on Instagram and he's very famous. We've had Robin Windsor, who, man, he, you know, he was one of the dancers from Strictly Come Dancing, which is massive in the uk and he's such a lovely guy. And what was powerful about his interview was that he, probably three quarters the way through, had given us some great tales of what it was like, you know, being in front of 10 million people dancing. And he said, you know, I've never been so. I can't remember the word was scared. When I saw the red light come on and you're about to dance and, you know, there's at least 10, 10 million people watching you. I mean, that's. That's crazy. But you know what credit to him with about 20 minutes to go off that's on the interview, he spoke about a tough time in his life. And as far as I know, I think it's the first time he's said in public that actually he got very close to ending his own life. And as I said, you know, commending him for. For being honest and being vulnerable and comfortable enough to tell us that story. But, you know, he spoke about the fact that he got to a stage that had. I think the person who had split up with him, which is why he was in such a dark place, happened to actually call him. And it broke his state, thankfully. And, you know, he's. He's still here and thriving, thankfully. And, you know, that's just one of. Again, Daniel Priestley, we had on which is a tour interview. We had a guy called Chevy Ruff who was just. I mean, he swears like you wouldn't believe. He's such an interesting guy. He nicely said it was the. It was the most. It was the favorite podcast he'd ever been on. We went for two over two hours. And. But this guy knows a lot, and I think I know a bit. But it's great when you meet someone else and talk to them. That knows a lot and you're like, you're firing off each other.

Yeah.

And this is what we want. We want guys. And I mean, it's not just for guys. I mean, 20, between 23 and 27% of our listeners are female, which is interesting. And we want guys firstly to be entertained. I don't want this to a boring podcast. I want it to be entertaining. Otherwise you'll switch it off. Yep. But we always say that you want the podcast to be entertaining. You know, it's fun and you're going to get some golden nuggets out of it that help you do life better. That might be something different for person number one as it is for number two. You might hear the same conversation. You might hear one sentence, and you hear it differently to the person next to you. That's lie.

Yeah, I think you have women listening because they're probably trying to help their man transform. And so they're listening and then probably delivering the information and hopefully getting them finally to become listeners themselves.

That's the hard bit, because guys. That guys don't want to be told what to do.

No. It's the same reason why we don't ask for directions when we're driving somewhere.

Yeah, I'm terrible. That's just made me laugh. Yeah. I think I know where I'm going, so I'll follow my nose. And it turns out my nose is usually stuck up somewhere, so I love that.

Oh, man. You know, it's. I want to talk about mental toughness and fear. Yeah, I want it. Before I do that, I want to talk. You know, I've. I've kind of coined this saying, and I truly believe this. I believe that every human being is born with greatness inside them. But I think the difference is some people, number one, have the courage to go in and mine the greatness because you got to go deep, you got to work, you got to dig. It doesn't happen from watching Netflix. Right. And you have to build a skill set and constantly want to learn. So part of my thing is asking you, like, you know, anything that you can add or why you think maybe some people can do it and other people spend their whole lives blaming others for where they're at in their lives. And then I really want to end up this. And then a few questions at the end. But I really want to talk about. Because I think it's so prevalent today with where we're at in the world is fear and mental toughness. Right?

Sure. It's a big question. I think there's a couple of things. I'm always happy to give what works for me. Please. Again, you know, I could tell you what works for me, and you do, and you'll be like, this guy's a joker. He's got no idea. Because you're different to me. Although I think we're quite similar. But anyway, number one is, for me, what works is trying to have some real structure. So a good morning routine. The importance for me of keeping fit, staying fit. A lot of people don't know this, but I actually represented Team GB in the World Championships for obstacle course racing out in Ohio.

Nice.

So I was out in Cincinnati for that a couple of years ago in the 35 to 39 age category, which meant I was very, very fit. And there's levels of fitness, there's being able to run for a long way. Whatever. But being able to run, carry, climb, crawl, drag, upper body strength, freezing cold, swim, go underneath stuff, you don't want to go under and do all that when you're racing to other people pushes you. And I think challenging yourself in life continually is one of the really important things. It's fine to be comfortable, but finding something that is challenging you if it is starting a new side business, if it is entering to a race, if it is trying a new skill, the longer you keep learning and pushing yourself, I think the sharper you stay.

Yeah.

And Scott in some of these events talks about and I'll get all this wrong, but he draws a, draws a line and it's a, it's a curve of our God. I'm going to get this wrong. But the moral of his story is that the scientific research, research shows that those that continue to learn basically stay sharper for longer. Yeah, the curve doesn't drop off as fast. So there's, number one is continually learning. And it hasn't got to be every day, every second, what have you. Please settle your mind at some point and just chill out. But actually doing that was great for me. It gave me a reason to train, get up early, eat well, etc, etc. We all have a goal to work towards. The morning routine part is ever changing. There's no right one for anybody, but it's just picking one or two things, maybe that work for you. We call it for us move, breathe, think and drink. So already I've given you four. Those can be applied in different ways, but let's go through them quickly. Move as in get up in the morning and try and do something. Even if it's 5, press ups or run up and down the stairs if you can, or if you live in a bungalow, you're screwed. But anyway, you know, is something, is it five minutes, yoga, is it an hour, is it whatever, but do something to get the blood flowing. So that's move, breathe, state the obvious. We don't need to get bogged down with the technicals of breathing in through this nostril out this ear and reversing in through this nostril. No, just. Even if you said every morning I'm just going to stop and go like 20 times, open the window, that will help move and breathe. You've got those, think what am I doing today? Who hasn't? Especially in this Covid time when they're working from home, got to their desk, whatever it is that they're working from and be like, what am I doing? What should I do first. So on a Sunday night, Emma and I write out a whole week just so that firstly, she knows what I'm doing, I know what she's doing, and it starts to give you some structure. And every day. I like lists. I've got them in front of me here. Yeah, there's a great book written by a chap who I think is fantastic called Dave Allen, and he wrote a book called Getting Things Done.

Yep.

Actually, the GTD method, if I've got that right. Yeah. And, you know, his big thing is your head is for having ideas, not for holding them. And when I read that, I realized that I was a list maker anyway. But I have lists on lists and lists. What it does is it just means now, you know, tomorrow when I come to my desk, I already know what I should be working on. Not like, should I. Oh, I've got an email. Should I do this? Shall I do that? Shall I have a third coffee? So you've got move, breathe, think. And the last one is drink, which is obvious. Most people start the day maybe with a coffee or orange juice. Coffee. No, in my opinion, and especially Emma's, start with something that's actually nourishing your body. You know, for obvious ones, water, maybe. You know, you can buy so many great products now that are full of really good nutrients that you can take, you know, green juice or just like warm water and lemon. Or we have apple cider vinegar and good quality stuff as well, not just the crappy stuff you can get. I hate apple cider vinegar with a passion. Emma's like, I literally am gurning and it's like I've got a spider up my jumper when I've drunk it, because it's like, oh, yeah. And every day I'm like, I'm not having that again. But guess what? It's in my routine. So move, breathe, think, drink. You can go down and expand on those, but if you could remember those four, that would be a good start.

You know what I love? So you talked about, you know, doing this competition and all the things that you had to do. That's mental toughness. Right. You do. Your brain is. Is. Here's what I've learned. I mean, I guess I always knew it, but I didn't know it scientifically. Is your brain is mean to protect you. Right? The lizard brain don't go out of the cave. The saber toothed tiger is going to get you. So our brain, when we start to feel pain, whether it's from physical exertion, emotional pain, whatever it Might be says, oh, well, don't do that. It's painful. Like, stay in bed, it's warm. Don't get up early, Stay safe. Yeah. Don't do another push up, or as you call them, press ups, which I love, by the way. I love. I love your. The English terminology for things. It's amazing. I just absolutely love it. Um, and then you, you touched on the thing that I've been talking about that has changed my life, which is a morning routine. Get up a little earlier, get some exercise in. That's what I tell my listeners. Even if you go for a brisk walk, five, 10 minutes, like, just move.

Get the air and the light, daylight.

Yeah. I meditate, so I breathe. Meditation is all about breath work. I journal. Right. I write down kind of my thoughts and all the things that are in here so I can get it out. And then I do a cold shower, which is not fun. It's kind of like your apple cider vinegar. I don't enjoy it, but it has a lot of health benefits. It also builds mental toughness.

Talk to me about that. Talk to me about the cold shower. I mean, that's. It's something I do. And I only started doing it, although I knew it was good for me. I wasn't doing it. You know, knowing not doing is the same as not knowing.

Yeah.

So I knew it was very good for me and Emma was very good at doing it. I was like, yeah, I'm going to do it. But. But probably about six months ago, I was like, listen, pack it in. You're going to do it whether you like it or not, every morning. No excuses. So now for, let's say a minute, put it on as cold as possible.

Yeah.

You know, and, and you feel great afterwards.

You do. And so, so obviously, physically, it gets the blood flowing, opens up all the capillaries, gets everything moving. It enacts your, your. Your parasympathetic system. Like, just. It has so many scientifically proven health benefits. And then of course, it's the mental benefit. Right. Because it gets you. It toughens you up. It gets you used to feeling uncomfortable. And then like you talked about, if you, if you learn to master your breath. Right. So like, I noticed when I first started them, I would almost hyperventilate.

Yeah.

And then there's a wonderful guy named Wim Hof who, if you haven't, the Iceman. You know him, he's awesome. And if you learn to. So I do some breathing techniques before I get in. If you master the breath, you start to get comfortable. I know it sounds crazy, but you get comfortable. And I do some affirmations like one of my coaches taught me. I do some affirmations before I get into cold water. And, man, I tell everybody, like, that's how I cap off the morning routine. Once I've gotten to that point, I feel like I could climb Mount Everest, you know? So I think it's important. I think mental toughness, especially now. You know, I heard one of my mentors say earlier this week in his podcast that the world has been pretty. You know, we've had some ugly things happening, but especially here in the United States for About the last 12 years, we've had it pretty easy. The economy's been good. Everything's been pretty easy and so new. Yeah, we're mentally weak.

Yeah.

And now we're facing some. Some real adversity. And I'm not diminishing the economic hardships and the deaths, but, you know, we've all got to toughen up a little bit and. But I also still think it. It doesn't mean being alpha male tough, where we just pack everything in and don't talk about it, and then that turns into stress, and that causes all kinds of damage to our bodies.

Well, I'll tell you what, you make an important point there, because some people would hear you say you need to toughen up and think that that means that, you know, you don't show any vulnerability. But actually, for me, toughening up is part of. I think it would make you tougher to be open, more open with people and say, you know what? Like, I've had a terrible. You know, I've had a terrible day, and I just. I just, you know, I don't think I can go to this thing, or I just don't want to talk to you, or I don't want to. What have you. Understanding that actually allowing yourself to express that should make you, in the long run, alleviate some of the pressure that maybe guys are feeling and be honest with your partner. And I'm not talking about every day, you know, having to go through whether you're feeling good, bad, or what have you. If you don't want to. I'm talking about sometimes just saying, you know what, like, forgive me if I'm a bit sharp with you or I shout at you or whatever. Hopefully not hit you, because that's different kettle of fish. But, you know, even with that, understand that I'm not going through a great time at the moment, and I just need someone to understand it.

Yeah.

And that can Help you stay mentally stronger because you've alleviated some of that pressure because you don't want it to build up and then have a heart attack, someone kill themselves, you shout or you hit someone or you make a really stupid decision like telling your boss to stick your job, when actually you should have just gone in and said, you know what, I've got a new baby and I'm not sleeping and I feel stressed and I've lost some money on a stupid deal and I'm overweight or something. Actually, speaking about it openly will help you in the long run, I think, in my humble opinion, actually remain or become more mentally stronger.

I agree. Great stuff.

It's a pressure valve.

Yeah, no, I mean, that's good stuff and I think you've touched on it so many times and I think the one thing that we all overlook is our health. Without your health, you can't do any of this stuff. You can't climb the mountain of success, you can't have strong relationships. I mean, you can, but, but you've got to be healthy. And it starts with what you put in your mouth. Right? It starts with having a normal exercise routine. I don't care. Like you said, you don't have to lift weights, go for a walk. Walk, Just move. Yeah, I like that you say just move, do something. Yeah, yeah.

So the thing is, I mean, this could be a. I guess that's the danger of podcasts now is I love talking about this because it's something I'm, firstly, I'm passionate about. Secondly, the reason I'm passionate about it is because I know it works for me and I know the power of how it can work for other people and not just men, you know, it can work for anybody, including children. And you saying about what people are consuming, I mean, food wise as well as social media and what they're reading. And I would say, you know, question everything, have a look at, how can I put it? Think the diets that children are consuming at the moment in the US and in UK are not nourishing their body, probably. And you might not see the effects of it now, you will see it in 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, etc. I would say with all of that, as a father of two lovely little boys, and again, I'm lucky because Emma is a nutritionist, so she knows a hell of a lot about it. But having this knowledge means that I would like to pass that knowledge on to other people.

Yes.

And especially even more so when you've got a little child and I'm talking a teenager as well who's still got probably 60 or 70 years of their life. What you fuel yourself with makes a massive difference to firstly, your day to day feelings, you know, not, I don't know how you feel, but how your body is going to react because of the way you create inflammation in your body and secondly, your chances of getting things later in life that you do not want and you're put down to, oh, I've just been unlucky. Maybe, maybe what you've consumed, what you fueled your body with could possibly, I don't know, but maybe that's had an effect as well.

I couldn't have said it better myself. And while you were saying that, I'm thinking here in the United States we have an obesity epidemic and we have a diabetes epidemic and now that we have this COVID pandemic, who's most affected? People who are obese and diabetic. And you know, look, I understand that it's very. They make it so that it's easy to eat. Unhealthy. It's the cheapest way to eat.

Exactly. And a family that are struggling, hey, are you going to go for an expensive grass fed steak where the cow was, you know, played some Mozart just before it was killed or are you going to get the chicken dippers?

Yeah.

Can't blame you for that.

It's hard but. And maybe talk about this. I did. I wasn't expecting to go down this, but I love it. What does your partner think about how a family can eat healthily on a, on a tighter budget?

Yeah. Again, it always comes down to where they are because the frustration these days is that of course just because you're eating vegetable it doesn't mean they're good quality because of the quality of the soil which has been, can't think of the word but you know, strained of its goodness. But ultimately a, a red pepper, you know, that's full of vitamin C and I believe it's got more vitamin C than an orange, which people find surprising, you know, is going to be ultimately wherever it's come from, probably better for you than something that's processed. So if you could just trying to think who the author is that wrote the book, like Jerf, just eat real food. Imagine if you went into your cupboard now and you know, this is, the problem with this is it's so eye wateringly simple but people don't want to eat healthily generally. I get it. I love. You know, I was gonna say McDonald's. I haven't had McDonald's for like 10 years. But the point is, I love burgers, I love chocolate, all the good stuff. Why? Because our bodies are craving the sugar. No, no surprise there. But if you said, you know what, especially as a child is growing up, if you're introducing more vegetables to them earlier on, they're used to it. And, and if you are on a budget trying to say buying locally produced, especially the vegetables, you know, to make up a larger portion of your plate is as good as you can get and just do your best because again, some people might have a, you know, plenty of money and you're like, good. You can buy really good quality meat and fish and organic vegetables if you can only buy organic something. I think Emma would say buy organic eggs would be one of the main ones. But, you know, again, I don't pretend I'm an expert. I just know a fair bit about it. But I have my own views and saying, you know what, just trying to eat less processed foods and it all comes down to education.

Yeah.

If you said, go to your fridge and get out all the things that are processed and write down all the ingredients that have an X, a Y and a Z in it, in my head, anything you're eating that's got an X, Y and a Z in the ingredients probably isn't race car fuel for you. Yeah, yeah.

And I think something that's really important, I think is it starts at home. It's about home cooked meals. Make your own food. Try and source the most top quality ingredients that you can get your hands on. Make it a point to eat as a couple, as a family, with your roommate. If that's what it is. I think that's super important. And while you were talking, all I could think of was Jocko Willink, the Davey Steel and extreme ownership. Meaning that all the things that we've touched on in this hour and 20 minutes that we've been going here is that you are in charge. You have to take extreme ownership in the way you eat, your exercise, the way that you attack your business, your relationships, the investments, all of it. It's up to you. You can't blame anybody else. Yeah, right. You can't blame somebody that you put too many donuts in your mouth and now you're overweight or you're not healthy.

The problem is it's easy to blame someone else.

Of course, it's much easier.

You know, I did this because she was cheating on me or I made this business move because that guy did something and you're like, okay, that's great. But that guy's carrying on with his life and, you know, whatever the decision you're making, it's going to affect you. Yeah. So as you said, extreme ownership. And I'll tell you why I love, why I love you brought us onto that is the third part of when you spoke about, you know, some, some things that guys can do. And one of them was morning routine. One of them was just educating yourself. One of them was about understanding. Often get asked, you know, if there was. So I got asked the question at an event I was speaking at. If there was one thing you could tell a group of, like, kids to help them through life, what would it be? And I said this. Your thoughts control your feelings.

Yes.

And I use this as an example that my. My nan, or my gran, as you might call in the US, she died last year. She was 93. I loved her and I'd spent all my life with her. And as you understand, with the loss that you had, it's very upsetting. And of course it's a different thing because when someone is that age, mentally, you, you know they're coming to the end of their life. So you. It's an expectation that it's going to happen at some point. And she passed away from the complications with dementia and Alzheimer's, which was one of the cruelest diseases, because it robs them of the memories and there's nothing worse than them feeling scared because they don't know where they are and who you are. And thankfully we didn't go too far down that. But here's my point. I'm fine sitting here, but if you said to me now, right, we're going to put a couple of slides on of some lovely pictures of myself with my gran and we're going to play the music, which was Johnny Mathis, that she used to love, that we played at her funeral, that I cried at. Give me a minute or two and I'll break down in tears. Why? Because I've started thinking about her.

Yeah.

Which I wasn't a minute ago. And thinking about her has created a reaction and then the tears will flow and I'll probably get a red chest and. Etc, etc, my heart rate will go up. And there's an example of how powerful a little thought can come in. Now, here's the thing. Two things on this. One is you should be so highly commended, and I mean you, for the fact that you didn't let the loss that you had, which could devastate people and I'm sure devastate you. You could have let that rule the rest of your life. And it is absolutely right to have spent, I mean, a very long time going to the depths of despair because I have no concept. And I. Because I'm lucky enough to have kids, I have no concept of what that must be like. But you should be a shining example of that. You get to decide what you do and how you feel, you know?

Yeah.

So saying something terrible has happened and it, quite frankly, doesn't matter what is, everybody has their own thing. But saying this has happened, I'm gonna deal with it in the way that it's okay to grieve, but I get to decide how long I grieve for and the level of it and the level of how it impacts on my life.

Yeah.

Because some people will say, I can't go on. And I. You know, I. Especially when their partners leave them for an example or their partner dies when they're older. And I totally understand. It's very, very hard. But ultimately, it's your decision what you do.

Yeah. Yeah. And I'll. And first of all, thank you for saying that. It's funny, because a friend of mine said to me once, well, you didn't have a choice. I said, bullshit, I had a choice. Could have easily quit, and the world would have said it was okay. They would have said to me, well, after what you've been through, it's okay. You can quit. It's okay. And I just. You know, Antony, I decided two things. Number one, I was going to honor my daughter with the rest of my life.

Yep.

And number two, I want to prove to myself, to the world and to my family that human beings are resilient.

So there's your two reasons why.

Yeah.

For guys that listening, there's that. There's the thing you've heard that when people go, if you've had a loss, and actually, it doesn't matter what it is, but if we're talking about one of the hardest ones is a parent and your child, you've had the two decisions and your two reasons why you're going to move forward. Yep.

Yeah. And I believe. I believe that all human beings have the resiliency inside them, the strength. You just have to acknowledge it. You have to go for it. And I tell everybody, look, it's not. It's one day, one moment, one breath at a time, but commit to it. And that's how I came. That's how I came to the title of my podcast, the Daily Decision, because somebody said to me, how did it Start. And I said with a decision.

Yeah. I was just going to say it can be a split. How long does a decision take? A second? A heartbeat.

So that's it.

And that. That I think that the thoughts control your feelings. What I would say on that is understanding that it's okay to. You can't control your thoughts. You know, if you turn this podcast on tonight and you know, we've known each other for a couple of weeks, so you kind of know what it looked like. But if you turn the podcast on and I had a big pink sparkly hat on, like or not, you'd be like, your initial things, like, what is this guy doing? Like, he's going to ruin my podcast. So you can't stop the thought coming in because that's human nature to allow your. You know, your brain is working and it's continually doing this. But understanding that when it comes in, firstly it's just a thought and you get to decide if you want to focus on it or you want to just say, hey, there's that thought. Let it drift past. And I liken it to the weather. Guess what? I think when you're born, it's a clear blue sky above you. But the shit that we get thrown with career and relationships and stress and money and social media and what have you, they create these clouds, but they are just passing clouds and they're your thoughts. And sometimes you're going to get a storm, sometimes it's going to be a summer's day. But when you're in the eye of the storm, it's very, very hard to know that one day it will be sunny again.

Yeah. Which is what we're going through right now as an entire planet. But this is good stuff, man. We could go on forever. I thank you for, you know, for sharing, for being here. I am super excited to see where the whole man academy goes. You definitely have a listener in me for your podcast. So I got a couple more questions I want to ask you before we wrap up. So I love to ask this question, which is, if heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates?

Your nan and granddad are back together. Would be one, and two would be. You made a great impact on many people and hopefully a positive one.

I love that. It's funny. You, you, you. You got me emotional there with that, with that answer. I love that. That's really good. So where can our listeners connect with you online?

So let's run through them all. It always makes you laugh. No because there's so many ways now, isn't there, for people to. You need to have like a long. A list of. List of. But I mean, let's start with. I mean, most people understand what a website is. So it's imaginatively titled wholemanacademy.com.

Perfect.

Then you've got Instagram, which is. And Facebook and Twitter, which is all Oleman Academy, which is good that no one had got those. And if you want to, our podcast is also unsurprisingly called Wholeman Academy and it is on all the good platforms. Or you can just email me and it's anthonyoleman academy.com.

Nice.

So, yeah, hit us up. And I'll tell you what, here's the interesting thing. I set a challenge out to any of the guys who are listening to this. Here's the thing, because we couldn't do our, obviously our face to face events for a while, which is absolutely fine. In a way it's been a blessing because it takes so much organization that it was quite all consuming. And actually, as you said, getting guys to come along, not necessarily because they are worried about coming along, but they've got to be available. They need the time, they need to travel, they've got to pay for a ticket, which wasn't very expensive, but maybe that's an issue. Then maybe they have to ask permission for their partner because they've got kids and the partners like, oh, you've been at work all day, etc. We started doing online events. Zoom calls. Absolutely. Just, I was like, let's just start them and see what happens. First one was just, we're not trying to get 500 guys on the call. We're talking like 10 to 20 guys. But the first one we had nine guys. Second one, I was like, how can we spice it up? Pardon the pun here. So we got a guy who's supporting us, who is a chef and he's worked under Heston Blumenthal and Gordon Ramsay, which I'm sure the listeners will know. So I was like, dude, jump on the call. Teach us all how to cook the perfect steak.

Nice.

He was like, okay. So he hooked up his zoom in his kitchen. We did a whole hour, I think an hour and a half of cooking a steak and all this, all the stuff that goes with it. But it was really interesting. And I learned and the guys learned and they all took photos of their food and sent it to us. Week three, which is last week, we had a guy who talked about the state, how you can change in an instant as you spoke well about which is so important. And tomorrow night we've got the guy who wrote the book the of sleeping. And he's going to be talking unsurprisingly about, I call it super sleep. You know this soup. Soup. No, that's, that's what you eat. There's sleep and there's super sleep. It's not easy. It's late here. So it's not just guys coming on a call and chatting. It's like, guys, listen to this expert. He's going to give you a golden nugget of some segment of your pie of man and we'll just like catch up. So any guy that is listening to this, that wants to, if you either email me and, or you subscribe to our E letter, which is just on our website, if you do and jump on one of the calls with you, I'll also say if you want, you can have an hours free life coaching session as a thank you. Because what would be cool about it is just a guy from your side of the water going, I'm going to invest an hour of my time into these guys and see what they're about.

That's cool. We'll put a link for sure. Send me the link and we'll get it on there and put it in the show notes. All right, first of all, thank you. That's, that's a cool offer. And how cool is it to learn how to cook the perfect steak? I mean, let's face it.

Yeah.

Whatever your sexual preference is, your partner or a prospective partner loves somebody who can cook.

Yeah.

Right.

So it's, it's a, it's a very, it's a very important. For me personally, I love food. I mean, I love food and I could eat all day. So having a partner who not only is a nutritionist, so can cook really healthy, great food is priceless.

I love it. All right, so the last question before we let you go, which is, it's pretty simple one, which is, what's the mark you want to leave on the world?

I, I not. I hope I will see it that I helped millions of guys do life better. That's important in all shapes and sizes and, and all different guys.

Yeah.

Because I'm confident any one guy doesn't matter how successful he is or unsuccessful in his own eyes because success is just in the eye of the beholder unless it's a monetary one. Because that's the only thing that people keep track of. And I believe that any guy across the world could either enjoy what we're doing, contribute to what we're doing or learn from it. So if you, if you say, you know what, I know it all, that's great, you come along and help us teach some other guys.

Absolutely.

I dare you. If you know what you're talking about. Brilliant. Come along, write for a newsletter, jump on a zoom call, whatever it is, if you've got great knowledge you've built up through whatever it is you're doing, business, life, I don't care what it is, you come along and help us and say, I'll give the guys something to think about.

I love it. It's a great way to end it. Antony, thank you so much for your time. Buddy, I know it's late there in London.

I'm good.

And you know, I love the technology that we can do this across the oceans and share all this knowledge with the listeners and guys, if you, if you enjoyed this, like it, share it, subscribe to it, as I always say, it all starts with a decision.

Or learn from it. So if you say, do you know what? I know it all, that's great. You come along and help us teach some other guys.

Absolutely.

I dare you. If you know what you're talking about. Brilliant. Come along, write for our newsletter, jump on a zoom call. Whatever it is, if you've got great knowledge you've built up through whatever it is you're doing, business, life, I don't care what it is, you come along and help us and say, I'll give the guys something to think about.

I love it. It's a great way to end it. Antony, thank you so much for your time. Buddy, I know it's late there in London.

I'm good.

And you know, I love the technology that we can do this across the oceans and share all this knowledge with the listeners and guys, if you, if you enjoyed this, like it, share it, subscribe to it. And as I always say, it all starts with a decision.