Dr. Matt Cook & Ben Greenfield Get Put In The Hotseat: Favorite Books, Best Anti-Stress Tactics, Pig-Based Nootropics, Best Billboard Advice & Much More!

On this episode of the Ben Greenfield Fitness Podcast. Be happy, be nice, just smile. I promise it'll change your life.

These are all spiritual beings, like all these people, and you never actually just meet an ordinary person. They're all very. Like I said, they're spiritual beings. And everyone's important. Everybody needs some kind of interaction that lifts them up, builds them up.

Why are you letting the absence of the ability to be able to step foot into a sterilized, treadmill laden, dumbbell rack equipped health club keep you from staying fit?

So then we'll all look back 100 years from now and go, man, that was like the greatest thing ever. Remember before 2020 how much everything sucked?

Health, performance, nutrition, longevity, ancestral living, biohacking, and much more. My name is Ben Greenfield. Welcome to. All right. I had the pleasure today of speaking with a multiple time, repeat podcast guest. I'm going to keep him a secret. This is his sixth appearance on the show. This was a very unique episode, though, because it was pretty much us getting interviewed by my wife and. And someone who works with him who you'll also meet during the episode. Her name is Barb and we had a ton of fun with this very informal, casual, yet educational Q and A episode recorded at my kitchen table.

Three.

That was like my favorite.

Hey, you guys.

It's a great song.

We. We're actually recording this. This podcast episode has begun. How's everybody's day going, by the way? Before I introduce each of you?

Amazing.

Feeling good?

Super.

Yeah. Sun is out, red lights, little crisp in the air.

Paul's coming.

Matt.

Dr. Matthew Cook. Welcome to the podcast.

It's awesome.

What have you done to optimize your day thus far? Appear at the Greenfield compound is the best.

I woke up and I did the biocharger for 20 minutes while standing on the PEMF machine. And then I did red light and the nanov. Did a cold plunge, did a yogurt, yogurt routine. I can't speak. And did naoli. And then we did a workout. I did a whole bunch of peptides. I did some other injections, drank several amazing, amazing cups of coffee.

Did you poop yet? Because that's a lot of stuff to do without pooping yet.

I pooped three times. Okay, good.

I'm just checking.

What time is it?

Let me make sure we don't have to stop this podcast.

I was like.

Now that it's three.

In the afternoon, if you get a little bit. And I'll be adjusting levels a little bit here as we go, get a little popping on the mic. If you get a little turtle head poking out from all that optimization that you've been doing all morning, just let me know and I can press pause on today's show. So of course we're here with Dr. Matthew Cook, who has come up once again from BioReset Medical in San Jose to join, not just me, for yet another rollicking podcast episode, which may be the least scientific episode we've ever recorded. But we are about to be put into the hot seat by a couple of hotties. We also have Barb of bioreset Medical. Barb, how would you describe yourself to people?

I'm the person that tries to make sure everything's working and everybody's happy. Whatever that takes.

Whatever that takes. So you keep things running down there at your guys regenerative medicine facility in San Jose, where actually Jessa and I went. We were gonna record this podcast, actually, when Jessa and I visited San Jose, we were going to do exactly what you, the listener, are about to hear, in which Jessa and Barb put Matt and I in the hot seat with a wide variety of questions. But we did not because we decided to do do better things. Particularly a kind of like a miniature retreat getaway plant medicine journey, which was actually really nice, but it resulted in us not being able to podcast together and instead sitting cross legged on the living room floor for eight hours having an amazing conversation, which was also good.

So.

And then we have Jessa, mother of twin boys, keeper of the Greenfield household.

That's right. I hope.

Matriarch, queen, holder of the keys. You look lovely.

Shall not pass unless you come through me.

Babe, how many biochargers sessions have you done this morning?

I have done none.

Any laser lights now? We did all just get injected. Matt, what'd you just inject us with, dude?

Oh, we. That was cerebralysin, so.

And what's cerebralysin do?

So it's a. It's a peptide that has a whole. It's a combination of a variety of different peptides. It's actually from pig brain.

Oh, awesome.

Sustainably harvested pig brain.

You know, I've actually butchered a pig. You want to know the size of a brain of a pig?

How big?

Not even a quarter cup.

Did you know that the size of your brain does not dictate your intelligence though?

Well, I'm just telling you that theirs is like a quarter.

They did autopsy. Einstein's brain did have a larger than normal amount of gray matter. So it is possible that size does dictate intelligence to a Certain extent. But pigs are not stupid animals. Neither are sheep. I used to think sheep were stupid.

And I grew up around them.

Remember when we went bow hunting for sheep in Hawaii?

Well, domesticated sheep are not smart.

No, but the wild sheep are. They're very smart.

They're their own breed.

Oh, they have their own like sentinels set up and they, they camouflage themselves better than a frickin elk. And they can see it coming like 500 yards away and they set up in these different formations to escape intelligently as you approach with like I've, I've hunted wild sheep for five days in a row and been unsuccessful before. They're smart.

Back to you, man.

I had. Actually Barb is still a little traumatized from this, but when I bought my farm, I, I, we had sheep and sheep, goats. They were like a cross between a sheep and a goat and like they.

Could jump across, they could jump across a creek.

Oh, I, sheep can't do that.

And then, which we were super pumped about. And then a lion came down and killed.

Oh, a mountain lion did.

Yeah. Oh. But then, but it was still, it was like dead. And, and so then I was like not going to let that go to waste. So you ate so then. Yeah. Oh yeah. So then I cut the head off and then I, I literally roasted the entire head.

I'm surprised the mountain lion didn't take it.

Harvest the cerebralysing.

Yeah. And then it was, that was the single, like I roasted it with herbs and stuff like that all day long.

Was it good?

And then, you know, like you've had like cheek. Yeah, it was. And basically what you do is you would take the cheek out and then we would dip the cheek in the brain. And it was, and it was, it was roasted and it was, it was still the greatest meal that I've ever had.

There are certain things that tend to be surprisingly good. Like when we were down at your house and we took the bone marrow bones and made what's called Butter of the Gods where I smoked the bone marrow for about an hour at about 200 degrees and then for the last 10 minutes, covered it with grass, fed butter, a little salt and thyme and rosemary, and then we put those on top of burgers and had bone marrow on top of burgers stories. It's kind of like cheek on top of brain. These are the turkeys and cranberries of the wild animal kingdom that nobody's talking about. But anyways, back to cerebral lysis.

Yeah.

And pig brain.

What's cerebralysing from pig brain? Gonna do for us?

Well, so some people use it to improve neurological or brain performance. I have quite a few people who I've been taking care of that have dementia and stuff like that. And people will. I just got a text from somebody that said my wife has been enjoying herself more. Her memory's been a little bit better, thinking more clearly. And so there's a lot of evolving protocols of taking care of people to fix bigger problems. The other thing that's, that's sort of interesting is, is that I injected it for you in and around where the nerves are, where you pulled your muscle.

Where I pulled my muscles doing my pull ups this morning.

And so interesting. A lot of times if you can just calm the nerves down and fix them and, and, and it seems to be really great for nerves. I'll use it for hydrodissection, so I'll put it around nerves and so I'm cautiously excited to see how you feel after the podcast.

I feel great, but probably because I'm smoking a pipe at 10am in the morning. This is really good.

Prior to everything else.

I got cerebral lysine and nicotine and then I made you guys a bone broth smoothie, which, that's one of my favorite smoothies. I use the ancient nutrition bone broth and then I for the liquid use the kettle and fire bone broth liquid. So it's got bone broth powder and bone broth liquid and you do that all over ice and then you add what I put in. This morning's smoothie was colostrum, sea salt, stevia, cinnamon, and then you blend that all up. Oh, and a little bit of cacao. That's right. Because we know cacao is a wonderful, wonderful herb, especially for a little morning blood flow.

It's a bean.

A bean, sorry. And so you, you a high exalate containing bean that everyone's going to be concerned about now.

And then this is the truth and reconciliation committee over here. That's right.

There's more fact checking.

Then you blend it all up and then we put things like coconut flakes and dark chocolate and some frozen berries and you just kind of choose the toppings that you desire. So yeah, we had a good morning. Between cerebralysine, a workout, all the little contraptions, a little brown Bosch smoothie. And now, now we're about to jump into podcast. Yeah, Jess has done nothing.

I just basically made half of dinner.

Drinking a cup of coffee. Okay, so, so here's the deal and I'm gonna put all the show notes as well as the previous five podcast episodes I've done with Dr. Cook on everything from, from, from SIBO to nerve hydrodissection to ketamine. We've talked about so many things. And a link to all those previous podcast episodes, if you go to BenGreenfieldFitness.com MatandBen that's BenGreenfieldFitness.com MATandBen because today, Matt and Ben, speaking about myself in the third person again, narcissistically, well done. We're going to get put in the hot seat. And what we have done is we have very selectively chosen, I mean, stolen, 11 questions. 11 questions that Tim Ferriss actually came up with and used for his book Tool of Titans, and also tends to ask many of his podcast guests quite frequently when he interviews them. Tim is a friend of mine, so I'm sure he's not going to get too litigious over me stealing some of his questions, but we thought we were going to come up with all of our own questions for Jessa and Barb to ask Matt and I. And then we thought, you know what? Tim's already figured out some of the best questions to get just decent life advice from people. And so Matt and I have actually not really reviewed these questions, aside from just finding them on Tim's website and texting them to you guys. But we are ready to get put in the hot seat. And so you ladies can just fire away with whatever you'd like to ask.

But can I say one thing? I want to say, like, honestly, from, literally from the bottom of my heart, thank you to Tim Ferriss. Because it was, it was so amazing that when I first found, I, I did, I, I did. He was, I, I didn't meet him really personally, but I did my RKC certification with him. And so then he, he was podcasting. And so then I was, I, I saw him there, he gave a little talk and so then I started listening to his podcast then. And this is like years and years ago. And that was the first time that I basically heard about podcasting and what was happening. And then I took it to all my surgeon friends and went like, we all started listening to it like we would. And I.

To Tim's podcast, Tim's podcast.

And I feel like it fundamentally changed my life and I saw that there was like a way to become self expressed and actualized and live your life. And I fundamentally think that he was like the single person who put me on this path more than anybody else. Thank you.

All right, Tim, Tim, if you're listening.

There you go, that's.

That's a nice compliment, actually.

Tim's book for Our Workweek was. Was a book that, when you read that, it changed a lot of the way I ran my business. When I realized how much could be outsourced, I hired my first virtual assistant. I began to think more about the things that I do well versus the things that I didn't need to be doing, like, say, mowing my lawn. And, yeah, that actually changed life quite a bit.

Not good at mowing lawn.

Well, oh, my God, me neither.

I figured this out when I was a kid.

If there's, like, Mohawks in the lawn.

Your lawn is beautiful. If he doesn't mow it.

If there are certain things that you don't really have a great passion for doing and you just decide, I'm not going to do this, well, then you're not going to be asked to do that task very often in the future, like loading the dishwasher or washing the car. So, yeah, me and my brothers figured that out at an early age. If we did a kind of shitty job washing the car when mom and dad asked us to, then they would come out and finish the job and they would just figure out other things for us to do aside from washing.

See, my mom would stand out there and watch us do it until we did it the right way.

See, I think men. I think men are more likely to do that, do something poorly so you don't get asked to do it again.

My mom wouldn't let that life experience.

Not that I endorse it, make you.

Wash it one, two, maybe three times responsibility.

All right, who wants to go with question number one? Oh, and what you got can. I'm out of. I'm out of butane on my pipe torch. Matt, can you reach that. That lighter that's right there by you? I can't without unplugging my microphone, but you're within distance of a torch that I can use. All right.

I feel a little like I'm in a Lord of the Rings scene here.

I do, too.

It's pretty awesome.

It's the most hilarious pipe I've ever seen.

I love the smell.

I felt the smell of his grape.

I'd like Marion Pimpin right now by.

My plant medicine facilitator. And apparently it's a very special pipe that is like a limited edition long stem pipe. And he gave me some of his wonderful organic tobacco. You guys smell that?

Yeah, that doesn't smell good. It's a homeopathic dose of.

Yeah, I Only want the homeopathic dose, but it's delicious. Yeah.

All right, what's question number one? Let's do this.

All right, Barb, I'll let you start.

Okay. So, Ben, what is the book or books you've given most as a gift and why?

I would say one of them is a wonderful treatise of both the rational and the irrational decisions that human beings tend to make and how those can affect the way we communicate with them. Is called Poor Charlie's Almanac, written by Charlie Munger, who is Warren Buffett's partner at Berkshire Hathaway. And it's a book just chock full of wisdom about the way that people think. So that one I've gifted multiple times, Poor Charlie's Almanac, and if I could name one other that I think I have probably given away quite a bit recently, or at least gotten for people quite a bit recently. Gosh, there's a lot, a lot of them. But one that comes to mind. I'm blanking on the actual title of the.

We can take it to Matt while you remember.

I'm going to remember the title of this book because. Or that I'll look it up. But, Matt, why don't you go. But I'm going with Poor Charlie Zalmenack for now, and then I'll tell you the other book momentarily. But, Matt, what's yours?

There's this book, and it's called the Brothers K. And it's a story that's a story of an Americana of an American family. It's like, it references the Russian.

Book.

With a similar title, but it's the tapestry of an American family that goes through multiple generations. And I connected super deeply to many of the characters, and I think it touches on themes of family and difficulty and challenge and transcendence. And it's a. It's a sweet and powerful read.

And that one's called the Brothers K. Yeah.

David James Duncan.

Okay. Okay, got it. You know, I can't find this. This other book that I was thinking of, but I can tell you another one that I tend to recommend to people quite often is a lot of people ask me about my faith. And an author I really like named CS Lewis, he has a book called Mere Christianity. Mere Christianity, which is just like a basic, really good overview of hope and Christianity and Jesus and just this idea that it is possible that despite me getting a lot of flack for this belief that the planet was created by a giant magical God, fairy in the sky and how cool and magical a world that we live in, Based on that. So I would say Mere Christianity. And then also Poor Charlie's Almanac would be the two books that I've gifted.

Which I've never even seen that book in our house.

Mere Christianity.

No, no. Poor Charlie's Almanac. I don't even know this book.

Maybe you'll get one for Christmas.

Now Jessa reads. What? Like, maybe I'm a visual. Yeah.

I don't read very, very little. I listen.

Yeah.

But I don't read often.

I. I literally read or for a while, read almost a book every day and have a massive library downstairs. And I. I rarely give Jessa books.

To be totally honest and truthful, I didn't finish a book until probably my mid-30s.

Now, do you want to share with.

People why that is?

Well, that. Because I'm dyslexic, and I. Reading is an absolute chore.

Yeah.

Really?

Well, Jessica sees. She sees words as shapes.

She's a visual. I'm a very visual artist.

She's an amazing visual graphic artist, but she sees words as shapes. So the word like the is not T, H e. It's just this shape. Isn't that interesting?

Yeah. How is it for you to read now? What's your experience of that?

I feel like I was talking to Barb the other day. Once I introduced a lot of fats into my diet, it really helped me quite a bit. And then also reading to my children, because there's no judgment with your kids, it actually really boosted my confidence in reading, especially aloud. And then that carries over into just reading for yourself. So when you have the confidence, you're not thinking about, am I doing this correctly? You're actually listening and understanding what the book says. Where for most of my life, it was like, am I reading this correctly? Are people judging me by the way I read? You know, you're more concerned about the outward appearance than the actual words and what they mean.

And there's, like, an interesting part about people who are dyslexic seem to be more successful, at least a percentage of them. And why do you think that? Why do you think that that might be? Well, like, what was your. And have you. Because I. It's really interesting to think of you with that background and some of our conversations, because I think of you as a very successful person.

Thank you. I think a lot of it is you have to be adaptable because most of the world functions in this certain way of reading and comprehension and whatnot, and you don't. And so you have to figure out how to. To survive in that situation. So it's a very much a. For me especially it was a survivalist mentality, especially because I was in a school that was a reader based school. Surviving was really challenging and you get very creative on how to do that and you become super adaptable.

Bring the thunder. Epic.

Well done.

Yeah, yeah, that was.

And it's me about me.

But superpower.

That accent is only funny if you actually see me smoking. All right, what's our next question, ladies?

Before I want to finish this up because I love the fact that you named a C.S. lewis book and I just want to call that out. He's an amazing theologian and an amazing writer who from his faith and from his understanding wrote for his children to explain to them these complicated concepts. And he wrote the Chronicles of Narnia, which is.

Which is a great.

I have given that set of books.

I love the Chronicles of Narnia and.

My oldest sister gave those books to me and it was a huge gift. And so if you're looking for something to buy also if I'm huge.

Have you ever read a science fiction series I've started Space Trilogy. It's amazing.

But he has a really great book on mourning. Like people who have lost. And I can't recall the name of it, but it's come up a couple of times in the last couple months that had just really helped people. If they've lost somebody, we'll hunt it.

Down and put it in the story.

Yeah, it's a really good.

Yeah. So we'll put all the books@BenGreenfieldFitness.com MatandBen I'll link to that CS Lewis book on morning too.

Your. Your kids. It like I love Narnia with every ounce of like my being like an Aslan and like all the characters and your kids have a little bit of that vibe of being there. It's like they're on a spiritual, magical journey, like, which is just super cool to watch them like going through that. Like. And that series I thought was so good because it's starts with them as in. In in different stages of being young. And what you watch them as they're maturing both spiritually and then in their physical and. And, and life.

You go from not battling to battling and they.

And they go from being children to being kings and queens.

You know how last night we were saying we're going to be in trouble if the first question we get into. We're going to be a half hour into the podcast by the time.

Are we half hour in already?

Yeah. So we. We should. We should. We don't rabbit hole too much.

Okay.

Yeah, but I know it's fun to converse as well. All right, what's the next question?

Okay, number two. Ben, what purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months or in recent memory? My readers love specifics like brand and models, where you found it, et cetera.

I would say something I use almost every day when I'm walking. It's a breath control device that trains you to engage in carbon dioxide retention while you walk. And it is. It resists your exhale so that you're forced to take these deep, long inhales through your nose. And then as you exhale, because your exhale is resisted, you retain carbon dioxide, which helps to offset oxygen delivery into muscle tissue, helps to increase your nitric oxide consumption or production, and it leaves you feeling, after you've been on a walk while using this thing, as though you're in, like, this deep meditative state. Because we know now from books like James Nestor's book Breath, and I interviewed him about this, that carbon dioxide inhalation is now being used for things like PTSD and stress control. And while it's often vilified as, like, this acidic waste molecule that's bad for the body, it's actually an incredible molecule. It does a lot for you if you can retain especially high levels of carbon dioxide and high levels of oxygen simultaneously. So this little device, I got it from a breathwork practitioner named Anders Olson, and it's called a relaxator. Relaxator. I have it in my fanny pack over here. Tiny little thing, and it hangs around your neck like a necklace. And when you're out on a walk, you just put it in your mouth and you walk as you normally do, but all you're doing is breathing through your nose and taking these long resisted exhales. I want to say it's probably like a 20, $30 device, but I use it all the time when I'm walking, and I absolutely love it. Trains me to do, like, deep diaphragmatic breathing, CO2 retention. So I'm going to say my relaxator.

Nice.

Very nice. How about you, Matt?

Okay, I'm going to. I'm going to break the rules.

Okay.

And I'm going to say something that cost $365.

What?

That. But. But here's the thing. That's. This is in California. And so.

So 100 is like 300.

And we don't have any list here.

Here in eastern Washington. $100 is like a hundred dollars.

But I think it's probably going to be so worth it and it's going to save you hundreds, hundreds and hundreds of dollars per year.

So it pays for itself.

I bought the seventh generation detergent free, you know, chemical free washing detergent for years and years and years.

Is this the thing that cleans your washing machine ozone?

Yes.

And so it's an ozone generator that goes in before it water comes in and then it gets ozonated and then it goes into your washing machine. And if you've got mold in your clothes or mold in your, in anything in your house, you can put it in there and then you wash it on cold water without any detergent and it gets it super clean. And there's no smell of mold or toxins or anything like that.

What's it called again?

What's it called, Barb?

The Pure O3 oxygen generator.

Pure O3.

We're getting that.

That's coming in the mail. We've got one in the mail.

Yeah, we have one. I got the lake. So it was supposed to get here a few weeks ago.

Well, that's fine because the washer's not here yet either.

Okay. Yeah, yeah.

It's amazing.

It's amazing.

Okay, so especially if you're concerned about is mold, do you think A pretty big issue in washers, Matt, like how you're an expert in mold remediation and cleaning up in the body.

So it's so big in front loading washing machines. And I had it embarrassingly before I really knew about this and three washing machines in a row and like different places that I lived. And then I moved the house that like you guys, I moved into that house and it had a washer and dryer and it had, it was full of mold on the inside. And. And so then the first thing before I moved in was I got rid of the front loader. I always tell people to do that. And then put in, put in a top loader and then put the ozone thing in between.

That's what I have coming in the menu.

You're gonna, you're gonna love it.

My mind's gonna be.

I'm gonna give you a money back guarantee on that.

Take a domestic goddess to a whole new level.

Yeah, absolutely. Because what you notice is that, is that you, if you use a towel three or four days in a row and it still smells perfect, like it just came out of the dryer, means you got all the stuff out.

Okay.

And so you.

I can't wait for this.

And I'm going to tell you because.

That'S not what's happening in my house right now.

So what happens is, is because the towels, I used to have to over dry them to get any of that mold smell. And so the towels that you guys have out, sometimes I would notice the ones by the cold plunge will have a little bit of mold smell. That's going to go away.

Perfect.

It's going to be amazing.

I can't wait. Yeah, I can't wait.

It's gonna be amazing.

Okay, I guess I'll let you suggest that one even though it's more than 100.

I apologize.

We'll roll with it, Rebel.

All right, Are we ready?

You, Barb.

Let's do it.

Okay. All right. Hey, Ben.

All right.

This one's about failure. I love that. How is a failure or apparent failure set you up for later success?

I like that question because as you guys experienced last night, our family does self examination every evening where we go around and we ask each other, what good have I done this day and what could I have done better this day? And like I was saying last night, it forces you to press rewind on your day, review your day, which in and of itself is a wonderful way to just analyze how you lived, how. How whether or not you wasted your life, so to speak, or whether you actually rose to the occasion and lived out your life's purpose that day. But part of it too, when you're asking yourself, what could I have done better, you're looking at your failures. Failures and what you've learned, which are a reality for your failures. There are many, of course, but I would say a failure that set me up for success. You know, the thing that comes to mind right now, and it might be fresh on my mind because I just finished writing an article about this. I'm doing these Sunday articles right now that a little bit more spiritual or self improvement based is the fact that I've recognized my propensity to engage in transactional relationships quite a bit. Meaning especially for me as someone who runs a digital company, works online, works with a lot of virtual assistants, even works with my clients in many cases via text and text messages and emails and voxers. Very little personal, what would be called transformative relationships. Meaning there was a time when I ran gyms and personal training studios where there were hugs and there were handshakes and there were high fives and you'd see your clients in the gym, but then you'd also see them, you know, out at a Friday night party or you'd Be with your co workers at a health club, but then also be out to lunch with them during the day or spending time with them in real, face to face, personable flesh and blood interactions that went beyond just the mere, often strict and businesslike interactions that tend to be what are largely transactional reactions which allow you to treat someone with less human connection and as more of a means to an end. You know, in my case, it's very easy to, for example, shoot off an email and be curt, businesslike, and even somewhat, you know, rude. You know, for example, you know, one, one example I wrote about in this article that I was writing was, you know, I'll write to my social media manager and just be like, you spelled workout wrong. It's two words, work plus out. Thanks. Right? Whereas if I was with them, I'm a loser.

If I was instantly feel like they.

Were sitting right across from me and I was looking them in the eye, I would phrase it far differently. I would be more nice, I would be more personable, there might be a compliment sandwich worked in, and I would be getting to know them as a person in what would be called a transformational relationship. And what I've found myself doing over the past couple of weeks as I've realized this and as I've been writing the article is I have been treating relationships more transformationally. Thinking of people as true human souls who I may be going on to live with for the rest of eternity. Not as these passing these almost like stepping stones for me to, you know, get an article published or to put some money in the bank or, you know, essentially, you know, in the article I wrote, I described it as a propensity to treat people like coin operated monkeys, right? You put the coin in, they do their little dance with their symbols and their hat, you say thank you, you walk away and that's it, you got what you needed from that person. And I think that that realization for me has really helped me begin to connect with people on a more deep and meaningful level. Looking people in the eye, caring, asking about their day, and going beyond just the mere transactional into the transformational. So that's what I would say is a failure. The ability to treat relationships transactionally that I think is leading to a success, which is the ability to treat relationships transformationally.

Right on.

That's a good one.

That's a good one.

Yeah.

What do you got, Matt?

I think that, and I think that was particularly relevant for what's happening right now in the world. Right. And so I think so much of interaction during shelter in place and just during the sort of limited interaction that we're having with people, things do tend to get more transactional. And I've noticed what I think is happening is that people are flocking more to social media, because that feels more like social media.

Yeah.

But that's also got a lot of downside, as we know, because it's got a really addictive dopamine thrill and desensitization situation. So.

But in the same breath, I think when you haven't seen people and then you finally get to see them, it's like, oh, my gosh, I finally get to see it feel great. Yeah. It feels like soulful, rather than what you've been, like, trapped in your heart grow. Yeah, for sure it does. Absolutely.

Familiarity breeds contempt. Yeah. Which is why you and I have such a hard relationship, babe.

I know.

We gotta be around each other all the freaking time.

Shelter in place is killing me.

There was a great shelter in place that's like. You have two choices. First, you can stay at home with your wife and kids for the next four months.

Or is this like, pick your own adventure or.

And the guy goes, I'll take choice timber, too.

He's like, I don't even need to hear it.

Whatever it is, I got the choice number two.

What's your failure, Matt?

Hey, Matt, do you have a favorite failure?

Well, so I think I'm going to dovetail on your answer, Ben. I think that I'm a sort of a fundamentally transformational relationship person, and people will sell you a little bit of a bill of goods, and then often you'll buy it. And I'm susceptible. I love sales. And so I'm somewhat susceptible to buying. And so I did, because I wanted to be like an expedition doctor and, like, kayak and go on big. That sounds rock climbing things.

Yeah.

I went into anesthesia, which was the field that has the least transformational ability to connect with patients.

And because they're asleep.

They're asleep. And so. And so I. I did it to facilitate a goal, but it was literally, like, probably the worst thing for me to do from a perspective that, like, I. I deep, deeply love people. And so then extricating yourself from that is difficult. But then, fortunately, in the process of doing that, I learned literally everything that I needed to learn to do what I do now. And interestingly, what I'm doing fundamentally is having transformational relationships with people who have big problems. Be that mental, emotional, spiritual addiction, autoimmune lyme cancer, dementia. They're dying, wanting to do Peak living. And then it's almost like we're transformational relating. And then I'm like, healing at the same time in some way that's parallel to them, which is super, super amazing to go through. And I think fundamentally my pain that I had was that I wasn't going to be able to do it. Like, you hope that you're going to be able to do that as a doctor. And then I saw it slipping, and I really thought I might not make it. Like, I might not be able to be who I wanted to be. And I fundamentally believe it. Like, and if my life is like, being here hanging out with you guys, doing smoothies and working out, I mean, it's like, I feel like I barely made it, but I made it, and I feel so great about it.

That's my next question. Because I'm like, it's nice to be able to pour yourself into people and really get, you know, and participate with them, but do you feel like sometimes it's. You have to limit that to a point, otherwise, Jesse, you can't stray from the script.

You can only ask scripted questions.

Well, because overextending yourself or, you know, emotionally involving yourself so deeply that it's, like, exhausting. So I under. I get. And I think what you're saying is beautiful, but I like, for myself, I'm one of those people who will, like, invest in a lot of people and. And give emotionally. And you do have to, like, limit yourself to a point. Not to like a point of being cold, but, like, you will. You can overextend yourself where you're no longer there for the people who. Like your immediate family or something like that.

Yes. So the trip. The trip about that one is interesting. So I've been basically working for like, 12 or 14 hours a day.

Yeah.

So like 20 years. Yeah. So my endurance in my ability to do that is really high.

Yeah.

And yet you're 100% right. And I think the trajectory for me is to work like an hour a day less.

Yeah.

And then two hours a day and three hours a day less and. And pouring more and more of. Of yoga and meditation and sort of internal work in to balance that. And we've always done that and. And it's like a dance. But like, right now what happens is my. My energy is basically good, but then as soon as I start doing it, as soon as I kind of get my vibe, which I get sometime around like, 10 or 11 in the morning, I basically get more energy as the day goes on. So at 10 o' clock. I have way more energy than I had at, like, noon. And basically, there's something happens. Is so inspirational when I start to see people get better that I'm. It doesn't. It doesn't wear me down anymore. Like, I'm. It's kind of like what you. What you said, Ben. I'm so ecstatic. It's like, I have an idea that it's gonna be amazing, and then when it turns out that it actually is.

Yeah.

It's more ecstasy for me than anything else.

Okay.

That I can experience on Earth.

Yeah. It is interesting being down at your office and. And seeing you just kind of float from room to room, typically while singing some cheesy country music lyrics with a big, goofy smile on your face. But, yeah, it's a little bit of like a. Like. Like an infection. That's exactly what joy that you carry from room to room. And I could see how that would almost, like, kind of fuel you still having energy throughout the day just by spreading positive energy and having it bounce back at you from the patients that you're working with. It is kind of a cool experience.

And that is only. All of that. All of that is just something that is just allowing me to walk around and sing goofy country music songs.

I'm a doctor.

Exactly.

Yeah.

All right, well, I don't ask my other question because we're going to go along. So I'll just. Yeah, leave that. If you could have a gigantic billboard anywhere with anything on it, metaphorically speaking, getting a message out to millions or billions, what would it say and why? It could be a few words or a paragraph.

Okay. You know what? We were on our walk last night along the river.

We kind of did this already.

I kind of thought of something that. Because I'm sure very few people saw that Instagram Live. It's still floating around in my head, and I still think it's just a great song and a great quote, and I think people should listen to this song. I would say normally, if we were in normal circumstances when they're driving to work in the morning, but maybe, like, when you wake up in the morning before you just start interacting with people for the next few days, listen to this song. And it is a song by the Black Eyed Peas. It's called Be Nice, and the chorus just basically goes like this. And I would totally put this on a billboard. Be happy, be nice. Just smile. I promise it'll change your life.

Never heard that song.

Now you have.

I don't think so, but maybe the way you're singing isn't familiar to me.

And we're gonna do a big shout out to Snoop Dogg because he's. He's. He sings on that track too.

It's a great song. Don't like him. So NBC has a show called Songland and I love. And it's especially relevant to Matt and I because one of the things we're working on this weekend is a lot of singing and songwriting because we have a band called rocky roots@rockyrootsmusic.com shout out. And an artist came into the Songland studios for this show on NBC where singer songwriters come and present their tunes. And the lead singer for the Black Eyed Peas. I forget his name.

Oh, well, I am.

Yeah, Will I am. He was one of the judges and he chose this song and then turned it into an actual Black Eyed Peas song. And that's where the song came from was the NBC show Songland. But yeah, that's what I put on the billboard. Be happy, be nice.

That's probably why I don't know this.

I promise it'll change your life.

I'm pretty stuck in the 90s.

I'll play. I'll play it for you later on tonight.

Okay?

Yeah, yeah.

I'm not up to date on the new stuff.

How about you, Matt?

Can we. Can you give a shout out to that kid that plays guitar that you played for us yesterday?

Oh, yeah, the other kid. I was. I was down at. I was down at Mikey D's from the Beastie Boys. Shout Out. Mikey. I was down in Malibu hanging out with him and his boys Skyler and Davis. And this cat named Marcus King came by who was recording at Rick Rubin studio. Marcus King's from Nashville. Oh my gosh. Look at, look, look him up on Spotify. His. I like. One of the. One of the funniest things was Rick was. Rick was listening to Marcus play and the dude rips out guitar licks like Jimi Hendrix. And Rick Rubin goes, yeah, that's big boy guitar playing. 22 year old kids. Yeah. Marcus King. Shout out. He's got some good tunes. We should listen to some of those. During tonight's burger party that we're doing, we'll put on some Marcus King.

Can you ask me my question again? Sure.

If you had a billboard and you wanted to put anything on it and get your message out to millions and billions of people, what would it be?

I would say it's gonna be amazing. Yeah, but, but this is my. This is my idea.

Okay.

It's been so crazy with COVID and so Then there's like, trying to figure out what's happening and, and transitioning from the state that we're in into the state that we're going. And often when big pandemics and crazy things happen, all kinds of evolution and science and technology and opportunity kind of come. And I think that that's going to happen from a functional medicine perspective, from a science perspective, from a wellness perspective. And this is an opportunity for all of us to take our health to a deeper and greater level. And I've done that for myself. And it's been like absolutely the most amazing sort of four months of my clinical practice. And so I'm super pumped and so. And there's so much fear that in driving around. And so I'd like to have billboard, it's all over that said it's going to be amazing and start to program that into our consciousness.

It is going to be amazing. That's your catchphrase. I made you a giant dork.

You got T shirts and mugs and hoodies and beanies. You can buy them. That's right here. It's going to be amazing.

Bioreset medical. It's going to be amazing.

Get up today. So you made me that.

I keep having to turn Jess's sound out because she shouts.

I come from a loud family.

I know you do. Trust me, we're noticing.

I wore that T shirt to work and then some people saw me wearing it and so then they made me cups that say it's going to be amazing. So it's like really right off the Rosa gift that keeps giving spiral.

Okay, okay. So, Ben.

Yes.

You're a savvy investor. What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you've ever made? And that could be an investment of money or energy or time.

I did invest $10,000 in a startup cannabis enterprise in Canada that I was prepared to liquidate at about 2 and a half million a few months ago. And then Covid hit and the stock crashed right before I was going to liquidate. So right now, if I sold it, I think I'd get about, about 10k out of it. So.

Wow.

No money lost, no money gained, no money lost. It's all, it's all on paper. I would say one of the best or most worthwhile investments that I have ever made was where we are at right now. I used to come up to this very 10 acre plot a couple of times I came up here and I hunted whitetail deer and it was just this blanket slate piece of land off the side of the road in Spokane, Washington. I made the landowner an offer that if I was able to find water, which is really funny because I actually hired what's called a well witcher, where they walk around with a douser, they. They find exactly where water is supposedly passing through the. The underground springs. And, you know, he walked around the land with me, and he put his foot down, he said, drill here. And we drilled, and voila, we had water. And I told the landowner that I wanted to be able to ease a driveway in and if I could get power in from the local municipal power, even though we eventually added solar, so it could be off grid, that I would buy the land. So I did about 10 acres for about $90,000, which is a pretty good deal. And then we have spent the past six years just gradually building it into the Greenfield estate. You know, we built a home, and then we built a little pool house. We built a guest house. We built a fort chipmunk, the tree fort, and put an obstacle course in, and the goat in the chicken barn. And, you know, the house, of course, doesn't kick off income. You know, the houses depreciate. But just having this oasis, especially during the past 100 days, during the amazing lockdown, being locked down on 10 acres of luscious land with vegetables and goats and chickens and hiking and sunshine and trees and nature and plant foraging, I am so happy when I'm at home. And I think this is probably one of the best investments I've ever made. I know so many people are the nomadic, don't tie yourself down with a home. You know, there's the guy who I will teach you to be rich, or Ramit Sethi, who, you know, writes that, oh, you don't want to own a home, and it's just. It ties you down. It's just a chore all the time. And you want to be nimble and you want to be mobile. I just disagree. I think that a home is a castle. It's a safe haven. It's an oasis. So I'm gonna go with this. This little piece of land and home in Spokane. I think it's the best investment I ever made for just overall happiness.

It is a magical place. And I want to thank you for YouTube for creating this here and allowing other people to experience.

We love. We love to. We love to share it. We love sharing good food and good times at the Greenfield house.

And it's so awesome to see it, like, evolving. Like, you know, the. The. You guys didn't have the.

Yeah.

Guest House.

Yeah.

No, I mean, Jess and I'll probably.

It's the bomb.

What? Die here holding hands in bed. Someday like this. I mean, God. God willing, at least at this point.

I don't plan on moving in 30. 30.

Yeah, exactly.

So that'll make 260 years old with all that. All that cerebral lysine, pig brain.

Yeah, yeah. Anti aging man.

How about you, Matt? The.

Yeah, my greatest investment, for the most part. I just about went to like a meeting to teach or learn or meditate or do yoga like we were. We basically went to meetings, traveled three to four weekends a month for the last 10 years. And now it's harder to do that because. Because we're not traveling. So to me, I'm so grateful that I did that. And my primary investment has just been in knowledge and education. And even currently, like I'm building this platform that's gonna. A functional medicine education platform basically that's gonna go live in an introductory limited way in the next month or two, but. And so I'm just continuing to double down on an introspective journey of education and learning.

That's interesting because I actually knew you were going to say that.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

I don't know why.

Cool.

It was.

That was weird.

That's the.

Yeah, I mean, books you cannot be for. I mean, that's the unwritten rule in the Greenfield house is if river and Taran want a new LEGO set or Nerf gun or anything like that, they can use their hard earned money to buy that. But books are pretty much a no questions asked, we will purchase them. Because book. I mean, I could have said that. Book library downstairs with hundreds and hundreds of books on religion and philosophy and science and nature and health. That also, I would say.

And Captain Underpants.

And Captain Underpants, of course, I think that's upstairs in the boys bedroom. But my, my book collection is, I would say, is a pretty, Pretty decent investment as well. Yeah, for sure. Knowledge, wisdom. Yes.

Okay.

All right, well, on to the next question. What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing that you love?

This is a tricky one. An unusual habit or absurd thing that I love? I guess I could say a weekly coffee enema. That's a real treat, you know, I don't know if this is an unusual habit or an absurd thing, but as a guy with a background in Ironman and obstacle course racing, I used to run a lot. You know, when I. When I was racing, I was still considered like a minimalist runner. I'd run like 30, 40 miles a week. Which for Ironman, is not considered a ton of mileage. But now, not a day goes by that I don't walk for a good five to seven miles. Like out in the sunshine when it's deep, dark winter, I'll throw on my headlamp and my boots and go walk in the snow. But for the past two years, I've adopted a walking habit in which I take all my phone calls when I'm walking. I do a lot of my deep thinking and meditating when I'm walking. I do, like I mentioned earlier, my breath work when I'm walking. I used to think that when I'd see people just walking on the side of the road that it was a waste of time or why aren't they running or getting fit. And now that I've begun walking regularly, a ton. So I probably take 15 to 20,000 steps a day. And I love. I love to walk. It's where I do a lot of my thinking. It's where I make all my important phone calls. It's where I'll listen to audiobooks at four times speed sometimes because I just find when I'm walking, I can absorb material better. And I, I literally. Not a day goes by where if I don't go for a walk, I feel as though I'm missing out on part of my day now. So, yeah, I mean, I walk ruthlessly every single day. And it's just a. I. I don't even enjoy. Like, my running now consists of me going down, checking the mail, and running back up the driveway occasionally. That's about it. Or maybe when we're playing tennis with the boys. Yeah, I. I would say walking a lot, A lot.

Ruthless walking. I like that. Dominating.

Now, now, speaking. Speaking of which, I. I want to listen to, I want to hear Matt's reply, but I also have to pee like a racehorse. So, Matt, why don't you reply? I'm gonna go take a quick pee. And Matt, you keep. You keep all the people entertained with your. With your response for your absurd thing. And I'll be right back.

And it's gonna involve being ruthless and dominating.

Okay.

Of course. Because you strike me as that ruthless dominator.

Yeah, exactly. Totally. The soft hand. The soft hand of wisdom. So the. I would say that my absurd behavior is that probably almost like him walking almost every minute that I'm not working out or working or eating, I'm walking around with a guitar on my house, playing along to music that's playing on the sound system and singing at the top of my lungs. And, you know, it's. It's.

I can totally see that.

I spend tons and tons of time playing along with. With people and so. And. And I. I've gotten to the point where I just kind of pick the guitar up and then I'll figure out the song as like. And I was having dinner with Barb the other night, and it was amazing because I hadn't heard, you know, John Prine died. And, you know, there's this song, the Speed of the Sound of Loneliness.

Oh, yeah.

Remember that song came on and I just picked it up and I. I nailed it. Which was kind of fun because I hadn't played that song in 10 years. And so it's been super amazing. And then interestingly, and this is just a crazy story, Ben, you're not gonna believe this, but I've been doing hydrodissection where I put fluid, and I've actually used cerebralysin, but I've also used a bunch of other peptides and a bunch of other products. And I basically did vagus nerve hydrodissection and I hydrodissected all of the muscles underneath my jaw and my pterygoids and then the nerves that go to my vocal cords.

I was gonna say, do you sing better now?

My singing voice is like. And it was amazing because there's all of these songs that I used to sing, but I couldn't sing them. Right. Like, I couldn't get, like. And especially like, you know, Jackson Brown and Elton John and people whose vocal register is just.

Your higher range is good.

A little higher than. And. And then like, I. I noticed now.

You'Re gonna like a lot of singing stars coming to your place now for the same thing.

Probably. Yeah, like what. What we're doing with that is probably the most interesting thing that we're doing.

Just so everybody knows, I'm back to cerebral. I.

Well, this is about Matt right now. Sorry, honey.

No, it's not. It's not about.

Just so everybody knows, my bladder's good to go. All right, sorry.

Nailed it.

Back to you, Matt.

I was. Sorry, I was just stalling for time. I was just. We were praying you were going to get back here, Ben.

No, and I think that actually Matt was talking about doing these hydrodissections of all the muscles that interact with the voice and with the fifth chakra and with self expression. And, you know, I've been doing some of those as well. And it's very interesting because it. That impacts your perception and your cognition, and I see your clarity coming out of that as well because And. And the fact that music and singing particularly does something different to your brain. And during COVID you've done that more because you're not at a restaurant, at a business dinner. You're at home with your guitar, singing.

Yeah. I mean, I'm singing for, like, two or three hours every day because before I was doing entertaining, I was doing business entertaining seven days a week.

Sure.

And now I'm pretending that I'm a rock star seven days a week. But it's interesting that you say that, Barb, because I feel like when I. Even when I look at you, I have a sense of, like, also with you, like, where I feel. And I don't know if this is Covid or everything that we're doing, but I feel like, an order of magnitude more present than I did.

Yeah.

Yeah. Six months ago.

Yeah. Oh, absolutely. I think so. Even with interactions that I have with just the store clerk, Honestly, to me, it's like I. I've had the. Especially during COVID this just realization that these are all spiritual beings. Like, all these people, and you never actually just meet an ordinary person. They're all very, like. Like I said, they're spiritual. And everyone's important. Everybody needs some kind of interaction that lifts them up, builds them up. And I think that was total sidetracked, but I do know what you mean.

That's a good sidetrack. Keep going on that one.

There's just. No, we're not just people. That's basically what I'm saying. We're. Everyone is like this very amazing spiritual being, and everybody needs to feel that encouragement. I think it's so important. So important.

I agree. And I think that's the as. Even just when you're interacting with people with a mask on, you have to make eye contact. If you make contact, it's eye contact, which is the deepest kind of sort of spiritual contact. And the expression namaste from yoga, that's what that's about. Like, I see you as a spiritual being. I acknowledge myself and you as a spiritual being. It's so totally different kind of interaction than a transactional interaction of. I'm going to write you an email, and now I'm done with you.

Yeah. Well, especially since I'm not really crazy about the mask, but since people are masked up, it's almost like you have to be overly expressive.

Yes.

To actually be felt.

I've gotten amazing at using my eyebrow muscles.

Still can't do the one eyebrow. I would love to be able to do that, but I can't do it anyways. But you have to be overly expressive.

Yes.

And it has to be super thoughtful, which I think is actually sometimes pretty good. Like a good thing. Anyways, next you should probably move on.

Looking at past over the last five years and just think about what one new belief, behavior or habit has most.

Improved your life over the past five years. Well, look, I want to say a regular meditation practice, but I feel as though 95% of people would give a reply like that. That meditation has changed their lives when they adopted it. But specifically the flavor of meditation and journaling that we've adopted as a family just over the past, you know, we just finished a 30 day gong in which we challenge each other to do 5 to 10 minute meditation as a family in the morning out on the patio, combined with journaling in the morning. And the journaling in the morning consists of two questions. What am I grateful for? And who can I pray for or help or serve this day? And then in the evening we all gather as a family before bed as you guys joined with us doing last night and we do our self examination. What good have I done this day? And what could I have done better this day? And then finally, what is one way that I lived my life's purpose today? Those four questions, gratitude, service, self examination and purpose, when paired with checking in in the morning with the meditation and the breath work I have, I've really, really enjoyed that a lot. And I feel as though it's been a really nice bookend for the day. So much so that I'm actually working on a new journal for a while. I had something called the Christian Gratitude Journal, which is three questions, what am I grateful for? Who can I pray for, help or serve this day? And what truth did I discover in my reading today? And I'm actually, I'm going to stop producing that journal and I'm going to start producing what I call the Spiritual Disciplines Journal, which is the four questions that I've just described. What am I grateful for? Who can I help? What good have I done this day? And what could I have done better? And what is one way that I lived out my life's purpose today? And I would say that although I'm one of those guys who is always adopting new habits, new routines, new rituals, that's one that really comes to mind.

Awesome.

That's amazing. You know, it's so interesting to go through that with you last night because you know, super fun, like goofing around, singing songs and stuff like that. And then we went and played some songs with the kids and did that. And I didn't say anything, but, you know, you were talking about failures and I was thinking about how humbling the practice of medicine is on the way up here. And then I was meditating on that and then taking then to, to get up and then go meditate on the, the porch this morning and to marinate that in with like the whole workout that we did. And I was like, I chose my parents. And then my sister called me right before we did this shout out to Jenny Cook and she was like, you have to buy dinner for parent mom and dad tonight. I was like, okay. So it's like, it was like service. I was like, is super cool. And what you guys are doing with that is just the totally the greatest.

How about you last five years belief, New behavior or new habit?

Okay, so I'm gonna go into a.

And we know you haven't ejaculated or masturbated for a decade, so you can't say that.

Oh, I'm holding, I'm holding it in. Holding it in. Brahma. Brahmacharya. Yeah, that's not, that's not probably one of my main belief systems.

He's like, I don't hold to that at all.

You know, it's interesting because I had a belief system that was much more dogmatic around yoga of like, you just have to work your way through your practice and that you could be in pain. And I would, I would use yoga poses and to work through things is how I would work through in kind of a fairly sustained way where I might have pain for a month or two and work my way through it. And then I basically just started injecting peptides and stuff and just basically fixing things and not having to do that. And so I guess my belief system is that we're going to be able to keep ourselves fundamentally relatively close to this age where super long time by harnessing the best tools and techniques and strategies of what is going to double in quality every two years. Just like Moore's law. And so then we are going to look forward to a golden age of health and medicine. And so maybe coronavirus is just ushering this in. So then we'll all look back a hundred years from now and go, man, that was like the greatest thing ever. Remember, remember before 2020, how much everything sucked?

I wouldn't be surprised.

Yeah, let's hold that.

Definitely a historical moment. And I don't think we're just saying that out of narcissism.

Oh, it's definitely a historical Moment for sure. With a lot of potential.

There's a shift.

All right, I'm that. Are you boys ready? Okay. What advice would you give to a smart, driven college student about to enter into the real world? What advice should they ignore?

Why did you go to college, you idiot?

I wanted to be an engineer, to build a bridge.

So if they have indeed gone to college for legitimate reasons, such as they need demonstrable evidence that they have engaged in coursework that allows them to do something that may harm someone if they didn't actually pass fail, such as building a bridge, being an engineer, being a physician, being an astronaut, etc. I certainly do think there are some things that rigorous, demonstrable coursework is necessary for. And I also of course believe that if you're going to college for the social exposure, generalized education, etc. That you should travel around the world for a year and you'll get a lot better education than going to college. However, I would say that the advice that I would give would be to, if at all possible, because I still feel as though mentorship and apprenticeship and practical hands on learning is under emphasized or sometimes completely neglected in a college setting. That my advice would be to, for whatever career that you want to embark upon, you find one of the best people that you can who is practicing that craft that skill and you figure out a way to shadow them, to follow them, to learn from them, to be mentored by them, or to in some way see what they do on a daily basis. And of course I think that that's an indispensable experience whether or not you're going to college. But let's say that you graduate with a degree in, you know, let's just use something very simple and realistic. Like I did say physical education, right? Well, I just went straight into, you know, operating gyms and personal training studios and working at health clubs when if I could go back, I would have found one of the best of the best, like Charles Poliquin, the strength sensei, or Pavels Hadelin, you know, a kettlebell. Kettlebell instructor, yeah. Charles was a friend of yours?

Love Charles.

Yeah, I mean he rest in peace. Or Pavel or you know, let's say if we were talking about something like, you know, endurance, maybe a Lance Armstrong or a Mark Allen or a Dave Scott and just basically hound those people, their assistants, the people close to them, figure out a way to where you can actually go in and follow them and see what they do and learn from the greatest of the great, the goats, so to speak. A new term that we taught our children last night. And what I would do is find whoever's doing what you want to do in a very good way and figure out tooth, claw, nail how you can get yourself tucked under the wing of that person and just be a fly on the wall or shadow them for a good several months just to really get exposed to how what you've learned in a formal setting can be applied in a real world, boots on the ground setting. And you asked about advice that should be ignored. I would say, I don't know a lot of advice that college students are being given these days, but just general life advice that I see floating around out there. I would say that probably one of the things that I was personally advised to do was to really get my hands dirty. Get into the business, learn what I was doing inside and out, whether it was programming web pages or designing PHP scripts or writing newsletters or doing research for clients. And I would, I'm going to use this word again ruthlessly. Outsource as much as you can to focus on what Gary Keller, who has a book by the same title, which is excellent, would say crushing your one thing, right? Don't worry about putting yourself into a situation where you need to learn every single aspect of what it is that your business involves. Instead, just focus on the one thing. And like for me now, I don't know how to log into my own website, I don't know how to fix anything, I don't know how to send out a frickin email to my audience. I don't know, I don't even know how to do any of that stuff. I have no clue how to do it. And there was a time when that would have driven me absolutely nuts because I'm supposed to know how to run every little aspect of my business. And now I've largely extracted myself from all of that so I can focus on what I really, really want to do. Read, write, learn, teach, create, right? And so I'm living out my highest purpose because I'm not trying to do it all. So I'd say those are the two main things. Get practical, hands on experience from someone who's doing it quite well and then focus on doing what you do best. Crush that one thing, outsource everything else.

A good one. Okay, I'm gonna dovetail on what you said because I think there's two sort of genres and categories.

How come you're gonna dovetail? Not piggyback?

I was gonna dovetail to kind of creep up and then I was gonna jump on Top and piggyback.

Piggytail and dub back.

I was gonna piggyback on the second half of it, which was gonna be amazing. So some of the people you talked about, like the goats, like I think yourself and Tim and Charles Poliquin are people who are fundamentally very self expressed. And they expressed and created almost like a reality distortion field around them. And I think that's what I told Barb. I go, it's almost like we're in a reality distortion field here where Covid doesn't exist. This is the greatest. And so that is like on the one hand of one, one potential pathway of life and then this other pathway in life is this more didactic, more traditional college experience of. I have several boxes here and figure out which one of those boxes you want to be in and live in for the rest of your life. And. And I think that there's a hybrid model for the kids out there which is to play in any or all of those boxes and try to pick what you're truly passionate about. Because what I now believe is if you really want to do it, you can do anything. And then living in that and getting curated with all of the latest and greatest of tech and science and art and. And a modern perspective on traditional culture and religion. And then in parallel to that, then finding these people that are outside of the box, finding a Ben, finding a Pavel, finding these people who are the mavericks who are creating the reality that it's going to be all of our future reality and then marinating that and then, and then, and then, and then take that and then do something amazing with it that defines your life and changes basically the, the, the possible, the potential possibility for all of the people around you.

I like that.

Love it. Yeah, you totally jumped up on the back of the pig there.

I jumped right on the back of the pig and then I was like riding the pig.

You know pigs only by the way.

The Black Mirrors TV episode about the pig, it was one of the very first and I'm not much of a TV guy, but everybody's telling me, you gotta watch Black Mirror. So finally I, I said, okay, what episode should I watch? A Black Mirror. I believe it's a Netflix series. And so I watched it and it was basically about a guy who. It's. It's hard to explain, but in basically. Basically it basically involves making love to a pig.

Ew, sorry, I can't get into that.

Easy, easy.

And between, between pig brains, piggybacking and making love to pigs. Pigs seem to be a prevailing theme in today's episode.

Okay, I think it's time to move on to the next question.

We're getting a little long in the two, so we'll go, we'll go rapid fire on these. We've got three questions to go.

This is a great question. Question. Okay, Ben, what are bad recommendations you hear in your profession and area of expertise? There's a lot of junk out there.

How much time you got? I'm. I'm gonna limit, I'm going to limit myself to one. And I would say that it would be that exercising is the best way to get fit. When in fact, if you are, as I mentioned earlier, engaged in low level physical activity all day long, lots of walking, lots of de stressing, a really nice cold bout in the morning and another cold bout in the evening, a regular sauna practice and, you know, doing a little bit of manual labor, lifting heavy stuff every once in a while and playing some sports. Some of the fittest people I know from a pure health standpoint, who I know are going to live a long time are not necessarily the people who are the two hour long gym rats, because I know a lot of those kind of people. They're inflamed, they're sick, they're overtrained. I mean, for me personally, now, perfect day of exercise for me is about 30 to 40 minutes of some kind of just like hard grind, like kettlebell or something like that. And then lots of walking, a little bit of cold, a little bit of heat, some kind of sport. And if you'd asked me 10 years ago, it would have been like, go to the gym hour or two a day, you know, get a long bike ride or a lunchtime, you know, hardcore slog in on the treadmill or on the road or like long swims and just exercise, exercise, exercise. And now I think brief bouts of like some high intensity interval training, a little bit of kettlebells and then just lots of movement, lots of hot, lots of cold, lots of time in nature. I think that's the way to go. So I'm getting, you know, especially since I even stepped into a gym for the past, what, like almost 110 days, I'm realizing how much people associate gyms and health clubs, et cetera, with fitness, when in fact you don't need any of that to not only be healthy, but also to be fit and strong. And it still shocks me how many people are like, I can't wait for Covid to end so I can finally get fit because I'm putting on so much weight. During the scene, I'm like, you looked outside, you've got. You've got some shoes, you got the sunshine, you got miles and miles of roads you can go walking on. You have rivers, you have lakes, you have oceans. Why are you letting the absence of the ability to be able to step foot into a sterilized, treadmill laden, dumbbell, rack equipped health club keep you from staying fit? So, yeah, it's basically. It would basically be that you'd need a gym or a health club or a formal exercise program to stay fit.

Which nobody needed, like, you know, 125 years.

It's old school. Yeah.

Unless you were an Olympian or a gymnast. Yeah, I was like, oh, I look at people like my dad who worked in the field, you know, farm, and he's in great shape for his age. I never went to a gym.

How about you, Matt?

No, I'm gonna nail it totally on this one.

Nailed it.

No, I didn't mail it yet, but I'm going to.

You're going to. I'm anticipating.

My, my. What I'm going to do is I'm going to turn it around and I'm going to let. I'm going to cede my time to Barb and Jessa and let you guys answer this question, because I want to hear what you guys have to say.

All right. Donating his time.

I do not like the advice people give. Like, if you want to be happy, just think happy or just, you know, you just make yourself happy. Like, you know that. That where you just like manif. Like, I don't know if manifest is the word or. Do you know what I mean? Where it's like, it's like you just. It's just mind over emotion.

You mean the quote that a man can be happy no matter her circumstances?

No, no, no, no, no, no. It's just more of like you can will yourself.

You can.

Yeah. Will yourself into this emotion.

Willpower based belief.

Yeah. And I was like, there is like, I guess some truth to that, but I think, like, you have to. To really wrestle through that.

Do the work.

Yes, do the work.

You have to deal with the shadow.

Exactly. And so when you see. I hate it when I see Mems, where it's. It's like that kind of thing where you're just going to will yourself into some kind of emotion. I don't think that's true. And I think that puts actually a huge amount of pressure to be in an emotional state that maybe you're not ready to be in and that you need to go, like I said, go through the work and deal with the demon that inside that is bringing or having that negative emotion and really labeling it and understanding it and confessing it. For me, as a Christian, confessing it and then turning away. Like, I feel like there's a whole process. It's not just like, I'm gonna be joyful because I'm gonna will myself into joy. And I'm like, no.

And where you are in that process is exactly where you're supposed to be. Because what it is is the journey and that life is a journey. I think we're all. There's. There is this expectation of just like, put a bunch of positive. I'm a big believer in affirmations. Right. Like, because you need to retrain your brain out of different kinds of patterns. And that's what gratitude meditations are about, and journaling and everything else. But the fact is it is always a journey and it's layers and we're complex beings with a lot of history that we take in genetically and through everything that's happened to us, you know, in pre verbal states, all the early deep brain conditioning. And you don't unravel that just by thinking that it's. You should just be happy.

Yeah, I just. I need. Yeah. I mean, perfect example is that like, Ben came back from California. I had two days where I was just in this major funk. And I told him. I was like, I don't really even know why. And eventually I was able to label it, and then I now can understand it, and then I confessed it, and then you turn. Then I turned away from it. But it was a whole process. It wasn't just like, I'm in a depressed state and now I'm just choosing to be joyful like that. Just. I don't like that advice. I think it's not real, and I think it's. Yeah, it's. It's this in. We live in a world where we want instant results, and that is not reality, in my opinion.

Good one.

Good job.

Yeah. And I think that I see that a lot in the medical practice because we deal with a lot of people who have had chronic conditions, chronic pain, chronic illness, Lyme disease, post Covid, all the things that kind of happen in people's life. And there's a guilt associated with. When they're asked, how are you doing? They want to say, oh, I'm doing great, but you can see they're really not doing great. And it's okay to like, share that with people because it's how you process it and you start and you get through that sort of imposter syndrome, because we've all been programmed to just be, you know, always pretend. And as somebody who grew up with what was, you know, called chronic illness as a type 1 diabetic and as a double organ transplant, you know, I view this as just chronic health. And everybody's dealing with stuff, but I really like to share that with people because it make. It gives a richness just to their ability to be like, oh, yeah, I got stuff too.

Everybody's got stuff for them to actually acknowledge it and.

Yeah.

Know that it's there.

Right.

Because a lot of people don't even want to acknowledge, like, yes, I'm dealing with depression. Like, I need to. Like, I'm not sure why I'm gonna work, you know, and then actually run through the process where. Or yes, I have this chronic illness. I don't really like to talk about it or, you know, even name it or anything like that. I just kind of want you to give me the shot and just deal with it. You know, it's like nobody wants to actually go through the process.

Well, there's accountability associated with that too. And I think one of the things that we've lost in our culture, in this, you know, particularly in this sort of influencer culture and the cancel culture, everything moves so quickly that, you know, the ability to not judge and not particularly not judge yourself and be wherever you are and then continue to move along that process is something that we sort of lost as we got into this very transactional and quick moving media culture. And maybe part of what's happening now is we're having a chance to back off from that a little bit. Yeah. Yeah.

Good ones.

Good one. Good job. Nice, guys.

So much for rapid fire.

Thank you for helping me.

Yes.

Sorry, girls. Like, I like to talk.

Yes.

And I want to go deep. I'm not into. Yeah.

Okay.

So are we. Are we bypassing you, Matt, or are we gonna come back to you?

No, no, I seated myself. I want to echo what you said, because for me, I felt like I couldn't say anything ever for almost all my life. So I was just kind of holding that in. So I relate to that. How you felt, because I. I was just. If I felt bad, I would just kind of hold it in and I would wonder if it would go away. And I was. I felt like I would wonder for, like, months or something like that. And now if something happens, I just say, I was like, ah, blah, blah, blah. And then it. It Never seems to last more than like 10 minutes because I can just process through it. And so I think that that's an amazing thing for you that you said.

Bard, you got the next one.

Oh, yeah, yeah. In the last five years, what have you become better at saying no to? Invitations, distractions, et cetera. What new realizations have helped?

Easy. I actually this is fresh in my mind because I just got invited down to compete in this kind of like hardcore masochistic manly man event in Texas with shooting and swimming and hauling heavy loads. And I am still struggling with the transition from being an athlete into being what I know is kind of my bigger calling in terms of impact and fulfillment. And that is being a mentor, being a spiritual leader, being a motivator, being someone who doesn't necessarily inspire people by going out onto the field of battle and competing, which, let's face it, I'm not going to be doing anyways when I'm 80. And my acceleration to a body that will feel like I'm 80 is only going to be vastly increased by my participation in these type of events I've been doing for the past 20 years. And I've identified myself with, and I've gotten invited to so many swim run competitions and random screwed up versions of triathlons and obstacle course races and, and heavy man lifting and strongman, all this stuff. And I have had to learn that most of the time my pulling towards a lot of those activities is based on ego, based on the fact that I've identified myself as an athlete for so long that it was really hard for me for a long time to just say, no, can't make it. And like this last event, it's like I look at it and look at all the events that they're going to be doing. I'm like, oh yeah, I could totally win this. Like, I'm gonna totally go there and clean up. And I'm like, but you know what? That's two days of travel, flight, Texas, two days of sitting around shooting the shit with a bunch of guys, you know, lifting stuff, exercising, not really necessarily creating meaningful for people or doing what I know is gonna be my true calling, or even being around to raise up my boys or be with them or take them out into the wilderness or down to the river or out in the forest. And so I've had to begin to learn to say no to athletic events that I get invited to that I'm realizing are more simply things I'm tempted to do to fuel my ego versus things that are going to Help me to fulfill my impact in the world.

I can totally resonate.

Yep.

Awesome.

Yep. So hanging up the athletic identity and replacing it with the man, mentor, leader, father, king.

It took me two years to actually. Actually fully.

Yeah.

Give in to that y. Because it was a huge part of my identity as well.

So that's what I would say.

I get it.

How do. How do you feel now?

Transformation, Jessa.

How do I feel now about it? I feel like I've already proved myself, and I don't need to prove myself anymore.

That's a good one.

That's basically it. It's in a very simplified version. That took me two years to get to that.

Oh, that was. That was quick, though. Most people don't get to there. Yeah.

How about you, Matt?

For me, it's a little similar. We're saying no to a lot of travel now, and I'm trying to say no to almost anything other than, like, exercise, meditation, yoga, movement, mobility, medicine, and just doing that. And I feel like we're gonna. That investment's probably going to do more towards improving what we can do for other people. So saying no to travel and being on the road and saying yes to sort of our version of that introspection is. I'm incredibly excited about.

Cool.

That's awesome. Okay.

Yes. I agree with the no to travel. It's been amazing.

It has been amazing to have you home.

So great.

Food is so much better.

We used to. I used to come home, and it would be. It'd be interesting because a lot of times what I would do is I would. I would work, like, in the. Especially in the older days, I would work and fly and meet at, like, a baseball team, but, like, take a red eye Thursday night and then work, and it was interesting. And so then I would basically just kind of stay up all night, Thursday night, and then work all the way till Sunday night. Or if you. If we would do that and go to medical conferences and stuff like that, and. And so come home just dying. And then a lot of the stuff that I learned was just I would come home and inject myself with NAD and stuff like that, and then next thing you know, we could almost make it like it didn't happen, and it'd be almost perfect. But that was, like, we were a little road weary, and so then realizing the possibility of doing that. We're all way more connected than ever.

And it's more sustainable. I mean, I think what we've kind of realized is that we had a lot of shortcuts and biohacking is great and you know, do a little nicotine or do a little nad and do a little peptides. But what you really need is, is a feeling. You need to be grounded and you need to be connected to source and taking care of yourself and taking care of the people around you.

Connected to your people. Yeah, it's like your community.

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay, question. Last final grand finale question.

That'd be a good one.

When you feel overwhelmed or unfocused or have lost your focus temporarily, what do you do? If helpful, what questions do you ask yourself?

This is hard for me and this is gonna sound like an asshole reply, but I don't really lose my focus barely ever. I've just never had a problem being focused. I would say about the only time when I lose focus, if I overstimulate my body, like too much caffeine or too much nicotine or something, that just kind of gets you a little jittery. And even then, if I take a few deep centering breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth, just like we do before dinner each night, just to activate the parasympathetic nervous system, it brings me right back into focus very quickly. And even when I wake up in the morning and I've got like 20 different things to do, I'll stop here, right at the kitchen table, and I'll stand and look at that window, you know, like 5:30am and I'm like, what do I even. Which, which thing do I start with? And I'll just take like three deep centering breaths. And you know, I've always, even as a kid, been able to focus in the middle of complete chaos on a book or a project or a task. So I think some of it might be nature and just built into me and my personality and just being able to block things out. But I would say, you know, as silly as it may seem, I'm gonna roll with what I actually do. And that's deep centering breaths. That brings me right back into focus. So I wish I had a sexy reply, but that's really all I do.

Then that's the perfect reply. Because I think that the main reason why people lose focus and I can speak for myself and just kind of having watched other people, is underlying anxiety, right? Whatever that is. It could be a physical kind of inflammatory situation. It could be emotional, you know, anxiety about things that have happened and mental or just reflecting the general anxiety of the society right now. But your breath so related to the emotional and mental body and just letting yourself do that and that goes back to all the old spiritual practices. Right. You're quiet with your breath. And so, you know, we. It's a simple thing, but we forget how powerful that is and just being able to do that. And, I mean, I noticed that because I used to have a claustrophobia, really bad claustrophobia, which I've gotten rid of. But even when I'd have that anxiety attack, like, stuck on an airplane in the middle seat, I would be like, okay, I got no choice here but to breathe. That's all I got. And then I would get through it. Right, because you always have your breath.

Yeah, I developed that when I used to run track and field in cross country, because there is an anxiety when you're on the track running and. And controlling your breath that. I mean, that can make or break your run or your race. And if your breath is erratic and out of control and full of anxiety, you're generally gonna take. And so you have to learn how to, like, just totally, like, settle yourself in the midst of something really hard. That's. Yeah, that's a great one. What about you, Matt? What you got?

All right, the.

So this one pigs. This one pigs. The hooves.

Have I told you about the hooves?

What I've got is I've got a dovetail, and then we're gonna sneak up on the hooves. I grab a hold of the hooves.

I prefer the tail, and then I.

Climb to the tail, and then I piggyback. And that's basically what I'm actually gonna do with this answer.

Amazing.

Which is awesome. Amazing. So this is an interesting one for people that are, like, practitioners or people out there. And. And I only started to be able to do this basically, in the last six to 12 months. And what would happen is. And what happened. I take care of a lot of people with ptsd, with everything from sexual trauma to a lot of war and crazy stuff. And I'll be in some genre of conversation that feels kind of like this, and everything is great, and then all of a sudden, like, the cataclysmic event will come out, and then when that does, it's somewhat overwhelming and distracting and hard to deal with. And then what I noticed is that there would be, like, I would feel like I wanted to cry. And I realized that I had, for most of my life, whenever I felt that way, I felt I wasn't safe. And then I would just shut down. And so then I think that in a lot of those interactions, I would have just shut down. And so then time would go, and then I would like, come back into my body. And then for this last year, basically what I'll do is I'll just sit with people and I'll look at them, and I'll breathe, and often I'll feel like I want to cry. And often even they'll feel like they want to cry, but I'll keep breathing, and then I'll talk to him like this, and I'll feel the emotion inside me, and often it's, like, real intense. But then what happens is as soon now that we're talking and I'll tell them that I'm feeling really emotional also, and then I'll feel. I'll start to feel that emotion move within me. And then basically, at that point, I'll always come up with, like, an amazing idea that's kind of either funny or whimsical or thoughtful. And then that. Then now, then we'll start kind of naturally engaging in that. And then next thing I know, we were in this overwhelming, difficult place, and now all of a sudden, everybody's laughing is kind of funny. And so then being able to kind of be, I guess, awake and aware and connected in that space is maybe my favorite thing, because that emotion, when it comes, it's so overwhelming. And yet then once you can kind of process it and deal with it, then I'm left with such an extraordinary sense of hope and optimism about. About life that we can. That these horrible things can happen, and yet we. That we can transcend and heal.

Yeah.

And heal. Yeah.

I like it.

Very cool.

Wow. Well, we. We covered a lot of territory over the course of 11 questions with these provoking questions. Of course, for those of you listening in, if you go to BenGreenfieldFitness.com Matt and Ben M A T T A N D B E N I really.

Think it should be Jessa and Barb.

It should be. I know. Do you guys have any.

Just to be totally honest.

Do you guys want to weigh in? Do you guys have any final thoughts?

I feel like I've contributed.

I'm good.

I'm satisfied.

Yeah, I feel. I feel very complete with the interaction because I feel like that we all brought different things, but came back to the breath and came back to community and came back to connection and joy and appreciation and celebration of life.

Well, if you guys are listening and you do have your own thoughts, comments, questions, feedback, if you want to reply with your own replies, which would be great. If you have your own replies to any of these 11 questions, go to BenGrinthelfitness.com MatandBen Leave your questions, leave your comments, leave your feedback. I'll link to all the previous podcast episodes I've done with Dr. Cook, which are a little bit more medical and sciency based. This one's a little more kind of lifestyle advice, playful based. And leave your comments over there because we love to read them. We love your feedback. And in the, in the meantime, I will also put links to everything we talked about, all our favorite books and our lovely toys and everything that we discussed. So that's all again@bengreedelfitness.com Matt, Matt and Ben. So, Matt and Barb, thank you so much for coming all the way up from San Jose, chilling on our pad. We're gonna have an amazing hike today. We're gonna have some people over, make burgers, do sauna, do ice, and we'll have another wonderful evening.

We're gonna make it hard to leave.

Yeah, that's right.

You always do.

In the meantime, for those of all of you listening in, have a magical week. We hope that this has been helpful to you. That's why we do this, to serve you, to make your life better and to give us an excuse to drink two extra cups of coffee sitting around the kitchen table.

So amen.

I'm Ben Greenfield, along with Matt Cook, Barb and Jessa, signing out from BenGreenfieldFitness.com have an amazing week. Well, thanks for listening to today's show. You can grab, grab all the show notes, the resources, pretty much everything that I mentioned over@BenGreenfieldFitness.com along with plenty of other goodies from me, including the highly helpful Ben Recommends page, which is a list of pretty much everything that I've ever recommended for hormones, sleep digestion, fat loss, performance, and plenty more. Please also know that all the links, all the promo codes that I mentioned during this and every episode help to make this podcast happen and to generate income that enables me to keep bringing you this content every single week. So when you listen in, be sure to use the links in the show notes, use the promo codes that I generate because that helps to float this thing and keep it coming to you each and every week.