Jerzy Gregorek | Hard Choices, Easy Life: A World Champion's Philosophy on Living Well

We cannot be completely satisfied because if we are, then we'll never create anything better or more. Okay, if we are in a place that we want only satisfaction and not getting better, being satisfied means also the living that doesn't have any meaning, that doesn't fight for anything better, for more, for society, for yourself.

What is the key to living a better, longer, and more meaningful life? Isn't more exercise, more willpower, or endless planning, but understanding how to make the hard choices, embrace discomfort, and take full responsibility for your body, mind, and relationships? Today I'm talking with Jerzy Gregorek, a 4-time world weightlifting champion, poet, and creator of the Happy Body program about discipline, joy, longevity, and the art of living well. Hi, welcome to another episode of the Radical Responsibility Podcast. My name is Dr. Fleet Maull, your host for the Radical Responsibility Podcast, and I'm really happy to be here today with Jerzy Gergork. Welcome, Jerzy.

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for inviting me. I'm happy to be here.

Yeah, I've been looking forward to this conversation. Well, I really like your credo that hard choices, easy life, easy choices, hard life. That has certainly played out to be true in my life in spades, decade after decade. So Jersey, you've lived quite an extraordinary life being an Olympian, a world-class powerlifter, and a philosopher of discipline, and now president of the Happy Body. I'm wondering if looking back, if there was a defining moment when you realized that strength alone without responsibility to self, you know, doesn't really lead anywhere, that the real power had to be internal and how that relates to, you know, the basic background of our Radical Responsibility podcast is the power in living a choice and taking full ownership for the circumstances we've we find ourselves in moment to moment and the choices we make in response to those circumstances. So I wonder if there was a moment when this kind of became apparently clear to you, and then that kind of set the trajectory for your life and career.

Well, at a certain point in my life, I realized that I had choices, that I didn't live the life without them. And I think that the biggest one was that solidarity when I was in Warsaw and studying at the fire protection academy. There was a choice to do the strike because the government wanted us to fight against demonstrations and color water and arrest Solidarity demonstrators after demonstrations, recognize them and arrest. So we began the strike. We didn't want to do that. That was our choice. The choice was moral responsibility for ourselves and the way we were going to live life. So we began the strike and the strike was put down after 10 days, and then we lost our careers. And then some of us were underground, and after 4 years I had to leave our country. So there is a, even in the darkest moment, we have our choice and maybe we don't see it, But it's there, and to be aware of it is very important. And when we are free, there is no freedom without a choice, right? So the freedom comes with a choice. But when we have a choice, we have responsibility for that choice. And it showed up really how we live our life. So if we want to see whether we were responsible for our choices, we can look at our past. So where is my past and Poland and Solidarity? We disagree with the government, risk our life because of moral choice. And I'm glad that we did it because the Poland today is free Poland. And we contributed little to that, the wholeness, and every one of us contributed something. If we didn't fight, then possibility of Poland today free maybe wouldn't be there. So when the president of Poland was giving me the medal, he said, I was 9 years old when you risked your life and fought for the free Poland that I live in. And he said, I'm very thankful for that. So that's some kind of a Collaboration in life is that every one of us adds to the wholeness that eventually becomes free.

Well, it's an amazing story in history. How old were you when that began, when you started striking and refused to arrest the demonstrators in that way?

I was 27 years old, and I was ready to finish my study, to graduate with engineering diploma and start my life with vanilla and be a chief somewhere at the fire department, and my life would be awesome and great. And I love being a fireman.

You grew up and came of age under the communist era in Poland, and where I know there were still choices and you chose to be a fireman, you probably could have had a good career as a fireman, but there was certainly less choice than what we think of as a freer society, as Poland is now, as the US is now, in most Western countries.

Yeah, we were living in a place where we could lose our life in a day. So even though I was a fireman, but I had to be careful how I interacted with the chief, right? So, and anybody around that would be from the Communist Party. So if I didn't smile the right way or be antagonistic to, you know, people that were in power, I could lose my life. I know about it. So we had some choices, extremely limited. We were not as limited as slaves, right? That had only one choice, live or die. You know, we had a little bit more. And definitely, like you said, people in the West have a lot of more.

Yeah. Yeah, this is very poignant for me. I've been going to Poland every year for almost 20, probably 25, 26 years now. As part of the Zen Peacemakers, we hold a, what's called a Bearing Witness Retreat at the former Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in Oświęcim every year. And I've developed many, many friendships in Poland and When we first started going, things, you know, it was post-communist era, but things were still pretty drab there, you know, and then Polish has become a flourishing society and it's just such an incredible artistic aesthetic and technology. It's really an amazing country and I love the Polish people so much. I have a lot of friends and I, among my friends, there are some who are involved in the Solidarity movement and it's been really interesting to understand that and have a relationship to Poland and its history and its present course of events. So I really appreciate your story and being able to interview you. So, you know, interesting. I had one friend who was younger and her parents had, that's all they ever knew had been the communist era. And they kind of, they were working class people and they kind of appreciated the predictability and the security of their lives. I guess they weren't particularly entrepreneurially minded, right? And of course she was so grateful to live in free Poland, right? And she was, you know, artistic and entrepreneurial and, But her parents kind of longed for that more predictable, seemingly secure, where you had a job, you just had to show up for whether lengthy or— and that's kind of— it's interesting to whatever degree, even here in the West. And I think it's part of the message of this podcast that we may find ourselves sort of drifting between looking for the security and the non-challenging life and the illusion that that could be somehow an easier path. As opposed to leaning into a little more risk and entrepreneurial kind of spirit and be willing to really embrace our choices and see that we have so much possibility in life, right? And so you obviously embrace that and decide to immigrate to the US. And again, I wanna focus on that statement that you're somewhat famous for, that easy choices, hard life, hard choices, easy life. So how did that unfold? You, it couldn't have been easy coming here and starting all over and having to establish yourself.

When you think about easy choices and hard choices, is anything that requires effort and progress and improvement and challenges, you know, is hard. So to create goodness is hard, to create improvement is hard, and to be responsible is hard too. It's easy to give up your freedom for security. Right. So why I love America is that I know I'm left alone to live my life, and it means also that I am responsible for my life. And, you know, I didn't have it much in Poland, so I really love to be independent and I love to live my life the way I created. I decide and I have choices about how to spend my money, and I have a responsibility for taxes and contributing to the wholeness to the country. But I am left alone with the way I want to distribute it, where I want to put it. And I love to be in, in a country like that. Socialistic country has more Like I was in Sweden and Sweden was more socialistic country. They would give you a lot, but also they would take a lot from you. And supposedly you would be okay with everything what you were given, but what if not? So then it wouldn't work for you, right? So there were, you know, these gymnasiums open and free riding and medicine and everything else, but it was not really much of you there.

Yeah, I think that's an ongoing dialogue and cultural phenomenon of people, you know, the where do we want to be in that spectrum from, you know, a completely free enterprise system and to a more social democratic and somewhere there may be a sweet spot in there somewhere. But yeah, I certainly appreciate the freedom that we have here in, in the US. And in terms of making the hard choices and the notion of discipline altogether, I think depending on our upbringing, Those of us who've grown up in the West often have a lot of internal self-criticism and self-shaming, and we've kind of inherited it from the culture in many ways. And so we can turn discipline into a should or further way to kind of beat up on ourselves. And I know one little, I do a lot, I'm a very disciplined person and I spend 2.5 hours on training my mind every morning before my day starts. But one of the small things I do is after I take my hot shower, Every morning I then step into the cold shower and my body does not wanna do that. And I do it for a number of reasons that cold immersion has health benefits, but also I'm right there at the beginning of my day, I'm letting myself know I'm in charge, right? But it's not punishing myself. I could easily, if my old patterns of self-criticism, whatever, could flip that into I'm punishing myself, but I'm not. I'm actually, I try to get under there and actually experience the exhilarating quality of the cold water. And experience it as something really positive, even though part of me does not wanna do it, right? So how do we embrace discipline, especially physical discipline, without turning it in a way, kind of trying to beat ourselves towards success, right? How do we do it in a way that's really, in my Buddhist training, we say that actually discipline leads to joy and freedom as opposed to discipline being a burden. But that's a switch that I think we have to learn to make.

Yeah, well, what is at stake here is you're talking about to live the life to improve. And once we want to improve, then the challenge is presented and how to do it. And when the effort is needed to actually do it, then we give that effort sometimes and we fail. And then when we fail, that's the beginning of how we believe and how we think. If we are hostile to ourselves, then we don't think about ourselves as we are good or we are capable. And that has an extremely negative effect on what we're actually doing. So the wisdom here is to fail and focusing on what we are doing and not whether we failed or not. So thinking shifts if we are negative about what we do, our thinking shifts to backward and we are starting being judgmental about that we are not good enough and we'll never be able to do it. Instead, in a healthy way, if we fail, we go to another lift, another effort and try to fix it and keep working on it until we find a way. Without any expectations. Expectation comparisons, the reasons why we live the life that is very hard for us, because we pick up these easy choices of blaming, complaining, and then the effect of it is really hard on us.

Absolutely. And you make a really important distinction there, which I think has to do with all the ways in which we maybe are wanting to evolve and move our life forward. In that, you know, if we start thinking, well, I can't do it, or I failed, or I'm bad, or I'm insufficient, you know, we're identifying with it, right? And reinforcing a negative idea. Instead, we can just say, okay, let me look at what I did. Let me look at the technique. Let me look at my approach. Let me, you know, make another effort, maybe correct something this time. And so I'm not identifying so much with the result, or I'm just— it's just something I realize that, like anything else, you get better and better the more you practice it, right? We can do that somewhat with focusing, instead of focusing so much on self-identity, other than that I'm somebody who keeps trying, but other than that, we can focus more on the process than identifying with it. What if transformation isn't just about thinking differently, but feeling differently? Science shows us that true change happens when we align not just our minds, but also the neural networks in our hearts and guts. This heart-mind connection is the key to deeper healing, resilience, and expanded awareness. That's why I created the HeartMind All Access Membership and Community, a space designed to help you rewire your nervous system, cultivate heart intelligence, and live with greater clarity and purpose. With over 1,000 hours of transformational teachings specifically curated to meet your needs, you'll learn from world-renowned meditation teachers, neuroscientists, and experts in neuroplasticity all sharing powerful tools to help you shift your mindset and heartset, regulate your emotions, and unlock your full potential. You'll also gain unlimited access to every summit and course we've ever produced, a treasure trove of wisdom worth over $10,000 and growing, plus live gatherings and an inspiring global community to support your journey. If you're ready to step into a more heart-centered, connected, and conscious life, I invite you to join us. Click the link to learn more and start your journey today.

Yeah, more, more on the solution. What is the solution? And not that people didn't create the solution. So it is sometimes hard for people to create the solution and it needs more time sometimes. And if we are hostile to people that try to create something, then they will, of course, need more time to create it, will not feel good about what we, about our attitude toward them if we are the leaders. So in order to make it really healthy and possible for the solutions to be found in the shortest period of time, we have to create the atmosphere, let people take care of how to find the solution and not give them the solution, but waiting for that solution and be patient. And it is going to happen. When people are happy, they work more.

Absolutely. So Jersey and Radical Responsibility, as I mentioned before, we talk about taking 100% ownership for really our inner and outer lives, for the circumstances we face moment to moment. And in some places we can see where we created some of those circumstances or at least participated in the arising of those circumstances. In other cases, We may see it, you know, I really didn't have much to do with it, but we still have a choice to make at that point, right? And you've said, often said, I think, that the body never lies. And so how does the physical body expose the places where maybe we're avoiding responsibility or avoiding ownership, whether it's emotionally, relationally, spiritually, what have you? How can we have the body be something that kind of is a truth teller for us?

Well, the body receives the way that we care for it. So the body receives all the care, and if it doesn't receive care, it receives something else and can be harmed. And when it happens, it can be in pain, it can be in discomfort, and it will tell us. And we have the power to feed it the right way, to move it the right way. And we have the power to destroy it. Right. We have the power to heal it. We have the power. Our mind is everything what really happens to the body. And we are responsible 100% for that body. And the body is a great communicator, tells us that if something is wrong, It tells us, and we have to really look into that with love and care, with healing and kindness. And if we do, then we can find what bothers the body and find a way how to resolve it, how to heal it, what the body wants to get better. And if we are really kind and healers, we will find a way. We will find what's what the body wants.

Yeah, absolutely. And you know, we in the radical responsibility kind of philosophy, we say the kind of magical radical responsibility question is, what can I do? And so that's that solution focus you were talking about. Whatever circumstance we find ourselves in, no matter how challenging, how unjust, how terrible, whatever it might be, if we just ask ourselves that question, we've shifted out of any kind of victim mindset or any kind of disempowering mindset into, What can I do? Well, there's always a million different things we can do and try. We can experiment with this, we experiment with that. So if it's a team, it's what can we do, right? Or individual, what can I do? And it seems like you've really embraced that solution focus. And also I wanna come back to this idea about easy and hard choices because, you know, when I grew up, I came of age in the 1950s and '60s and my father was pretty conservative and he was definitely, you know, recommending this is the way, discipline, you know, and, you know, for whatever reason, I wasn't responding well to that. And I just kept looking for an easier, softer way. The whole counterculture happened, and I went headlong into that. And there were reasons for that. The 1950s society in the US was pretty controlling and suffocating. But nonetheless, that choice to pursue an easier and softer way led me into addiction and the chaos, eventually into prison and all kinds of things before I finally woke up and realize the power of living at choice. So it's just such a critical distinction. And we live in a culture today that's just engineered for comfort and convenience. It's all about comfort and convenience. And that can be such a gravitational pull for people to get addicted to comfort and even have the entitlement like, I shouldn't have to experience discomfort. Whereas human beings for hundreds of thousands of years dealt with discomfort we can't even imagine just to survive. And suddenly here we are feeling entitled to live in a cushioned world of nonstop comfort and convenience. So I wonder if you could talk about the impact that you see that having on people and how we can shift out of that to, again, not to punish ourselves, but just to embrace the kind of way of being with life and this issue of comfort and discomfort that actually moves us forward because being willing to challenge ourselves, 'cause if we don't, not much happens.

Yeah, we can look at that from many perspectives, I guess. You know, one of those is, let's say, body weight. And when body weight is higher than normal, people become bigger, and because of that, they could live a lot shorter. So the research really points to one thing, that when people— when the research on rats and mice and monkeys showed that when the food was restricted, limited, and rats were not satisfied completely, then they turned themselves into survival and healing and getting better and lived about 40% longer. So you could think about that. We cannot be completely satisfied because if we are, then we'll never create anything better or more. Okay, if we are in a place that we want only satisfaction and not getting better, okay, that's what the person's belief is. But also we are responsible for society and for the voice of society. So we also need to talk that being satisfied means also the living that doesn't have any meaning. That doesn't fight for anything better, for more, for society, for yourself. So that in order to be in that place, we need to overcome something that is really difficult, hard. So that's the hard choice comes in that we need to be in the places that something is hard for us. And that's the only way actually to become better, to improve something that without the existence of it, we will be satisfied. Easy choices will be presented and we can never evolve. We can never get better. We can never really fight with aging and deterioration and getting worse over time.

Yeah, you pointed to something really important there. I think one of the most important elements or principles for our mental, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing is having a sense of meaning and purpose in our lives. And we create meaning through our struggles, right? That's how we create meaning. And this idea of, I love this, if we're completely satisfied all the time, where's the motivation to improve, to grow, and where are the challenges and thus where's the meaning? And you know, there are many modern conveniences that we can use to support our growth and prioritize our time, but there's a difference between using the conveniences of modern life to support our growth and create more possibilities as opposed to creating just a never-ending state of self-satisfaction or something or comfort.

You know, where is the hard choice, right? If we have enough money for anything what we want to do, then what, right? So should we go to Hawaii and smoke cigar and waiting for death, right? So what to do? There is always, there's always something to improve, to get better, to be responsible for the society. The Stoics' approach is that they believe that nature brought us here and we are responsible for the nature. So we are responsible for educating ourselves, thinking, and evolving, and to serve back the nature with everything what we could become. And that drove me crazy all my life. You know, I really thought about that. And that's how I live my life. I am evolving, I'm responsible for that nature, for my, you know, mother and my planet and the wholeness.

So I don't know what your age is and if you're comfortable disclosing that. I don't know which one of us is older. I'm 76. I was born in 1949. And I'm very happy what you talked about, you know, that the research that shows the research with rats and mice that if they have less food than would be fully satisfying, they're actually motivated to their physiology shifts in ways that are actually healthy for them. And I weigh less today than I think I weighed in high school. And that's been, it's been a long journey because I got up to, you know, there were times 40 years ago when I even got over 200, but I spent much of my adult life in the 180s and 190s. And I weighed 161 yesterday. And I think that's less than I weighed in high school. I still need to get, I think I need to break down into the 150s to get rid of the little bit of visceral extra visceral fat. I still have that belly fat, but I'm really happy to be there and I feel so much healthier. So I like to talk about aging and this idea of maybe aging even as a radical act, how we embrace aging. So obviously you're probably in the second half of your life, at least. We, none of us know how long we're gonna be around, but I wonder if you could, I wonder if you could talk about how your own process of aging and how you've related with that.

Well, you know, my brother was born in '49, so I was born '54, so I'm 71.

Oh, you're a youngster.

Yeah, youngster. Yeah, young boy. You know, for me, when I look at aging, it's very interesting from the perspective of my life, how I lived life. What is interesting that I always was telling my clients and other people that you should always hire somebody older than you to learn how to live life and not younger, unless you have some other thoughts. So, you know, like, uh, when I look at aging, I do look at the research and, but I look at 100-year-old people that lived life and learn from them. So I look into a lot into Blue Zones and analyze the way of eating, movement, exercise. And then it is very clear that they didn't exercise much. They have just very limited way of exercise. So they either do gardening or walk up the hill and not really much of it. They mostly, they have plant-based diet and not overeating. It's a lifestyle, a community lifestyle. That they are happy with themselves. You know, I watched this documentary from Costa Rica and then they said that they didn't have medical insurance, but they are responsible for everyone. When somebody has something, then they contribute money and they actually help. So they live very healthy way. So nothing happens really to them and they believe that is the way. So I learned not to exercise too much. I learned to, to smile and to be happy and to enjoy life because I think it's important part. I learned that, that you cannot be too big because, you know, the weight creates inflammation and creates problems and gets heat. The body becomes hot and when the body becomes more and more and more skinny, Lives long and it's cold. It's cold body. It's not— why is it cold? Because it's not overworking too much. The furnace is not too hot. So everything is limited to what is really needed and there is no excess. Excess is very interesting in life from the perspective of enough. What is really enough, really? What do we need? Do we need really so much? And do we need really more than we need? So these are a lot of questions about exercise, about the food, meditation. Do we need to meditate 5 hours a day? Or is it enough 20 minutes twice a day? Is it enough exercise 30 minutes a day or 5 hours in the gym? Right. So there are questions about You know, the food, the exercise. And there is somewhere, there is balance somewhere. There is a way. And some of us get a little bit better in one and the other one. But definitely those who live more than 100, they did something right.

Absolutely. Yeah. I want to explore more of this whole issue of exercise and everything with you. I watched a news magazine story on TV a while back, not too long ago. That was focusing on one of the blue zones in Costa Rica. And they had this gentleman who was a campesino cowboy, kind of out in the country kind of character. And he was over 100, I think he was 103, 104 or something. And he was still getting on his horse every day. And I was quite amazing, right? He still rides every day. And he was quite a character. He was joking up with the interviewer and, you know, he was quite a character and he was clearly enjoying life, you know. So I think there's a real key there, that enjoyment quality. And there's also our relationships, which I wanna come back to in a moment. But first of all, let's explore exercise. So it's interesting to hear you say that, you know, you learned to not exercise too much. Now you're a weightlifting champion and you look like you're in pretty good shape now. And I also wanna talk about, you know, how we work with pain, both physical pain and then obviously emotional pain, different kinds of pain. But so talk a little bit about your journey. I mean, I don't know whether you were primarily a weightlifter in your early years and now you've moved to a more balanced approach to physical health, or what has your relationship been to exercise and your philosophy around that? And also in terms of working with pain that kind of inevitably comes up in life, whether it's physical or emotional pain.

You know, weightlifting is— was savior for me. And weightlifting is anaerobic training, so It's really not much training. The more intense we become, the less we train. To understand that, let's think about Usain Bolt, right? You know, training coming out of blocks. And let's say he's in blocks and coming out after 3 seconds stops running, right? So the longest run that he does is only with in the competition. This is 10 seconds. But in training, he does something for 3 seconds and rests for 3 minutes and does another 3 seconds and rests for 3 minutes. And in an hour, 20 times 3 seconds is only 1 minute. So he doesn't do anything for 59 minutes and does only for 1 minute. That 1 minute creates the best runner in the world, the fastest human being on the planet. You know, weightlifting is kind of the same thing. You do the snatch, it takes 2 seconds, and then you rest for 3 minutes and you do another one. So it's not much really training, but it's a lot of talk between and so on. And that creates the best athletes. When you think about, when you look at the Olympic stadium, what do you see? You see athletes throwing things. Jumping, right, and running fast. So, and then when you look at pole vaulters, wow, what beautiful bodies they have, right? It's amazing bodies that, you know, so the body has to somehow withstand, you know, much what is needed. So if the bar is, you know, 5 meters up there, So the body needs to match it in order to overcome. And every level brings the same story. So when jumper, the long jump is there and the record is there, the flag is there, and the brain starts really rolling toward how to train, how to spend next 5 years to really jump farther than that. And that's in a way creates this kind of training, creates the happiest athletes. Never exhausted, never tired, and smiling, laughing. Look at those sprinters when they finish the sprint, you know, it's like 9 seconds, 10 seconds, and they hang out. And, you know, like you could see that they are really happy. But look at the marathon runners ending the run after 2 hours. They exhausted, tired, some of them collapse. And okay, so we are talking about a choice. Here it is. Make your choice.

For me, this is really good news. I'm very busy leading my company HeartMind, and so I, I need to be efficient about how I use my time, but I'm really focusing on health. And so it's been a number of years now that I learned from so many different people. One, that if somebody wants to be an endurance runner, that's fine. That's what they wanna do. But it actually, there's no research that says endurance athletes have longer lifespans. There's actually what really play comes into play is more your VO2 max, which you don't need to be an endurance athlete to increase your VO2 max, how efficiently your body uses oxygen. And so, you know, rather than, you know, the spending hours on a treadmill or a bicycle, or rather than, you know, I've really learned to do intervals in a short period of time with cardio. And then for my weight training, to do the model that I've kind of embraced is where I do, uh, 1 set of 12 to exhaustion. I have enough weight, whether it's tension-resistant bands or it's weights I'm lifting, to get to that point of exhaustion with 12 lifts. And over time I can increase the weight. But so I can go down. In fact, I did a workout this morning. I did my usual weight workout with mostly arms and some legs in my little home gym. Just took me about 20 minutes. If I go over to the Y, the YMCA, where we do more extensive workouts, I might spend a half hour to 40 minutes at most doing the circuit, right? But I'm really happy that I don't have to be a gym rat to be healthy. Right? And so obviously that's been your experience as well.

Yeah, to think about VO2 max is hilarious. It is relating to them.

Yeah, there are people that live long lives, you know, that don't do much of what we think leads to longevity other than be happy or have the right diet or have good community, have good relationships. But they may be also, I think we have to be a little wary of exceptionalism because just the fact that they're in these cultures, there are people that live over 100 doesn't mean that's the baseline or the average or something. So, but clearly I think it does, you know, there's a whole biohacking movement today and there's a lot going on there in terms of really understanding the deep research on how we can extend longevity, perhaps even, you know, into 110, 115 if people wanted to do that, even beyond. But I think, you know, that Harvard study of adult development that my friend Robert Waldinger is the current leader of points to that the, They followed a group of men and then their spouses and now their children for 90 years. And they found that bar none, the leading contributor to longevity and healthspan, not only longevity but healthspan, has been the quality of people's relationships, that they had committed relationships of one kind or another.

Yeah, well, that's definitely a community important element of loving and happiness and enjoying time together. I remember Tim Ferriss asked me a question, what is success for you? How you could measure that? And I said, well, you know, if you can have a dinner with another couple and 4 people sit at a table and they enjoy life together and they like each other in every way and next day nobody has a hangover and they really are looking for another one, another dinner like that. And then when you have 10,000 dinners, then you die. Okay, that's kind of a life that we live. And our success is actually have these dinners. The truth is that people don't have this kind of dinners. There is always somebody that doesn't like somebody. And then these dinners are not good. So to really have a good time, It's our responsibility to really how we can find people, how we can find people that when we sit together, we like each other. We like each other in 4 ways. It's hard to even put 3 people together. They like each other.

4? Wow.

Dinner is a challenge. Dinner is a challenge to enjoy the relationship on that level. And then if we enjoy a relationship at that level, of course, this happiness and this goodness in us shines through us, and we feel good. All of us feel good. And that's what it's about. And you're right, this is the biggest element of longevity, and, you know, definitely one that is valid and important. And when I look at the people in Blue Zones, they get the same thing. They definitely had the community and you can see that they like each other.

Yeah, absolutely. It's a wonderful example you brought up, this having dinner, 4 people having dinner, a wonderful framework. I feel very fortunate. I just was out in Colorado for a retreat with my wife, and at the end of the retreat, we were able to go visit a very close friend of mine. And so he and his wife and my wife and I, the 4 of us had dinner, and it was exactly the kind of dinner you were describing. We all liked each other, enjoyed each other. All 4 of us are committed to our individual spiritual journey, but we're also, working as couples. We have a sense of a path as couples, being on a path as couples, and they're very embraced in recovery work as couples. And my wife and I are involved in other types of work, but we really enjoyed each other and enjoyed the meal, and nobody had a hangover. And so it was, it was great. I think having more dinners like that is an absolutely wonderful thing. And I will say that, you know, in terms of physical, well, the exercise part, you know, I exercise regularly, but as I said, I keep it, you know, It's something I can accomplish in 15 to 30 minutes, 45 at most, several times a week. But what I really invest in is my own happiness. And I invest a lot of time in feeling happy and grateful. You know, I do a lot of inner work every morning and my meditations and really to learn to live life in a state of happiness and gratitude regardless of what's going on. That's my responsibility, that happiness is an inside job. And I think those are the biggest investments that really pay out. That and really investing in my relationship with my wife. Renewing that commitment every year, I feel more committed to really having the power of that relationship being a central focus of my life. So yeah, I really resonate with what you're saying.

Yeah, thank you. Well, everything what we do in life should serve happiness, right? So because it's equanimity, right? This is the side effect of our life. But if it is the side effect, then whatever we do, contributes to that happiness. And whatever we do has to somehow relate to our happiness. It cannot be too hard because then we are not happy. We are striving too much. So it has to be somehow aligned with it. And when we want to achieve certain things too hard, then we play too much attention to something that we want to get. And we can easily lose our happiness, our joy in life. So there is a timeline in life that the things happen, can happen shorter. Let's say you need 5 years to get something. But if you really push, really push, it will be 4. But when you push like that, you will maybe not have too much time to spend with your daughter and your son, your wife. And everything in relations will suffer. And if you spend 5 years, you will have everything together. So here is this balance that we are responsible for, that whatever is outside of us has to somehow wait and be feeding their happiness and not challenging it.

Yes, I'm listening to you, George. I'm really appreciating. And we could title this interview The Art of Living, I think, because there's a kind of art to finding this balance. And yeah.

Yes, it is. It is the skill. There is such a thing as a skill of living a good life. And philosophers try to figure this out and try to talk to us from a different perspective, like Buddhist perspective and Stoic perspective and, you know, and other clubs and societies and so on. So there is such a thing as, as the skill of living a good life.

Absolutely. And what philosophers— philosophers, I'm sorry— have been focused on for the ages And which is often given short shrift in our current society is wisdom. And you don't even hear people talk about wisdom that much, but really that if we're interested in learning the art of living and living a good life, and maybe as we're aging, learning to age well and so forth, the art of that over time and developing that discernment and finding those balances, what accrues is a kind of wisdom, which is I think a good reason why you suggested, or you said someone suggested, if you wanna learn something about life, get someone older than you to work for you that you can learn from because they possibly have more wisdom. Right?

Right. And hopefully they were happy, right? And they enjoyed that life. So we don't want to learn from people that lived long and they were miserable. We want to learn already from people that lived long and they were happy. And I try to really I tell people over and over when they really question the whole thing of miserable and happy and so on. My answer is very clear. I can make myself miserable in 1 second. I can be so hostile to myself for the things that I didn't do, or I didn't forgive myself, or I didn't achieve, or I failed. I can bring all of those to my mind and make myself so sick. That is unbelievable. And I don't choose to do that.

Well, there's wisdom in and of itself. Yeah. This has been fabulous, Josie. So you just really model this, the power of living a choice. And you just won you right there that we could choose to focus on all the things that would make us miserable, or we can choose to focus on what's going to bring about happiness and move our lives forward. And it's very much a choice that we're making every moment, every day. And we can do our best with it, but you're really modeling that and articulating that so beautifully. So thank you very much for being on our Radical Responsibility podcast and for your work and contributions. And we will put in our show notes everything that people would like to learn about you and your work. Do you have a basic website that people can go to?

Yes, there is thehappybody.com, and probably the best way to start there and begin the journey toward the happy body.

Yeah, well, I love even the name of your work and your brand and so forth, Happy Body. I mean, how can you go wrong with that? Sounds great. Well, thank you very much. Be well and take care.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

Taking radical responsibility for our lives means taking action. And today you can start by helping us grow this community. If these insights into healing and transformation have served you, please subscribe on YouTube and follow us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. While you're there, leave us a review. It takes 30 seconds, but it's the most powerful way to help our message reach someone else seeking deeper self-awareness. Thank you for being part of the journey towards lasting change. Thank you for joining me on the Radical Responsibility Podcast. Remember, real change happens when we commit to our growth, face our challenges with compassion, and stay open to transformation. If you found this episode helpful, I encourage you to subscribe and help us spread the message of healing and personal empowerment. Stay grounded, stay present, and stay true to you. Take care.

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