This Improves Your Sleep and Energy Without Changing Your Habits with Seth Casden

Today's special guest is going to help you sleep better, operate better, perform better, think more clearly. And all you've got to do is nothing. That's right. It's through infrared technology. Literally, you will wear a piece of clothing or you'll sleep on a pillow or wear a pair of socks. That will create natural infrared through the heat of your body. It's phenomenal. You're in for a treat. And this is something I'd never heard of before. Seth Kaston created this product called Salient and. And big companies like the Adidas, the Pumas, the Under Armours, they use this technology. So you've got to listen. I promise you this will really transform your thinking about how you can have a better, happier, longer life by doing nothing. Enjoy the show. Seth, a huge welcome to the Habits of High Performers podcast. How are you doing?

Hi, James. Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm doing well.

I'm so glad you're here because you've got something we need to talk about and something that my listeners, I guarantee 99% of them don't know about, have never heard of, but. But after they hear about it, they're gonna go, I need that. So most people think performance, like human performance gains come from doing more, pushing harder. You've built a company around improving human performance without changing behavior. Tell me a little bit more about that.

Yeah, that's great. I'd love to jump into it. Thanks, James. And you're right on. You know, traditionally, we're told that if we want to be healthier, we have to either eat better, sleep more, work out more. And all of those things, of course, are true. What our company is focused on is how can we help integrate with whatever you're doing in a way that doesn't require any behavior changes. What we've come across is the power of infrared. Infrared is a wavelength of light just beyond visible that when you envelop the body and it improves circulation and blood flow and really affects the health and wellness of the body. And so we do that through textiles. So whether it's the clothes we're wearing, like the shirt I have on now, or the materials we use in our bed, the sheets, the pillows, really, anywhere that you come into contact with a textile, we can embed that with infrared emitting minerals that are then powered by ambient heat so they're charged by the heat we're giving off. Even during this podcast, sitting here talking, we're giving off about 100 watts of heat every second. As a Result of the metabolic process, you know, 37C98.6 for. For us to maintain that internal core temperature. Our bodies are working and emitting all of this heat. And the minerals, the infrared emitting minerals, they absorb heat and they become saturated and convert heat to infrared. So you're changing from heat energy to light energy. And then when that goes into the body, it improves circulation and performance, helps with sleep, helps with energy, really just helps your body maintain its thermal regulation. And we're optimizing the body, and that's done passively. So, you know, if you're a very fit athlete, you're healthy, it's going to help you. If you're a couch potato, it's still going to help you.

Either way, I love it. And, Seth, in simple terms, what actually happens in the body when infrared energy interacts with cells?

Yeah. And the challenge is there's nothing simple about it. Right. And the scientists are still trying to learn exactly all the different ways and the mechanisms of. But the simplest way that I've been able to say it is that it's a food source. Just the way plants use sunlight, the process of photosynthesis. Our bodies can use infrared. And we don't have an energy organ in our body. We have our lungs for air, our heart for blood. But energy is every single cell individually. So we have literally trillions of energy factories in our body, and they're all stimulated and excited by infrared. So the mitochondria and that process of ATP is enhanced when you add infrared into that system.

And for those that are not maybe familiar with mitochondria and ATP. Do you mind just explaining that a little bit for us?

Absolutely. And so within the cell. Let's pull back a second. Circulation is the foundation of our health. It's how nutrients and vitamins and minerals are processed and then delivered to the cells is through circulation and blood flow, and metabolic waste is cleared through circulation and blood flow. And so when you look at people that have any kind of chronic condition, there's usually some type of circulation impairment, or if you improve circulation, they start to get better. Another way of saying that. And so when you start looking at how energy is made in the body and in the cells, that process of making energy, that's what. That's what ATP is. And the mitochondria are within the cells, and that's really the like sort of the energy factory, the part of the cells that. That optimize and maintain the health of our body.

Wow. And in terms of the technology, so the infrared being emitted essentially from the textile, how deep into the body is that actually having an impact? Is it right under the skin or is it quite a lot deeper?

Yeah, that's a great question. And that's where infrared makes a big difference than just traditional heat. So heat is absorbed more at the surface level, superficially. And infrared can go up to 4cm deep into the tissue and muscle. So if you go 4cm in, you're really getting into all of the structure of the body, the muscles, and can really have an impact beyond just a surface level.

It's important, I think, for us to get that understanding of what it's doing because a lot of people are skeptical around new things or different things. But when we can actually understand the science, and this is science based, it's kind of mind blowing. And I guess if we look at the costs involved, because most humans, they tend to be motivated when something starts to hurt or when there's a cost or when they see that there's a consequence for me not doing the right thing. So what's the hidden cost of, say, poor recovery for high performers, people that are busy at work or busy in sport?

Yeah, and I think that's something. Again, you're really hitting on the key way to look at this. Right. Because there's a hidden cost in all of our choices. And a lot of times what we don't realize is it's not so much what we're saying yes to, it's all the things we're saying no to by virtue of saying yes to one thing. And so I think, you know, the hidden cost of not doing what you can to really maintain your health is, you know, we're looking at how to improve preventative care, how to improve health span or lifespan, and not just sick care. And I can't correlate and say, oh, well, you know, you're going to live X amount of time longer or develop these diseases sooner or longer. But certainly the goal here is what can I do to feel my best? I mean, if you could clone yourself as an example, and you run a marathon the next day, if you have one version of you that sleeps and is bathed in infrared and have that recovery period and another version of you that doesn't, in the morning, one version of you is going to wake up a lot less sore, feeling a lot better, a lot more rested, and the other version is going to be, you know, have a lot more lactic acid and not having received the benefits of clearing that from the body. So, you know, really it's about what can I do. And the beauty of our technology is that again, it doesn't require any type of behavioral changes. So it's, it's even easier than taking your vitamins. It's just, you know, getting dressed in the morning and going to bed at night, you're going to help support and boost your body's performance and recovery.

That's amazing. Now look, we've looked at some of the science behind it, but let's go back to why you started it. This very unique product and world changing. Where did it all begin and why did it all begin?

Yeah, and you know, sometimes I look back and wonder like, you know, it was a lot more challenging than I realized. And to your point, you know, people are skeptical, as they should be, and we're talking about something that's invisible. You don't see infrared with it's beyond the visible light. So we certainly picked something challenging. But that was more of a statement about my passion and about my vision of what we could do with this technology and how to help people than anything else. And, you know, it started with a friendship and wanting to, you know, the inventor, David Hornick, just a great guy and had this vision for how we could help people. We had, you know, he had some people in his life, family that were suffering and looking at holistic ways to treat that. And you know, certainly there's a, there's a point where you have to have stronger interventions, but if you can help people in ways that require less side effects and treat things before they become bigger problems, I mean, that's certainly, I think, the way that we approach this. And you know, we're going back now about 25 years when we started this. And it's really just, just something that evolved naturally and organically from, from our passion of, of wanting to help people and help optimize the body. And we both are, you know, healthy people and love to exercise and be outdoors and just looking at, you know, how do we, coming back to this word, like, how do we optimize the body and how do we, how do we get the best version of ourselves? You know, whether it's, you know, being the best dad, being the best at our job, you know, being the best in life, just, just, you know, best can mean a lot of different things to different people. And for us it's just about, you know, fulfilling and being able to show up and be our healthiest selves.

Hey, James here. I wanted to take a quick moment to let you know about something. Look, I get asked to deliver keynotes and workshops for Teams and companies all over the world, from London to Antarctica, from America to Australasia, from all armies to small businesses to large corporates, to sports teams. But I go in and deliver keynotes around the mindset of high performers, around the habits of high performers, about how we navigate change. If you would like me to come and speak to your team or speak at your conference or deliver a bespoke workshop, please get in touch with my team. Carolinejlochlan.com will be able to help. I'll also make sure that we put that in the. The show notes. It's incredible. I think everyone listening to this show listens because they do want to be better. They do want to have that 1% healthier, 1% more effective, and be their best self. So I want to just go a little bit into, again, the textile itself. So how did you come across the right textile to then embody, embed, whatever the word might be, put these minerals into? What was that process like?

Yeah, and that's been. That's been kind of the fun of it, right? Like, how do you build a better mousetrap? And when you look at textiles, you know, clothing started as a way to insulate and protect ourselves from the elements and became, you know, over time, a fashion statement. And we were looking at just how do we improve on something that's been around a long time, that really hasn't had any kind of significant improvement? And, you know, fun fact, polyester, you know, nylon, these synthetic materials, and also viscose, which is a sustainable, you know, renewable material. They start out as liquid. And so we were adding. We realized there's an opportunity to add these minerals in at the liquid stage so that once it's extruded and drawn into yarn and fibers and then knitted and woven into fabrics and cut and sewn into garments and other products, it's permanent. And like you said, embodied or embedded, they really mean the same thing. It's not a coating, it's not a finish or a spray or an application. And so it lasts the life of the material. It's very much like baking a cake. And you make the ingredients and then put it in the oven. And once you take it out, you know, that's your product. It's not going to separate or come apart. So, you know, we're starting at the. At the first stage of these materials.

Incredible and really random Irish question, but when you wash the garment in warm water, does that have any negative impact on the minerals?

No, not at all. You treat it. We had to be able to make it interchangeable with the products that you already are using or we would have really ran into some problems. And the biggest issues in the beginning were the size of the minerals. They create kind of a scratchy, rough hand feel. And we're able to get the particles small enough and mix them thoroughly enough now that the hand feel of the product is basically indistinguishable whether it has the minerals or doesn't.

It's incredible. And in the first instance, my understanding is that you partnered with brands to kind of get that out there. So who are some of the brands maybe our listeners might be familiar with that you partner with over the years?

Yeah, we've been really fortunate to work with a lot of the leading global brands. We've worked with Aeon in Asia, we've worked with Decathlon in Europe. You know, we've worked with Jockey and some of the betting companies in Oceania, New Zealand and Australia in your neck of the woods. And in the us our largest customer currently is Under Armour. And we've worked with global brands like Puma and ADI and New Balance, Puma, Calvin Klein, Levi, who's who. Yeah, well, a lot of your listeners have probably bought a product that had our technology in it at some point and didn't realize it because, you know, that's been one of the challenges is education. And the brands historically just want to talk about their product and they might be a little reticent to really promote or feature third party technology providers. And it's also where we are today. Your listeners have probably heard of infrared or infrared sauna or know somebody that uses that if they don't use it themselves. And you know, the biohacking longevity world has sort of exploded that space. But 15 or 20 years ago it was really much more of an unknown.

And the key thing that I understand now is that you actually also go direct to customers. So if people want to get the product direct, they don't have to go and try and find it with some of their existing brand names.

That's correct. We started our own shop selling store last year. We're offering pillows and sheets, embedding products, socks, wristbands. Sometimes the best reaction people have is just with the socks. You know, very simple. Your feet stay dry, they don't swell, they don't overheat, they're great for travel. So yeah, we, we now are bringing this directly to the consumer and to the market and you know, really excited about that.

That's amazing. I'm. I'm heading to Antarctica for some work next Week. And so second trip down and being on the ice and sweating. Sweating is actually an issue when you're in such cold temperatures. So I think your products would actually do really well in really rough environments like that.

You're absolutely right. And I also have been down to Antarctica and brought all of my selling gear and was very happy with how it performed because you don't want to be sweating, right? You want to move that heat away from the body, otherwise you're going to get cold very fast.

I'm super excited about this product. I need to get a bunch of it for myself. So sleeping, you mentioned pillows and et cetera. Sleep is arguably the thing that most of us have talked about for the last five years as a performance enhancing, life enhancing tool. We're not getting enough quality sleep. Often we're sleeping in warmer environments that are heated and therefore we're not getting into the REM and the deep sleep. So how does salient help in that regard?

I'm really glad you asked that. And you're right. Sleep hygiene and the focus on sleep I think is really critical. And you know, again, going back to our evolution as a society around performance and health, it kind of started out with feats of strength, right? You think about the Olympics and people that are like, you know, who can lift the most weight or jump the farthest, run the fastest. And then we started seeing, well, how do we support those feats of physical performance? And then it was like, well, diet, right? You need to have the best diet to have the best outcome. And then once we kind of locked that down and came up with the best diet plans and ways to support that, then it sort of shifted to sleep. And what is the best sleep to then optimize the person that's eating the best? And that really the more we learn about the brain and actually the only time that the brain can detox is when it's asleep. And so that's why when you look at people that are sleep deprived and you start seeing how their mental functions start to falter and fail and it actually becomes fatal if you go, you know, they tried to push that to the limit. And so sleep is, you know, we spend a third of our lives asleep. And the process of detoxing the brain and recovery, it's really circulation dependent. So the more circulation you have, you talk about being too hot, some people are too cold. All of that is going to impact sleep negatively. And what selling it does and what infrared does is it helps. Again, this is, it's a, it's powered by, so you're in a dark room with the light off. It's just powered by your body's own heat emission. So it's not like going in a sauna where you're going to overheat. What's happening is the body is actually having the heat pulled away from it. And so if you're too hot, it's going to help cool you. At the same time your circulation is improving. So if you're too cold, it's going to help warm you. So it's about homeostasis, it's about thermoregulation, it's about bringing the body into balance and providing the support so that you can get that deepest sleep possible. And when you're looking at like having increased circulation to the brain, that's going to help you recover, it's going to help promote restful sleep. So it really is critical to optimizing your sleep.

Incredible. And if we could talk about some of the specific products. So you've got pillows, what else can we use that might help?

So, so when you look at the whole sleep system, we were integrated from the mattress level, the mattress pad, the sheets, blankets, pajamas, if you sleep in pajamas, and then the pillow, pillowcases, so the entire sleep system can have this incorporated.

That's so powerful. Like as I listen to it, I think, why am I not doing this already? Why am I discovering this today?

That's the key, right? We need to get it out there. When people hear about it, when you have these one on one conversations, when your audience hears this, it really starts to click. It's very hard to tell this story on the back of a package or, you know, if you're not aware of it, you're not looking for it. It really requires kind of like that intimate one on one. You know, let me explain this to you and then let you go on your own journey to try it and get your own experience with it.

So, so true. And for the skeptic out there that's going, what kind of research or studies have been done with this that you can go, James, actually here's, here's the proof.

Yeah. And you know, we encourage the healthy skepticism because it creates an educated consumer. And then when you have, you know, that type of customer, they're going to share with their group as well. So we now have 11 published studies just on our technology and there are thousands now of papers on photobiomodulation, which is a fancy word for sort of what's happening here. And then I think there's now over Tens of thousands, if not more people that have gone through those trials. And focusing specifically again on salient. And the 11 studies that we have, we look at tissue oxygenation. Our largest study is on around 150, 153 people measuring the amount of oxygen that their tissue is receiving. And we saw an increase of on average over 8%. We have two studies published on grip strength and grip strength now is a very direct correlation to longevity. We increased grip strength around 10%. And so, you know, I would encourage people to go to our website. All of our studies are available for download. And you know, we're very transparent with the science. We've looked at preclinical trials looking at inflammation markers on mice. We've done mechanical studies measuring the amount of emissivity on the fabrics themselves. So we really have a pretty wide spectrum of research. And then, you know, in New Zealand and Australia we're a registered medical device. In the European Union, it's the same in the us we're determined to be an FDA medical device and general wellness product. So we really have invested in the regulatory support needed to show that we increase circulation.

Well done skeptics. I hope you're listening. That kind of gives you all the information you need. I'm going to put also your website in here so people can go and download that. I'm excited to look through that stuff myself. On a personal note, so since I was a young kid, I got like dry skin eczema at times. Does the salient help in terms of kind of inflammation?

Yeah. And you know, I want to be really careful. Everybody's experience is different and you know, we definitely can't make medical claims beyond, you know, what we've been able to demonstrate conclusively. And you know, it's interesting you bring up that specific example. I have from time to time the same type of skin maladies and there's you know, skin and skin just, you know, taking a step back, that's one of the areas I think that's least understood by science because, you know, our skin is our largest organ, right. And there's so many factors, particularly ones that are hard to track, like stress. Like I notice in my own, in my own life, like when I'm in a high period of stress, I'll get flare ups in my skin. And so a lot of times I think it really depends on what the underlying condition is that's causing the symptoms. So, you know, the best way to answer that is if you have something going on in your body, whether it's eczema or inflammation or any type of condition and increasing circulation would have a potential to make that better. Then, then that's certainly something you could look at, that it might help. That is foundationally at its core. What our technology does, what infrared does, is it helps boost and promote an increase in circulation. There's also research that shows infrared helps the body's production of nitric oxide, which is a vasodilator. So there are other things that are interacting, but the, the real core pillar is increased circulation. So if that would help your condition, then it might see an improvement. But if there's some other issues that are contributing to that, it might not have any effect either.

No. Thanks for explaining that. And it's interesting when you talk about the nitric oxide. So I've been working with a breathwork coach for about a year and the whole thing he wants to do is really get this vasodilation happening to help with oxygenation. And so you're saying that the studies showed 8% increase in oxygen. That's oxygen?

Yes. Correct. Not. Not in blood oxygen and tissue oxygen? Yes. Yes.

That's phenomenal. I mean, right away, like if somebody hears that and doesn't want to engage in the product, I think they're crazy.

Yeah. And you know, that, that's really part of what, you know, what David and I got so excited about was the body. Another way of looking at it is, let's say your, your energy is, is a fuel gauge. Right. When that fuel gauge drops below 7, 8, you start having problems. It's not like you're on empty, you know, the body, you know, your blood oxygen levels, like pulse oximetry, you want, you know, 91, 96. Some people have 100. You know, that starts dropping below 90 and people will get concerned. And it's the same with circulation. There is an amputation in the United States every 30 seconds because of poor circulation. And the people that are having those issues, if you can just boost their circulation 4 or 5, 6%, that could be enough to make it so that they can keep, you know, their toe or their foot. So, you know, an 8% can have a huge impact and really make all the difference in somebody's life. So, you know, I appreciate you calling that out.

Not cool. And what about the peak performer, the ultra high performer who's, you know, long distance running is maybe an athlete professional or semi professional. What are some of the different aspects of the technology that could support them?

Yeah, and that's, you know, it's, I'm glad you asked that because the healthier you are, the more optimized your body is. So there's going to be less room for improvement. But at the same time, the more elite you are, the bigger each incremental improvement matters. Right? And we did one of our study is on elite club level cyclists looking at VO2 max, doing repeated trials, randomized, very rigorous study done, the University of Calgary, sponsored by Adidas. And we saw with the clothes provided that there was an increase in VO2 max. And you know, it was about 1%. So you know, for somebody at that level, that's, that's really significant. And it's, you know, when the Olympics are coming up here, the Winter Olympics, you know, you'll see people miss the podium by thousands of a second. So, you know, if you're really looking for that edge and you're, you've optimized everything else, this is going to give you just one more advantage.

That's incredible. It's, it's interesting. So Adidas have sponsored our national team, the All Blacks rugby team. So it'll be really interesting. I'll chat to some of those guys and see if maybe selling has already baked into some of what they're using. And on another note, Sir Dave Brailsford, he was brought into the British cycling team and they were pretty atrocious at the time that he came in and he said, look, we're going to get good real fast, but what are the 10 things that we need to be good at to be a good cycling team? So they all come up with these 10 things. And he said, look, all we've got to do is each of us commit to getting 1% better in each of those areas every day, just 1% better. And so it's so interesting that you did this test in cycling and it gave almost a 1% improvement. That's all it takes to potentially go from not on the podium to on the podium or from bronze to silver, silver to gold, so that the 1% actually matters.

It really does. It really does. And I was talking to a cyclist and we were looking at other ways to, you know, convey that same information. And he said to me, if you just improve your time, like for the Tour de France by a half a second or a quarter second on each turn, and you think about how many turns you have, you know, whether you're going on the hill, sections coming down the hills, and you add that up, you know, it's minutes and you look at the difference, you know, from people, and you're talking about going from 10th place to first place. And it's just these micro improvements when they're stacked and compounded over time and all of a sudden, you know, you've made a huge difference.

Yeah, the small things are the big things. It's just that's so important. And if someone's listening or watching right now and they wanted to improve one thing in the next 30 days, whether it's their energy recovery or sleep, where do you think they should start?

Well, I'm obviously biased. Right. They could start by incorporating infrared and they wouldn't have to change their diet or their sleep or their exercise. And they're going to get incrementally better just by giving their body another energy source. It's basically supplementing all the other ways that we typically think of energy. What we eat, what we drink. We know sunlight can make vitamin D, but. But really, I think, you know, we've created this hybrid engine. Right. We're recycling the heat that's coming off of the body and making it usable in the form of infrared light back into the body. So that would probably be the easiest thing that they could start with.

Amazing. And in terms of. So you do certain products, but so like T shirts and so forth, do you do that as well?

We really rely on our partnerships like Decathlon, Under Armour Defend. We have a really good basket of brands that do apparel and so we're happy to support that.

So if people want to go and get that kind of stuff, they can go and find the brands globally and make sure it's got salient baked into it.

Yeah. If you go on the Under Armour website and type in selling it, there's about 100, 108 products right now. I just checked for somebody that wanted something, so that's phenomenal. It's a very wide range.

It's incredible. And I guess, you know, on the oxygenation side of things, my understanding at a base level is when we get more oxygen and our cells are more oxygenized, it tends to help prevent autoimmune inflammation stress, which long term has a big impact on our health. Right?

Yeah. And that's exactly the key. You help eliminate all, all kinds of, whether it's free radicals, oxidative, stress. You're just really helping the body run a clean and efficient. I mean, we're machines at the end of the day.

Yeah, 100%. And Seth, you just strike me as someone who deeply cares about health, longevity, and you've been in this field for a long time. May I ask what a day in the life of Seth looks like? Morning wake up routines, habits.

Yeah, you know, I. And it's changed over time. Right. And so where I am now is getting a little older. I seem to need less sleep overall. I'm getting up a little earlier. So normally my routine during the week is I get up, walk my son's dog so he gets a little extra sleep. We get a nice, there's a nice loop here where I live. So it's about a 30, 30 minute or so walk. This year I've set a goal to go in the ocean every day. So I started that towards the end of last year. So I'm about 60 days in. So every day that I'm home, I'm in the ocean and that feels great getting your head under the water. And then my dad, he lives downstairs so I make a great protein health shake for myself and take him a glass and we share that and kind of check in on the day and then if it's, you know, regular school day, I'm off to school to drop my son off and then kind of plug in with work and get through my calls and you know, try and keep the emails to a minimum. But those always seem to kind of creep, creep up and take a lot of time. And then you know, in the evenings I'm picking my son up, he's playing baseball and soccer and so you know, I'm assistant coach and like to help out for that on the days he has practice and then you know, we usually pick up food on the way back but sometimes we'll make, make a meal here and you know, the screen times are a big issue with kids so we make sure we get a lot of reading in so we have a little reading time. He beats me at chess. He's only 11, but he's, he's already a better chess player than I am. And you know, when he, yeah, when he was younger I used to be able to put him to bed and then have a little bit of time for myself. Now I just, I usually fall asleep beforehand so it's starting to flip and then, but then I'm up early so that's kind of a typical day.

That's beautiful. And caffeine, what role does it play in your life?

Yeah, you know, it's a love hate relationship. I know that it's, you know, it's a powerful when, particularly if you're not, you don't take it regularly. You know, when I travel is when I tend to have the most because my body is not in the right time zone and it gives a Real, you know, sort of artificial energy kick. If I have coffee after about 11 in the morning, though, I won't be able to go to sleep at night. It seems to really stay in. So I have a pretty small window in the morning where I can take caffeine in, but I don't really drink sodas or other. I'll have some green tea, but a couple of times a week, but try and avoid it.

Amazing. And the same. And what about things like meditation, prayer, journaling? Do they show up in your habits at all?

Yeah, you know, meditation is such a buzzword. I had a great teacher and, you know, what he taught me was, you know, you could meditate for an hour, five minutes, whatever. But it's about how you are the other time in your life, you know. So for me, the focus is like carrying that mindset throughout my day. I do journal, I do like to write. I have a meditation prayer that I'll play like in the morning just, just to kind of help get me grounded. And it's like through a. It's a pause app. So, you know, I love, I love statistics and streak, so I try and, you know, keep that going. I think I got up to around 4, 400 days and didn't have Internet one day and had to start over, so. But yeah, it's, you know, it's, it's. It's really about what works for people. And I think the point of the journaling or the point of the meditation is just getting clear and getting the dysregulation out of your body because of the stress or the deadline you missed or the work you haven't gotten to or the demands that are being placed on you. So having some kind of way, it could be a walk, it could be breathing. I think breathing is really important. There's a lot of vagus nerve stimulators on the market now to help kind of calm the body. So whatever the hack is. And I've over my life, leaned into ones more than others at various times, but it's really about a mental mindset and being able to control how I react to my environment versus letting my environment control my reactions.

Yeah, I like it. It's kind of stoic in its basis. I really love that. And these. I got some Zen buds. I had the founder of Zenbud on the show a while ago, and essentially it's vagus nerve stimulator. It sits in your ear and so I just started to use it. So I definitely feel, feel it physically when I'm using it. So It'll be interesting to see what the long term is on that.

Yeah. And I, I have one of those tracking devices. I use a whoop. And one of the journaling is, you know, did you use a vagus nerve stimulator or not? And I've used it a handful of times and it does. My heart rate variability does seem to be higher on the days that I use that. So, you know, interesting before I go to bed. But, yeah, like, that's, you know, that's another. Another way breathing is really, I think, one that's overlooked. And I just had somebody, I was just at a mastermind workshop and they were teaching us some of the breathing exercises to just whether it's before meeting an important phone call, something you're, you know, you have to be grounded for. Whether it's box breathing or, you know, creating those pauses between the inhales and exhales. I think that can all be helpful 100%.

And, Seth, may I ask, what are you reading right now? What have you read in the last few months that you've really enjoyed?

Yeah, well, I read heavily meditated by Dave Asprey. That was great. I was really interested in that. You mentioned stoicism. I really. The last few years I've been reading Ryan Holiday's series of books.

Likewise.

Yeah, I like those a lot. I'm reading right now Life is your fortune. And that's really interesting for me. And that.

Or what's that? What's life is your fortune about?

Let me make sure I got you the title. Right. I have to. Faith. Faith is your fortune. Sorry.

Okay. Faith is your fortune. Okay.

Yeah. It's about. It's a Christian text based on an interpretation of the Bible that basically says what you believe is what you manifest. And so it prescribes to the idea that God is inside of us, that we're manifestations of God and that if we live up to that spirit, then our lives will manifest accordingly. If I could say it that way.

Yeah, that's awesome. I love it. And yeah, I'll send you a copy, actually, of my book. It comes out in the States in about two weeks time from the day that we're recording. So I'll make sure and get a little copy across to you. And if it's not your cup of tea, you can always gift it to others.

No, I love it. I have. Yeah, I would absolutely like to read that. There's. Yes, thank you.

Pleasure. Seth, may I ask you one last question? If we fast forward many years into the future and you're Highly aware that it's your last day here on Earth and someone that you love dearly, maybe a young person. It could be a grandchild, a great grandchild. They come into the room and they say, seth, how do I go about leading my life on purpose? What might you say to them?

I. It's such a beautiful question because it gives us opportunity, God willing, today's not our last day, you know, to reflect on that and see what changes we might want to make and. Or what kind of advice. In this case, guidance, you know, purpose to me, one of the. One of the things that I've learned in my arc, I've gone from seeking and wanting and giving advice to seeking and wanting and giving a mirror perspective, a reflection. And in that, you go from trying to influence someone to trying to help them find out for themselves, right? And it's sort of this Gestalt method. It's looking at, like, the Johari window and understanding what I don't understand about myself and what other people can't see. And. And how do you shine a light on what you don't know? Right? You don't know what you don't know. And to me, like, trying to walk on that edge and be open and be curious, you know, when you stay curious, you're open to learning, and when you lose that curiosity, you kind of stop growing. And, you know, going to the heart of your question, the purpose for everyone is different, right? We're all here. We all have our own paths. So rather than try and share with my grandson or whoever that person is, what my purpose was, or trying to guess or presume to know what their purpose. To me, that path of discovering the purpose comes from coherence. And that's been what I've really been trying to dial up in my own life. And we tend to think we're coherent people, you know, we tend to think that, like, you know, what we say is how we feel and we're in touch with ourselves, but just in my own life, understanding how radically disconnected, like, maybe it's because I didn't want to hurt someone's feelings, or maybe it's because I didn't feel it was the right time, or maybe it's because I didn't feel comfortable advocating for myself and so trying to get to a place where I am incoherent with myself and I'm in alignment and understanding that things like fear and pain and sadness and grief, those are not things of the mind. Those are things that come from our body and that our body is trying to tell us it's experiencing. And when our mind tries to shut it down and say, oh, I'm not afraid or I shouldn't be afraid or I'm not sad or I'm okay or that didn't hurt, I'm not going to let that bother me. We, we create a disconnect between our mind and our body and over time we'll develop physical pain. You know, people like back pain is famous for that, where there was no injury, there was no accident, they can't really explain it, but their back just. I've had that happen myself. And it's through that process of trying to understand that that I've kind of learned these things that are experienced, these things I'm sharing now. And for me, when you become integrated and coherent and you listen to what your body's telling you and, and you understand how to, how to assimilate that, then it can leave the body and you can be healthy and you can, and you can find your purpose. And so to your question, I would just encourage that person to really go on a path of coherence and make sure that they're in touch with how they feel, what they believe, and that they're able to articulate that and bring that into the world and not argue with it or negotiate or try and kind of suppress those, those beliefs and desires. Because when you, when you create that space and you're incoherence, your purpose will be revealed to you.

That's really powerful, Seth. So thank you for sharing that. I know that there's a person that's listening right now that really needed to hear that and I can really resonate with what you're saying as well. And know of times when there's an absolute incoherence and those times I did have physical manifestations of that. So really good advice, not just for that many years into the future, but for today, right now for the person listening. So just want to say huge heartfelt thank you and the work that you're doing is making a big difference in the world. And I hope that the listener right now goes to the show notes, clicks through to your website, checks out the amazing stuff you're doing. We'll also put your LinkedIn and all your other socials in there if they want to connect in. But just a heartfelt thank you for joining us on the show.

Thanks, James. Thanks for having me. And I'd love any of your listeners to reach out. I'd love to communicate and develop relationship with anyone interested.

Awesome. Thank you so much.