What MMA Taught This Plumber About Mental Health w/ Dan Tempest

For me, it's not about making the mistake. Making the mistakes are inevitable. We're only human, that happens. The key is how you deal with that mistake. It's owning up and saying, look, I've messed up, but here's what I'm going to do to fix it. And that's how you, from a business, that's how your business grows. That people will always respect you much more for.

I think also it's worth just kind of pointing out that these extra hobbies, having time for yourself, looking after yourself, doing what you want, yeah, is actually really important for you.

Massive, massive.

If you, if you just focus on business— this is something that, you know, I've done, um, at times, you know, it's just not healthy. This is the Field Rocket Podcast. I'm your host, Tolek Priest, and today we're joined by Dan from ST Plumbing and Heating. Welcome to the show, and we're going to be talking about some mental health. We were speaking prior and you were kind of mentioning a little bit about, about your background and, um, you know, how that's kind of helped you.

Yeah, I mean, I'm a retired MMA fighter. It's—

how long did you do the fighting for?

Best part of 20 years.

Okay.

Me hips and knees think it's more like about 40, like. But yeah, it's— I've always come from a bit of a fighting background because growing up in a mining community, we have like boxing clubs, that kind of thing. It's kind of the equivalent of a kids' youth club, were local boxing clubs.

So, um, more kind of hands-on, I would imagine.

Yeah, pretty much. It, uh, I mean, it did us all good. It was a very good environment to be brought up in, to be totally honest. It, uh, um, and I think, I think there's not enough of that kind of thing, um, available to kids anymore, uh, if I'm totally honest, because I think removing stuff like that from communities is, is probably a big problem with how kind of the younger generation are now. But that's a— it's probably a different story altogether, is that. Um, but yeah, fought in MMA and boxing for best part of like 2 decades, so it's, uh, I've been about a bit.

And how did it kind of help with you, with your sort of running a business? Because you're, you're also a father as well. Yep. Um, there's, there's quite a lot of juggling involved.

What I find a big part of it is, first of all, let's— you've got to go right to the root. Without, without my wife at home picking up all the slack, none of it's possible because she's there dealing with kids, running of a house, all that kind of stuff. Me working long hours between training for fights, running a business. I mean, there were regular days I could be out of the house for maybe 15, 16 hours. And literally just coming in. There were days, especially when my oldest girl, she were, when she were really young, there were days literally I didn't actually see her awake. The most important factor in being able to deal with all that is the person that's at home picking up all that slack, because like I say, and I think, I think in a lot of businesses, especially self-employed people, I don't think the person the partner at home ever gets enough recognition, um, for what they have to actually— because in certain instances, being out at work is actually the easiest part of it. It's, uh, um, and, and I don't think they ever get enough recognition for, for what, what they actually do. Um, but then when we have 4-year-old twins and it is intense. Yeah, yeah.

If you're looking after them after— yeah. But the other thing is you also get quite a lot of sole traders or people that wear the actual, um, partner at home is actually answering the calls, doing the admin, plus everything else.

Yeah, yeah. And, uh, and so a lot of times they'll probably be working a lot harder. So like I said, then when I, when, when I've got fighting on top of that, you've got to deal with the preparation for fights. When you've got big fights, you've got a lot on your mind. You've got the, they've got the, you've got the work. Um, it impacts all sorts of things. Like, you can't just say when, when you're prepping for a fight, you've got to wait a specific weight to make you can't just say, oh, we're off out for a meal tonight, or— because you don't know if that meal is going to be compatible with your dietary requirements for what your plan is, or you've got to find somewhere.

I mean, so are you kind of planning down to, I need this amount of protein, I need this one?

Yeah, yeah, you've got to work out, you've got to work out everything, because like I say, the last thing you ever want to be— you want to be, um, MMA is a little bit different to to like boxing and things like that, because your weigh-ins 24 hours prior to— sometimes even if you're late, if you like headline the show, it could be like 30-odd hours before you're even fighting. So when you, when you step into that cage, you're not actually the weight of what you've weighed in. It's so— it's not really a true reflection. It's like, I, I spent most of my, my career fighting at middleweight, which were 84 kilograms.

So do you kind of like bring your weight down and then it bounces up?

Yeah, so I, so what I do is I spent most of my like I said, most of my career fighting at 84kg. So what I'd do is I'd diet down to about 80, 88, right? And I'd stay that, that'd be my diet. And then I'd just water cut the final 4, right? Which would involve like salt baths. And a funny story with salt baths is me, um, he's now one of my engineers, but he'd only just started working for me, like a 16-year-old apprentice, and I were prepping for a fight and he was like, oh, what's his next job? Right, I've got to go, I've got to go and meet Wade later today, so I just need to go and cut some water in a salt bath. And he thought I was messing about, I was like, nah, I've been serious. He was like, oh, what do I do? I went, right, well, you've just got to sit inside the bath and just make sure I don't pass out and drown. He went, what do you mean? I went, just that, make sure I don't pass out and drown, because when you get in a salt bath, you've got to get the water as warm as you can physically take, full of Epsom salt, hat on.

So you're just sweating all of your water out.

You submerge every single part of your body, so literally just keep you that much of your face out of the water, and you're laid in this boiling hot water just going, yeah, and then so you'll be in that for about 10 minutes, then you get out, wrap yourself in towels, and just stand there for about another 5 minutes, then you're back in. You do that probably about 4 or 5 times. And the goal is just to reduce the water content, just to suck every little bit of water out of your body.

So you've got 4 kilograms of water you've got to get out.

Yeah, yeah. And so, and I have actually, I've passed out in salt baths before, but you've got— they're really dangerous if you haven't got someone watching you because, like I say, if you just get that— if you're stubborn enough to stay in it, you can really— you can do it in a sauna, but I always found salt baths were the quickest way of doing it. And yeah, me and Brent were sat there. He'd not been working for me very long and he was just— I bet he must have just been sat there thinking What have I got myself into?

Was he on his phone looking for a different apprenticeship?

So, uh, yeah, but yeah, so then I'd cut the final 4, um, and then we'd go and weigh in. Now when I do that, I'd weigh in, I'd met weight, I'd met my 84 kilo. When I stepped into the kit, by the time I'd refueled, rehydrated, refueled, when I stepped into the cage the next day I would normally fight at about 91, 92 kilograms.

Well, so that's it, that's a huge difference.

Yeah, I'd normally put about 9 kilos on from— sorry, but normally put on up to about 91 kilos, so put like 6 or 7 kilos on.

How do you put that much weight on?

It's just putting—

is it just water?

But you've got to be really careful not to like gorge. It's really tempting to like just net loads of water and gorge on food and things like that because you've starved yourself, and— but you've got to progressively put it into your body or you just end up feeling really bloated. And so there's a massive science to it, getting it right. And, and, uh, but it's like anything, the more you do it, the more— but then age creeps upon you and all that changes. So you have to, you have to tweak it as you're going along and, and things like that. And I came to sort of— but then towards like the, the, the older end, the final years of me fighting, I, uh, I just had to stay closer to my fight weight. And I won't put in massive amounts on after, after weigh-ins because my body just didn't work in that way anymore.

And this whole time you're fighting, you're, you're building the business at the same time with your family.

Yeah, so that, yeah, that was fun, busy. But, but what I do, what I do call— on one side it was very hard, but on the other side it also taught me, it taught me a lot when it comes down to the discipline, doing things in a disciplined manner. You apply that— if you apply the logic of preparation for a fight, you've got a goal and you've got all the stages that require leading up to that goal. So it has to be broken down into individual segments. And now if you apply that logic to running a business, that's how, that's how a business works. And that's probably a big part of, a big part of my success. Well, I say my success, it's me and my sister that run the business, but it's I think it's a big part of the success of the business is applying that logic to how it all works.

But you say applying that logic, that's great. You can, you can do a goal, you can make out the steps to actually get there, but you have to be incredibly disciplined, and then you need to be committed.

Yeah. And then, you know, on those mornings that you don't want to get up, they're, they're the most important mornings because I guarantee you, going through, especially going through a fight camp um, you could find a million reasons to not train or skip, or just— you could find a million, and it's not hard to find an excuse. Um, but it's just holding on to that one reason why you should. That's the, that's the key, is that just getting that one reason why you should.

So that mental toughness.

Yeah. And that's because although you've got a team around you, um, and I was fortunate enough to have an amazing team around me um, but it's very, it's a very, it's very lonely because as soon as that cage door shuts behind you, it don't matter how good the team is that's, that's next, it's you.

Yeah, and somebody else.

It's you and that person. It's you and that person. You're looking across a cage for someone that's not done anything wrong to you, and you've got to try and knock them out. That's— it's a different— it's, it's a very it's a very different mindset. You've got to be able to— it's almost flick a switch, and you've got to find a trigger to flick that switch and get that going. And that works. And you've got to learn to be able to, like, control that switch. And that's the switch that you need on those mornings when you don't want to do it or you don't feel like doing it. You're going to flick that switch, say, right, I'm doing it. And that's where— and like you say, it comes down to a certain mental toughness and it's— and having that is a good thing. Also, on the flip side, it's sometimes a bad thing because sometimes you do things that really aren't in your best interest.

I mean, can you give us an example?

I mean, a lot of— I've fought many fights with injuries that have impacted how my performance has been, when the reality is I should have, I should have called the fight off. Some of those injuries have gone on to, to probably cause irreversible damage. Um, but it's that, it's that stubbornness to say, no, no, I'm doing it. And, and that, look, it's had— having that, having that mental toughness and having that stubbornness about me has— it's given more success. There's been more success out of it than there has been bad things. But I'm saying it's not always a— it's not always a great thing.

It's kind of a fine line, like, when is it actually an excuse Yeah, or is it, you know, a sensible decision, sensible thing?

But I think that's when you need— I think that's where you need, like I was referring back to, having that team around you that knows, right, you need to listen to me now, this is not a good call. And it's— that's where you need— that's where you need that little voice in your ear to say, right, we understand that you, you're not backing out, this is not— you— this is not this is a, just a sensible decision. And you need that. And I think especially when you're, especially in, in something like fighting, I think you do need that team around you to be able to help you make that, that right decision at the right times as well.

And how is this, you know, because running a business is stressful or can be stressful, how has this kind of helped you with your sort of running a business and juggling things?

So it's it's something that I always refer back to, and I call, I call it my reset. And what it is, is, and it, it's something that I will always advise somebody to try and find. It doesn't necessarily have to be fine, it doesn't necessarily have to be anything physical. What's, what people need to find, because what, what fighting meant for me is when I got on that mat, no matter how bad my day had been, no matter what had gone off, no matter how stressed out I was when I got on that mat for 2 hours, nothing else mattered. Nothing else mattered. And because you have to be present in the moment or bad things will happen to you, so you have to, you have to be fully on it. You have to be able to— so again, it's like I was having that switch where you could just switch off completely, deaden everything out about, about what's happened previously and concentrate on the here and now. And then what you find is after that reset and after that 2 hours, then you walk off the mat and then you're you'll think back and you'll be like, that thing that was stressing me out, or that thing that's been winding me up, it don't matter. It's actually not really a major problem because the reality is it wasn't just that one thing that was getting to you. It were a combination of probably 4 or 5 little things just nibbling away, and then it all just built up into this massive, into this massive thing. But what you've done, but you've had that reset, and you can look at it and you can sit back and you can look at it objectively now and think right, it's not actually a problem, is it? And then you walk off that mat with a big smile on your face, preferably without bleeding, not too many punches to the face. And, uh, and, and like I say, things don't— it's, it's not a problem anymore. And, and like, that's the reason I always refer to it as my reset.

So, so for your reset to work, or for, for others, you know, might not— as you say, might not be fighting, but You were saying that you really have to be present, so there's no future, no past, you, you were just there.

Yeah.

Um, and then anything else you think there would be, like, if, if other people are looking for something that's just something that fully involves you and you fully have to concentrate on?

So like I say, something I've, uh, when we were talking earlier, I know a lot of, a lot of people I know that they, for that, they, they use fishing. I mean, Matt I, I don't get fishing. It's not, it's not, but it works for them. It's going to be something different for everybody because everybody has different things. I mean, I think people are crazy who play cricket because who'd want a corky ball thrown at them at 90 miles an hour? Because I know I wouldn't, but I think, I think they're crackers. But then again, they probably think I'm mental for stepping into a cage and doing what I do. So it's all down to what you what you want and what, what you, what you need to be able to, to find that reset.

So you just need to find that reset.

Yeah.

To, you know, just to kind of just, well, essentially reset yourself.

Yeah.

So you just don't have that, you know, because if you have, if you have that without the reset, you kind of have that stress building up every day.

Yeah.

Um, it's just, it's just not good.

And it eventually it spirals and it becomes it just becomes overwhelming. And I've been in, I've been in situations where I've, I mean, I picked up a, I picked up a bad injury in one fight. I actually broke me, broke a bone in my leg and damaged my ACL in first round of a fight.

And what's ACL?

Cruciate ligament.

Okay.

Again, this is where, this is where I talk about that, that stupid stubbornness. I continued and I finished the fight. On a— we had broken like a bone in my leg and a damaged ACL, which were—

and you knew it was broken at the time?

Oh God, yeah.

Oh yeah, it wasn't just like a tackle.

I felt it just snapped from underneath me where it weren't good.

I think if you do something like that and then if you were like dealing with like something in business, you are not, you know, it's, it's not at the same level, is it? You know, like if you have the discipline to actually carry on a fight, yeah, I would imagine that, you know, if you are getting, you know, having an issue with a customer or whatever it is, or an employee, or you're just trying to grow the business, they're at very, very different levels.

Yeah.

And you kind of have a bit more perspective, I would imagine.

Yeah, and I think the two things actually do run in line in a sense. In the sense that I think if you've got the discipline to follow through on a fight from training to getting ready to making weight to making the fight to, to, to, to getting to the end result, a business is the same because all the way, all the way through your fight camp, you're dealing with problems, you're dealing with issues, you're working around problems. It's the same thing in working in a job towards the end goal. And I, I think the, the similarities from start to finish with running a business or training for a fight, you're navigating problems, and it's about how you navigate them problems. There is always a solution, always.

I think so. But there's also, you know, in a fight, I would you know, I'm not a fighter, but I would imagine you have to face your issues in business. You know, you do— you can avoid issues if you wanted to for a long time, and that will slow down the growth of your business. Would you say that's a fair kind of—

I think that's a real— I think that's a really— and it's like I've— it's like I've always said, it's when you're running a business, there will always be problems. You can't avoid it. There will always be problems. Mistakes are made. We're only human, we make mistakes. Even I, I will— I mean, I regularly, to be honest, I— to try and give a little bit of a human aspect back to like my social media, I will always show my mistakes if I mess something up. And I will always show, look, hands up, here's what I've done. For me, it's, it's not about making the mistake. Making the mistakes are inevitable. We're only human, that happens. The key is how you deal with that mistake. That's where the important part is. It's not about— it's owning up and saying, look, I've messed up, but here's what I'm going to do to fix it. And that's how you— from a business, that's how your business grows. That people will always respect you much more for— yeah, you're taking ownership, being totally upfront for it. And I think that's a very, very big part of it.

Yeah, I think for, like, for me growing a business, they— there's two things in parallel. There's personal growth and the business growth. And you don't actually get the business growth until you actually grow yourself.

That's it, yeah.

And I can definitely see this, you know, just having that discipline, like you were saying earlier, that each session is what? How long was the session?

A couple of hours, probably.

A couple of hours.

Between an hour and a half, two hours.

So two sessions a day, ten a week. You know, that's, that's an incredible amount of discipline required to actually make— because it's, it's easy to do it for the first week, but then week 2, and then, you know, just to have that consistency.

Then when you start going into a calorie deficit with your diet and then getting up and training, it's nice.

And then you'll get a cold, there'll be, there'll be just— yeah, when you have children, they collect stuff from school. Yeah, you know, that's—

yeah, it's, uh, It's not pleasant at times. Yeah, you do wake up some mornings and you— towards the back, I don't think there's ever— I don't think there's ever been a fight camp where at some point I haven't thought to myself, I'm not doing this again. I don't think there's ever been one. Um, at some point in every fight camp, I've always thought that. And then fight day comes and all those— but all you forget about every part of it. Because it's all worth it.

When you have those thoughts, that's when, that's when it counts. Like that morning you don't want to get up. Yeah. When you think this is not fun.

Yeah. And, but it's getting up and doing it. And like I say, they— I've always said they're the most important sessions. The— it's the sessions you don't want to be there that are more important than the ones— you can sometimes have great sessions and you can be, you can be on fire and you like think, oh, I'm feeling great. And, and yeah, they're good. But it's when you, it's when you go, it's when you get up and go when you're thinking and you grumble into yourself when you say, I'm sat there, it's 5 o'clock in the morning, there's ice on ground, and I know that mats are going to be iced over when we get onto them because of that, because there's not many heated gyms, you know, mats are going to be freezing cold. And you're there and you grumble into yourself on your way, way to training, and you think, but then like I say, come fight day It's all worth it. Everything's worth it. And I think there's, like I say, there's parallels with that with business. When you say, when you're on a job that you're really not enjoying, because we all get them and you're thinking, I just want this job to be over, and then you finish it and it's all working perfect and it's just like, yeah, it was worth it. And that's where kind of like the similarities come in. It's nice. It's nice when you get that fine bit that that final sense of satisfaction is what it's all about.

Yeah, I think also it's worth just kind of pointing out that these extra hobbies, having time for yourself, looking after yourself, doing what you want, is actually really important for your mental health.

Oh, massively important.

If you just focus on business, this is something that, you know, I've done at times, you know, it's just not healthy.

No, I agree, I mean, and I've been situations where I've just been completely engulfed with, with work. You, you forget about what's important, you forget about what's important at home. And because it— and I don't think, I don't think we get into— I don't think it happens overnight. No, it's, it's like, it's a progress. It's like, I'll just stay up another half an hour tonight and get this done, and then that half an hour I'll stay up another hour and then get that done. Oh, if I do this, it means I don't have to do that tomorrow. But then you end up doing something else in its place the next day. And then before you know it, I mean, I would regularly at a point where in between all this training and things, not getting to bed while 1, 2 o'clock in the morning because I would up doing my work stuff and things like that. And so like Mrs. and kids would have gone to bed and sometimes I wouldn't even notice they'd gone to bed because I'd be sat with me head in the computer and it's— you become in that situation where you're there but you're not present. Yeah. Um, sorry, you're present but you're not—

you're not—

well, you're physically present, you're not there. Um, and I think, I think that has a massive effect on you, as it can have a massive effect on your family life. And sometimes you've got to— sometimes you do need that boot up ass and just say, come on.

But I think you need like a bit of discipline that this period is for personal. And I don't know whether you've heard about it, but there's this expression about boiling a frog. Like if you put a frog, it's not something I've tried by the way, not something I would suggest, but you put a frog in water, slowly boil it, you know, it will boil.

Drop it into hot water, it'll bounce straight back out.

But it's just harder to catch.

I mean, we do, we do little things at home. It's like Sundays, Sundays, because me and my wife both work full-time. Sunday, there's, there's no phones on a Sunday. So if anybody tries to get in touch with me on a Sunday, unfortunately there's, there's no chance because there's no phone. So that means social media is gone, all that kind of stuff. We'll, we might get his phones out probably, and then it goes for kids as well. So we have no choice but to interact with each other.

And, uh, what are we gonna do?

But it's like, ah, we've got to speak to each other now. But I think it's really healthy. It's a really healthy thing. It's a really, really healthy thing. And it's like, not so much now because when kids are at school and things like that, but at the bare minimum, me and my wife always sit down to have tea together, no matter what, no matter what time of night it is or anything like that. We sit down and we have tea together. And I think that's really important.

And getting those little I know they're only tiny little bits, but then the, the, you say they're tiny bit, but these like, okay, you could go for one big extravagant kind of thing, but you need these daily habits to enforce things.

Yeah.

And I, I think that these small things are the, the important things.

Yeah. Like I say, I mean, it's, I, I, and it's amazing how you, you go, you speak to people and there's, there's little things that, little things that, that like, that, that we do and But other people, I know lads that literally just get up, go out to work, they don't do anything. And I think to myself, that don't quite sit right with me. It's a bit unfair. It's like, I mean, little things I do, there'll never be a day when I come down in the morning and get myself ready for work, because I'm out before everybody's even got up. Wife will have a cup of coffee waiting for her. All she's got to do literally is just put hot water in and I'll empty dishwasher, you know, just to do, you know, tiny, tiny little things.

But yeah, when they open the— your wife opens the dishwasher, you know, it's a little ray of happiness.

Yeah, I don't have to do that now. And then, and you know, like I say, those, those little things, and I think, I think they're really, really important to, like I say, to get the, that family, that, that working dynamic of a house, household working. Because going back to what I said originally, the success of everything or anything comes down to the foundations. Where your home should be your safe place, it should be a calm place. If you're going home to someone that— someone that's stressed out, and you could have done— you could have done tiny little things. No, I'm not saying anything major, because at the end of the day, you've got to remember that you've got your own stuff to do. But if you could do a tiny little thing, just one tiny little thing, just to make life a little bit easier, that don't really put you out in any way, shape, or form.

Something thoughtful.

Yeah, just then that's major. And I think, and what happens then is that, that appreciation is kind of reciprocated when, when it's mirrored back to you. Yeah, when you come back, when you get back. And, and I think, like I say, that, and look, we'll have all been there, we've had a bad day at work, your partner's had a bad day at work, you get home and the tiniest little thing, I don't know, put your shoes in wrong place or, you know, something like that. That suddenly then becomes a massive issue, don't it? It's not, it's not a tiny, it's not a tiny little, it's not the tiny little issue that it actually is. Yeah, it's a massive issue. And then if you've got two people like both me and my wife, we're both, we're both really fiery people. If, if she fires at me, whether it's right or wrong, I'll just fire back because it's just a natural reaction. I mean, if you're that way, ah, you end up finding you end up finding yourself arguing over someone who's put over back wrong way around us, you know. But we laugh, but that's what, that's what all these little things end up, end up leading to. So if you can, if you can do anything to, to make not just your life but everybody else's life a little bit easier around you, it just, it's, it's, it's a big part of. And, and I don't think, I don't think people understand it, but I would I would all— I would advise to— I would really recommend to anybody, have one day out your weekend with just your phones off. Not necessarily off, but, you know, away from you.

Yeah, not on the phone constantly.

Yeah, because we, we— and we all do it. We all did. If you've got a spare couple of minutes, if, if you say to— if you lined up 100 people, say, if you've got 5 minutes where you're sat doing no, what, what's the first thing you do? Yeah, and we all know what it is. Just go to your phone straight onto social media or something, or Google something, or yeah. And we're all guilty of doing it, but what that's doing is it's making you— it's taking your attention away from something else that could be— you could be doing. You could be focusing on, like I say, on your family, on your kids, on that kind of— out like that.

Yeah, and that will help your mental—

yeah, yeah. And that helps you, that helps you massively, because the problem is with, especially with social media, if you're feeling a little bit low, a little bit down, or something like that, there's a very good chance you're going to go on social media and you're going to read something that's going to make you feel even worse. Because like it or not, there isn't that much positive stuff on— when you, when you actually break it down, there's not a massive amount of positive stuff on social media. I bet, I bet the majority is because negative, negative publicity generates You know, more clicks, you know, more attention.

Yeah.

Um, and that, that is just that, that, that's the toxicity of social media. Um, is the negative, negative interaction will always trump positive interaction. And it's wrong, but that's, that's the way, that's the way it is, isn't it? And so if you're in that situation, then you, you're spending a lot of time engulfed in social media and things like that. It can warp your views on what real life is. It can— it can— oh, I'm seeing all this, should I be expecting that from my life? It's like— and it's very easy to—

it's just— it's not going to help.

But you're looking at people, they're getting paid to actually say these things, and to be in that situation is— it's not helpful. So that day off your phone is, I think, is a massively, massively important thing.

Really appreciate coming on, Dan. It's Dan from ST Plumbing and Heating. Yeah, it's really good insights. And, you know, in summary, you know, really get the time off and also find a kind of a way to reset.

Yeah, definitely.

You know, just small steps.

That's it.

Build your habits up and then, yeah, take care of yourself as well. Definitely. Yeah, thank you.

Not a problem.

Cheers. Perfect. Thank you very much.

Cheers.