 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind pump, mind pump with your hosts. Sal de Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. We had our good friend, Ben Greenfield. Oh, you're about to hear a good little episode here. Visit us here in San Jose. He actually spent the night at my house and we made sweet, sweet love. Yeah, no, I believe you guys really bonded. You were the, what did he say? He's the little spoon? No, he's a big spoon. Yeah. Were you a little spoon in it? So, Ben? No, Ben is one of our, I mean, great guy. Like we first saw him because he was racing in the Spartan race when he was up here. And we went and see him up there. Then we hung out with him. We had a great dinner with him. We maybe drank a little bit, I don't know. You might hear that in the episode coming up. But we had a great time with Ben. He's a very intelligent guy, but this episode gets a little deep, right? We talk about Ben, his life. We talk about more personal stuff. I can't wait. A little bit of fitness. I'm here, so I can't wait to listen to this one. Oh yeah, that's right. He's sat in your chair, Justin. I know. I'm pretty sure. It smells different from here. I asked him questions that nobody's ever asked him before and got him talking about things that he's never talked about on the podcast before. He's one of our favorite podcasters. You can find his podcast. It's called Ben Greenfield Fitness Podcast. His website is bengreenfieldfitness.com. His Instagram is at Ben Greenfield Fitness. And he's released a new energy bar. Now we're not big fans of bars and stuff like that, but I'll tell you what, I kind of like his bar. It's minimally processed. It's got good ingredients. It actually tastes pretty good. And we bullied him to giving our fans a discount. Not only did we bully him into giving us our fans a discount, a better discount than you can get anywhere else because the affiliate code was supposed to be 10%. And I strong armed him, strong armed him into giving us more than anybody else. So mind pump, if you go to the checkout, make sure you put mind pump, no space, all one word. That's impressive because he has like a 15% discount on those bars. I love them. I've been using them consistently now. So here we go. Here we are talking to Ben Greenfield. Can you hear Ben? My blue light blockers are cutting off blood flow to my ears. Dude, why are, first of all, you're in the funny chair. That's Justin's chair right there. The chair does smell a little funny. It does. And it's a nice. Son of a bitch. This is true. Dude, tell Ben about how Justin had got a skin surgery. What Saturday, when we come over to see you at Spartan Race, right? And you introduced us to Hunter and... That really hard, super steep Spartan race that I did that you guys didn't do. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you. Yeah, right. Definitely not. First of all, we ran out of gas on the way there. So that's right there that tells you we shouldn't compete in a Spartan race. It's a classic Spartan race excuse. Exactly. So we get... I was gonna do the barbed wire, but I ran out of gas. Ironically, when we were at the 7-Eleven that was right across the street from there, we saw a bunch of Spartan wannabes or whatever. They're the people that look like they're gonna do the race, but they don't. I didn't know this existed until this moment. Because a whole crowd of them, and I told Taylor, I said, oh, hey, bro, let's go just interview these guys. They probably just finished the race. They're coming over to us. Yeah, that's right. Were they climbing on the gas pumps? No, but there was the whole mob of them. You know, the tall socks and the headbands and the Spartan shirts on and stuff. So one of them had the war pain on his face, all that stuff. And I go, hey, man, did you just race? He goes, oh, no, I missed my time. I missed, and there was a whole group of them. What do you mean I missed my time? He didn't, you were, this is what you- No, you get like an allotted time that you're supposed to start the race. Yes. Oh. That's like the dream I had. You know, like the dream where you go to school and you're underwear or like your teeth are falling out, you can fly. I've had that dream before where you sleep through the race or you miss your start time. I just thought of this. So how did you- You know you care about the race. How did you do, by the way? How did you do in this last one? I sucked. Really? I was thinking for you because I feel like sucked in you. Like how many- For you means like, oh, I only ran like the second fastest person or whatever. No, I didn't run very fast. That happened to me in the race before that too. We were talking about this beforehand. Oh yeah. So you were telling me about- I did a whole new protocol this winter of lifting and gymnastics and sitting on airplanes. I think it's possibly that last one. Because in the Seattle race, I had just flown in from, I was back east and then for this race, I was just flown from Bulgaria. I'm not sandbagging, but I think that sitting for like 24 hours before the race, affects your body. Is it always the same side? And I warm up- Yeah, it's always the right side. It's always the right SI joint. There's- I think sitting for that long. There's a recruitment pattern issue. I mean, that's 100% what it's pointing to. But the hard thing about athletes like yourself, because you're so highly trained, you're so, yes, handsome, but that has nothing to do with what I'm about to say. You're also very fit. Is that your body is exceptional at compensating. So it can be very difficult to identify a recruitment pattern issue on someone like you. Yeah, plus my right testicle, just fucking huge. Yes, that's the other part. My right, I get that shaping on my right thigh. So sitting on for a long period of time hurts the SI joint for you, apparently. That's the only variable that was the same. Like if I look at both my last races, like they're not that, they weren't that great. So no, I wasn't happy with that. I hope. Great, we'll see you tomorrow. Ben, how competitive you feel. What I did like was how you guys showed up and you all leapt over the fence to the race, but Sal, I'm glad he called you out. Tiny little fence, and they're standing there talking, and I'm like, why don't you guys come over here into the race? And I was like, okay. And he just kind of steps over the fence. And then, who was, I think Justin leaps over the fence. And then Sal walks the 100 yards around the bathroom. You're out of Spartan race. It's okay to jump the fence. The funny thing is, the entrance is right over there. I saw. I don't understand why I need to jump over the fence, but I can just go into the entrance. Let me tell you how much. I feel like I made the smart decision. Let me tell you how much I know my boy, is I saw, I saw for a moment there, he thought about it. Like he looked at the fence, he saw me hop over, then he saw Justin, and he thought, what could- What if my pants catch? What if I don't make it cross his mind? Just for a split second, there was a split second there. Surrounded by obstacle course racers. I don't want to be the guy. You imagine how embarrassing that would be? And there's a bit of it very, that's smart in his own way right there, because he saw that. He's like, if all the places I'm not going to make a fit, he's gonna do that guy. Yeah, we're out. Just a hand? Yeah, there's a whole bunch of obstacle race people that are hopping over doing crazy shit. Sal is not going to fail at that. That splinter. I'd rather be made, I know him. I'd rather be made fun of for walking around the fence and actually attempting the next- It's this one time, dude, that I stepped over the fucking chains at McDonald's and I pulled the whole line down with me. But then the funny- Everybody came down with me. So we go to watch the game. And I spilled nuggets everywhere. We go to watch the game tonight at the bar. Oh yeah. And I give Sal a hard time and I kind of jump over the fence to like get into the bar. And so like 10 minutes later, I turn around, Sal's getting there, ready to jump over, and the security guards come over and say, sir, please step down immediately. Step down. So they knew. They knew that you have a fence problem. They did. And they saw Ben do it and they're like, let that guy do it. He can obviously do it. And then they saw me attempt and like, sir, you're going to hurt yourself. Because they saw a lawsuit. They saw a lawsuit. There's a ramp. There's a ramp over here on the side that you can use. You told him 48 inches. Okay, please, go around. Listen, I'm extremely agile. I'm extremely agile. I'll show you guys one time one day. Now, Ben, you said you played sports grown up, right? Mm-hmm. What sports did you play? Tennis was my main sport. Okay. Yeah, tennis and chess and violin. You threw chess in there, chess. There's competitive violin. There's competitive violin. No, I don't think so. Oh, like your right hand gets really sore. Yeah, I know. Yeah, like the right upper bicep. Did you really play the violin? I did for 13 years. Wow, you don't have the, what do they call that on your neck? No, a hickey. No, when they get the violin, players will get like leathery skin, right? Well, yeah, you gotta kinda hold it against your shoulder. Yeah. It's a, I forget the callus. It's kinda like there's a term for it. If you actually watch a violin concert or you go Google violin concert and like do a close-up of, there's like a big pad on the side of the violin that's supposed to go up against your shoulder. Yes, but they also, my family was not wealthy, so the way that we did it was I had a rubber band and a piece of foam that we get from like Jo-Ann's fabrics and we just kind of rubber band that to the violin, so that probably saved my ass. Well, I think the violin's one of my favorite instruments. I played the trumpet. Oh. Yeah. I played the trumpet for three years. I could see that. Something about my lips. What were you gonna say? I have a challenge for us today. Uh-oh. Yeah, I wanna see, because this is totally not formal, right? Violin off? No, not a violin off. I wanna challenge ourselves to, on this fitness podcast, to not talk about fitness. This is a fitness podcast? Yeah, as much as we possibly can. So we're not allowed to talk about fitness? Yeah, I wanna stay away from that day because here's a perfect opportunity after we just hung out, had some drinks, had a good night, and then stopped by the studio. Let's be honest. I just drank like half a bottle of sake and I'm high. Right. What? What? What are you talking about, Ben? Anyways, continue Adam. I'm just edamame. So I'm gonna, like, and this would be good, because I haven't even asked a question like this from Sal. So let's, I wanna go back to high school. Oh no. For both of you. And I want a memory. This ought to be fun. And we're gonna do, you know I was homeschooled K through 12. That's okay, this is fair enough right here, right? So at that age, K through high school, somewhere between freshman, senior year and high school, I want a moment that you remember that was tragic to you and then a moment to you that was like, probably one of your happiest or exciting moments in that timeframe. So first one, tragic. So, and I want both of you to sit down and hear me ask Sal. I can't even. That comes to mind. This is gonna be a really sad podcast. No, it doesn't have to be. What do you mean tragic? I mean like the time I took mom's pills and tried to commit suicide, my dog I hit by a car. It did. Let me rephrase it then. Does that have to be true? How about just something that my brother attacked me with a sickle or the time he sprayed himself in the face of bear mace. No, okay, let me back it up. Okay, let me back it up. Tragic is not a good word. That was not a good word for that. How about something that you know that has formed you into the man you are today because of what happened to you? And it doesn't have to be necessarily tragic. It's just something that has. Some transformative moment. Yeah. Okay, what formed me into the man that I am today literally like the worst injury of my life happened when I was in high school. Oh, what happened? I had a dirt bike course. My brothers and I were big into dirt biking and I was on our home dirt bike course in school because we were homeschooled, right? So we'd get out of school at like 10 a.m. Just go barefoot and play in the dirt and roam the hills the rest of the day. And that's why homeschoolers are so smart, by the way. This is actually true, by the way. It's nothing to do with the pace of the classroom or independent education or anything. It's the fact that we get out of school early and go and go play. Yeah. Well, long story short, because it really did turn me into the man that I am today, I hit a rock, my front wheel hit a rock at about 45 miles an hour. I flew over the handlebars and I was all by myself. When I flew over the handlebars at that speed, the only thing that slowed me down was my crotch hitting the handlebars. So I got what they call a testicular contusion, meaning that my balls within a day were swollen to like the size of grapefruits. And I remember being really pissed because I couldn't play basketball. Cause I was like waddling like a cowboy for weeks and like they took me to the doctor and they didn't know if I was gonna be able to have babies until I actually had babies. And so it actually was a pretty, like for a boy, right? Like to basically have your junk just get mangled. They got crushed that hard? So were you on the ground just forever? Cause I was on the ground by myself for four hours on the field, yeah. So did it scare you away from the dirt? And one of the guys who was like gardening up in the hills found me. Wow. Yeah. Did it scare you away from riding again? Or did you do not, really? I didn't go near a dirt bike for like two years. Really? How old were you when this happened? My balls would quiver with fear. I was 14. I was 14. 14 years old. Wow, that's a horrible age to get hit in the nuts. I had to go into the guy that would be out of the- That's when they're really primed too. Oh yeah, I remember like the urologist, he was like, you know, he shines like the flashlight on your balls to look at the damage and you could like see all the- You ever do that before Adam? No. And it goes through the other side? It is kind of cool. Even if you're not in here, it's kind of fun. You shine your light, you take the flashlight, you put it up your ball and you shine through and you can actually like go in. You're the dark sometime and just like shine a flashlight at your balls. It's kind of cool. You can like see through them because they're kind of transparent. Do you hear that, do you hear that, hon? We'll try that later. He's like, we've been doing that this whole time. I don't know it was a medical technique. We'll try that later. That's a thing, that's a medical thing. Wow. You know what I think is cool is I think you, I was just telling Jessica, we were talking about this, how you used the body build. She was like, no, you didn't. I'm like, yeah, you did. You see the whole thing? Yeah, you. Yeah, it's pretty. I did. Going from there to this whole like to where you are now, what was, that's such a drastic switch or change, right? Going from bodybuilding to like you went to triathlons. Yeah. What made that switch so quick? I just like just trial sorts of new things. Really? Yeah, that's probably why I'll be like golfing in two years instead of doing an obstacle course. What are you into now? Our paddle boarding yoga. What's really getting you excited now? Oh wow, he was handsome. Yeah, there he is in there. Oh wow. Look at this picture. How old are you right there? How'd you find that? How old are you right there? Did you just Google? I'm 22, 22 years old. So I was about 210, 215. But you know what, I think in that show I was about 198 because I, I, Bro, that's a good weight though. I hit stage at 203 at USA. So we weren't that far off and your house told you six what? Six two. Six two? So like six, two and a half. We're like, When you train for hypertrophy you put on muscle pretty easily? Well, I've done the genetic testing to determine like your fast twitch, slow twitch, muscle fiber capacity. And that's a pretty good, they've done some interesting studies on that. How if you're built for power or you have higher fast twitch and you train for endurance, your results are not efficient at all. Oh really? In vice versa. So I read that the type one and type two can act like the other one though. They can. If your genetics determine that you'll respond better to a certain type of training you actually do respond better to that. So I'm like 90% power. So I respond really, really well to like full body, heavy lifts. And that's exactly what I don't do to prepare for endurance competition. You always train for the, for the slow twitch stuff, the endurance stuff. Right, exactly. But I'm better oriented for like power, fast twitch. But he, but it does mean that even in training for endurance I do better if I do do the short fast stuff. It's just, it's in many ways not conducive to it. So as soon as you start training that way you just find your body wants to build. Yeah. Oh wow. How much do you weigh right now? 175. Oh wow. Solid fence hopping muscle, babe. Yeah, that's a lot. I mean, once a week. Dude, that's 30 more pounds of beef on you right there. That's no joke. Well, I was sponsored by ABB Bodybuilding Shakes. Oh yeah, that's right. That's right. Those things are fucking horrible. And what was the other? It was ABB Redline was another one like for, for caffeine. Yeah, VPX, right? Yep. And then there was a bar. BSN or? Then there was a bar, it was like a bar or a cookie that like all the gyms had. Have a go to was. Oh, I know. The big ones out, the big one under Metro. Protein puck that tasted like chalk. Yeah. Horrible. Did you actually, were you for real sponsored by ABB or is it just because you took all their shakes? No, I was sponsored by them. For real? Yeah. They would actually send like crates and crates of the shakes to my house. Stuff was horrible. Blue Thunder, did you think that one? Tell me where you're at in like in your business career around this time. And what, what made you go this route? Like, did you, did you grow up? I was in college, dude. Okay. I was just, I was just studying exercise, physiology and buy it. And, and I, this was on a dare. Like somebody just dared me to do a bodybuilding show with them. So I started lifting more and I, I didn't drink alcohol and barely any carbohydrates for like six months. No shit. And that was how I lost the weight. Did you, did you? Okay. So you were. And ate just a crap ton of protein. High, high, high protein, low carb, low fat diet. What? How you must have felt great. Out of the cans with relish. You must have felt amazing. Slab of meat on the couch. Yeah, right. Exactly. Total sex symbol who couldn't get a boner. Yeah. Testosterone goes plummeting. Oh, dude. It's horrible. Yeah. The only other sport that could do that to you was the sport I did after that. I mean, man, triathlons. Yeah. So there are a few years. I feel like your balls take a lot of punishment. You smash them. That's true. Then you killed them with bodybuilding. Don't forget he shoves flashlights up them. Well, that was why he does that now though with the red light. That was the tragic part though. What was the other part of the question? Oh, what was it? What was something great that happened? Oh, yeah, yeah. That was fun. Wait, do you have to say the tragic part first? I can't even think of anything. It doesn't have to be tragic that we fuckin' back to our erase that. It has to be something transformative. I think that was perfect. It was great growing up as a rich spoiled kid who never got hurt, Sal, huh? Okay, so it was tragic and then something great. No, get rid of tragic. Transformative moments in your high school life. Stuff that happened when you were a high school kid. Transformative was also losing my balls or almost losing my balls. Okay, you guys are thinking backwards. Let me help you out here. Okay. Look at yourself as men today. The habits that you have, your fears, your insecurities, the things you love, you're passionate about, and ask yourself, what are some of the things when I was in high school that helped form that trait inside of me? Is that better for you guys? I got some. Okay, thank you. So when I was, I must've been maybe 13 years old and my grandfather from Sicily came to visit. And I think it was either the first or second time he'd been here. It was pretty cool to see him see big overpasses on freeways and stuff. And it's not that, you know, Sicily's backwards or anything like that. He just never went anywhere. He stayed in a small town. He was very poor. Did he talk like Geppetto? He didn't speak English at all, actually. I appreciate that. But anyway, so we took, my dad worked, you know, kind of construction work, right? And so my grandfather in the summer he came to visit. My dad had to go to work still. So my grandfather came along and my dad would take me as well to work with him. And my job was to do all the hard grunt labor. So like mix the cement, carry the buckets in, you know, wash everything or whatever. So my grandfather who at this point is in his, I don't know, maybe late sixties is mixing cement with me. And I'm watching this guy like, I mean, he's killing me. And I'm 14 years old at work out. I'm fit, I'm healthy. And we're mixing cement back and forth. And there's a water bottle, you know, next to us. But I won't stop to get the water because this old man isn't getting any water. And the whole time we're doing this, this guy is whistling the entire time, like whistling happy songs and having a great time. And I am absolutely dying. And when we went home that night, I just realized that, you know, some people can work really hard and we have a tremendous capacity for work. And it kind of changed my perspective of things. I had so much respect for him, but they also had a lot of respect for just the fact that you can do quite a bit more than you think. Because again, here's this old man that's just killing me in this hard labor. So that definitely molded me. I'm sure you know how weak you are. I have mixed the cement like this all day long. See, I'm not even tired. Exactly. Do you remember how old you were? I was probably like 14. Oh, so early freshman year. Yeah, I was young. Yeah. So while I was laying in a field with my- With your balls swollen. With my balls swollen. Me and my grandfather were riding in pain. You and your grandfather were building an amazing thing out of cement. Exactly. Ben, what was your first job? I feel like shit, dude. My first job would have been working in my dad's coffee shops. Because my dad decided, he was like a serial entrepreneur. So when I was a kid, he started off as a firefighter. You know, everything makes sense when you hear his stories. Everything makes sense. And then he started off his own ambulance transport service until the local government put him out of business because they don't want a competing ambulance business, competing with the city's ambulance service. So then he started a pager and communication service because he had all these pagers and stuff left over from the ambulance business. And so all of us kids and I, we all look like drug dealers. We go over with pager, but it was always just our mom, like pick up eggs on the way home from tennis practice or whatever. But we all had pagers. And then after the pager business, he started a bagel franchise. And then after the bagel franchise, he started ordering, he built an enormous coffee roastery at our house, which I don't know was legal or not, like in terms of like zoning, cause the whole neighborhood would be full of illegal coffee. Illegal coffee. But we lived a little bit outside of the city. So it was probably okay, but we would get these big like burlap bags from Guatemala and Costa Rica and Tanzania delivered to the house like every week. And he would just go out there and roast coffee. And then he started opening coffee shops and I got a job as a barista. So when I was 13, 14 years old, I was doing like 10 shots of espresso a day. No, you weren't. Yeah, totally. Really? Totally. Everything makes sense. I've drank coffee forever. Everything makes sense. Were his businesses successful or was he like successful enough to take care of the family, but was he ever, did anything ever really take off? No, nothing really ever took off. Eventually he moved to Vashon Island and became a monk. And then he quit doing that. Now he sells structured water filters to like farm and agriculture facilities. Do those work? He says the cows get bigger. Really? They drink the structured water. Interesting. Super interesting. He also put Snickers and Skittles in the structured water. So it's amazing. Those cows just flourish. She's all thick magic. They drink the chocolate water crazy. When you're in homeschool, what is it like for you, like as far as like hanging out with other kids? Now we grew up in, I know an era where going outside and playing with the neighbor's kid was probably more normal than it is today. I feel like kids don't do that very often. But did you go, was there other events that you met up with other homeschoolers and like did your family take you to certain things or did you go to camps every summer to engage? There's a whole community. There's a whole whole community of van driving homeschoolers and calico dresses, their foot having lots of children in the kitchen. No, we actually, we had pretty good socialization because I was in Idaho where you can play sports for the local schools. That's allowed. At least it was when I was homeschooled. So you could be homeschooled, so I still play sports for the school. So you played tennis for the high school, you played basketball for the high school. Oh wow, that's cool. So I had like some sporting outlets there and then we had like really good like homeschooling group where we would go out and do field trips, you know, like rock climbing and gymnastics and like theater and art competitions and you know, like all sorts of stuff. So I mean, I was still a geeky little homeschooler who played violin and chess and you know, made gingerbread houses and did watercolor paintings. Did you guys take a lot of like courses or was it all done by mom? So it was mostly curriculum because like when you're homeschooled, you can buy any type of curriculum. Like I homeschooled my kids for a few years before I decided I was traveling so much and my wife isn't really a teacher that it wasn't fair to them to use that model. But what my parents did was they had all these curriculums that they'd buy and then they'd basically just give them to us. And for me that worked really well because I've always just loved to read and be an independent learner. You're like, you're probably the perfect kid to homeschool. Oh, well, I was. You're just like here. I mean, you just kind of got screwed because like a lot of them, like they didn't really want to read the books or do the work. They needed like more hands on like tutoring and teaching. But yeah, a lot of it was really hands off. It was just like, yeah, read this, learn it and take the test. And I wound up getting, you know, fantastic, you know, SAT scores and... I was just gonna say in order to get into college then you have to take certain tests, right? Yeah, take the tests. I forget what they are. So obviously if you did your kids some years and probably would have if you weren't traveling so much, you're a huge fan of it, for sure. You can tell the way you talk about it. Anything you... Kind of, I mean, like what I'm a fan of is outsourcing the things that are best left to the experts, to the experts, and then doing a little bit of unschooling and homeschooling yourself. Meaning that like my kids go to a cool school now where they can learn like how to program Lego robots and they're learning Spanish and Chinese and learning how to play all these different African instruments, all these things that I never probably would go out of my way to teach them. Plus, they're learning how to play well with others, how to be a good team player, how to play well with others. Things I actually was really pretty shitty at when I got out of homeschooling. Like I had to learn all that stuff late in life. When did you recognize that? Because I was like an independent, you know, all I wanted to was lead. As soon as I got to college and when you get stuck, like you're in a team of five people to complete some task, right? And you realize like unless you're leading every single part of it, you're unhappy and you don't trust anybody to do any of the work except yourself and you wanna micromanage everything and I still have to deal with that. And you know, part of it might be personality but I think part of it is I just didn't really grow up cooperating with a team of peers around me. So I think it's good for a child to be put in that situation. I think it's good to have tutors or have a private school or have some type of a, some type of a school setting, right? And there's some people that are even doing like freaking like forest school. But then you have those things that you want to teach your kids when they get home from school. Like your job is to homeschool them, unschool them. I work with my kids on wilderness survival and foraging and shooting the bow and entrepreneurship and cooking and all the things that they're not learning at school. And they always have the option whether or not they actually wanna be homeschooled or go to school. And I would love like once they get up to fifth or sixth grade for them to just branch off and start doing their own thing. But that's up to them. I'm gonna tell you right now, when we came to your house and we had the first time we met, one of the things that everybody, as soon as we all walked out, like everybody was like, oh my God, he's like super dad, like his kids. And you could tell by your kids' mannerisms, the way they look at you, the way they respond to you, the relationship that you've built with them. And then you can just see how intelligent they are too. I mean, it was pretty cool to- Well I put the fear of God in them and hang them in the cages for a little while before the company comes over. It's not like that whatsoever. It's in fact, it's exactly what you're saying is all that time. It's crazy to think somebody like you is as much as you're flying and doing things and you've got, and I know you handle a lot of your business all by yourself. So I feel like to still make time as a father to do those things, that's a big fucking deal. There's not a lot of men that are as successful as you are that still are managing their home life that well. And that was something that we all noticed right away. Yeah, I think if you enjoy it, you enjoy doing those things with your kids then they just happen. But you know- All I remember is you said I had ugly hands. Yeah, big, they're big hands. I think that's the future of education. I think that's the future anyway is where you're gonna just have facilitators, people who are gonna facilitate the learning through different means, kind of like what he was talking about. People I think they get the, and I don't- Maybe dude, but maybe the future of education is VR and AI, right, like there's that possibility too, which I actually don't really like the idea of, but you learn just about everything through a virtual headset and through artificial intelligence that gave you progress along the way. And I like, I know this sounds alarmist, but just like having electrical pollution and Bluetooth and Wi-Fi next to your head all day long as you learn and interacting with the computer, like for your entire education, I would rather my kids be involved before school. As far as the dangers of the devices themselves are concerned, I think we'll figure that out. I think we'll definitely figure that part out. Now, the real question is, is the destination the goal or is the journey a big part of it? And what I mean by that is, someone can just give you answers to things and you'll learn something from that because you'll learn the answer, but then you learn a lot also from finding the answers, the journey that goes along. It's almost like when people talk about like reaching enlightenment and you've got monks talking about meditating for decades and then you've got other people saying, well, I just take psychedelics and I can see the same thing. And then they do brain imaging and they're like, oh, what is the same thing? They're a neurofeedbacker. Right, and I think that some parts of it are and I think a lot of parts of them aren't. There's a lot that comes from the process of learning, the trials and tribulations, the dedication, learning how to mold your life because you have this particular goal or whatever. So as far as learning is concerned, we can create shortcuts and we'll know things, but I don't know if that's necessarily the same thing, you know what I'm saying? Because there's a lot that I've learned in the pursuit of trying to learn or figure out the answer to something. Going to a library, I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've researched a subject, but I've read so many other things because of the kind of the web of knowledge that it leads you down. And I just, I think that we'll see what happens. I think really the, I mean, if you wanna go that, I mean, and even the idea that back when I wanted to learn something, I'd go to the library and go to that section of the library where all the books about that particular topic were and I would have to leaf through the books and look through books that happened to be beside that book and just delve very deeply into the topic versus being able to just like laser target something on Google. Yeah, Google or TED Talks or Wikipedia now is so great. Now granted, you can go down a rabbit hole on the internet just like you can go down a rabbit hole in a library, but yeah, just that process of having to hunt down the answer in a library. Here's the deal, like if I'm reading on the internet, like I'm in my room and I can boom click and I've got all this information and that's fantastic, there's nothing wrong with that. But the process of going to the library, the preparation that goes into this is a mental one. Like I'm driving there, I'm going to this place with all this knowledge, I'm here to learn, I'm in this space. It's the reason why churches exist. It's the reason why people go to places of worship and meditation. You can do that anywhere, but when you have that dedicated space, there's something that comes with that the journey to get there and I think that you have to value both. Like I said, I don't wanna demonize technology because I think it's fantastic, but I also think the journey is extremely important. You mean sitting in a dark basement watching porn is different than going to a coffee shop to talk to a pretty girl? Definitely, but they're both valuable. They both got value, they both got value to them. So, but yeah, I think it's like this, like they look at statistics with people who go to college versus people who don't and they say, if you go to college, you earn this much more money. And they say it's because, oh, it's because they went to college, but they don't factor out the part that people who tend to go to college also tend to be a little more serious about what they're doing. So part of the reason why they may be more successful is they're willing to go through the journey and not necessarily the degree itself because I know lots of entrepreneurs were very, very successful who didn't go to college, but pursued that also on their own. They just didn't have that structured thing or whatever. So that's kind of, you know, a little bit of the comparison I'm trying to make. But I mean, moving ahead, I think we're gonna learn quite a bit from the home school and it's a movement right now that's growing very rapidly. It is actually homeschooling, unschooling is another one where- It's a huge movement. Like it used to be very fringe, but now it's very, very big. And there's certain things that come from it that we can learn from. Like one of the things that I learned, which didn't even dawn on me until I had some clients who homeschooled their kid and you know, they kind of educated me, was how one of the things we do in schools is we put kids in the same classrooms that are all the same age. So like if you're six and you're in the same grade, if you're seven, you're in the same grade and so on. And that's actually not optimal for learning. It actually encourages bullying. It doesn't teach- Chronological snobbery. Yeah. Like really wanting to only interact with your peers, having difficulty, you know, for me, like I actually for a very long time got along quite well with adults. Yes. People who are a lot, I didn't actually do that well with my peers as well as I did with people who were a lot older. Because you were always around adults. Well, around adults a lot more than if I would have been in public school. That's right. So one thing we can learn from homeschooling there is to put classrooms and have kids of different ages. And again, there's a facilitator that's facilitating the education. So each child can learn at a different rate but what they find- A one room schoolhouse. I'm sorry? With a blackboard. Yeah, exactly. And a teacher up front with the switch where she hit you on the hand. Very motivating. In the corner with the dunce cap. But they find when they do this, Older kids become like protective of the younger kids and they kind of police the classroom. It makes total. It's really, it worked for Abraham Lincoln. So. Yeah, exactly. It makes total sense. You know, Ben, you talked about, you know, some of the drawbacks of being homeschooled and the working with others. When was the last time that you noticed that in your adult life that we're a relationship where you're like, fuck, looking back I probably didn't handle that the best because I have a hard time with that. Like, do you still see that surface? Oh, all the time. I mean, even right now I was telling Sal in the car, like I'm really working hard on building a little bit bigger brand right now. You know, like, you know, tomorrow we're launching an energy bar for my website. And I wanted to write all the copy, all the emails, all the, you know, and I did wind up doing a great deal of that because, and I paint myself into this corner where I'm just like having to work my ass off because I don't trust anybody else to do it. Or I'll see what somebody else will write. I'm like, nah, sorry, that's not my baby. That's not how I would have written it. And so I do really want to manage like everything myself. And it's hard for me being able to build a team and scale my business, still wanting to just do a lot of that myself. And even honestly, you know, something that I've had to work on a lot is just company culture, right? Like, I'm so happy just doing things by myself. Sometimes I forget that, you know, I need to actually talk and get to know the social media manager and the COO and the person who's doing tech and the IT person. Like I need to actually, you know, interact with these people, you know, on a daily basis when I'm just so used to just being introvert. Well, I can imagine that you probably assume just instinctually that they'll just do that. Like they're just gonna do work, you know what I mean? Like, okay, you manage my social media, you sit over there and just do it. Cause that's what I would do. That's probably what happens to you. And I'm like straight, like if you guys have ever done anyogram personality type? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, great, great. I mean, anybody listening is like, it's like 11, 12 bucks. You could take this personality-tapping test. It's called a naogram. Yeah, a naogram. Super accurate. You learn a ton about yourself and how you tick and how you interact with others. You can send the results to other people. I can't remember what type I was. How to interact with you. Well, I am like the most extreme end of self-driven achiever that you can get to. Like the most extreme end. Like I will just take something and want to do it all myself and need nobody to ever talk to me to follow up and see if I'm actually doing it. Super self-motivated. And so I just, you know, I fall into that trap sometimes of assuming that everybody's like- Everybody's like a self-driven person who just wakes up wanting to conquer the world every morning, which is how I wake up. I hate to break it to you, dude. Most people don't like that. It's weird. It's also, it can be pretty limiting though, right? Because like you're saying, it's tough to... You're limited by your own physical ability. Like my wife and I, we were talking about this at dinner too. Like we're like Ian and Yang, right? Like she doesn't take supplements and she doesn't have like a workout regimen and she doesn't care about, you know, any of the bio hacks or, you know, she's never even listened to one of my podcasts. That's so great. But I see her, you know, she'll, like at five o'clock she'll be out in the porch for two hours sipping a glass of wine, sitting on the hammock, watching the trees. And I'm like, that is a foreign concept to me. Like I would be out there for five minutes and I'd be like, well, what you wanna do? I'm gonna do, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go check this. I gotta go, okay, I got a project downstairs. I'll see you like, I finished my wine, bye. And I'm like, that's just real. So when you, how do you meditate then? Very carefully. No, even meditation is difficult. Like the kind of meditation that draws me, Kundalini or moving meditation or even like candle meditation where I'm just watching something flicker and glow just closing my, like I did TM. TM was really hard for me. Where you're just there with you and your mantra and your eyes closed and you're not focusing on your breath. For hours. You've got the mantra, but that's about it. And that kind of sort of distracts you. But yeah, it's tough. Gosh, man. That's, we're all very similar when it comes to that though. Yeah. Well, it's different. Do you think, is this what drives you to do all the biohacking? Because you're limited by, because I mean, you do do a lot. I've actually, only one of the person I've met who I would kind of, Craig is like that. Craig does a lot of shit on his own too, right? Yeah. Super, super hard working. Yeah. But you're limited. You're limited by your physical ability. You can't possibly do everything you wanna do. You turn over a lot of employees. Have you do go through a lot? No, I don't go through a lot of employees at all actually. And it's because I'm a people pleaser. Like I just, I like- You don't fire up? No, I don't. I figure out a way. I've probably ever fired, I think one person. Oh, wow. Yeah, in 10 years. So what if they suck really, they had to suck really bad for your part of them? Right, no, I have this process where I just gradually make them realize over the course of time that they suck so bad that they should probably quit. God, that's so inefficient. You messed up again. Just fire them. You messed up again, please. Yeah, what was your question? The original question. Is that what drives you all the biohacking? No, here's what drives the biohacking. And you guys are gonna realize this as fitness podcasters. You talk about this. We already know what you're gonna say. Justin and I just talked about this because eventually you're like, you run out of shit. Eventually you're like, I talked about barbells three years ago and I talked about how to do a kettlebell swing. And I talked about, the values of a complete amino acid profile. And then you get to the point where, well, gosh, what else is there to cover in fitness? And then you're like, maybe I'll talk about your circadian rhythm. And then they're like, oh, I talked about the circadian rhythm. And by the way, there are special glasses that you can wear and they're called blue light blocking glasses. And then you're like, oh, I just went down that rabbit hole and you've got that biohack. And then somebody's like, oh, I heard your podcast on blue light blocking glasses. And I have this brand new 10,000 lux special light producing earbud. I wanna send you to check out. And they send that to you and you're like, wow, this is cool, this work. Maybe I'll mention this on my podcast. So you do that. And then there's some other persons like, oh, hey, I have some new form of coffee that I've infused with whatever. I wanna send this to you to try it because I see now that you talk about some interesting things and then you get that and you're talking all of a sudden about like smart drugs and nutrients. Next thing you know, you've got lights in your ears. You've got weird glasses. This is the next thing you know, you're doing coffee animals in Thailand. So yeah. This is exactly what Justin and I talked about the other day. You know what? I bet you Ben was not like that when he first started. I bet he was talked about a lot of the same things we do. But at one point you just, you keep reaching. If you watch the evolution of the stuff that we were talking about just two years ago and now it's- Oh yeah. You see- But you also evolve as a host. And I did a Q and A. Like I've done Q and A for 10 years. You structure your podcast based on the questions that people are asking. And the way that we always do it is I will tell the person who now goes in and picks the like questions that will answer on the show and stuff like that. I tell them, try not to choose questions that cover things that we've already talked about on previous shows. Instead, just tell that person, hey, go listen to podcasts- So now they like it. That's why you're Z. Tell us about the best town you're worked out. And the questions just get more and more fringe every year. But it's kind of cool because it keeps me educating myself too. When I get a question, I don't know the answer to it. And I have to figure out what the answer is. I mean, you actually, you get a very targeted education that's precise to what your audience wants to know about. Have you ever shared this with your audience what you're sharing right now? Because I think- Oh yeah. Because I think that's really cool because I think probably not enough because you could call up people like, oh, I listened to your podcast eight years ago and you were talking about muscle fiber types, but I tuned in today and you were discussing dick-shocking. I'm no longer going to listen to your show. It's gotten really weird. And, you know, so yeah, I mean, it's something that I think more people should realize is like, you know, with podcasting, every time you record one, it's out there forever. And there's this thing called Google and you could Google, like, you know, my name or your guy's name and whatever topic that you want to know about and see if someone's actually covered it before. How many total episodes have you recorded? Has you been on air for like nine years? Oh, over a thousand easily. You've been on for nine years, right? If you've applied- 10 years. Yeah. Which is, that's like ancient in podcast world. You're probably one of the first ones. How did people access it back then? Just website? No, the covered wagon. Okay. And one of those little Styrofoam cups with the wire coming out the side of it. Smoked signals. No, it was like, I had to like write the RSS feed and submit that to iTunes. And it was a pain, it would break all the time. And it was like, it was not a smooth process. What were you doing for work at that time? I was a personal trainer. Okay, so you were a personal, in a gym privately, what were you doing? Oh, I owned all my own gyms for seven years. That's all I did out of college was I ran gyms and personal training studios. And the way that I ran them was I bought the nicest equipment. So I had indirect calorimetry equipment, high-speed video cameras, platelet-rich plasma machines. Like I was the complete geek of fitness. And I partnered up with local physicians. They would send me their patients because they knew that I was the guy to send people to when they wanted good treatment that nobody else was able to get. And they wanted results that these people weren't getting from other personal trainers. And I did that. Like that was, that was my stick, right? How the hell did you afford that out of college? I bought it. I understood the value of investing. And when I came out of college, I didn't have a lot of debt because I worked five jobs in college. So I had a lot of money saved up. And, you know, I remember I paid Med Graphics $14,000 when I first started a gym just to buy the indirect calorimetry equipment. What? And then I set up all the high-speed video cameras. So I had all this stuff. But what I did was I partnered with docs. Dude, you wait, so you just stop right there. You gotta tell me what's going through your head at that age to have the foresight to see to even invest in something like that. Were you 18, 19 years old or 20 years old? I wanted to be the best of the best. At that moment. So you never went out through college? You never went out and partied or any of that stuff in college? Oh yeah, I totally did. But all through college, I was a personal trainer. I had a lot of jobs. I was very, very driven, you know, because I was also homeschooled. So I didn't know it was normal, right? So I did party, but I also studied my ass off, took a ton of credits, worked a lot and held down a job as a personal trainer all through college as well. So when I graduated college and started working at a gym and then eventually branched off after about a year and started all my own gyms and studios, I had a different mindset. I had money. I wanted to invest it in what I was doing. And I really had this, you know, I did a podcast with Neil Strauss on my show about how the way I grew up was like the Greenfields had to be like the best of the best. Like that was like the way that I was raised was we had to get like the best test scores. And we had to, you know, like everything, like spelling had to be perfect and reading had to be perfect. Just everything was- Now how are you measuring that as a homeschooler? Is it, do you, when you're buying- Well some of it's standardized. You just kick in your little sister's ass and ask who you really beaten up on. And part of it is literally just like mom with a red pen. I mean, like that's part of it as well. Like my parents expect a lot out of us. And so- Now it worked on you. Did it work on your siblings too? Did they also- Not so much. No, I think part of it for me was just my personality type. Yeah. Cause I could see that method being very effective for some people. Right. And but also be very ineffective for a lot of people. Yeah, it didn't work that well on myself. Like my sister worked pretty well on, but then, you know, I've got another sister and two brothers that I don't think that approach- Wow. So you leave college, you've got money saved up because you work five jobs. You buy all this equipment and you start these gyms where doctors refer you patients. So you do a lot of rehab. I was primarily working with patients and I was working with athletes, right? Cause I was racing as an Ironman triathlete at the time. So everyone in the triathlon community knew me. And triathletes, frankly, have a high disposable income. I mean, like the average income of a triathlete is like $171,000 or something like that. It's an expensive sport. It's crazy, yeah. Spandex is expensive. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. Well, oh yeah, their bikes are super expensive. The training requires a lot of training. I didn't know that was, it was that much of a- It's high. Yeah, wow. The divorce rate is really high too. Anyways though, so it was primarily triathletes and other like professional endurance athletes for the most part, like, you know, 40 to 60 year old demographic disposable income, loves to exercise, wants the best of the best. And then also all the patients that physicians are referring to me. And a couple of physicians in the community nominated me for the NSCA as America's top personal trainer, like their national personal trainer of the year award. When I won that, that's when I started doing more speaking, more traveling, more riding, more freelancing. And I gradually got out of the gym scene and started doing more what I do now, which is basically- Were you nervous on your first like public big speech? No, like I was in theater all through homeschooling, all through high school. I competed on the college speech and debate team. So I was on stage all the time for that. So no- So it wasn't a big deal at all? No, it was, and you guys know personal training. You're hanging out with people and talking all the time. Right, so, yeah. Well, so then anything that you see from the homeschool that you've already said, like working with others, anything else that you have a fear of that's a challenge that you are always having to work on? Yeah, what do you suck at? I know, we just talk about everything you fucking at good at. What is homeschooling make you suck at? No, no, what do you suck at? Well, yeah, you personally- He's all nothing, he's, I suck at sucking. Yeah, honestly, a big part of it still is that, like doing a really good job making friends, right? Not being a complete lone wolf. Do you have a best friend? Not really, no. Well, me, besides me, we became best friends. I'm very introverted, I have a ton of acquaintances. I don't have like a best friend that I just, call up on the phone, bro, and chat with. Like probably, I know this sounds lame, but like my best friend right now is my wife. Oh, that's nice. That's not lame, that's cool. Should be that. But well, you should have a second best friend. Yeah, exactly. So, like things like that, you know, and part of that too is I just spend so much time traveling and speaking and, you know, being with a whole bunch of acquaintances, but never being like settled down enough at home to have like that best friend on the home friend who I hang out with. Yeah, so because of that, do you catch yourself like in like conversations or potential relationship moments like that you get nervous or feel different or you don't act completely yourself? Do you feel that ever? Oh yeah, yeah. And usually it's one-on-one situations with other, usually like other guys, peers, like people like just because growing up, that was one of the situations I wasn't in a lot. Give me a stupid thing you've done then. I know you've done something that you've embarrassed yourself and you were like, fuck, Ben, why would I say something stupid like that? No, no, don't bullshit me. No, no, really. I mean, we already stroked you off for a half hour. I want to hear some. Not so much as just like, just awkwardness. Like really having a hard time having like one-on-one, heart-to-heart conversations. Like I don't do well like, even when I'm like at masterminds and stuff like that where they send you off one-on-one day, pour out your heart and your feelings with other guys. That kind of like, I just, yeah, that's something I've never really been that great at. So that's, I think, and I think part of that is homeschooling. Part of it is I'm an extreme introvert as well. So I recharge by being by myself. I'm very good at like, there's a book called Power of Introverts by Susan Cain and it's a really good book, but it goes into how introverts are really good at like one-to-many. Like being on stage, speaking, doing things like that, but like one-on-one or in very small groups at like cocktail parties, stuff like that, they're not so great at. And I think that- It's that engagement back and forth. That about being homeschooled, about being like a self-driven like high achiever type I think kind of makes me suck at making friends, like close friends one-on-one. Did that make interviewing at all challenging then? Because that's kind of like that, right? Like when you first started, was that, did you notice that was a major hurdle where you would have to have this dialogue back and forth? Or were you very formulaic when you first started? Like you had these questions you were gonna ask, like, what was that? Do you mean me interviewing people or- Yeah, you interviewing people. Oh, you mean for podcasts? Yeah. No, that was never that hard for me to just sit back and ask questions. Because a lot of my podcasts are based on books, right? I read voraciously. I read three to five books a week and I'm constantly underlining and highlighting and then contacting those people and getting them on the show. So for me, it's super easy. I'm literally just like talking to that author. I might not even know what they look like, right? Sometimes it's the Skype conversation. It's just like this imaginary conversation almost with the person who I have a bunch of underlines and highlights in front of me for. You know, at the same time though, like one-on-one face-to-face interviews, those can sometimes be a little awkward for me. I mean, it's still something I'm working on. That's what I was wondering. I actually peed my pants twice so far just sitting there talking to you guys. It's just a share though. I heard it was the funny share. Totally normal. So do you notice, because I know that you have the, was it the brotherhood, which is a bunch of entrepreneurs, businessmen that, you know... I'm not supposed to talk about that. Oh, is it? Oh, it's a group that we're not supposed to... It's a secret. Well, we'll call it the secret group. Ah, yes, thanks. Mark that down for edit, Doug. Secret group. Is there, do you feel like that's helped or do you feel like those guys? You've gotten closer and tied too. Because you've been doing that for a while now, right? Totally. How long? Like five years. Okay, so five years. Yeah, and that's true. Like being part of like a mastermind, a group of like-minded guys, that helps a lot. But I guess like for me, when you say friend, like sometimes I think of like being at home in Spokane, Washington, who's that guy I'm gonna call up to like play for Izby or go paddle boarding with or just like come hang out. And that's like the thing that I haven't really built still. It's hard too when we're all grown ass men and we're in our lives now. So I have two childhood best friends, Justin and Jared, that we go all the way back to elementary school. And to me- You mean Justin from Mindpop? No, no, it's different Justin. And then I have just a ton of like acquaintances and then some good friends. And there's definitely a difference between all three of them. There's a difference between my acquaintances, there's a difference between my good friends like that I've made as an adult. And then there's a difference between like my childhood friends and my childhood friends that the neatest thing about those friends or making those types of relationships is literally we can sit in a room and actually not speak to each other. And it'd be comfortable and normal where then if I'm with like good friends we kind of need to be doing something but we were easy going and whatever you wanna do, I'm down to do and we have good conversation, we laugh, we joke. And then you have your acquaintances which I know all of us have quite a few. You know, when we're in the business that we are we meet people all the time and lots of times are like-minded people that we like hanging out with. So there's definitely different levels to- There are, but I'll tell you what, I mean those childhood friends that you develop they get very close, they know you for a very long time, they know things you've done and ways you've thought which is great, but there's also a downside to that. Of course. As you grow as an individual sometimes it's very difficult to be who you are now with someone who's known you when you were something else or when you were a certain way because everybody, like I said, everybody grows and changes. And so it can also make it very difficult which is why I think you'll find yourself having different friends along the way. Like there's definitely people I've grown up with that. I mean if I'm gonna cry those are the people that are gonna see me cry. But at the same time I'm a growth-minded individual and I change all the time and I'm always talking about something different. I'm always obsessed or passionate about a new subject. And sometimes it's very difficult to do that with some of those old friends because they're like, oh, you know, there you go again or whatever. That's like, so and you do, you can as an adult and it took me a long time to figure this out. And I felt like that kind of slowed me up a bit because at one point I kind of went a different direction. But so we're all still very close and like family and see each other when we have a great time when we do. But there are different types of friends and levels and they're all important, I think healthy. But it is tough as a grown man at our age to meet another man and get like become best friends. It's like most of them have married, kids, wife. They're not even making enough time for their wives and kids and they got work 60, 70 hours a week. And it's like- I mean, I don't know what the statistic was that I read but it was something along the lines of even in an era of Facebook and social media and extreme connectedness, loneliness is one of the major leading causes of depression even in our hyper connected era. And it's possibly because of that, like we all have very fast moving lives. We're all extremely connected virtually but how often are we just like, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. Well, it's because- Sitting on a fishing boat next to some guy and I don't know, is that how friends work? Well, I think we sell fishing boats. I don't know. He's new at this. Please do it. You wanna go fish on my fishing boat? Let's go throw a Frisbee. So my theory on that is we're hyper connected. We can share ideas and information better than ever but the way you really form bonds has to do with sharing emotion and experience. And you'll find this with like men who go to war with other men, for example, the bond that they create with each other is, I mean, it's like nothing else. Or if you've been on a sports team and you guys played very hard and you've won hard battles together and you've lost together, that'll form incredible bonds. Or just traumatic experiences or amazing experiences. Those are the things that create those bonds and because we're so fast paced and we don't necessarily sit there and experience things as much, that could be probably what I would say that's causing it. But I think we should probably all go to prison or join sports teams more. Let's all kill someone together. But I think, it's harder for men, right? Because society makes it easier for women to show and connect through emotion and it makes it very difficult for men. It's hard to sit here and talk to another guy, you're just mad, even though you guys are cool and you're kind of like, oh, we can be great fans. You're not gonna share like super emotional, deep things with them because we're brought up to believe that that's just not, you just don't do that as a guy. So it becomes more difficult. I tell you about my balls. For exactly. It'd be interesting, we do have a studio audience of females, we're sitting right now. Yeah, yeah. I think they're all not listening anymore. They're all on their phones, playing Candy Crush. Exactly. What about your wife then? Does she have a lot of friends? She actually does. Yeah. Yeah, but she's, you know, again, we're yin and yang, she's extremely extroverted. And you know, like when I go home, I'm content to sit at home in my underwear and do absolutely nothing but hang out with my kids and like, you know, work a little bit and chill. You know, do some workouts, play the guitar and you know, but she wants to go out. Does that make you a shitty double-dater? Little bit. Yeah. Little bit. But yeah, she's got a lot of friends. Yeah. Yeah. When was the last time you were on a double date? I don't know. I honestly don't even know. Oh dude, you are shitty. Yeah, bring her out next time, man. We're all going out together. Yeah, I'll have to bring her down. Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. Do you find, cause I think you're a phenomenal father. I've seen you before. Actually, we were on a triple date the other night. Did you? We were at a, like a health event in Carmel. Like sometimes I'll fly her into different events. Oh, there you go. So it was a triple day. It was me, other podcasters. Chris Kelly and his wife, they were in the Norrish Balance Thrive podcast and then Dave Asprey and his wife. So it was a triple date. Oh, no shit either. Very, very geeky table. I didn't know you hung out with Dave before. I knew you knew him. I didn't know you guys actually hung out like that. Is that the first time or you hung out with him before? No, we get around to a lot of the same events. So. I don't know shit. Yeah, he had like the biggest booth at the Paleo FX. I have blue light, blocking glass, jealousy though. Why? Cause they're always cooler than mine. Is he wearing them all the time? No, they're just cooler. They're always more cutting edge. You're not supposed to wear them during the day, by the way. Ben taught me that. Yeah, I remember when we brought it up at Paleo FX. That's pretty funny. People walking around like ski goggle size, blue light, blocking glasses at middle of the day. New. I granted the lights were bright. And those type of lights are not good for you, right? I mean, those old fluorescent lights, right? Easy for you to say. That's the word on. Actually, they do cause a lot of glare. They flicker and our eyes, you know, it's, you know, like I mentioned at dinner, like the human body has not evolved to a certain extent to deal with a lot of modern assailants, you know, such as like, you know, modern lighting, for example. So, yeah. Ben, what are you finding like super cool right now? Like what are you learning about at this moment? Hmm, what am I learning about? That's an interesting question. Probably one thing I've been, when you ask that question, the first thing that comes to mind is what books have I been reading? And the two that I've just finished, the two that I read flying over from Bulgaria cause I didn't realize they confiscate your laptop when you fly to Turkey. There's like 12 countries you can't fly into the U.S. and have your laptop on the plane because apparently you can hide a bomb inside a laptop. So they take the laptop, so usually I'll write on a plane. But what I did on this last plane right a couple of days ago is I just read instead. The two books were one on the Russian practice of Sistema, which is a form of. Oh, martial art. Yeah, martial art, it's really fascinating. Very simple, but just a series of sit-ups, levers, push-ups, and squats while doing certain breathing patterns such as in through the nose, like for two push-ups. For the first push-up, you just go in through your nose, hold for a count out through the mouth. And then the next push-up, you do that again on one breath and then you proceed up to being able to do seven on one breath and then back down the ladder from seven down to one. Then you repeat with a specific version of a squat, like a wall-facing squat, and then a lever, and then there's a bunch of tumbling movements. It's really interesting. I wanna actually find a gym up in Spokane that does Sistema. Now what do you find interesting about it, just cause is it different or is it because it's combined in breath with activity? I like breath work and body weight training. I love the idea. It's like the Wim Hof fire breathing where you'll breathe up, you'll retain a bunch of CO2, or you'll blow off a bunch of CO2, and then you'll do a set of 30 push-ups with your breath held. And honestly, my infatuation with it is I just love the way that the body feels. I like some of the evidence that you get in terms of blood flow. But how does it feel? Explain how it feels. You get a rush. You get this nitric oxide rush. It's like a head rush. So walk me through that real quick. I wanna try that. So what do you do? It's like the Wim Hof style breathing would be, for example, you would breathe really fast, sharp, deep inhales, and then short, shallow exhales through the nose for like 60 seconds. So it'd be like breathing from the belly. And yoga'd be called like fire breathing or yogi breathing. Then at the very end, you exhale all your air. And when you've done that, you've blown off a lot of CO2, and then you breathe everything in, you hold for a deep breath, and then you just crank out as many body weight exercises as you can. Or you get into a cold shower, you know, jump into cold water because you get this nitric oxide release as you blow off all that CO2. So it's just hyper-oxygenating you? Is that what it's doing? Exactly. Very interesting. And it's also dangerous. I mean, you know, CO2, for example. It's also dangerous. Yeah, CO2 is like your body's signal to breathe, right? And some people will do this, and then they'll go like do hypoxic underwater swimming and get shallow water blackout because they don't have carbon dioxide, the body's signal to breathe in high enough amounts to remind them to breathe when they're underwater. Can they die? But you can hold your breath longer, right? Like a lot of freedivers will do this as a breath hold tactic, but you also increase your chances of dying. So it's, you know, it's risky to do in certain situations. You don't do the push-ups underwater, then? I don't do my push-ups underwater, no. So Systema Breathing was one, or Systema, and that book was called Let Every Breath. And I've just been doing that in my hotel room and just a little bit of body weight training the past couple of days, experimenting with it. A little bit of the back of the airplane. And then the other one was a book about basically how the body is a battery. There's a really good book called The Body Electric by Robert Becker about the electrochemical potential, you know, across the cell membranes and how different things can affect that. Everything from, you know, exposure to negative ions from the water, from forest, or you know, exposure to household appliances, you know, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, stuff like that. But this book is called, it was something like Healing Is Voltage, I think is the name of it. And all, it's like 600 pages that goes into how different frequencies affect the human body. It's really interesting. Wow, so that's pretty fascinating. You're probably, you're gonna interview some of these authors? Mm-hmm. Yeah, like that's my MO, like honestly, you guys know this, that's a cool part about being a podcaster. If that's the way that you wanna go, like more of an educational podcast is you read just extremely fucking cool books and then you contact these folks and you interview them. I mean- Do you turn your Wi-Fi off at home at night? I don't have Wi-Fi. You don't, oh, that's right. It's all hardwired. Everything's hardwired. Yeah, see we- It always feels like you can't access the internet without plugging your computer in with a metal-shielded, like physical ethernet cable. Yeah, see when we interviewed Mercola, he'd like scared the shit of us talking about this. Oh yeah, okay, like when you call him on his phone, he answers with his selfie stick to make sure the phone's far enough away from his body. Because legit, he's saying it's a cancer risk. And he actually is like, I sound like I'm making fun of him, but he's extremely smart. Like he talks with like nuclear physicists and stuff about this shit. And like he has like all sorts of different instruments that he uses to test his electronic equipment. And he wouldn't be doing this if there wasn't a biological impact of that stuff on the human body. It's just most of us are too afraid of how silly it looks to be talking on our phone using his selfie stick, whereas he doesn't give a shit, just because he's, yeah, he's that- Because he's Mercola. Yeah, he's like, I'm fucking Mercola. Yeah, the number one fitness visited website for like the last 15 million visits a day on my website. Yeah, exactly. Because I'm the fucking man. He has to be one of your favorite guys to have talked to. I mean, he was such a treat. He talks to him every week. Oh yeah, we talk every week. Oh, do you really? Oh, no shit. Oh yeah, so he definitely, him and who else were we talking about? I could see you really hit, oh, and Paul Check, yeah. Those two guys, I feel like- Oh, Check will blow your mind. Those two guys you'll really, really enjoy. Different too, the two of them. They're not anything like each other, but they're both brilliant minds. I bet Paul Check deadlifts more than Dr. Mercola. Yeah, I think so too. I think Paul Check might even deadlift more than me. But Dr. Mercola's got a longer selfie stick. God, we're living like in a ticking time bomb with all this wifi and internet and stuff with kids with cell phones up to their face. There's always the concept of formesis. You can keep your fingers crossed. Yeah, let's hope we make it okay. Just radiate yourselves into a longer life. Excellent. Yeah, it is tricky. I mean, I'm pretty careful with it. Well, my friend, it's been a pleasure again. It's always a pleasure. We always have fun with you, brother. And by the way, we are friends now. You are one of my best friends now. I just brought you, you're in my fab five on my phone now. Can we go fishing? Yeah, we'll go get it, we'll get in the boat. Let's go fishing. Well, he's sleeping over tonight. Next time you come over, we'll go get in the boat. We're having a sleepover. And tomorrow morning, we're gonna work out together. Who's the big spoon tonight? Me, duh, duh. I'm actually sleeping in Sal's meditation room. That's true. There's good mojo in there too. Good feng shui going on. Very good mojo. It's my meditation slash sex room. They were concerned I'd need a bed, but I told them I hunt. Pretty cool with that. Yeah, I have a meditation mat in there. And I'm like, oh, you know, I don't really have a bed. And he's like, I sleep on rocks. Is that like a yoga mat? No. Which you got a little more beef to it. It's like a Japanese floor bed. You ever seen them? You can roll them out. I slept on that thing for like four months. What are they called, Doug? Futon. It's like a- A futon? I thought you were gonna say something. Not a futon, it's a futon. Sorry, Doug. I'm gonna go basically pass out and slobber on Sal's meditation futon all night. And we'll work out tomorrow morning. Work out. Thanks again, my friend. All right, listen. 30 days of coaching for free, mind pump media. Oh, wait a second. Well, we're gonna do a podcast with B right now on a day like this. We have to plug his bars right now, dude. His bars? Yes, dude. Are your bars gonna be available? He just released his bars. They're available as of today. Right? So tell people where are they at to tell them everything right now. Tell them their affiliate code. Tell them what's up. What's up? We don't even have an affiliate code. You gotta make it right now. Yeah, well, we could probably get you guys some kind of a discount if I get it set up before this podcast comes out. It will have a couple of days. Yeah, you got a couple days. So we could say and remind me about this, Doug. We'll set up, I would say about a 15% discount would be appropriate. Exclusive for my pump fans. It actually would be exclusive. I want 1% higher than anybody else has. The code will be mind pump. We're best friends now. You don't even have a best friend until, five minutes ago, you didn't have a best friend. You have a best friend now. As your first best friend call, I'm calling on you. Best friend, shut the fuck up and let me finish talking. So the code is... You see, you're not gonna do this. This is not how we work this relationship. Mind pump, here's the deal. I spent like two years taste testing and designing this thing and also testing it. Like I took it to like 38 degrees below zero racing back in Vermont. I put it in my sauna for five hours. I took it on bike rides in Hawaii. It is coconut flakes, cacao nibs, coconut oil, a little bit of organic honey, white chia seeds, Spanish almonds, sea salt, cacao butter. It's about 50 to 60% fat, 25, 30% protein, about 20-ish percent carbohydrate. It's kind of like a low work, not like a greasy ketogenic barb, like a low carb, higher fat barb. No, not paleo-esque. Like I looked at a lot of like the paleo, you mean like the glazed donut paleo bars. I saw your video on that. Yeah, they had beaver butthole on it. Yeah, it doesn't have any of like the egg white protein and all the excess, I think a lot of bars have excess protein. This one's got a little bit of collagen in it. It's got the equivalent of like a cup of bones broth worth of collagen in it and super clean. And yeah, and it tastes amazing. It has, I learned a new word designing it. The organoleptic profile is really good, meaning it's like, it tastes really hedonistic, but it's actually really good. So it hits all, what you did is you designed it to hit all of the hedonistic signaling in your mouth. That would be guilt-free, but also extremely addictive because I hear that's a good business move. Excellent. So what's the code again, mind pump? Let's go mind pump. We'll get that set up to get people a 15% discount. The box is coming a box of 12 bars. And where do they buy it on your site? For $268. And what's your site? You can get it, you know what should work is bengreenfieldfitness.com slash naturebite should get people there or just look up Ben Greenfield naturebite and you should be able to find it. And if you can't, then I'm gonna go fire some people. Excellent. Thank you, Ben. Love you, brother. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Superbundle includes Maths Anabolic, Maths Performance, and Maths Aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on iTunes and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support and until next time, this is Mind Pump.