 Hey guys, what's going on? It's Andy Elliott. Today I'm here with my man Shauna. This is crazy. This dude has one lung What's even crazier? See they say you need two. You don't need two You just need one and this dude has climbed every mountain almost in the world Mount Everest whole bunch of other ones What's he's gonna tell us about but anytime that you guys think that you know life is Is limited it's really limitless and a lot of you you have so much more inside of you You have more than you need and I think once I once you got to where you had one lung You went really did some stuff. You didn't do when you had two lungs. Am I right? Absolutely So this is an opportunity for you guys that are ready to push to a new level to get inspired and understand how this man did Check it out. I just want to stay that stay mad shit by my shoulder because they treat me like an outcast I ain't gonna take that stay back. I'll be swinging on till it you want to talk about one percenter How about a one of a kind one at eight billion? Sean Swarner is here with us He is the only person to have done two different things Survived two different types of cancer one of them incredibly rare and the second to climb the seven highest peaks on seven different continents do a Iron man in hawaii and go to the north and south pole Yes, except I didn't climb the seven highest peaks on all seven continents just the highest peak on each continent Okay, it does sound like the seven seven seven seven. Yeah, but no the highest mountain on every continent the seven summits And then if you include the north and south poles, that's called the explorers grand slam or the adventure grand slam I think it sounds like a denny's breakfast platter, but I didn't name it but then you add in the hawaii iron man championship and there's one person in history who's ever done it Amazing take me to the top of Everest because this was your first challenge So you are diagnosed with cancer twice when you're a teenager you're told you're gonna die Twice as a teenager Including the second one with the rare type 14 days like I can't even imagine that So from that point you're on the top of Everest What is it like being up there? What did that sense of accomplishment feel like? You know, I I think i'm more amazed at the fact that you did your research Such a short amount of time and you have all this stuff down. I'm impressed with that That's amazing Ever I mean Everest you you really can't Put it into words you know, it's it's Pretend you're in a plane And the captain comes over the announcement system and says, you know, we've reached our cruising altitude of 29,000 feet You look out the window and up 35 more feet You know, that's the height of Everest Everest is at an altitude where jumbo jets level off and fly Mm-hmm, and I was up there with one lung But the biggest thing that it meant to me was the entire time I was climbing I was on the mountain for about a month and a half when I reached the summit I pulled out a flag that had names of people touched by cancer It was always next to my my heart In my chest pocket as a constant reminder of why I was going for that that goal And when I pulled that flag out wrapped it around the top of the world It wasn't just me being the first cancer survivor up there It was everybody who's ever been touched by cancer in the world at the same time Sharing that success together. So did that keep you going that? Why that purpose because 29,000 feet you mentioned you have one lung So it's hard enough to do with two lungs let alone half the lung capacity when the air gets really thin When you said you're there for a month and a half and you spent 20 minutes on the summit So how is that time equate because you there's a great quote that I saw that you said I have to find it here the outcome is worth the trouble. Did you think that in your 20 minutes at the top? you know What went through my mind when I got up there I I fell to my hands and knees I wept like a baby Because I I climbed Throughout the entire night We woke up at say 10 p.m. Summated at 9 32 in the morning the next day So we're climbing throughout the night headlamps on and there's so many other climbers up there as well It's like a string of white Christmas lights. I mean it's beautiful and When I got up there again, it It made me realize that Reaching the summit reaching the end goal You learn more about yourself In the journey up there because we talked earlier. I was on the summit for 20 minutes It took me a month and a half to reach the top So I I had to learn and force myself to appreciate The journey even though it was miserable. Sometimes we were at 20 21,000 feet camp two Two days two nights. I was in my tent holding up the frame my tent with hurricane force winds Now That's not exactly exactly enjoyable But it makes the struggle worth the destination And to do it with the other cancer survivors and people that have been touched by cancer in mind So while you're sitting there holding the tent up, right because now is this the third time you face death? Because if you count the cancers, you count this this Mount Everest, you know hanging on like, uh It's a hurricane up here and 21,000 feet up Yeah, I mean, we're not going to talk about the car accidents. I've been, you know, yeah So maybe the fourth or fifth time that yeah Hey guys, what's going on? It's Andy a lot of you leave comments Tell me that you need help do me a favor. I'm gonna tell you the best way to get a hold of me Shoot me a text message right now 918 210 254 918 210 254 I'll help you with whatever you need. I got your back for life. Let's get back to the video Yeah Enough enough times that I've had a brush with death Where, you know, we've played Scrabble. I know the grim reaper very very closely, but I'm also pretty close to the big guy upstairs There was one story you told in your book being unstoppable that I got a chance to read a clip of Where at one point when you were going through cancer, you had 108 degree fever And you had this out-of-body experience What did that mean to you as you became an adult as you became a cancer survivor And as you start climbing Everest did did all that come into play to to showcase the strength that you have I think you can get strength From any source that means A lot to you, you know, it can be spiritual. It can be religious. It could be nature. It could be Whatever for me It definitely was going back to that experience 108 degrees. I remember Literally floating out of my body turning around and seeing my body laying in bed And then all of a sudden I I felt this this hard push in my back And all of a sudden I opened my eyes, you know laying back in bed and I've always had a different look Different perspective on religion and God and stuff like that And we're not going to get too deep into that that hole But I've always found that as a source of power and energy to continue pushing me forward because I was on a flight not too long ago. I was discussing religion with somebody and I was like, well, have you fulfilled your life's purpose? He sat there for a while and I was like, are you still alive? He's like, yeah, I was like, well, then you haven't fulfilled it So I feel that same way about myself where I haven't fulfilled my life's purpose I think when when your time's up your time's up, you know, I always read my last rites with the Second cancer. I remember a man in the cloth ashes ashes dust the dust the whole thing and they wanted to put me in hospice I look at my mom and my dad and like, you know, the hell are they doing? I'm not dead yet But I've used that to push myself further and further and further because I don't want to say I'm not afraid of dying. I am I don't want to no one wants to but When your time's up your time's up. Mm-hmm so month and a half on Everest after you Visit with the grim reaper you somehow get to this point where You're climbing Mount Everest for a month and a half. What about leading up to the month and a half? The preparation that you had to go through how did you Sean Let me back it up even further because Where did the idea to climb Mount Everest come from? So you're surviving cancer, you know, you have one lung And you're like, yeah, I think about climbing Mount Everest. That's a good idea. Yeah Actually, I remember my mom and my dad when we were leaving um Just near near florida I was driving out to colorado to train because there are no mountains in florida This was 320 degree or 320 elevation or something Well, the highest point in florida is the top of the four seasons hotel in miami Right. So I'm sure the owner wouldn't appreciate me going up and down the stairwell So I remember hugging my dad And my Honda Civic was packed up, you know, everything I owned at that point fit in a Honda Civic So I drove out and I remember him hugging me and he whispers in my ear We didn't get you through two cancers to go kill yourself on a hunk of rock and ice But my parents have always been there to support me They're always honest with me telling me, hey, what you're doing is just absolutely ludicrous However, we support you. Mm-hmm So it's it's been it's been interesting. Um When I was in florida, like I said, I realized I I had something else that was pulling me to do something bigger And I did some research and found no cancer survivor had climbed out ever before I was like if a survivor's gonna do it Why not me and why not do it for the right reasons? Not for selfish reasons but to give back and give other people hope because there's so many people out there who They need to see something's possible And then believe they can do it where I'm a huge believer in the mind-body connection vivid visualization I see it in my mind's eye first and then I know I can do it Power visual visualization. Absolutely. And you did this when you were a kid as well When you got back in the swimming pool after the first cancer from not mistaken So you learned that at 13 14 years old And the power of visual visualization. I don't know why I can't say that Is What helped you? Progress So you take this skill that you start developing at 13 How often did you practice visualization and how did it come into play as you packed up your civic and and drove from florida to colorado You know, it's it's it's interesting because Do you know who kavelin hobs are like the the the comic book? Or not comic book the comic Bill waterson was the the the the writer And he had How many different Characters in his head right one of them was spaceman spiff Right, so when I was 13 the visualization started then I remember laying in the hospital bed Getting my treatment and I remember being like in a microscopic spaceship In the chemo drip bag and dripping into that clear plastic tube and I remember Visualizing and seeing my body laying in the hospital bed the hospital door over here the television Up here the window out to a courtyard and either my mom or my dad sitting next to me in one of those lazy boy chairs And I also remember Seeing myself going into my body through the ivy And all these little microscopic spaceships were collected in the heart that was a grand central station, right? And then I could I would literally visualize the the valves of my heart beating And I remember then it was my turn to go So I was shot out of the heart and I was going left right left right, you know going through the these veins Following on the dashboard like, you know turn here go there go straight whatever the directions And I would sneak up on a cancer cell in my mind And I would shoot it with and keep in mind i'm 13 years old There's a little out there But I would sneak up on this this cancer cell and I would shoot lasers and missiles and bombs and everything But they'd be laden with chemotherapy. So I would essentially be destroying the cancer from inside out Going through that the chemo. It's not easy. You gained a lot of weight. You lost your hair 6070 pounds every now which is usually the opposite of of what we hear like people that are undergoing cancer They get real thin They put me on prednisone, which is a steroid So I didn't gain the weight because of the treatment I gained the weight because of the the steroid they put me on prednisone Which has made me balloon up 60 70 pounds and you're an athlete prior to that So you you face this challenge. You're putting your body through Really what turns out to be an amazing feat like anybody goes through cancer and chemo What your body goes through and especially if you you survive it Did it show you what your body's capable of and what your mind is capable? It showed me what my mind was capable of Because it's amazing how mental being physical is And when you're trying to do something this gives up way before the body does It's just we don't we haven't as human beings, you know, you look at back to caveman society You know, we've slowly lost because we now have technology to do things for us We've slowly lost this resilience And I think a lot of people who go through something traumatic it builds that resilience in them So you use your mind to push your body because we hear at the ellian army fitness division We go fitness mental business Because they're so interrelated the physical and the mental Because there are moments when you're pushing yourself where your mind's like no no no But you're like no, I'm gonna keep going Yeah, and you mentioned that when you got back in the pool the race that you won After your first cancer. Yeah 50 meter breaststroke You you were talking about the conversation you were having in your head and being unstoppable And it's really compelling because Mastering that inner voice that you have is one of the hardest things To do because that to me is the key To as you put here conquering your Everest Who do you talk to Throughout the day more than anyone else Yourself the internal dialogue most people are like, oh my wife, you know, my mom my dad my my co-workers. What it's yourself And then how often is that talk negative? 80 percent of the time Like would you want to be friends with someone who is that negative to you? Like why do you do it to yourself? But the the problem is we've been doing that for how many years all the all the seemingly mundane decisions that you've ever made Or i've ever made my entire life brought me to where i am now right here exactly this moment Most of those people most people don't pay attention to how they talk to themselves from the moment their eyes open They probably think Ah man, what do I have to do today? And it starts off with God you know another day i'm like oh god another day You know completely different, but if you don't pay attention to that internal dialogue it'll either beat you down or build you up So where did you learn that because it's always the how My first personal development conference i went to i left and i was like Oh, this is going to be easy. I've figured it out But they don't tell you oh no you got to do the work every day You got to have these daily habits daily practices In order to make big leaps and the big leaks always come when you least expect it And you've been kind of grinding away for 30 days 60 days or years or whatever And then you finally have this break and you're like oh, that's why I did the work every day So take me back to going back to from florida to colorado you have this goal this mission This purpose to climb Everest to be the first cancer survivor to do it all with one lung And you're going to train How does that The internal conversation push you to help you physically train to be able to handle whatever it's going to give to you Knowing everything that i've already been through Will be more more difficult than anything that i'm about to go through And also knowing that look looking at how I got through the cancers It was a little bit of chemo a little bit of chemo a little bit of chemo Obviously eating healthy exercising everything else But knowing that consistency was more important than intensity Pushing myself a little bit today a little bit tomorrow a little bit the next day and more today than I did yesterday more tomorrow than I did today And it was the same thing with with training for Everest When I moved to colorado I moved to a place called estus park beautiful place And in my backyard was literally rocky mountain national park and the biggest mountain there was longspeak 18 miles round trip 14 256 feet And I slowly worked my way up to carrying Once a week 100 pounds of rocks in my backpack to the summit back But it wasn't just hey, it's it's like when you go to evers you don't show up at base camp and all of a sudden You know you make it to the top ready to go it's slowly Moving but knowing that again what that destination meant to me and why I was doing it All those little pieces add up. Yes, the the the negative thoughts are there But you have to realize the thought One two three negative thoughts don't determine who you are as a person. It doesn't define who you are It's a temporary state not facts. Yeah, exactly. Mm-hmm. I coach clients To better to speak better publicly Because a lot of what we see when it comes to that is people get on stage and they get nervous But that's when the prep kicks in so if you've prepped enough You can manage the nerves or the negative thoughts or if you just don't care at all Yeah, or just like whatever i'm just gonna wing it But you know you knew so i'm gonna i'm guessing so you get to evers And you've done all your prep and you've done your daily task and you've managed your mind You're carrying the 100 pounds of rocks up a 14 000 foot peak Did you get to evers feeling confident? Or did you look at it and go shit 29 000 feet. Yeah, that's probably what I did I mean when you get to base camp it's 17 600 feet. The mountain's 29 000 feet man You get there and you're like this is a big mountain It's huge. Yeah, but at the same time What am I going to do today? You know, that's a long distant goal What am I going to do today to help me get there and it takes a month and a half? Exactly. So you know go all right. I'm going to do this in a month and a half Did you have like a strategy of okay day one? I'm gonna try to get to here or is it just I know I got this time allocated I'm gonna do whatever it takes and I have a plan and a strategy, but you know like battle plans They go great until the first bullet is fired Got to base camp and The the crazy thing about when you get there So the locals believe the mountain is a goddess Right they call it chumulungma or sagamaratha, which means mother goddess of the universe And you can't climb up the mountain Until you have a llama which would kind of be the equivalent of a bishop in Catholicism So you have a llama who does a ceremony to ask permission from the mountain to go And I had done all my research I got my body shape got my mind in shape and when we got to base camp That was the first time I ever heard of that so I leaned over to my other my sherpa friend and I was like, you know What if the what if the mountain says no, right? Rejected. Yeah, it's like no Sean. Sorry denied You wanted to be the first not today, but tough luck And he goes well it happens all the time But what happens after that is you get a new llama You have a new ceremony and you pay that llama more money And we're talking like an extra five or ten bucks, right? So after that happened after we got permission from the mountain Then we had a schedule in place. Hey guys, what's going on? It's Andy A lot of you leave comments. Tell me that you need help Do me a favor. I'm gonna tell you the best way to get a hold of me. Shoot me a text message right now 918-210-0254 918-210-0254 I'll help you with whatever you need. I got your back for life. Let's get back to the video We went from base camp to camp one We would go up with a full backpack come back down with an empty backpack Shuttling things up the mountain, right? Always coming down with an empty backpack taking more stuff up So it did two things it would help us establish different camps up the mountain, but it would also Help our bodies acclimatize. So going into altitude there's less oxygen. So Because of that the body adapts by developing and growing more hemoglobin and red blood cells It's phenomenal how the body can adapt So we knew that we would do this and then we come back down and then we would rest It could be a day two days three days. It's It's very similar to when my body was going through The treatments for for the cancers, you know, I couldn't go back into the hospital day after day after day after day because the medicine would kill me If I continued up higher and higher and higher in the altitude it would kill me So we would come back and rest it could be a day two days three days However, our bodies adapted then we would go up a little bit higher and then come back down So that was a schedule until we were at camp three. We're like, okay Let's come back down put some weight on eat rest get our bodies hydrated and then go for the summer So you have to be adaptable. Absolutely. Yeah, you can't be a type a personality and be like, I'm going to control the weather It doesn't work that way Unfortunately, no, some of us do like oh, come on. I just want some sunshine today But you have also, you know, you're talking about going in the high altitudes You know knowing that your capacity to to take in air is not The same as to say mine with two functional lungs that I haven't even rune with smoking So you what kind of challenge did you know in your head like, all right, I'm going to have to do this knowing that I have what some might call limitations, but as Andy said in the intro That's not really how you approach life. You don't approach life as and I'm limited because I have one lung I'm still going to go do this at Everest it goes back to What I learned with with the chemotherapy, you know going through the treatments People often say when you ask them, hey, how you doing? I'm having a bad day, right? In my mind I'm like I'm having a less than ideal day You know, I never put things in a neg I try to never put things in such a negative light You know, I try to spin a positive version of whatever's happening to me Where did the idea to keep going after Everest come from because you get to Everest? How old are you when you when you reach the summit 27? So you're 27 years old? It's like three years ago. Yeah I mean simple and then three years you've done crazy things since then you've been non-stop So where did the idea to go and you know what I did this one? There are six more continents with highest peaks on each of those continents. Let's go do those I think A few months after coming back from Everest, I forgot about all the shitty things that happened how horrible and miserable it really was And I remembered all the good stuff. I was like, let's do it again There there are two types of fun. I think there's like type a Where you're on a roller coaster like, whoa, this is great. This is fantastic And then type two in the moment you're thinking man, this sucks. This is miserable But then you get home. You're like, hey, that's kind of fun So I think I afterwards I I forgot all the the bad stuff all the how frigidly cold I was You know, I couldn't feel from my knees to my toes going up for the summit push Couldn't breathe All the bad stuff that happened I forgot about But then I also heard of this thing called the seven summits seven peaks seven continents and because I had a flag of The head names of people touched by cancer on Everest I'm like, well, why don't we continue that and literally wrap the world in hope And you kept adding names so new names that were added to each flag, right? Different flags so different flags and different names So what it did Everest how did Everest prepare you to do the other ones? Because obviously you think of Everest you think that's the hardest thing Oh, the rest were downhill This is not nearly as bad so but still you still have to travel you still have to stay in shape You have to keep your mind sharp Walk us through that because I think that that Sean is one of the most difficult parts is you achieve a goal And oftentimes like what do I do now? Right And you got to keep challenging yourself and keep pushing yourself and if you start at Everest You have to figure it. Okay. I was able to do that Now what else can I accomplish because I I think that oftentimes going back to that the personal development space is They tell you about the end and you've been named one of the most eight inspirational humans on the planet Which is pretty awesome. Yeah, my mom voted on that. Well, that's good. She knows she's just like give me the website I'll just click it a hundred times. I got this But how do you compel people that you work with? That the end goal is there But it's the things that you do in between that gets you there that really matter because that's that grind that I don't think most people are prepared for and I don't think most people want to do What is what is the ultimate end goal for every human being? We all have an end. Mm-hmm. Who's in a rush to get there? Not me Shouldn't we all slow down and enjoy what we have. Mm-hmm, and I don't know anybody who's in a hurry Minus some other people who really don't value life as much as we do, but I don't know anyone who's in a hurry To get to the grave Which is a good thing because absolutely I've as I got an older I hit 45 this year Then I started to think of time differently over the last few years because if I'm lucky I've lived half a life already. Yeah, if I get to 90 that's exceeding the average. That's pretty good So maybe I have 30 35. Maybe I have 45 summers left What I want to do with those summers what I want to do with those years left And I find that Sean slowing down And taking things in and just enjoying even challenges that pop up and I say I get frustrated I'm like, why is this happening? And I'm like, why wait, wait? Why don't you just enjoy this chill out? It's not going to be easy But you're alive. Yeah, and you know having faced death how many times total you think I'm more than a cat That's lives I imagine it gives you an appreciation for living to go back to your point and you wake up every day Oh, god, it's going to be the best day ever How did you get to that point to be able to convince yourself to believe when you wake up? You're like, I am going to kick this day's ass Let's go back to the second cancer When I was given 14 days to live Night after night after night after night I was terrified to close my eyes because I didn't know if they were going to open the next morning Now let's say that goes on for a year Every single day your eyes open You're like, this is the best day ever I got another one. Yeah So even now I go in once a year for checkup because no one's ever had Hodgkins in askin sarcoma before I get my blood work done You know sometimes a cat scan maybe just cbc plate. Let's blood count stuff like that Um And it always comes back good. I see does another year to live Day by day month by month year by year You know and and one of the things that really helped me put that in perspective on if you want to grab a sheet of paper Draw a horizontal line across it a vertical line here vertical line here Write down the four digit year you were born Add roughly 80 to that And put that number there figure out where you are on that line And now you have a visual representation of your life You're like, what have I done in the past? Nothing you can do about that. Mm-hmm. How can you change the past? How can you adjust to make the most of your future? And this great advice for someone that might be 23 that's watching you Someone that's 45 like me or someone at 65 Because it's about the time you have left That matters. So how do you coach people? that maybe are middle aged And aren't Happy with where they're at. How do you say? Okay, draw that line Now focus on where the dot is now versus that 80 or you're gonna be How do you get them to change habits beliefs? So that they can like you understand what's possible I'm glad you asked that question Because we will talk about this later. It's it's called the big hill challenge It is a three-week mental wellness challenge. It starts off with a root assessment because you need to know where you are before you need to know before you know where you're gonna go and There are a lot of core value Assess assessments out there. You know, I've seen stacks of cards where you pick out your top five whatever That's great. Now, you know what they are. That's where it usually stops I couldn't find what I was looking for. So I created it myself. I took out 60 of the top Core values that I could find that I thought would help other people And what I do is I have people pick out the top 10 And then they write them down and this is where it gets really cool in eye opening on the next page You rate how you're actually living that personal core value And now you have a visual representation of the top 10 things that mean the most to you And if you're honest with yourself, you can see where you're lacking where you're where you're succeeding And where you want to put your energy and attention to build yourself stronger day by day And that's a great point because like for most of my life, I I've been diagnosed with depression twice. I battled that demon for Until I was you know in my late 30s I just couldn't shake it because I didn't have the skills or the tools or the techniques But what really changed is when I was finally honest with myself Because I use that as an excuse. Of course you made that decision. You're depressed, of course You don't believe you're good enough and when I finally decided that I still made those decisions And hurt the people I love the most That was when I finally had that wake-up call that. Oh, okay I can do something about this. So you say on your book Sean conquering your Everest for me That was mine my mental Everest was overcoming that but it came down to being honest with myself Fully completely and just taking ownership of that and saying It doesn't matter what you did because you already did it and as you just pointed out you can't undo it It's about where you're going to go now and how you're going to learn from that So you don't do it again And maybe you can teach others as well, which is which is what you're doing So let's let's just talk about a couple of these words here. So communication is one that stood out to me That for myself and others because that's that most important thing we talked about so when you're climbing mountains or carrying a 150 pound sled on the north and south pole which you dragged I saw a video of you dragging a jeep also you had a rope around your waist you're like out there training It was in neutral Yes, but you're still dragging a jeep man. Come on So let's go through your mind and which one of these values relates to to pushing yourself In that capacity which most people don't like, you know, I'm going to carry this sled So I got to go run down the street with a jeep on my back That's that's a great question. I don't see crazy on here as a value Well, there you go. You can add that one For the next printing of the big hill challenge. I would honestly say personal growth. Mm You know one of the things that my parents taught me when I was uh, and I think it's in the book We talked about swimming the 25 meter breaststroke eventually a 50 meter breaststroke But when I first started swimming I would swim across and I would touch the wall Mom or dad will pull me out of the water and they would ask me one of two questions Did you have fun? And did you do your best not? Hey, why didn't you beat jimmy? Why didn't you beat scott? It was did you do your best? And if I could answer those two questions, did I have fun? Did I do my best? Absolutely? Okay, great be happy about it But going back to personal growth the next weekend when I was swimming the 25 meter breaststroke I would do everything I could to beat my time from last weekend So I never had to be the best. I had to be my best Competing with yourself exactly. So also in that same video There's probably you probably saw you saw me dragging tires I started off with two tires and then three tires, you know, and then four tires going up Everest You start here. You slowly go up building yourself up to it and people who want to go from here to here It doesn't work. It's like a house of cards. It's going to collapse on you And especially if you're trying to do something crazy like I'm gonna go see where Santa Claus lives at the north pole Or you might die. Well, and that's you keep doing these things where The the face of death is really there like you're in temperatures 80 below 80 below zero So what does that feel like when you're 80 below zero and you're like I got my skis on I'm carrying the sled behind me What's going through your head there? What personal growth are you doing? Not much your brain starts freezing at that point. I think it turns into a slushy You know, honestly, it's I mean this in the best possible way 90 degree north Looks very similar to 89 degree north Right a hundred some miles away, right? It all looks the same You know, it's boring Mount nearing is boring. There's there's a reason why they have, you know, climbing. That's my excuse. Yeah I don't want to do it because it takes so long. There's nothing sexy about mountaineering People say, oh, you know climbing Kilomba jar was sexy, you know, it's it's Romantic not sexy romantic, right? There's nothing romantic about spending a month and a half in a tent not showering You know, I I hugged my mom when when I was coming off of Denali, which was The last of the seven summits. ESPN was there there doing a thing And I remember hugging my mom and she goes I could smell you before I saw you There comes Sean. I'm not gonna ask that b. Oh anywhere. No, it's my baby. Yeah, but What goes through my mind literally for the north pole about three miles out I was counting my steps and I kind of went inside and it was almost meditative You know meditating on it. So for Everest, I had a mantra You know, when I wake up in the morning, I told you today's the best day ever I had a mantra going up Everest with every step I told myself the higher I go the stronger I get the higher I go the stronger I get And again in my mind, this is going to sound crazy when I say it out loud And maybe I shouldn't but I'm picturing this this conveyor belt In my body in my in the marrow of my body making red blood cells and hemoglobin Like it's going down, you know, it crunches crunches up the cell wall and it injects things in the middle So my body's adapting here But what goes through it so many things can go through your mind It's like, hey, don't fall over there because you're gonna die Another Yeah Death face Hi, I'm Sean. I like death at least to stare at it and wave at it. I pretend So how do you You use that In your everyday life and physical fitness obviously is incredibly important because you can't do any of these tasks Without it. So obviously at the elate army fitness division. That's what we believe is that When you take care of your body, your body will take care of you and you've proven that Numerous times whether it be the iron man the north pole the south pole the seven summits Your daily life you're going on a hundred mile bike ride just for fun You know well like it's no big deal. I wouldn't define it as fun. But yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. You're definitely crazy. No, so you Talk to me about that and how that the physical fitness aspect of it and how your daily approach to that is really what pays off that allows you Despite what some would see as limits again going back to to one long But that physical fitness helps you carry through so how important is it So if i'm trying to become a one percenter or a one in eight billion like you twice How much physical fitness how much should I pay attention to my physical fitness? For me it depends on what i'm training for So for example, if I am training for kilomajar take a group up there every year as a fundraiser I've been up kilomajar now 24 times And I know how to train for it. I'm not going to hop in the pool and swim laps until my arms fall off If you're training for the new york city marathon, you're not going to go Hop on a stationary bike and ride into your legs fall off You're going to train specifically for what you're trying to do At the end goal. So mountaineering i'm going to go hike up some mountains, which is why I left florida to move to colorado But i'm not always that Laser focused. I mean i'll sit down on saturday afternoon watch college football and all of a sudden a bag of potato chips disappear I don't know how it happens. They're just gone. It's like poof disappear But for the most part Again, I I eat I try to eat healthy wake up to yoga every day have a 30 minute yoga thing My wife and I wake up and we do together If i'm training for something then yes, i'm focused if i'm not training for something I kind of Gained some weight. Let's put it that way natural right that happens all but that's interesting because one of the posts you have on instagram is Really like a five-step process to be able to complete a task One is set goals that motivate you So talk to me about that How do you motivate yourself to keep going after all that you've accomplished? Again knowing it's it's not about the destination. You know, it's enjoying the process. I love working out I love the endorphins that kick in I love how I feel when i'm working out even if I feel miserable I know i'm doing something good, but going back to Kilimanjaro I I know I can make it you know this this july with my 25th trip up the mountain and It's no longer about The challenge it's about sharing that with other people. So it's very similar for me. It's very similar to Say christmas, you know, I don't need anything. I don't I don't want any gifts. I i'm fine. You know, I appreciate it You know, thank you so much. It's it's amazing But I love seeing my nephews and my nieces eyes light up when they open a present You know giving them something it's awesome. I love it It's very similar to taking someone up Kilimanjaro where they step out of the hotel They look up and they see the glacier on top of the peak and we're 200 miles south of the equator And they're like are those clouds? Right and I call that their oh shit moment So they go from real. Yeah it's like oh shit and I enjoy guiding them from their oh shit moment and seeing that transition that they go through to the summit where everybody's in tears You know the water works the emotions just come out of every pore and I can see in an instant someone's life changes That's the joy I get out of doing what I do And that's why I train not for me because somebody asked me say, uh, you know, hey, I'm going up Kilimanjaro with you What do I need to do to train? I'm keeping an eye on what you're doing is no way I can do that Yeah, it's like well you're training for you. I'm training for me and you and you and you and you So what I get out of it is helping other people, you know Even let's just hypothetically say you get to the top of Everest by yourself or whatever peak by yourself Whatever goal you want to accomplish by yourself. Yay self high five If you have a team Helping you out You're pulling each other up. You're grabbing each other up. You're pushing people up there. You do it together I have never made it to any significant peak by myself the cancer the the mountains anything that's important to note because we Have a support system Need a support system And I was just listening Arnold Schwarzenegger's got a new book out called be useful and he's talking about one point People describing him as a self-made man. He goes Well, yeah, maybe but along the way I've had helped this person helped me hear the fact that I moved to America was big I couldn't do what I did in any other country So it's having that recognition that As accomplished as you are as accomplished as I am Yeah, this person gave me a break here and hired me when they I wasn't nobody 25 year old or you know, this person Reached out to me after I was fired and said, yeah, well, we'll work something out here So you had that second life and sometimes I think our ego gets in the way. It's like I'm great. I'm like, no, no, no. Yeah, maybe maybe so But these other people were there too. Yeah, so when when you're thinking about Showing cancer survivors. What is possible? Is that tying into A goal that motivates you so if you're saying look look what's happened to me And I'm just going to go test myself To show other people That they can do the same thing. It doesn't have to be the same climb. I'm not Everest, but whatever your Everest is So going back. What was the what was the question in there? Yeah, it's about using Yourself as a cancer survivor to show others what's possible So when you are in those moments where you're like, oh my god, why am I doing this? Do you think about that? To keep you going that next step to get you out of that rut absolutely When I do visit hospitals and I talk to the survivors or or the patients I'm getting some some inspiration from them because they're literally tooth and nail fighting for their lives And when I'm climbing the mountain or I'm going to the north pole south pole, whatever I can always pick up the satellite phone. You know, I have travel and rescue insurance I can say hey, I'm done. You know, I'm not feeling what the mountains been there for Eons, you know, it'll be the next year Someone who's fighting for their life. They can't pick up the cell phone and say, yeah, you know, I'm not feeling it today They don't have that option So I hope that by me climbing They're getting some inspiration from that because I'm sure getting some some inspiration from them So maybe there's a circle of hope and the circle of inspiration with this this reciprocity of of Encouraging each other What is that Meant to you to be able to encourage someone else To keep fighting something as awful as cancer or to keep climbing something as awful as Everest It's it's meant That's a great question It's meant that I've been giving people hope I think because the human I've Been thinking this for a long time the human body can live for roughly 30 days without food The human roughly the human condition can sustain itself for about three days without water But no human alive can live for more than 30 seconds without hope So if I'm giving hope to somebody else, it's it's all worth it How do we take that hope and apply it to our lives no matter where we're at because I imagine for you Sean you have a structure you have an approach to your day, which you mentioned You have an approach to your physical Your mental to be able to accomplish those things And that's what I find in studying successful people and people that do crazy things like you the one in eight billion that are able to accomplish these great things they have A system of living I guess I'd call it That they go back to day after day after day after day that allows those big breakthroughs Every three weeks Personal core values every three weeks every three it's it's it's in here every three weeks And also what is amazing is how many people when they wake up in the morning Grab their phone. They turn on the news. They get inundated with this negativity. Mm-hmm when they go to bed They're on their phone. They get inundated with this negativity again You know bookend your day It start off With your your brain is like a computer If you don't program it the way you want it to be programmed it'll be programmed for you by external factors external forces So if you're not careful that negativity will inundate your brain and it's your thoughts are Very akin to a glass of water. Let's say dirty water represents negative thoughts clean water represents positive thoughts Let's say you have a glass of dirty water. You hold it underneath a spigot and you constantly flush in clean water What's going to happen? positive thoughts right clean clean glass of water so You start your day with an affirmation that goes back to one of your personal core values So now you're starting your day off with an intention of doing something to support what matters most to you And then at the end of the day what I always do is if even if I don't write it down My wife and I will share them with each other Write down as opposed to being negative. Oh my god. I have to do this tomorrow I have to do that tomorrow if you went to bed with an attitude of gratitude You would sleep through the night like a baby and I don't mean like waking up every hour crying So write down five things you're grateful for right you know that happened that day So, you know, you're already grateful for your health your your family stuff like that That's a given but write down five things that happened specifically that day And then journal about one of them I'm most grateful for blank because blank and that connecting word because helps it link it Helps you link it back to your personal core values So now you're going to bed with an attitude of gratitude You're thankful for everything you have as opposed to looking at all the things you don't have wishing you could be different You're going to bed with knowing what you have attitude of gratitude And you're waking up in the morning with an intention and an affirmation to start your day The book ended right? Absolutely. Like you said, so how do I sign up for the big hill challenge? We're we're gonna go to get more information on that. That's easy. What's it called the big hill challenge dot com Big hill challenge dot com. So it's a great way to start because again oftentimes this is not where we're taught in school We're not taught about core values or how our minds work and how are I like to say our minds play tricks on us It's always trying to talk you into doing bad stuff or believe in that you're not good enough for whatever So that brings up another question. I my personal Theory on that is you have like your fear brain and your ego brain and they always compete Especially if you start to get some success and your ego is trying to talk you know, I'm the man And then your fear voice is like You ain't good enough. So you have this this competition Facing all the things that you have Sean, how do you manage fear? How do you manage your fear voice? How do you manage that fear feeling? That's interesting because I I call it the gremlin Feed it after midnight. You never know what happens. It's a great example. I don't want to get them wet either The gremlin's over here chirping. Hey, you know, you're not smart enough. You're not strong enough You're not whatever. You don't have the education. You know, they're gonna laugh at you whatever it might be You're gonna fail miserably I think that in my past That voice was there from my mom my dad whoever it might be a parental figure Saying hey, be careful and it comes from a loving place. Mm-hmm. They're trying to protect you But now that you're older, you still have that gremlin chirping in your ear Don't do that. You're not smart enough. You're not strong enough So what I did was and again this goes back to the vivid visualization and picturing things Again, this is gonna sound crazy. I named my gremlin He's cooper Sounds so nice, right? That's my friend cooper. So cooper And whenever cooper rears his ugly head, I'm like, dude, stop So I go back and I pay attention to the internal dialogue. I'm like cooper cut it out, man Like look, we both want what's best for me. Let's work together to make it happen You know, I know in this I don't do this all the time But once you realize that gremlin whatever you want to call him Was there to protect you at some point because he loved you or she loved you, whoever Yeah, he was your parent They still do. Mm-hmm and they still want the best for you. Why are you holding me back from getting it? Can you use that energy to help motivate you? I'll use tim grover as an example michael jord and kobe bryance coach He talks about using the darkness and how he really worked with kobe was You know kobe obviously got in some trouble when he was younger Well, this is take that energy and use it towards becoming a better basketball player Can you use cooper and say all right koop? We're gonna work together like you said and i'm gonna use that energy that comes into my body To fuel me to take that next step. Absolutely When you get anxious when they and I mean like the You um When the human body gets anxious What happens physiologically? You start breathing through your upper chest you start Shallow breaths your hands start to sweat your temperature rises. You might have some ringing in your ears. Your ears get red Your pulse rate starts to go up your beats per minute now. What happens physiologically when you get excited Your respiratory rate goes up your pulse goes up your hands start to it's the exact same thing physiologically So if I feel that and it's happening to me and I'm going for a summoner. I'm scared about something I'm like again paying attention to the internal dialogue. I'm like look Take a deep breath I'm not anxious. I'm not scared. I'm excited And I will flip the script on it I love that because That's going back to that internal communication that dialogue that drives all of our decisions and our beliefs So that's what I want to ask you about too is is your beliefs? So the cancer seemed to almost Shred limited beliefs for you because all right. I survived it once I survived it second and in this book being unstoppable You you talk a little bit about the internal dialogue that started like why am I going through this cancer? And then the second time what god, why are you doing this to me? How did you start to turn that around? To be able to apply it in this way in that this tim grover coby bryant into this Sean way You know I I think I sat there for such a long time Why me why me why me? You know and then why again why again my god like what didn't I learn the first time that you're sending me through this again? And then I realized there's nothing I can do about the fact that I had cancer That was a fact nothing I could do about that. I couldn't do anything about the situation I couldn't change it nothing that was out of my control What was in my control was how I reacted to it? And I told myself look there's nothing I can do about it Except to change and control how I react because you can control You have a choice in every situation you're in To choose how you want to react So you can have the flight or fight you can do whatever you want to but you can always choose in every situation You have a choice in how you want to react And I decided that I wanted to choose one that Was more positive more of an outlook of of growth more of an outlook of living You know, I mean for crown out lot. I was 13 the first time 15 16 17 18 19 years Like I wanted to live all I wanted to do at that time was be normal They I was probably the only kid who wanted who wanted to be in school at that time You know, so all I wanted to do was be normal and I wanted to just flip it around and do To focus on what I could do as opposed to focusing on what I couldn't do So flipping that script and realizing hey, this is exactly I'm going kind of going off subject here, but I wanted to That's good But I think that what you're getting at is in order to become, you know, a one percenter These are the exercises you have to do and you you mentioned basically you can't do it like every other day It has to be every day. Exactly right. So one of the things I work on is communication So I work on that every day every interaction that I have I'm like, did I say it the right way? Could I have said it a little bit more clearly even if I'm interacting with someone at a store like a clerk or a cashier I'm always trying to think of what's a funky question. I can ask them to see what they'll go with me And you know, you find that you can build rapport with people quickly if you do things like that But it's that constant practice and I think if you commit to that and you even mentioned that in your goals is You know be consistent in your fourth way that you put that is that commitment to doing this because that is You know, you you notice a big difference when you don't even notice that you're like, oh, oh, I did change Oh, I did make progress And I think that that to me always seems like that big gap like when you give your your keynote speeches you spell out You know all these accomplishments how to do it. It's just okay. You got to commit to doing it every day And there's no real shortcut to that. There's no way around that So how do you coach people to go through that to be able to maintain the practice? Again, it goes back to your personal core values. Why are you doing it? If you have a deeper seated reason for doing what you're doing, you're gonna Not feel like you have to do something you do it because you want to do something So if you have that underlying meaning and the reason behind it, you're gonna have a deeper purpose So what's next for you, Sean? I mean you've Done things that no one else in the world has done You've beat cancer twice. You still have one lung But you're still out here Chasing dreams accomplishing new things. Where are you going from here? Well, I've recently gotten married. I've heard that's pretty difficult I can't be Doesn't always have to be yeah, it's it's great. I love julieza and we've we've been together now for five years So things have been going great. Um, obviously that was a joke. I know I'm as a married guy. I know okay good Like yeah, we've only been married for five years feels like too underwater Um Biggest challenge of life, but worse than no more challenging than ever is more challenging killman jarrow 25 times 100 mile bike ride this weekend. Uh, I'm looking at doing a Ride across america. It's called the ram which is race across america Bike race across america doing that and maybe june next year 2025 Potentially going back and trying everest again without supplemental oxygen You know, but the the biggest thing now is using The information and knowledge that I've gained from the cancers from doing what no one's ever done before to help other people You know, I want to pull other people up and help them believe in themselves You know, I I can see what people are Are capable of doing and maybe they don't see it themselves They just need that little boost of confidence or maybe a swift kick in the butt, you know one of the two Yeah, when I just got back I told you from a month long journey in europe and i'm looking at these sculptures and these paintings and these buildings And it reminds me of what a human can do and to go back to your team Like you look at something like the duomo and florence which took like 500 years to build but the Detail is immaculate. It is so spectacular That can be anyone's life The difference between say a michael angelo or the people that built the duomo is they just did it, right? They paid attention to the details. They fine-tuned everything to me. That's what it sounds like you do shan you agree I am very detail oriented But I also see the entire forest Because of everything that I've been through I'm very fortunate to be able to see different perspectives I've been to 70 countries, you know, I've Been adopted into a local tribe in africa I've been adopted into a tribe in or not a tribe, but a group of individuals in napal the sherpas So they call me da wa dorji sherpa in africa. They call me mezung guccia. So Yeah, what does it mean to you to be able to accomplish all of these things and inspire other people even myself Well, I appreciate that It means my life's not done yet You know, like I said, I haven't fulfilled my life's purpose. Well, my time's up my time's up And I'm going to continue living everything Every day to the fullest until my time is over until my until I finally hit my expiration date And I want to encourage people to take advantage of the the dash that we talked about before Take advantage of that lifeline and you can get started But the big hill challenge It's proverbial. You don't have to climb any mountains You know just your own mental mountains, right and involves your physical it involves your mental and it will get you right So go sign up for that Learn shan's method read his book Becoming unstoppable because you certainly are shan. Thanks so much for being here and sharing all this knowledge with us Hey guys, I just want to tell you the true one percenters you made it till the end of the video Do me a favor share it with the friend that wants to go to another level Make sure you like the video comment below so I know who you are Set your notifications and then subscribe to the channel. We got daily sales training videos dropping. I'll see you soon