Podcasts about 'yeah

Curcumin: modulator of key molecular signaling pathways in hormone-independent breast cancer Monash University Malaysia, August 10, 2021 According to news reporting originating from Selangor, Malaysia,  research stated, “Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide.” Our news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from Monash University Malaysia: “Despite the overall successes in breast cancer therapy, hormone-independent HER2 negative breast cancer, also known as triple negative breast cancer (TNBC), lacking estrogens and progesterone receptors and with an excessive expression of human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2), along with the hormone-independent HER2 positive subtype, still remain major challenges in breast cancer treatment. Due to their poor prognoses, aggressive phenotype, and highly metastasis features, new alternative therapies have become an urgent clinical need. One of the most noteworthy phytochemicals, curcumin, has attracted enormous attention as a promising drug candidate in breast cancer prevention and treatment due to its multi-targeting effect. Curcumin interrupts major stages of tumorigenesis including cell proliferation, survival, angiogenesis, and metastasis in hormone-independent breast cancer through the modulation of multiple signaling pathways. The current review has highlighted the anticancer activity of curcumin in hormone-independent breast cancer via focusing on its impact on key signaling pathways including the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway, JAK/STAT pathway, MAPK pathway, NF-qB pathway, p53 pathway, and Wnt/b-catenin, as well as apoptotic and cell cycle pathways.” According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Besides, its therapeutic implications in clinical trials are here presented.”     Ultrasound remotely triggers immune cells to attack tumors in mice without toxic side effects University of California San Diego, August 11, 2021   Bioengineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a cancer immunotherapy that pairs ultrasound with cancer-killing immune cells to destroy malignant tumors while sparing normal tissue. The new experimental therapy significantly slowed down the growth of solid cancerous tumors in mice. The team, led by the labs of UC San Diego bioengineering professor Peter Yingxiao Wang and bioengineering professor emeritus Shu Chien, detailed their work in a paper published Aug. 12 in Nature Biomedical Engineering. The work addresses a longstanding problem in the field of cancer immunotherapy: how to make chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy safe and effective at treating solid tumors.   CAR T-cell therapy is a promising new approach to treat cancer. It involves collecting a patient's T cells and genetically engineering them to express special receptors, called CAR, on their surface that recognize specific antigens on cancer cells. The resulting CAR T cells are then infused back into the patient to find and attack cells that have the cancer antigens on their surface. This therapy has worked well for the treatment of some blood cancers and lymphoma, but not against solid tumors. That's because many of the target antigens on these tumors are also expressed on normal tissues and organs. This can cause toxic side effects that can kills cells—these effects are known as on-target, off-tumor toxicity. “CAR T cells are so potent that they may also attack normal tissues that are expressing the target antigens at low levels,” said first author Yiqian (Shirley) Wu, a project scientist in Wang's lab. “The problem with standard CAR T cells is that they are always on—they are always expressing the CAR protein, so you cannot control their activation,” explained Wu. To combat this issue, the team took standard CAR T cells and re-engineered them so that they only express the CAR protein when ultrasound energy is applied. This allowed the researchers to choose where and when the genes of CAR T cells get switched on. “We use ultrasound to successfully control CAR T cells directly in vivo for cancer immunotherapy,” said Wang, who is a faculty member of the Institute of Engineering in Medicine and the Center for Nano-ImmunoEngineering, both at UC San Diego. What's exciting about the use of ultrasound, noted Wang, is that it can penetrate tens of centimeters beneath the skin, so this type of therapy has the potential to non-invasively treat tumors that are buried deep inside the body. The team's approach involves injecting the re-engineered CAR T cells into tumors in mice and then placing a small ultrasound transducer on an area of the skin that's on top of the tumor to activate the CAR T cells. The transducer uses what's called focused ultrasound beams to focus or concentrate short pulses of ultrasound energy at the tumor. This causes the tumor to heat up moderately—in this case, to a temperature of 43 degrees Celsius (109 degrees Fahrenheit)—without affecting the surrounding tissue. The CAR T cells in this study are equipped with a gene that produces the CAR protein only when exposed to heat. As a result, the CAR T cells only switch on where ultrasound is applied. The researchers put their CAR T cells to the test against standard CAR T cells. In mice that were treated with the new CAR T cells, only the tumors that were exposed to ultrasound were attacked, while other tissues in the body were left alone. But in mice that were treated with the standard CAR T cells, all tumors and tissue expressing the target antigen were attacked. “This shows our CAR T-cell therapy is not only effective, but also safer,” said Wu. “It has minimal on-target, off-tumor side effects.” The work is still in the early stages. The team will be performing more preclinical tests and toxicity studies before it can reach clinical trials.     Lycopene ameliorates diabetic osteoporosis via anti-inflammatory, antioxidation  Shaanxi University of Technology (China), August 10, 2021 According to news originating from Shaanxi University of Technology research stated, “Diabetic osteoporosis (DOP) is one of the complications of diabetes, with high morbidity, and high disability rate. Here, we established a diabetic rat model and administered lycopene to observe its effect on DOP.” Our news editors obtained a quote from the research from Shaanxi University of Technology: “Our results showed that ten weeks lycopene treatment lowered blood glucose, improved diabetic induced polydipsia, overeating and body weight loss. Lycopene treatment also enhanced bone mineral density, restored bone mechanical and bone Micro-CT parameters of diabetic rats. Subsequently, lycopene decreased serum inflammatory cytokines levels and increased serum anti-oxidant indicators levels. Moreover, lycopene reduced the number of bone marrow adipocytes, and osteoclasts numbers of diabetic rats. The serum bone turnover markers levels were down-regulated after lycopene treatment. Meanwhile, the bone and serum OPG, RUNX 2 expression levels were up-regulated by lycopene in diabetic rats, and the OPG/RANKL ratio was also up-regulated.” According to the news editors, the research concluded: “This study showed that lycopene could ameliorate diabetic induced bone loss via anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidation, and increasing OPG/RANKL ratio in diabetic rats. Lycopene could be used for nutritional intervention in patients with diabetic osteoporosis.”     Research shows just 8 weeks of meditation studies can make your brain quicker Birmingham University (UK), August 12, 2021 Researchers at Binghamton University scanned students' brains before and after eight weeks of meditation training. Credit: Binghamton University Millions of people around the world seek mental clarity through meditation, most of them following or inspired by the centuries-old practices of Buddhism. Anecdotally, those who meditate say it helps to calm their minds, recenter their thoughts and cut through the "noise" to show what really matters. Scientifically, though, showing the effects of meditation on the human brainhave proved to be tricky. A new study from Binghamton University's Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science tracked how practicing meditation for just a couple of months changed the brain patterns of 10 students in the University's Scholars Program. The seed for the research came from a casual chat between Assistant Professor Weiying Dai and lecturer George Weinschenk, MA '01, Ph.D. '07, both from the Department of Computer Science. Weinschenk is a longtime meditation practitioner whose wife worked as an administrator at the Namgyal Monastery in Ithaca, which is the North American seat of the Dalai Lama's personal monastery. "I developed very close friendships with several of the monks," he said. "We would hang out together, and I even received instruction from some of the Dalai Lama's teachers. I took classes there, I read a lot and I earned a three-year certificate in Buddhist studies." Dai has studied brain mapping and biomedical image processing, and while earning her Ph.D. at the University of Pittsburgh, she tracked Alzheimer's disease patients using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. "I'm interested in brain research to see how our brains are really functioning and how all different kinds of disease affect our brain," she said. "I really have zero medical training, but I pick up all this knowledge or background from reading the literature and talking with the experts." The two faculty members had neighboring offices and shared a conversation one day about their backgrounds. Weinschenk mentioned that he had been asked to teach a semester-long class for the Scholars Program on meditation. "I told Weiying, 'Yeah, meditation really can have a transformative effect on the brain,'" Weinschenk said. "She was a little skeptical, especially about whether such a short amount of time spent learning how to meditate, whether that would make any difference. She suggested we might be able to quantify such a thing with modern technology." For the fall 2017 semester, Dai secured grant funding, and their collaboration began. Near the beginning of the semester, she took the participants to Cornell University for MRI scans of their brains. Weinschenk taught students how to meditate, told them to practice five times a week for 10 or 15 minutes, and asked them to keep a journal record of their practice. (The syllabus also included other lessons about the cultural transmissions of meditation and its applications for wellness.) "Binghamton University Scholars are high achievers who want to do the things they are assigned and do well on them, so they didn't require much prompting to maintain a regular meditation routine," he said. "To guarantee objective reporting, they would relate their experiences directly to Weiying about how frequently they practiced." The results, recently published in the journal Scientific Reports, show that meditation training led to faster switching between the brain's two general states of consciousness. One is called the default mode network, which is active when the brain is at wakeful rest and not focused on the outside world, such as during daydreaming and mind-wandering. The other is the dorsal attention network, which engages for attention-demanding tasks. The findings of the study demonstrate that meditation can enhance the brain connection among and within these two brain networks, indicating the effect of meditation on fast switching between the mind wandering and focusing its attention as well as maintaining attention once in the attentive state. "Tibetans have a term for that ease of switching between states—they call it mental pliancy, an ability that allows you to shape and mold your mind," Weinschenk said. "They also consider the goal of concentration one of the fundamental principles of self-growth." Dai and Weinschenk are still parsing through the data taken from the 2017 MRI scans, so they have yet to test other Scholars Program students. Because Alzheimer's disease and autism could be caused by problems with the dorsal attention network, Dai is making plans for future research that could use meditation to mitigate those problems. "I'm thinking about an elderly study, because this population was young students," she said. "I want to get a healthy elderly group, and then another group with early Alzheimer's disease or mild cognitive impairment. I want to see whether the changes in the brain from meditation can enhance cognitive performance. I'm writing the proposal and trying to attract the funds in that direction." Though once skeptical about the subject, "I'm pretty convinced about the scientific basis of meditation after doing this study," she added. "Maybe I'll just go to George's class when he teaches it so that I can benefit, too!"   Study shows how food preservatives may disrupt human hormones and promote obesity Cedars-Sinai Medicine Institute, August 9, 2021  Can chemicals that are added to breakfast cereals and other everyday products make you obese? Growing evidence from animal experiments suggests the answer may be "yes." But confirming these findings in humans has faced formidable obstacles - until now. A study published in Nature Communications details how Cedars-Sinai investigators developed a novel platform and protocol for testing the effects of chemicals known as endocrine disruptors on humans. The three chemicals tested in this study are abundant in modern life. Butylhydroxytoluene (BHT) is an antioxidant commonly added to breakfast cereals and other foods to protect nutrients and keep fats from turning rancid; perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) is a polymer found in some cookware, carpeting and other products; and tributyltin (TBT) is a compound in paints that can make its way into water and accumulate in seafood. The investigators used hormone-producing tissues grown from human stem cells to demonstrate how chronic exposure to these chemicals can interfere with signals sent from the digestive system to the brain that let people know when they are "full" during meals. When this signaling system breaks down, people often may continue eating, causing them to gain weight. "We discovered that each of these chemicals damaged hormones that communicate between the gut and the brain," said Dhruv Sareen, PhD, assistant professor of Biomedical Sciences and director of the Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Core Facility at the Cedars-Sinai Board of Governors Regenerative Medicine Institute. "When we tested the three together, the combined stress was more robust." Of the three chemicals tested, BHT produced some of the strongest detrimental effects, Sareen said. While other scientists have shown these compounds can disrupt hormone systems in laboratory animals, the new study is the first to use human pluripotent stem cells and tissues to document how the compounds may disrupt hormones that are critical to gut-to-brain signaling and preventing obesity in people, Sareen said. "This is a landmark study that substantially improves our understanding of how endocrine disruptors may damage human hormonal systems and contribute to the obesity epidemic in the U.S.," said Clive Svendsen, PhD, director of the institute and the Kerry and Simone Vickar Family Foundation Distinguished Chair in Regenerative Medicine. More than one-third of U.S. adults are considered to be obese, according to federal statistics. The new testing system developed for the study has the potential to provide a much-needed, safe and cost-effective method that can be used to evaluate the health effects of thousands of existing and new chemicals in the environment, the investigators say. For their experiments, Sareen and his team first obtained blood samples from adults, and then, by introducing reprogramming genes, converted the cells into induced pluripotent stem cells. Then, using these stem cells, the investigators grew human epithelium tissue, which lines the gut, and neuronal tissues of the brain's hypothalamus region, which regulates appetite and metabolism. The investigators then exposed the tissues to BHT, PFOA and TBT, one by one and also in combination, and observed what happened inside the cells. They found that the chemicals disrupted networks that prepare signaling hormones to maintain their structure and be transported out of the cells, thus making them ineffective. The chemicals also damaged mitochondria - cellular structures that convert food and oxygen into energy and drive the body's metabolism. Because the chemical damage occurred in early-stage "young" cells, the findings suggest that a defective hormone system potentially could impact a pregnant mother as well as her fetus in the womb, Sareen said. While other scientists have found, in animal studies, that effects of endocrine disruptors can be passed down to future generations, this process has not been proved to occur in humans, he explained. More than 80,000 chemicals are registered for use in the U.S. in everyday items such as foods, personal care products, household cleaners and lawn-care products, according to the National Toxicology Program of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. While the program states on its website that relatively few chemicals are thought to pose a significant risk to human health, it also states: "We do not know the effects of many of these chemicals on our health." Cost and ethical issues, including the health risk of exposing human subjects to possibly harmful substances, are among the barriers to testing the safety of many chemicals. As a result, numerous widely used compounds remain unevaluated in humans for their health effects, especially to the hormone system. "By testing these chemicals on actual human tissues in the lab, we potentially could make these evaluations easier to conduct and more cost-effective," Sareen said.   Social activities help dementia patients stay sharp, avoid depression University of Sheffield (UK), August 12, 2021 Approximately 6 million people in the U.S. are suffering from dementia, as well 50 million people worldwide. There is currently no cure for the degenerative condition and medical treatments often have side effects such as vomiting, loss of appetite, and muscle pains. Now, researchers say patients can greatly benefit from a type of treatment that doesn't come with such downsides and helps their brain avoid additional decline. A new study suggests that mixing with other people helps dementia patients stay sharp and fend off depression. Scientists say the type of treatment known as “cognitive stimulation” could make living with dementia easier for hundreds of thousands of people. “Dementia is one of the biggest global challenges that we face,” says senior author Dr. Claudia von Bastian, of the University of Sheffield, in a statement. “Our research highlights that cognitive stimulation can be a safe, relatively cheap, and accessible treatment to help reduce some of the core symptoms of dementia and may even alleviate symptoms of depression.” The researchers analyzed the use of cognitive stimulation as an effective treatment for people with dementia. They found that getting patients involved in social and group activities helped combat depression and boost global cognition. Global cognition refers to five types of brain function: attention, memory, verbal fluency, language, and awareness. “It's great that governments now recognize the importance for people to live well with dementia. We've seen far more energy and resources put into developing initiatives to support this, such as cognitive stimulation, which is now used widely across the world,” notes co-author Dr. Ben Hicks, of Brighton and Sussex Medical School. “We still need to learn more about the key ingredients of cognitive stimulation which lead to these benefits and how they influence the progression of dementia. However, the absence of negative side-effects and the low costs of this treatment means the benefits are clear,” adds Dr. von Bastian. More research is needed to determine whether cognitive stimulation and other non-pharmaceutical treatments could help the growing number of people who suffer fromdementia.    “Our research is the first to comprehensively interrogate the evidence base for its effectiveness, using the most up-to-date statistical techniques. While early signs are positive, there's an urgent need to improve the rigor of evaluative research and better assess the long-term benefits of cognitive stimulation. People with dementia need effective treatments, and, as a research community, this is what we must deliver,” added Dr. Hicks.     Resveratrol supplementation improves arterial stiffness in type 2 diabetics Toho University (Japan), August 18 2021 A randomized, double-blind study reported on in the International Heart journal found improvements in arterial stiffness and oxidative stress among type 2 diabetics who were supplemented with resveratrol. The trial included 50 diabetic men and women who received 100 milligrams resveratrol or a placebo daily for 12 weeks. Cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI, a novel diagnostic measure of arterial stiffness that is a marker of atherosclerosis) and blood pressure were assessed at the beginning and end of the study, in addition to blood assessments of oxidative stress and other factors. At the end of the study, subjects who received resveratrol had significantly lower blood pressure, less oxidative stress and decreased arterial stiffness in comparison with values obtained at the beginning of the study.  Participants who received a placebo experienced no significant changes in these areas. “The primary finding in the present study was that oral supplementation of resveratrol for 12 weeks decreased CAVI in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus,” authors Haruki Imamura, MD, and colleagues at Toho University Sakura Medical Center in Japan write. “Many previous studies have demonstrated increased CAVI in atherosclerotic diseases such as acute coronary syndrome and stroke, and these reports indicate that CAVI reflects organic atherosclerosis.” They suggest that a reduction in oxidative stress may be one mechanism involved in the improvement in arterial stiffness observed in this study among participants who received resveratrol. Improved endothelial function via increased nitric oxide production may be another mechanism.

What if I told you that there's a way to keep yourself young? It takes a lot of hard work, and it's a continuing process. However, the payoff is definitely worth it. It also offers a lot of benefits aside from longevity. The secret? It's developing a lifelong passion for learning and growing. In this episode, Craig Harper joins us once again to explain the value of having a growth mindset. We explore how you can keep yourself young and healthy even as you chronologically age. He also emphasises the importance of fun and laughter in our lives. Craig also shares how powerful our minds are and how we can use them to manage our pain.    If you want to know how to develop a growth mindset for a fuller life, then this episode is for you!   Get Customised Guidance for Your Genetic Make-Up For our epigenetics health programme, all about optimising your fitness, lifestyle, nutrition and mind performance to your particular genes, go to  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/epigenetics-and-health-coaching/.   Customised Online Coaching for Runners CUSTOMISED RUN COACHING PLANS — How to Run Faster, Be Stronger, Run Longer  Without Burnout & Injuries Have you struggled to fit in training in your busy life? Maybe you don't know where to start, or perhaps you have done a few races but keep having motivation or injury troubles? Do you want to beat last year's time or finish at the front of the pack? Want to run your first 5-km or run a 100-miler? ​​Do you want a holistic programme that is personalised & customised to your ability, goals, and lifestyle?  Go to www.runninghotcoaching.com for our online run training coaching.   Health Optimisation and Life Coaching If you are struggling with a health issue and need people who look outside the square and are connected to some of the greatest science and health minds in the world, then reach out to us at support@lisatamati.com, we can jump on a call to see if we are a good fit for you. If you have a big challenge ahead, are dealing with adversity, or are wanting to take your performance to the next level and learn how to increase your mental toughness, emotional resilience, foundational health, and more, then contact us at support@lisatamati.com.   Order My Books My latest book Relentless chronicles the inspiring journey about how my mother and I defied the odds after an aneurysm left my mum Isobel with massive brain damage at age 74. The medical professionals told me there was absolutely no hope of any quality of life again, but I used every mindset tool, years of research and incredible tenacity to prove them wrong and bring my mother back to full health within three years. Get your copy here: https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/books/products/relentless. For my other two best-selling books Running Hot and Running to Extremes, chronicling my ultrarunning adventures and expeditions all around the world, go to https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/books.   Lisa's Anti-Ageing and Longevity Supplements  NMN: Nicotinamide Mononucleotide, an NAD+ precursor Feel Healthier and Younger* Researchers have found that Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide or NAD+, a master regulator of metabolism and a molecule essential for the functionality of all human cells, is being dramatically decreased over time. What is NMN? NMN Bio offers a cutting edge Vitamin B3 derivative named NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) that can boost the levels of NAD+ in muscle tissue and liver. Take charge of your energy levels, focus, metabolism and overall health so you can live a happy, fulfilling life. Founded by scientists, NMN Bio offers supplements of the highest purity and rigorously tested by an independent, third-party lab. Start your cellular rejuvenation journey today. Support Your Healthy Ageing We offer powerful, third-party tested, NAD+ boosting supplements so you can start your healthy ageing journey today. 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Manufactured in an ISO9001 certified facility Boost Your NAD+ Levels — Healthy Ageing: Redefined Cellular Health Energy & Focus Bone Density Skin Elasticity DNA Repair Cardiovascular Health Brain Health  Metabolic Health   My  ‘Fierce' Sports Jewellery Collection For my gorgeous and inspiring sports jewellery collection, 'Fierce', go to https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/lisa-tamati-bespoke-jewellery-collection.   Here are three reasons why you should listen to the full episode: Learn how to develop a growth mindset to keep yourself young and healthy, regardless of your chronological age. Understand why you need to manage your energy and plan fun and laughter into your life. Discover the ways you can change your mindset around pain.    Resources Gain exclusive access and bonuses to Pushing the Limits Podcast by becoming a patron! Listen to other Pushing the Limits Episodes: #60: Ian Walker - Paraplegic Handbiker - Ultra Distance Athlete #183: Sirtuins and NAD Supplements for Longevity with Dr Elena Seranova #188: Awareness and Achieve High Performance with Craig Harper  #189: Understanding Autophagy and Increasing Your Longevity with Dr Elena Seranova Connect with Craig: Website | Instagram | Linkedin Interested to learn more from Craig? You can check out his books and his podcast, The You Project. T: The Story of Testosterone by Carole Hooven  Mind Over Medicine by Lissa Rankin M.D. Lifespan - Why We Age and Why We Don't Have To  by David A. Sinclair PhD Neuroscience professor Andrew Huberman's Instagram  Dr Rhonda Patrick's website A new program, BoostCamp, is coming this September at Peak Wellness!   Episode Highlights [06:50] A Growth Mindset Keeps Us Young and Healthy It's helpful to take advantage of the availability of high-level research and medical journals online. If you're prepared to do the hard work, you can learn anything.  Learning and exposing ourselves to new things are crucial parts of staying young and healthy.  Age is a self-created story.  With a growth mindset, you can change how your body and mind works so that you feel younger than your real age.  [12:23] Develop a Growth Mindset It's vital to surround yourself with people with the same mindset — people who drag you up, not down.  You can also get a similar experience by exposing yourself to good ideas and stories. Be aware of what you're feeding your mind, on top of what you're feeding your body.  School is not a marker of your intelligence. Your academic failures do not matter.  With a growth mindset, you can keep growing and learning.  [17:40] Let Go and Be Happy People tend to have career and exercise plans, but not a fun plan.  We can't be serious all the time — we also need time to have fun and laugh.  Laughter can impact and improve the immune system. Laughing can change the biochemistry of your brain. Plan for the future, but also learn to live in the now. Having a growth mindset is important, but so is finding joy and enjoyment.  [23:31] Look After Your Energy Having fun and resting can impact your energy and emotional system.  These habits can help you work faster than when you're just working all the time.  Remember, volume and quality of work are different.  [30:24] Work-Life Balance Many people believe that they need to balance work and life. However, when you find your passion, it's just life.  Even doing 20 hours of work for a job you hate is worse than 40 hours of doing something you love. There's no one answer for everyone. Everything is a lot more flexible than before. Find what works for you.  [35:56] Change the Way You Think It's unavoidable that we think a certain way because of our upbringing.  Start to become aware of your lack of awareness and your programming.  Learn why you think of things the way you do. Is it because of other people?  Be influenced by other people, but test their ideas through trial and error. Let curiosity fuel your growth mindset.  Listen to the full podcast to learn how Craig learned how to run his gym without a business background!  [44:18] Sharing Academic Knowledge Academics face many restrictions due to the nature and context of their work.  He encourages the academic community to communicate information to everyone, not just to fellow researchers.  He plans to publish a book about his PhD research to share what he knows with the public. Science is constantly changing. We need to keep up with the latest knowledge.   [50:55] Change Your Relationship with Pain There is no simple fix to chronic pain.  The most you can do is change your relationship and perception of pain.  Our minds are powerful enough to create real pain even without any physical injury. Listen to Craig and Lisa's stories about how our minds affect our pain in the full episode!   7 Powerful Quotes from This Episode ‘My mind is the CEO of my life. So I need to make sure that as much as I can, that I'm managing my mind, and my mental energy optimally.' ‘If you're listening to this, and you didn't succeed in the school system, that means absolutely nothing when you're an adult.' ‘We're literally doing our biology good by laughing.' ‘Living is a present tense verb, you can't living in the future, and you can't live in the future.' ‘Often, more is not better. Sometimes more is worse.  So there's a difference between volume of work and output and quality of work.' ‘It's all about those people just taking one step at a time to move forward... That growth mindset that I think is just absolutely crucial.'   About Craig Craig Harper is one of Australia's leading educators, speakers, and writers in health and self-development. He has been an integral part of the Australian health and fitness industry since 1982. In 1990, he established a successful Harper's Personal Training, which evolved into one of the most successful businesses of its kind.  He currently hosts a successful Podcast called 'The You Project'. He is also completing a neuropsychology PhD, studying the spectrum of human thinking and behaviour. Craig speaks on various radio stations around Australia weekly. He currently fills an on-air role as a presenter on a lifestyle show called 'Get a Life', airing on Foxtel.  Want to know more about Craig and his work? Check out his website, or follow him on Instagram and Linkedin!   Enjoyed This Podcast? If you did, be sure to subscribe and share it with your friends! Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your family and friends so they can learn how to develop a growth mindset. Have any questions? You can contact me through email (support@lisatamati.com) or find me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. For more episode updates, visit my website. You may also tune in on Apple Podcasts. To pushing the limits, Lisa   Full Transcript Of The Podcast Welcome to Pushing the Limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host Lisa Tamati, brought to you by lisatamati.com. Lisa Tamati: Well, hi everyone and welcome back to Pushing the Limits with Lisa Tamati. This week I have Craig Harper. He is really well known in Australia. He's a broadcaster, a fitness professional, a PhD scholar, an expert on metacognition, and self-awareness. And we get talking on all those good topics today and also neuro-psycho-immunology, very big word. Really interesting stuff; and we get talking about laughter, we get talking about pain management. We sort of go all over the show in this episode, which I sometimes do on this show. I hope you enjoy this very insightful and deep conversation with Craig Harper.  Before we head over to the show, I just want to let you know that Neil and I at Running Hot Coaching have launched a new program called Boost Camp. Now, this will be starting on the first of September and we're taking registrations now. This is a live eight-week program, where you'll basically boost your life. That's why it's called Boost Camp. not boot camp, Boost Camp. This is all about upgrading your body, learning how to help your body function at its base, learning how your mindset works, and increasing your performance, your health, your well-being and how to energise your mind and your body. In this Boost Camp, we're going to give you the answers you need in a simple, easy-to-follow process using holistic diagnostic tools and looking at the complete picture.  So you're going to go on a personalised health and fitness journey that will have a really life-changing effect on your family and your community. We're going to be talking about things like routine and resilience, mental resilience, which is a big thing that I love to talk about, and how important is in this time of change, in this time of COVID, where everything's upside down, and how we should be all building time and resources around building our resilience and energising our mind and body. We're going to give you a lot of health fundamentals. Because the fundamentals are something simple and easy to do, it means that you probably aren't doing some of the basics right, and we want to help you get there.  We're going to give you the answers you need in a simple, sort of easy, process. So we are now in a position to be able to control and manage all of these stressors and these things that are coming at us all the time, and we want to help you do that in the most optimal manner. So check out what boost camp is all about. Go to www.peakwellness.co.nz/boostcamp. I'll say that again, peakwellness.co.nz/boostcamp, boost with a B-O-O-S-T, boost camp. We hope to see you over there! Right, now over to the show with Craig Harper. Well, hi everyone and welcome to Pushing the Limits! Today, I have someone who is a special treat for you who has been on the show before. He's an absolute legend, and I love him to bits. Craig half and welcome to the show mate, how are you doing?  Craig Harper: Hi Lisa! I'm awesome but you're not.  Lisa: No I'm a bit of a miss, people. I've got shingles, a horrible, horrible virus that I advise nobody to get. Craig: What it— do we know what that's made? What causes it, or is it idiopathic as they say? Lisa: Yeah, no, it is from the chickenpox virus. Although, I've never, ever had that virus. So I'm like heck how, you know, it's related to the cold sore virus and all of that, which I definitely have had often. So it sits on the spinal cord, these little viruses, dormant and then one day when your immune systems are down, it decides to attack and replicate and go hard out. So yeah, that'll be the down for the count now for two and a half weeks. In a lot of pain, but— Craig: What is it like nerve pain or what kind of pain is it?  Lisa: Yes, it's nerve pain. So this one's actually, it hits different nerves in different people, depending on where it decides to pop out. My mum had the femoral nerve, which is one that goes right down from the backbone, quite high up on the backbone, down across the back and then down through the hip flexor and down the leg. I've got all these horrible looking sores, I look like a burn victim all the way down my leg and across my back. And it comes out through the muscles of your like, through the nerves and nerve endings and causes these blisters on top of the skin but it's the nerve pain that's really horrible because there's no comfortable position. There's no easy way to lie or sit and of course, when you're lying at night, it's worse. It's worse at nighttime than in the day. So I learned a lot about shingles. And as usual, we're using these obstacles to be a learning curve. Craig: Why on earth are you doing a bloody podcast? You should be relaxing. Lisa: You're important, you see. I had, you know, I had this appointment with you, and I honour my appointments, and I— Craig: Definitely not important. What's the typical treatment for shingles? Lisa: Well, actually, I wish I'd known this two weeks ago, I didn't know this, but I just had a Zoom call with Dave Asprey, you know, of Bulletproof fame, who is one of my heroes, and he's coming on the show, people, shortly. So that's really exciting. He told me to take something called BHT, butylated hydroxytoluene, which is a synthetic antioxidant. They actually use them in food additives, they said that kills that virus. So I'm like, ‘Right, get me some of that.' But unfortunately, I was already, it's— I only got it just yesterday, because I had to wait for the post. So I'm sort of hoping for a miracle in the next 24 hours.  Also, intravenous vitamin C, I've had three of those on lysine, which also helps. One of the funny things, before we get to the actual topic of the day, is I was taking something called L-Citrulline which helps with nitric oxide production and feeds into the arginine pathway. Apparently, while that's a good thing for most people, the arginine, if you have too much arginine in the body, it can lead to replication of this particular virus, which is really random and I only found that out after the fact. But you know, as a biohacker, who experiments sometimes you get it wrong.  Craig: Sometimes you turn left when you should have turned right.  Lisa: Yes. So that, you know, certainly took a lot of digging in PubMed to find that connection. But I think that's maybe what actually set it off. That combined with a pretty stressful life of like— Craig: It's interesting that you mentioned PubMed because like a lot of people now, you know how people warn people off going Dr Google, you know, whatever, right. But the funny thing is, you can forget Dr Google, I mean, Google's okay. But you can access medical journals, high level— I mean, all of the research journals that I access for my PhD are online. You can literally pretty much access any information you want. We're not talking about anecdotal evidence, and we're not talking about theories and ideas and random kind of junk. We're talking about the highest level research, you literally can find at home now. So if you know how to research and you know what you're looking for, and you can be bothered reading arduous academic papers, you can pretty much learn anything, to any level, if you're prepared to do the work and you know how— and you can be a little bit of a detective, a scientific detective.  Lisa: That is exactly, you know, what I keep saying, and I'm glad you said that because you are a PhD scholar and you are doing this. So you know what you're talking about, and this is exactly what I've done in the last five years, is do deep research and all this sort of stuff. People think that you have to go to university in order to have this education, and that used to be the case. It is no longer the case. We don't have to be actually in medical school to get access to medical texts anymore, which used to be the way. And so we now have the power in our hands to take, to some degree, control over what we're learning and where we're going with this.  It doesn't mean that it's easy. You will know, sifting through PubMed, and all these scholarly Google articles and things in clinical studies is pretty damn confusing sometimes and arduous. But once you get used to that form of learning, you start to be able to sift through relatively fast, and you can really educate yourself. I think having that growth mindset, I mean, you and I never came from an academic background. But thanks to you, I'm actually going to see Prof Schofield next week. Prof Schofield and looking at a PhD, because, I really need to add that to my load. But— Craig: You know, the thing is, I think in general, and I don't know where you're gonna go today, but I think in general, like what one of the things that keeps us young is learning and exposing ourselves, our mind and our emotions and for that matter, our body to new things, whether that's new experiences or new ideas, or new information, or new environments, or new people. This is what floats my boat and it keeps me hungry and it keeps me healthy physically, mentally, emotionally, intellectually, creatively, sociologically. It keeps me healthy. Not only does it keep me in a good place, I'm actually at 57, still getting better. You know, and people might wonder about that sometimes.  Of course, there's an inevitability to chronological aging. Clearly, most people at 80 are not going to be anything like they were at 40. Not that I'm 80. But there's— we know now that there's the unavoidable consistency of time as a construct, as an objective construct. But then there's the way that we behave around and relate to time. Biological aging is not chronological aging. In the middle of the inevitability of time ticking over is, which is an objective thing, there's the subject of human in the middle of it, who can do what he or she wants. So, in other words, a 57-year-old bloke doesn't need to look or feel or function or think like a 57-year-old bloke, right?  When we understand that, in many ways, especially as an experience, age is a self-created story for many people. I mean, you've met, I've met and our listeners have met 45-year-olds that seem 70 and 70-year-olds— and we're not talking about acting young, that's not what we're talking about. I'm not talking about that. I'm not talking about pretending you're not old or acting young. I'm actually talking about changing the way that your body and your mind and your brain and your emotional system works, literally. So that you are literally in terms of function, similar to somebody or a ‘typical' person who's 20 or 25 years younger than you. We didn't even know that this used to be possible, but not only is it possible, if you do certain things, it's very likely that that's the outcome you'll create. Lisa: Yeah, and if you think about our grandparents, and when I think about my Nana at 45 or 50, they were old. When I think about now I'm 52, you're 57, we're going forward, we're actually reaching the peak of our intellectual, well, hopefully not the peak, we're still going up. Physically, we got a few wrinkles and a few grey hairs coming. But even on that front, there is so much what's happening in the longevity space that my take on it is, if I can keep my shit together for the next 10 years, stuff's gonna come online that's gonna help me keep it on for another 20, 30, 40 years.  For me now it's trying to hold my body together as best I can so that when the technology does come, that we are able to meet— and we're accessing some of the stuff now, I mean, I'm taking some of the latest and greatest bloody supplements and biohacking stuff, and actively working towards that, and having this, I think it's a growth mindset. I had Dr Demartini on the show last week, who I love. I think he's an incredible man. His mindset, I mean, he's what nearly, I think he's nearly 70. It looks like he's 40. He's amazing. And his mind is so sharp and so fast it'll leave you and I in the dust. He's processing books every day, like, you know, more than a book a day and thinking his mind through and he's distilling it and he's remembering, and he's retaining it, and he's giving it to the world. This is sort of— you know, he's nothing exceptional. He had learning disabilities, for goodness sake, he had a speech impediment, he couldn't read until he was an adult. In other words, he made that happen. You and I, you know, we both did you know, where you went to university, at least when you're younger, I sort of mucked around on a bicycle for a few years. Travelling the world to see it. But this is the beauty of the time that we live in, and we have access to all this. So that growth mindset, I think keeps you younger, both physically and mentally. Craig: And this is why I reckon it's really important that we hang around with people who drag us up, not down. And that could be you know, this listening to your podcast, of course, like I feel like when I listen to a podcast with somebody like you that shares good ideas and good information and good energy and is a good person, like if I'm walking around, I've literally got my headphones here because I just walked back from the cafe, listening to Joe Rogan's latest podcast with this lady from Harvard talking about testosterone, you'd find it really interesting, wrote a book called T.  When I'm listening to good conversations with good people, I am, one, I'm fascinated and interested, but I'm stimulating myself and my mind in a good way. I'm dragging myself up by exposing myself to good ideas and good thinking, and good stories. Or it might even be just something that's funny, it might— I'm just exposing myself to a couple of dickheads talking about funny shit, right? And I'd spend an hour laughing, which is also therapeutic.  You know, and I think there's that, I think we forget that we're always feeding our mind and our brain something. It's just having more awareness of what am I actually plugging into that amazing thing? Not only just what am I putting in my body, which, of course, is paramount. But what am I putting in, you know, that thing that sits between my ears that literally drives my life? That's my HQ, that's my, my mind is the CEO of my life. So I need to make sure that as much as I can, that I'm managing my mind and my mental energy                                                                                  optimally. Lisa: Yeah. And I think, you know, a lot of people if they didn't do well in the school system, think that, 'Oh, well, I'm not academic therefore I can't learn or continue to learn.' I really encourage people, if you're listening to this, and you didn't succeed in the school system, that means absolutely nothing when you're an adult. The school system has got many flaws, and it didn't cater to everybody. So I just want people to understand that.  You know, just like with Dr Demartini, he taught himself 30 words a day, that's where he started: vocabulary. He taught himself to read and then taught— Albert Einstein was another one, you know, he struggled in school for crying out loud. So school isn't necessarily the marker of whether you're an intelligent human being or not. It's one system and one way of learning that is okay for the average and the masses. But definitely, it leaves a lot of people thinking that they're dumb when they're not dumb.  It's all about those people just taking one step at a time to move forward and becoming, you know, that growth mindset that I think is just absolutely crucial. You talked there about laughter and I wanted to go into that a little bit today too, because I heard you talking on Tiffany, our friend Tiffany's podcast, and you were talking about how important laughter is for the body, for our minds, for our— and if we laugh a lot, we're less likely to fall victim to the whole adult way of being, which is sometimes pretty cynical and miserable. When you think, what is it? Kids laugh something like 70 times a day and adults laugh I think, six times a day or some statistic. Do you want to elaborate on that a little bit? Craig: Well, I used to sit down with you know, I don't do much one-on-one coaching anymore, just because I do other stuff. I would sit with people and go, ‘Alright, tell me about your exercise plan and blah, blah, blah. Tell me about your career plan, blah, blah, blah. Tell me about your financial plan, blah, blah, blah.' Tell me about, you know, whatever. And they have systems and programs and plans for everything.  I would say to them, 'Do you like fun?' And they're like, they look at me like I was a weirdo. 'What do you mean?' I go, 'Well, what do you mean, what do I mean? Like, do you like having fun?' And they're like, very seriously, like, 'Well, of course, everyone likes having fun.' I go, 'Great. What's your fun plan?' And they go, 'What?' I go, 'What's your fun— like, is laughing and having fun important to you?' 'Yeah, yeah.' 'Okay, what's your fun plan?'  They literally, like this idea of just integrating things into my life, which are for no reason other than to laugh and to have fun. Not to be productive and efficient and to tick more boxes and create more income and elevate output and tick fucking boxes and hit KPIs and you know, just to be silly, just to laugh like a dickhead, just to hang out with your mates or your girlfriends, or whatever it is. Just to talk shit, just to, not everything needs to be fucking deep and meaningful and world-changing. Not everything. In fact, it can't, you know?  Our brain and our body and our emotional system and our nervous system and— it can't work like that we can't be elevated all the time. And so, literally when we are laughing, we're changing the biochemistry of our brain. You know, literally when we are having fun, we're impacting our immune system in a real way through that thing I've probably spoken to you about, psychoneuroimmunology, right? We're literally doing our biology good by laughing and there's got to be, for me, there's got to be, because, like you probably, I have a lot of deep and meaningful conversations with people about hard shit. Like, I'm pretty much a specialist at hard conversations. It's what I do. But, you know, and, and I work a lot, and I study a lot. Then there needs to be a valve. You can't be all of that all of the time because you're human, you're not a cyborg, you're not a robot. And this hustle, hustle, hustle, grind, work harder, sleep less, you can, you know, you can sleep when you're dead, it's all bullshit. Because, also, yeah, I want to learn and grow and evolve, and I want to develop new skills. But you know what, I want to also, in the moment, laugh at silly shit. I want to be happy and I want to hang out with people I love and I want to be mentally and emotionally and spiritually nourished.  Like, it's not just about acquiring knowledge and accumulating shit that you're probably not going to use. It's also about the human experience now. This almost sounds contradictory. But because of course, we want a future plan and we want goals and all of those, but we're never going to live in the present because when we get there, it's not the present. It's just another installment of now. So when next Wednesday comes, it's not the future, it's now again, because life is never-ending now, right?  It's like you only like, live— living is a present tense verb. You can't living in the future, and you can't live in the future. You cannot. Yes, I know, this gets a little bit, what's the word existential, but the truth is that, yeah, we need to— well, we don't, we can do whatever we want. But I believe we need to be stimulated so we're learning and growing, and we're doing good stuff for our brain and good stuff for our body. But also that we are giving ourselves a metaphoric hug, and going, 'It's all right to lie on your bed and watch Netflix, as long as it's not 20 hours a day, five days a week,' you know. It's okay to just laugh at silly stuff. It's okay, that there's no purpose to doing this thing other than just joy and enjoyment, you know.  I think that people like you and me who are, maybe we would put ourselves in the kind of driven category, right? You and I are no good at this. Like, at times, having fun and just going, ‘I'm going to do fuck all today.' Because the moment that we do sometimes we start to feel guilty and we start to be like, 'Fuck, I'm not being productive. I've got to be productive.' That, in itself, is a problem for high performance. Like, fuck your high performance, and fuck your productivity today. Be unproductive, be inefficient, and just fucking enjoy it, you know, not— because in a minute, we're going to be dead. We're going to go, 'But fuck, I was productive. But I had no fun, I never laughed, because I was too busy being important.' Fuck all that. Lisa: I think both of us have probably come a long way around finding that out. I mean, I used to love reading fiction novels, and then I went, ‘Oh, I can't be reading fiction novels. I've got so many science books that I have to read.' Here I am, dealing with insomnia at two o'clock in the morning reading texts on nitric oxide, you know. It is this argument that goes on, still in my head if there was an hour where you weren't learning something, you know, I can't. Because I know that if I go for a big drive or something, and I have to travel somewhere, or going for a long run or something, I've probably digested a book on that road trip or three, or 10 podcasts or something and I've actually oh, I get to the end and I'm like, ‘Well, I achieved something.' I've got my little dopamine hits all the way through.  Now I've sort of come to also understand that you need this time out and you need to just have fun. I'm married to this absolute lunatic of a guy called Haisely O'Leary, who I just love, because all day every day, he is just being an idiot. In the best sense of the word. I come out and I'm grumpy and you know, had a hard day and I'm tired, I'm stressed, and I come out and he's doing a little dance, doing some stupid meme or saying some ridiculous thing to me. I'm just like, you know, I crack up at it. That's the best person to have to be around because they keep being—and I'm like, ‘Come on, stop being stupid, you should be doing this and you shouldn't be doing that.' Then I hear myself, and I'm like, ‘No, he's got it right.' Craig: Well, I think he does, in some ways, you know. It's not about all, it's not about one or the other, it's about— and it's recognising that if I look after my energy, and my emotional system, and all of that, I'll get more done in 8 hours than 12 hours when I'm not looking after myself. So more is not better, necessarily. In fact, often, more is not better; sometimes, more is worse. So there's a difference between volume of work and output and quality of work. Also, you know, quality of experience.  I wrote a little thing yesterday, just talking on social media about the fact that I, like all of the things that I do, even study, although it's demanding, but I enjoy it. My job, you know, like, right now you and I do podcasts. I do seven podcasts a week, apart from the ones like this, where I'm being interviewed by someone else, or spoken to by somebody else. My life is somewhat chaotic, but I don't really, in terms of having a ‘job'. Well, one, I don't have a job. I haven't had a job since I was 26. Two, I don't really feel a sense of work, like most people do.  Like the other night, I did a gig. I don't know if you, if I posted a little thing about this on Insta, and I was doing a talk for Hewlett Packard in Spain. Now, how cool is the world? Right? So I'm talking here, right here in my house, you can see, obviously, your listeners can't. But this is not video, is it? Just us? I wish I knew that earlier. Sorry, everyone, I would have brushed my hair. But anyway, you should see my hair by the way. I look like bloody Doc from Back to the Future. Anyway, but I'm sitting in here, I'm sitting in the studio, and I'm about to talk to a few hundred people in Spain, right, which is where, that's where they're all— that's where I was dealing with the people who are organising me to speak.  Just before I'm about to go live at 5:30, the lady who had organised me was texting me. So it's on Zoom. There's already a guy on the screen speaking and then lots of little squares of other humans. I said to her, ‘How many?' and said, ‘You know, like a few 100.' I said, ‘Cool.' I go, ‘Everyone's in Spain,' and she goes, ‘No, no, we're in Spain, but the audience is around the world.' And I go, ‘Really? How many countries?' She goes, ‘38.' I'm sitting here and I'm thinking, I'm wearing a black t-shirt. I'm wearing my camo shorts. I've got bare feet. I'm talking to hundreds of humans from this big organisation in 38 countries, and I'm talking about the stuff that I am passionate about, right? I don't have to do any prep, because it's my default setting. I'm just talking. I had to talk for an hour and a half about high performance. Well, giddy up, that's like an hour and a half of breathing. You know?  I just had such fun, and I had this moment, Lisa, halfway through, I don't know, but about halfway through, where I'm like, I remember growing up in a paradigm where pretty much when I was a kid everyone went and got a job and you went, you became a cop or you sold clothes, or you're a bricky or sparky or you're some kind of tradie. A few of my super smart friends went to university. That was way over my head, I'm like, ‘Fuck university.' But there was literally about 50 jobs in the world. You know, it's like there was only 50 jobs, and everyone or nearly everyone fitted into one of those 50. There was a few other ones but for the most part, nearly everyone fitted into about 50 jobs. I'm sitting there going— I won't say what but I'm earning pretty good money. I'm sitting in bare feet in my house talking to humans around the world about this stuff that I want to tell everyone about anyway.  I do it for free on my podcast and your podcast and I do it anyway. I have this great time, it's a really good experience. Then I finish at 7 pm. Then I walk 15 feet into the kitchen and put the kettle on and check my messages.  Lisa: No commuting, no travelling, no flying. Craig: I'm like, ‘How is this a job?' I'm like, ‘How is this real?' ‘This is a scam. I'm scamming everybody.' Like, how great is 2021? I know there's a lot of shit going on and I'm not trying to be insensitive, and it's smashed my business too. All of my live events for 2020 got kicked in the dick in two weeks, right? I got financially annihilated, but you just go, ‘Oh well, improvise, adapt, overcome and figure shit out.' But, I think when you can have it and a lot of people and it's a very well-worn kind of idea. But when you're, what you love, and what you're curious about, and how you make a few bucks, when that can all collide, then life is a different thing. Then there's not work and life, there's just life.  You know, and so when we talk about this idea of work-life balance, you know, it's like the old days that talk about that a lot. And it's like, almost like there was some seesaw, some metaphoric seesaw with work on one side and life on the other. And when you get balance like that— because what happens, think about this, if we're just basing it on numbers, like all 40 hours of work versus however many hours of non-work or however many hours of recreation and recovery. But if you're doing even 20 hours of a job that you hate, that's going to fuck you up. That's gonna, that's gonna mess with you physically, mentally, and emotionally. That's going to be toxic; that's going to be damaging; that's going to be soul-destroying, versus something else like me studying 40 hours a week, working 40, 50 hours a week doing 90 in total, depending on the week and loving it, and loving it. And going, ‘I feel better than I've ever felt in my life.'  I still train every day, and I still, I live 600-800 metres from the beach, I still walk to the beach every day, you know. And I still hang out with my friends. You know, it's like, it doesn't have to be this cookie-cutter approach. The beauty I think of life, with your food, with your lifestyle, with your career, with your relationships with the way that you learn, like the way that you do business, everything now is so much more flexible, and optional than any time ever before that we can literally create our own blueprint for living. Lisa: Yeah. And then it's not always easy. And sometimes it takes time to get momentum and stuff. Being, both you and I have both said before we're unemployable. Like, I'm definitely not someone you want to employ, because I'm just always going to run my own ship. I've always been like that, and that's the entrepreneurial personality. So not everyone is set up for that personality-wise. So you know, we're a certain type of people that likes to run in a certain type of way. And we need lots of other people when doing the other paths.  There is this ability now to start to change the way you think about things. And this is really important for people who are unhappy in where they're at right now. To think, ‘Hang on a minute. I've been I don't know, policeman, teacher, whatever you've been, I don't want to be there anymore. Is there another me out there? Is there a different future that I can hit?' The answer is yes, if you're prepared to put in the work, and the time, and the effort, the looking at understanding and learning, the change, being adaptable, the risk-taking, all of those aspects of it. Yes, but there is ways now that you can do that where they weren't 30 years ago, when I came out of school I couldn't be, I was going to be an accountant. Can you imagine anything worse than that?  Craig: Hi, hi. Shout out to all our account listeners, we love you and we need you. Lisa: I wasn't that— Academically that's I was good at it. But geez, I hated it. And I did it because of parental pushing direction. Thank goodness, I sort of wake up to that. And you know, after three years. I had Mark Commander Mark Devine on the show. He's a Navy SEAL, man. You have to have him on the show. I'll hook you up. He's just a buck. He became an accountant before he became a Navy SEAL and now he's got the best of both worlds really, you know, but like you couldn't get more non-accountant than Mark Devine. We all go into the things when we leave school that we think we're meant to be doing. And they're not necessarily— and I think you know, the most interesting 50 year-olds still don't know what the hell they want to be when they grow up. Just interrupting the program briefly to let you know that we have a new Patron program for the podcast. Now, if you enjoy Pushing the Limits, if you get great value out of it, we would love you to come and join our Patron membership program. We've been doing this now for five and a half years and we need your help to keep it on air. It's been a public service free for everybody, and we want to keep it that way. But to do that we need like-minded souls who are on this mission with us to help us out. So if you're interested in becoming a patron for Pushing the Limits podcast, then check out everything on www.patron.lisatamati.com. That's P-A-T-R-O-N dot lisatamati.com. We have two Patron levels to choose from. You can do it for as little as $7 a month, New Zealand, or $15 a month if you really want to support us. So we are grateful if you do. There are so many membership benefits you're going to get if you join us. Everything from workbooks for all the podcasts, the strength guide for runners, the power to vote on future episodes, webinars that we're going to be holding, all of my documentaries and much, much more. So check out all the details: patron.lisatamati.com. And thanks very much for joining us. You know, I'm still in that camp. Craig: You raise a really interesting point too, and that is programming and conditioning. And, you know, because we all grow up being programmed, one way or consciously or not, we grow— if you grow up around people, you're being programmed. So that's not a bad thing. That's an unavoidable human thing. So, situation, circumstance, environment, school, family, friends, media, social media, all of that stuff shapes the way that we see the world and shapes the way that we see ourselves.  When you grow up in a paradigm that says, ‘Okay, Lisa, when you finish school, you have to go to university, or you have to get a job, or you have to join the family business, or you have to work on our farm,' or whatever it is, you grow up in that. You're taught and told and trained. And so you don't question that, you know. And for me, I grew up in the 70s, I finished in the 80s. I finished school in 1981. And I grew up in the country, and most people go to trade or most people worked in logging or on a farm or— and I would say about five in 100 of the kids that I did— by the way, doing year 12 was a pretty big deal in that time. ‘Geez, are you a brainiac?' Definitely wasn't a brainiac. But year 12 is a big thing now. Now, even if you have an undergrad degree that it's almost nothing really enough. It's like, you kind of got to go get honours, or masters or maybe even a PhD down the track. And that landscape has really changed. So it's just changing again to— you know, and I think to become aware— like this is for me, I love it; this is my shit; this is what I love— is starting to become aware of our lack of awareness. And starting to become aware of my own programming and go, ‘Oh, I actually think this. Why not? Because this is how I naturally think about, because this is how I've been trained to think about work. I've been trained to or programmed to think this way about money, or relationships, or marriage, or eating meat, or being a Catholic or being an atheist or voting liberal law,' or whatever it is, right.  Not that any of those things are good or bad, but it's not about how I eat or how I vote or how I worship. It's about how I think. And is this my thinking? Or is this just a reflection of their thinking, right? So when we open the door on metacognition now we start to become aware of our own stories, and where they come from. And this is where I think we really start to take control of our own life, and our own present, and our own future that doesn't exist, by the way, but it will, but it won't be the present.  Then, we start to write our own story with our own voice, not our parents' voice, not our friends', not our peers' voice, you know. And we're always going to be influenced by other people. Of course. Just like people are influenced by you and your podcast, and your stories, and your thinking, and your lessons for them. They're influenced. But I always say to people, ‘Don't believe me because you like me. Listen to me, if you like me and consider what I say. If what I say sounds reasonable for you, maybe a good idea to test drive, take that idea for a test drive, and see if that works for you, because it might not.' Right?  I think, I really encourage people to learn for themselves and to listen to their own internal wisdom that's always talking. So listen to smart people. I don't know if Lisa and I are in that category, Lisa is, listen to her. But at the same time, do your own, learning through exploration and trial and error, and personal kind of curiosity and drive.  For me, I opened my first gym at 26; first personal training centre in Australia, there weren't any. I'd never done a business course, I've never done an admin course, I knew nothing about marketing. I knew nothing about employees. I knew nothing. But I learned more in one year than I would say, most people would learn in five years at university studying business, because I was in the middle of it, and I was going to sink or swim. So in one year, I started a business and I acquired overwhelming knowledge and skill because I had to, because of the situation. But that was all learning through doing.  The way that you've learned, you know you said earlier that, like, a lot of people think that they're not academic; therefore, they're not smart. Some of the smartest people I've ever met, and I don't— and this not being patronising, but like, mind-blowingly brilliant, how they think, live outside of academia. One of the reasons some people are so brilliant outside of academia is because they're not forced into an echo chamber of thought. They're living outside the academic paradigm, where we're not trying to restrict how you think or write or speak. There are no rules out here. So there's no intellectual inhibition.  Lisa: Yeah, I love that. Craig: When you do a PhD, like me, and I can separate the two, thankfully. But there's a way of communicating and writing in PhD land, which is incredibly restrictive because of the scientific process, which is fine, I get that. But it's having an awareness of— this is what I'm often talking to my supervisors about is, yes, I'm studying this thing, which is deep, deep neuropsychology, and everything, the way that you do your research, get your data or interpret your data. The whole process of creating new science, which is what you're doing as a PhD, creating, bringing something new into the world. That's one thing. But you write your journal articles, which is my PhD process, you get them, hopefully, you get them published in academic resources and magazines. But then, I don't want that to be it. I'm going to write a book when I finish about all of my research totally in layman's terms so that people can use the knowledge, so that people can— because that's the value.  For me handing in some papers and going, ‘Oh, Craig Harper is an academically published author.' That's cool, but it's not— and I'm so respectful of people who have had hundreds of things published, but that doesn't blow my socks off. I'm not really— like that's a real, you really hang your hat on that in academia. Oh, how many things he or she had published, publications, which is cool. They're all smarter than me. But I'm not. I'm like, yeah, that that's cool. But I want to connect with the masses, not the few. Also, by the way, people who read academic papers, they raise it— they're reading it generally, just like I am right now, for a specific reason which relates to their own research. There ain't too many people like you. You're one of the rare ones who just thumb through fucking academic journals to make your life better. Lisa: Yeah. And it's just some real goals. So you've got the wisdom of having lived outside of academia and being a pracademic, as Paul Taylor says, and then actually seeing the pre— and this is a discussion that I had when I was talking to someone about doing a PhD and they say, ‘But then you're going to become a part of the establishment, and you're going to be forced into this box.' And I said, ‘No, not necessarily because it's— I can see where you're coming from. But you can take that, because you have that maturity and that life experience and you can fit yourself into the box that you have to fit into in order to get those things done. That research done, but you don't have to stay there.'  That's what you know, one of my things has been, I don't want to spend however many years doing a PhD, and then that's not out on the world. To me that that needs to be taken out of the academic journals, wherever you go to publish, and then put out into a book or something that where it's actually shared, like you say, with the masses, because otherwise, it just collects dust like your MA does, or your whatever, you know, that sits on your bookshelf, and how you got hey, your exam your piece of paper, but you didn't actually do anything with it.  Of course, lots of people do their thing, they're going like they're in research, and they're furthering research and so on. But I— my approach, I think yours is too, is to be able to communicate that information that you've learned, and then share it with everyone, so that they can actually benefit from it, and not just the people that are in academia. The other thing I see after interviewing hundreds of doctors and scientists and people is that they are, actually, the more specialised they are, the more inhibited they are by what they can and can't say.  While they need to be doing that because they need to protect what they are doing in their studies and what they're allowed to and what they're not allowed to do and say, it also is very inhibiting, and they don't get the chance to actually express what they would actually like to say. That's a bit of a shame, really, because you don't get to hear the real truth in the qualifying everything flat stick. Craig: I reckon you're exactly right. But they don't need to be that. And the reason that a lot of academics are like that is because they get their identity and sense of self-worth from being an academic. They're way more worried about three of their peers hearing something that might not be 100% accurate, and then being reprimanded or, rather than just going— look, I always say to my academic, super academic friends, when I talk with them, not everything that comes out of your mouth needs to be research-based. You can have an idea and an opinion. In fact, I want to hear your ideas and opinions. Lisa: You're very educated. Craig: You know, that's the— and as for the idea of you becoming an academic, No, you go, you do your thing you study, you learn the protocol, the operating system, and you do that you go through that process, but you're still you. Right, and there's— you and I both know, there are lots of academics who have overcome that self-created barrier like Andrew Huberman.  Lisa: Yeah, who we love. Craig: Who we love, who, for people listening, he's @hubermanlab on Insta, and there's quite a few academics now, like the one that I spoke on before, on Joe Rogan. She's a Harvard professor, she's a genius, and she's just having a— it's a three-hour conversation with Rogan, about really interesting stuff.  There's been a bit of a shift, and there is a bit of a shift because people are now, the smart academics, I think, are now starting to understand that used the right way, that podcasts and social media more broadly, are unbelievably awesome tools to share your thoughts and ideas and messages. By the way, we know you're a human. If you get something wrong, every now and then, or whatever, it doesn't matter. Lisa: Well, we'll all get, I mean, you watch on social media, Dr Rhonda Patrick, another one that I follow? Do you follow her? Fantastic lady, you know, and you watch some of their feeds on social media, and they get slammed every day by people who pretending to be bloody more academic than her. That just makes me laugh, really. I'm just like, wow, they have to put up with all of that. The bigger your name and the more credibility you have as a scientist, the more you have to lose in a way.  You know, even David Sinclair another you know, brilliant scientists who loves his work. And I love the fact that he shared us with, you know, all his, all his research in real-time, basically, you know, bringing it out in the book Lifespan, which you have to read, in getting that out there in the masses, rather than squirrelling it away for another 20 years before it becomes part of our culture, and part of our clinical usage. We ain't got time for that. We have to, we're getting old now. I want to know what I need to do to stop that now. Thanks to him, you know, I've got some directions to show them. Whether he's 100% there, and he's got all the answers? No. But he's sharing where we're at from the progress. Science by its very nature is never finished. We never have the final answer. Because if someone thinks they do, then they're wrong, because they're not, we are constantly iterating and changing, and that's the whole basis of science. Craig: Well just think about the food pyramid. That was science for a few decades. Lisa: Lots of people still believe that shit. That's the scary thing because now that's filtering still down into the popular culture, that that's what you should be doing, eating your workbooks and God knows what. This is the scary thing, that it takes so long to drip down to people who aren't on that cutting edge and staying up with the latest stuff, because they're basically regurgitating what there was 20 years ago and not what is now.  Now Craig, I know you've got to jump off in a second. But I wanted to just ask one more question, if I may, we're completely different. But I want to go there today because I'm going through this bloody shingles thing. Your mate Johny that you train, and who you've spoken about on the last podcast, who had a horrific accident and amazingly survived, and you've helped him, and he's helped you and you've helped him learn life lessons and recover, but he's in constant chronic pain.  I'm in constant chronic pain now, that's two and a half weeks. For frick's sake, man, I've got a new appreciation of the damage that that does to society. I just said to my husband today, I've been on certain drugs, you know, antivirals, and in pain medication. I can feel my neurotransmitters are out of whack. I can feel that I'm becoming depressed. I have a lot of tools in my toolbox to deal with this stuff, and I am freely sharing this because what I want you to understand is when you, when you're dealing with somebody who is going through chronic pain, who has been on medications and antibiotics, and God knows whatever else, understanding the stuff that they're going through, because I now have a bit of a new appreciation for what this much of an appreciation for someone like Johnny's been through. What's your take on how pain and all this affects the neurotransmitters in the drugs? Craig: Do you know what? Lisa: You got two minutes, mate. Craig: I'm actually gonna give you I'm gonna hook you up with a friend of mine. His name is Dr Cal Friedman. He is super smart, and he specialises in pain management, but he has a very different approach, right? He's a medical doctor, but look, in answer to, I talked to Johnny about the pain a bit, and we have, we use a scale, obviously 10 is 10. 0 is 0. There's never a 0. Every now and then it's a 1 or 2, but he's never pain-free. Because he has massive nerve damage. And sometimes, sometimes he just sits down in the gym, and he'll just, I'll get him to do a set of something, and he'll sit down and I just see this, his whole face just grimaces. He goes, ‘Just give me a sec.' His fist is balled up. He goes, sweat, sweat. I go, ‘What's going on, mate?' He goes, ‘It feels like my leg, my whole leg is on fire.'  Lisa: Yeah. I can so relate to that right now.  Craig: Literally aren't, like, burning, like excruciating. I don't think there's any, I mean, obviously, if there was we'd all be doing it. There is no quick fix. There is no simple answer. But what he has done quite successfully is changed his relationship with pain. There is definitely, 100% definitely, a cognitive element to, of course, the brain is, because the brain is part of the central nervous system. Of course, the brain is involved. But there's another element to it beyond that, right.  I'm going to tell you a quick story that might fuck up a little bit of Dr Cal, if you get him on. He has done a couple of presentations for me at my camps. He's been on my show a little bit. But he told this story about this guy at a construction site that was working and he had a workplace accident. And he, a builder shot a three-inch nails through his boots, through his foot. Right? So the nail went through his foot, through the top of the leather, and out the sole, and he was in agony, right? He fell down, whatever and he's just rolling around in agony and his mates, they didn't want to take anything off because it was through the boot, through his foot.  They waited for the ambos to get there, and they gave him the green whistle. So you know that whatever that is, the morphine didn't do anything, he was still in agony. He was in agony. Anyway, they get him into the back of the ambulance and they cut the boot off. And the nail has gone between his big toe and second toe and didn't even touch his foot.  Lisa: Oh, wow. In other words, psychologically—  Craig: There was no injury. But the guy was literally in excruciating pain, he was wailing. And they gave him treatment, it didn't help. He was still in pain. So what that tells us— Lisa: There is an element of—  Craig: What that tells us is our body can, our mind can create real, not perceived, but real pain in your body. And again, and this is where I think we're going in the future where we start to understand, if you can create extreme pain in your body where there is no biological reason, there is no actual injury, there's no physical injury, but you believe there's an injury, now you're in agony.  I think about, and there's a really good book called Mind Over Medicine by a lady called Lissa Rankin, which we might have spoken about. L-I-S-S-A, Lissa Rankin, Mind Over Medicine. What I love about her is, she's a medical doctor, and she gives case after case after case of healing happening with the mind, where people think placebos and no-cebos, people getting sick, where they think they're getting something that will make them sick, but it's nothing, they actually make themselves sick. And conversely, people getting well, when they're not actually being given a drug. They're being given nothing, but they think it's something. Even this, and this is fascinating, this operation, pseudo-operation I did with people where—  Lisa: Yeah, I read that one. I read that study. Craig: Amazing. Craig: Oh, yeah, it's look, pain is something that even the people who are experts in it, they don't fully understand. Lisa: Well, I just like, if I can interrupt you there real briefly, because I've been studying what the hell nerve pain, and I'm like, my head, my sores are starting to heal up right. So in my head, I'm like ‘Whoa, I should be having this pain, I'm getting more pain from the burning sensation in my legs and my nerves because it's nerve pain.' So I read somewhere that cryotherapy was good. So in the middle of the night, when I'm in really bad pain, instead of lying there and just losing my shit, and have I now have been getting up every night and having two or three cold ice-cold showers a night, which probably not great for my cortisol bloody profile, but it's, I'm just targeting that leg. That interrupts the pain sensation for a few minutes.  What I'm trying to do as I go, I'm trying to go like, can I—am I getting pain because my brain is now used to having pain? Is it sending those messages, even though there's no need, the sores are healing?  Craig: That is possible. Lisa: Am I breaking? And I can break the pain for about 10 minutes, and then it will come back in again. But I'm continuing on with it, that idea that I can interrupt that pain flow. Then of course, during the breathe in, the meditation, the stuff and sometimes you just lose your shit and you lose it, and then you just start crying, ‘Mummy, bring me some chicken soup' type moments. But it's really interesting. I mean, I just like to look at all these shit that we go from and then say, ‘Well, how can I dissect this and make this a learning curve?' Because obviously, there's something wrong, but I just, I feel for people that are going through years of this. Craig: It's, yeah, I'm the same I feel. Sometimes I work with people, where I work with and as do you, I work with a lot of people who have real problems. I don't have any problems. I mean, they have real problems. And I'm, despite my appearance, I'm quite, I'm very compassionate. It's hard for me because I, it upsets me to see people in pain. I feel simultaneously sad and guilty. How do I deserve this? But it just is what it is. But people like John and a lot of the people that I've worked with and you've worked with, you know, people like that inspire me.  I mean, they're— I don't find typical heroes inspirational. They don't really inspire me like the people we normally hold up as, I mean, well done. I think they're great, but they don't inspire me. People who inspire me or people who really, how the fuck are you even here? How do you turn up? He turns up. He's actually in hospital right now because he's got a problem that's being fixed. But, and he's in and out of hospital all of the time. And then he turns up, he hugs me and he goes, ‘How are you?' I go, ‘I'm good.' He goes, ‘Now look at me.' So I look at him. And he goes, ‘How are you really?' And I go, ‘I'm good.' This is the guy who—  Lisa: Who's dealing with so much. I've got a friend, Ian Walker8, who I've had on the show, too, so he got hit by a truck when he was out cycling, I think it was years and years ago. He ended up a paraplegic. And then he recovered, he didn't recover, he's still in a wheelchair, but he was out racing his wheelchair, he did wheelchair racing, and he's part of our club and stuff. And then he got hit by another truck, now he's a quadriplegic.  This guy, just, he is relentless in his attitude, like he is, and I've seen him dragging himself like with his hands because he's got access now to his hands again. After working for the last couple of years, and he kind of, on a walker frame thing, dragging himself two steps and taking a little video of him, dragging his feet, not the feet out, working, they're just being dragged. But the relentless attitude of the guy, I'm just like, ‘You're a fricking hero. You're amazing. Why aren't you on everybody magazine cover? Why aren't you like, super famous?' Those people that really flip my boat. Craig: Yeah. And I

The legendary David Bowie finally makes his 'My Classic Album' debut courtesy of Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen. Phil joins Mike on this episode to discuss Bowie's celebrated album 'Aladdin Sane'. With a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame career of his own, Phil reveals the impact David Bowie had on him in his formative years and how this album set him on his own musical journey... and of course with Mike being such a huge Def Leppard fan he couldn't resist some chat about 'Hysteria' and beyond! In Phil's opinion, how does 'Aladdin Sane' improve on Bowie's breakthrough 'The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars'?  Why did Def Leppard choose to cover 'Drive In Saturday' for their 2006 covers album 'Yeah!'? What unique Bowie recording was Phil's band mate Joe Elliott able to give to the man himself? PLUS: Hear a preview of some great episodes coming this summer on 'My Classic Album' including conversations with Ron 'Bumblefoot' Thal and Riva Taylor! An unmissable episode of 'My Classic Album'. For more information on the show: Head over to www.myclassicalbum.co.uk Like us on Facebook at 'My Classic Album with Mike Norris' Follow us on Instagram @myclassicalbumpodcast Or on Twitter @mca_podcast   Music Credits: 'This Is Rock' by Silvia Marchese All music rights reserved to their respective owners.

Each year at Adweek, we select our Creative 100—a celebration of today's most fascinating and enviable creative professionals across categories like agencies, media, influencers, and many more. However, our editors never honor the same person twice, guaranteeing that each year's list offers a topical array of names you should know. This week on 'Yeah, That's Probably an Ad,' we're joined by streaming editor Kelsey Sutton, creative editor Shannon Miller, and Europe bureau chief Stephen Lepitak to chat about some of the big names on the list.

Do you feel like you're nowhere near your goals? Do you want something so badly but think that it's impossible to achieve? Having goals in life gives us a sense of purpose. Whether they're for our career or relationships, goals push us to give our best. However, we sometimes set too many goals and find ourselves stuck. We can also feel discouraged from pursuing our dreams because we subject ourselves to other people’s standards. But while our plans may sometimes seem impossible, we have everything we need. If you can stay determined and learn how to prioritise, we can have our breakthrough. In this episode, Dr John Demartini joins us to talk about living your best life by structuring it. Learn how to prioritise and you can achieve anything. He shares the philosophy of the Breakthrough Experience, which has miraculously helped thousands of people reach their goals. John also discusses how to make decisions based on priorities, not emotions and instincts. If you want to learn how to prioritise and stick to your top priorities, then this episode is for you.   Get Customised Guidance for Your Genetic Make-Up For our epigenetics health program all about optimising your fitness, lifestyle, nutrition and mind performance to your particular genes, go to  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/epigenetics-and-health-coaching/.   Customised Online Coaching for Runners CUSTOMISED RUN COACHING PLANS — How to Run Faster, Be Stronger, Run Longer  Without Burnout & Injuries Have you struggled to fit in training in your busy life? Maybe you don't know where to start, or perhaps you have done a few races but keep having motivation or injury troubles? Do you want to beat last year’s time or finish at the front of the pack? Want to run your first 5-km or run a 100-miler? ​​Do you want a holistic programme that is personalised & customised to your ability, your goals and your lifestyle?  Go to www.runninghotcoaching.com for our online run training coaching.   Health Optimisation and Life Coaching If you are struggling with a health issue and need people who look outside the square and are connected to some of the greatest science and health minds in the world, then reach out to us at support@lisatamati.com, we can jump on a call to see if we are a good fit for you. If you have a big challenge ahead, are dealing with adversity or are wanting to take your performance to the next level and want to learn how to increase your mental toughness, emotional resilience, foundational health and more, then contact us at support@lisatamati.com.   Order My Books My latest book Relentless chronicles the inspiring journey about how my mother and I defied the odds after an aneurysm left my mum Isobel with massive brain damage at age 74. The medical professionals told me there was absolutely no hope of any quality of life again, but I used every mindset tool, years of research and incredible tenacity to prove them wrong and bring my mother back to full health within 3 years. Get your copy here: https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/books/products/relentless. For my other two best-selling books Running Hot and Running to Extremes chronicling my ultrarunning adventures and expeditions all around the world, go to https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/books.   Lisa’s Anti-Ageing and Longevity Supplements  NMN: Nicotinamide Mononucleotide, a NAD+ precursor Feel Healthier and Younger* Researchers have found that Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide or NAD+, a master regulator of metabolism and a molecule essential for the functionality of all human cells, is being dramatically decreased over time. What is NMN? NMN Bio offers a cutting edge Vitamin B3 derivative named NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) that is capable of boosting the levels of NAD+ in muscle tissue and liver. Take charge of your energy levels, focus, metabolism and overall health so you can live a happy, fulfilling life. Founded by scientists, NMN Bio offers supplements that are of highest purity and rigorously tested by an independent, third party lab. Start your cellular rejuvenation journey today. Support Your Healthy Ageing We offer powerful, third party tested, NAD+ boosting supplements so you can start your healthy ageing journey today. Shop now: https://nmnbio.nz/collections/all NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 250mg | 30 capsules NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 500mg | 30 capsules 6 Bottles | NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 250mg | 30 Capsules 6 Bottles | NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 500mg | 30 Capsules Quality You Can Trust — NMN Our premium range of anti-ageing nutraceuticals (supplements that combine Mother Nature with cutting edge science) combat the effects of aging, while designed to boost NAD+ levels. Manufactured in an ISO9001 certified facility Boost Your NAD+ Levels — Healthy Ageing: Redefined Cellular Health Energy & Focus Bone Density Skin Elasticity DNA Repair Cardiovascular Health Brain Health  Metabolic Health   My  ‘Fierce’ Sports Jewellery Collection For my gorgeous and inspiring sports jewellery collection ‘Fierce’, go to https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/lisa-tamati-bespoke-jewellery-collection.   Here are three reasons why you should listen to the full episode: Learn about the Breakthrough Experience and how it has changed thousands of lives. Discover how to prioritise and determine your top priorities. John shares his secret to retaining Information in the quickest way possible.   Episode Highlights [05:00] About John Dr John is an educator, researcher and writer. He has spent over 48 years helping people maximise their potential. John wanted to know what allows people to do extraordinary things. That's why he distilled information from great minds throughout history. He made them into practical things that people today can use.  John had speech and learning challenges as a kid. At a doctor’s recommendation, his parents took him out of school and put him into sports. After having a near-death experience at 17, Paul Bragg inspired John to overcome his learning problems. With the help of his mom, he eventually learned how to read.  Listen to the full episode to learn more about John's inspiring story! [15:42] How Surfing Changed John’s Mindset Surfing has taught John that people are not going to excel without perseverance and commitment.  John converted his determination for surfing into persistence in reading.  [17:57] The Breakthrough Experience The Breakthrough Experience is a philosophy and program changing lives globally.  This system teaches you how to prioritise and structures life by priority. It breaks through limitations and helps achieve life goals.  John teaches people to use any experience, even challenges. These are catalysts for transformation and progress.  John has helped people learn how to prioritise to get their breakthrough experience in different areas of life. These include businesses, careers, health, relationships, among others. Lisa relates the Breakthrough Experience philosophy to when her mom had a severe aneurysm. [24:14] John Shares a Miraculous Experience At 27 years old, John handled a family with a son in a three-year coma. The family went to different hospitals in Mexico and the United States. However, they found none to help their son. They then went to John, and he thought of a maneuver to help the child. However, the treatment also came with significant risk. Listen to the full episode to find out how John helped a child get out of a three-year coma. [33:34] Jesse Billauer’s Breakthrough Experience Jesse Billauer, a surfer, decided to go to the Breakthrough Experience after a surfing accident.  At the time, he was depressed because he was physically unable to surf.  After the Breakthrough Experience, he learned how to prioritise and what his top priority was. Jesse became determined not to let anything stop him from surfing. Jesse developed a way to surf as a quadriplegic person. He taught others how to do the same.  [38:58] Herd Mentality in the Sciences New ideas are violently opposed and ridiculed. That's why people fear going against the norm. People who aim to survive follow the multitude. People who want to thrive create a new paradigm.  Each person can excel at anything if they focus on that, not on others' opinions.  [41:37] How to Prioritise John made a list of every single thing he does in a day over three months. He then placed multiple columns next to that list. The first column contains how much money each task produces per hour. The second column contains how much a job inspires him on a scale of 1-10. He also considered the cost and the time spent on each activity.  After doing that, he prioritised the activities that made thousands of dollars. He also focused on ones that scored ten on the inspiration scale.   John hired people for the low-priority tasks. This choice allowed him to be more productive in his top priorities. Within 18 months, his business increased tenfold. Listen to the full episode to learn how to prioritise and about investing in your top priority.  [56:19] How John Stays Looking Young John is almost 67 years old. However, Lisa describes him as someone who looks like a teenager. John doesn't eat junk. He drinks a lot of water, has never had coffee in his life and hasn't had alcohol in over 48 years. Doing what you love every day also slows down the aging process.  [58:03] Some Lessons from the Breakthrough Experience Nothing is missing in you. When you compare yourself to others, you'll try to live by their values or get them to live by yours. Both of these are futile.  Sticking to your values and priorities is key to resilience and success. People are different from each other, but no one is better than the other.  If you don't empower your own life, others will overpower you.   Your mission is something that you're willing to get through any means necessary. [1:06:38] How to Get Your Amygdala Under Control The amygdala is associated with emotions and the "fight-or-flight" response. Because we have neuroplasticity, we can remodel our internal system.  Perceiving challenges and feeling shame and guilt trigger an autoimmune reaction that attacks your body. Every time we choose to live by the highest priority, the amygdala calms down. The prefrontal cortex is reinforced. [1:12:03] The Mind-Body Connection Our psychological processes also affect our physiological processes.  People are used to blaming external factors. They don't take accountability for the things they experience.  John uses the example of when people get symptoms after eating unhealthy food. They don't face the fact that they brought it upon themselves.  Our bodies do an excellent job of guiding us. That's why we should learn how to listen to them. [1:18:13] The Journey to Financial Independence There is nothing evil about having money.  John believes that you can be a slave to money, or you can be a master of it.  Nothing is stopping you from doing what you love to do. [1:21:28] How to Retain Information Teaching what you've learned is the key to retention. Teaching compels your mind to organise ideas and reinforce them.  Teach the concepts as soon as you've discovered them. Don't wait until you're an expert on the subject. Resources Gain exclusive access and bonuses to Pushing the Limits Podcast by becoming a patron! You can choose between being an official or VIP patron for $7 and $15 NZD per month, respectively. Harness the power of NAD and NMN for anti-ageing and longevity with NMN Bio. Related Pushing the Limits Episodes 135: How To Make Better Decisions Consistently 183: Sirtuins and NAD Supplements for Longevity with Elena Seranova 189: Increasing Your Longevity with Elena Seranova Connect with John: Website | Facebook | Linkedin | YouTube | Instagram ‎The Demartini Show Demartini Value Determination Process The Breakthrough Experience program Join John's The Mind-Body Connection course Learn more about Jesse Billauer and his story. High Surf: The World's Most Inspiring Surfers by Tim Baker The Time Trap: The Classic Book on Time Management by Alec Mackenzie and Pat Nickerson  Brain Wash: Detox Your Mind for Clearer Thinking, Deeper Relationships, and Lasting Happiness by David and Austin Perlmutter The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing by Bronnie Ware   7 Powerful Quotes ‘I'm an educator, a researcher, a writer. I do a lot of interviews and filming for documentaries. I've been spending 48 years now on doing anything I can to help human beings maximise their potential.’ ‘I love studying and learning anything I can from those people that have done extraordinary things and then passing that on.” “I love anybody who's done something extraordinary on the planet in any field. I love devouring their journey.’ ‘No matter what the teacher was trying to do, I just couldn't read. And my teacher and my parents come to the school and said, ‘You know, your son's not able to read. He's not going to be able to write effectively’ because I wrote kind of backwards.’ ‘Well, I'm surfing the cosmic waves now. And in surfing big cosmic waves, radio waves that are big waves. Yes, that's the move from water waves into electromagnetic waves.’ ‘And so the Breakthrough Experience is about accessing that state. And breaking through the limitations that we make up in our mind and transforming whatever experiences you have into “on the way” not “in the way”.’ ‘She said that there was something that took over me, I can't describe it. It was like a very powerful feeling — like I had a power of a Mack truck. And me? I don't know how to describe it.’   About Dr John Dr John Demartini is an author, researcher, global educator and world-renowned human behaviour specialist. Making self-development programs and relationship solutions is part of his job. Among his most popular programs is the Breakthrough Experience. It is a personal development course that aims to help individuals achieve whatever goal they have. As a child, Dr John had learning challenges and could not read and write well until 18 years old. He has now distilled information from over 30,000 books across all academic disciplines and shares them online and on stage in over 100 countries.  Interested in knowing more about Dr John and his work? You may visit his website or follow him on Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube and Instagram.   Enjoyed This Podcast? If you did, be sure to subscribe and share it with your friends! Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your family and friends so they can achieve their life goals by learning how to prioritise. Have any questions? You can contact me through email (support@lisatamati.com) or find me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. For more episode updates, visit my website. You may also tune in on Apple Podcasts. To pushing the limits, Lisa   Full Transcript Of The Podcast Welcome to Pushing The Limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati, brought to you by lisatamati.com.  Lisa Tamati: Welcome back to Welcome back to Pushing the Limits. This week, I have Dr John Demartini. He is a world renowned speaker, teacher, educator, researcher, medical doctor. He's written I don't know how many books, countless, countless books. He's an incredible, incredible man who teaches literally thousands and thousands of people every year in his breakthrough experience. The information that you're going to get in this podcast could change your life. So I've given you a fair warning. He's an amazing, incredible man that, and I've talked to a lot of incredible people but this one is really next level, he started out as a big wave surfer in Hawaii, way back in the day. Even knew Laird Hamilton and people like that. Had learning disabilities and could hardly read or write, and yet managed to overcome all these things to become one of the greatest scholars that there is. He's read over 30,000 books. He has distilled the knowledge from people right through the ages, through leaders and philosophers and stoics and scientists. He's an expert in so many different areas. He teaches people in business, he teaches people how to overcome massive challenges in their life. So I really hope that you enjoy this episode. It is going to get uncomfortable in places because we’ll talk about really being accountable, really understanding our own physiology, and just so much more. An absolutely amazing interview. So I hope you enjoy it.  Before we head over to the show, just reminder, we have our patron membership for the podcast Pushing the Limits. If you want to join our VIP tribe, we would love you to come and do that. It's about the price of a cup of coffee a month or two. If you want to join on the premium level, we would love you to come and join us. Support the show. Help us get this work out there. We are passionate about what we do. We want to change lives, we want to improve your life, we want to improve the lives of others. And we need your help to do that to keep the show going. So please, head over to patron.lisatamati.com. Check out all the premium VIP member benefits here, and support the show. Be a part of this community, be a part of this tribe. Help support us and reach out to me or the team. If you have any questions around any of the topics or any of the guests that have come up. We would love to hear from you. Any feedback is always welcome. Please always give a rating and review to the show as well on iTunes or whatever platform that you listen to. That is really, really helpful as well. We do appreciate you doing that. And as a reminder, please also check out our epigenetics program. We have a system now that can personalise and optimise your entire life to your genetics. So check out our program, what it's all about. This is based on the work of hundreds of scientists, not our work. It has been developed over the last 20 years, from 15 different science disciplines all working in collaborating together on this one technology platform that will help you understand your genes and apply the information to your life. So check that out. Go to lisatamati.com and hit the Work With Us button and you'll see their Peak Epigenetics, check out that program. And while you're there, if you're a runner, check out our Running Hot Coaching program as well. Customised, personalised training plans made specifically for you, for your goals. You get a video analysis, you get a consultation with me and it's all in a very well-priced package. So check that out at runninghotcoaching.com.  Now over to the show with Dr John Demartini. Well, Hi everyone and welcome to Pushing The Limits. Today, I am super excited for my guest. My guest is an absolute superstar. Welcome to the show. Firstly and foremostly, thank you very much for taking the time out today. Dr John, I'm just really excited to have you. Whereabouts are you sitting in the world? Dr John: I am in Houston, Texas. I'm in a hotel room in Houston, Texas, even though it shows that I've got a library.  Lisa: Yeah,I love that background. That is a fantastic background. Really great. Well, greetings to Texas and I hope that everything is going well over there for you. Today, I wanted to talk about you, your work, the breakthrough experience. Some of the learnings and the exciting mission that you've been on for now. For 47 years, I believe. Something crazy like that. So Dr John, can you just give us a little bit of a background on you and your life and what you do on a day to day basis? Big question. Dr John: I'm an educator, a researcher, a writer. I do a lot of interviews and filming for documentaries. I've been spending 48 years now, over 48 years, on doing anything I can to help human beings maximise their potential, their awareness potential, and achieve whatever it is that they're inspired to achieve. So that could be raising a beautiful family to building a massive business to becoming fortunate or celebrity, doesn't matter. It's whatever it is that inspires them. I've been studying human behaviour and anything and everything I can get my hands on for the last 48 years to assist people in mastering a lot. That's what I love doing. I do it every day. I can't think of any else I'd rather be doing. So I just do it. Lisa: It's a bit of a role model for me, Dr John, because I think what you have achieved in this time, the way you've distilled information, I mean, you've studied, last time I looked on one of your podcasts, that was over 30,000 books, probably more now. And you've distilled the information from great masters throughout history into practical things that humans today can actually benefit from. Is that a good assessment of what you basically have done? Dr John: I'm writing right now a 1200 page textbook on philosophers and great minds through the ages. I summarise it. I love studying and learning anything I can from those people that have done extraordinary things, and then passing that on. So yes. Right now, I'm actually, I just finished, I’m just finishing up Albert Einstein, which is one of my heroes. I had a dream when I was young. When I saw that E = mc² drawn on that board, I wanted to find out where that board was. I went to Princeton, and met with Freeman Dyson, who took over his position at Princeton in 1955. Spent part of the day with him and we're talking on cosmology. I wrote my formula on that same board, exactly the same place, because that was a dream that I had since I was probably 18, 19. Lisa: Wow, and you got to fulfill it and actually love it. Dr John: Yeah. Took me a bit of time. So what? But yeah, I love anybody who's done something extraordinary on the planet in any field. I love devouring their journey and their thinking. That's every Nobel Prize winner I've gone through and every great philosopher and thinker and business leader and financially or spiritually, to try to find out and distill out what is the very essence that drives human beings? And what is it that allows them to do extraordinary things? So I wanted to do that with my life. Most of the people I get in front of want to feel like they want to make a massive difference. They want to make a difference in the world. They want to do something that’s deeply meaningful, inspiring. And so yeah, we're not 'put your head in the product glue and let the glue stick' and then pass it on.  Lisa: Instead of having to reinvent the world, why not? So Dr John, can you give us a little bit of history though, because you're obviously an incredible scholar,have an incredible mind. But as a child, you struggled with learning and with reading and writing.Can you give us a little, how the heck did you go from being this kid that struggled with all of that to where you are today? One of the greatest minds out there.  Dr John:  Yeah, I definitely had some learning challenges. I had a speech challenge when I was a year and a half old to four, I had to wear buttons in my mouth and put strings in my mouth and practice using all kinds of muscles. Went to a speech pathologist. When I was in first grade. No matter what the teacher was trying to do, I just couldn't read. My teacher, and my parents would come to the school and said, 'You know, your son's not able to read. He's not going to be able to write effectively,' because I wrote kind of backwards. 'I don't think he's going to mountain and go very far in life, put him into sport.' Because I like to run. And I did sports there for a while. But then I went from baseball to surfing. I hitchhiked out to California and down Mexico and then made it over to Hawaii so I could ride big waves and I was doing big wave and stuff when I was a teenager. So I didn't have academics. I dropped out of school. I was a street kid from 13 to 18. But then right before 18 I nearly died. That's when I met Paul Bragg, who inspired me one night in a presentation. That night I got so inspired that I thought, 'Maybe I could overcome my learning problems by applying what this man just taught me. And maybe someday I could learn to read and write and speak properly.' That was such an inspiration, such a moment of inspiration that it changed the course of my life. I had to go back. And with the help of my mum, I went and got a dictionary out, started to read a dictionary and memorise 30 words a day until my vocabulary. I had to spell the word, pronounce the word, use it with a meaningful sentence, and develop a vocabulary. Eventually doing that 30 we would, we wouldn't go to bed. I didn't go to bed until I had 30 new words, really inculcated. My vocabulary grew. And I started to learn how to do the reading. It was not an easy project. But, man, once I got a hold of it, I never stopped. Lisa: And once you started to read, you didn’t stop. Dr John: I've never stopped. I've been a voluminous reader now. You know, 48 years. Lisa: That’s just incredible. Dr John: I can’t complain. Lisa: So was it a dyslexia or learning disability? I just asked because my mum was a teacher of children with dyslexia and things like that. Was there specific ways that you were able to overcome the disability so to speak? Dr John: Yeah, I just, sheer persistence and determination to want to read and learn. I remember, I took my first, I took a GED test, a general education high school equivalency test. And I guessed, literally guessed, I close my eyes. I said this little affirmation that Paul Bragg gave me that, 'I'm a genius, and I apply my wisdom.' And some miraculous thing made me pass that test. I didn't know how to read half the stuff that was on it. I just went with my intuition and guessed. And I tried to go to college, after taking that test and had the test. I failed. And I remember driving home crying because I had this idea that I was going to learn how to teach and become intelligent. Then when I got a 27, everybody else got 75 and above. I got a 27 and I thought, 'Well, there's no way it's going to work.' But then I sat there and I cried and my mum came home from shopping, and she saw me crying on the living room floor. She said, ‘Son, what happened? What's wrong?’ I said, ‘Mum, I failed the test. I guess I don't have what it takes.’ And I repeated what the first grade teacher said, 'I guess I'll never read or write or communicate effectively, or amount too much. I guess I'll go back to Hawaii and make surfboards and surf. Because I was pretty good at that.' And she said to me something that was a real mind bender. She put her hand on me and she said, ‘Son, whether you become a great teacher, philosopher and travel the world like your dream, whether return to Hawaii and ride giant waves like you've done, return to the streets and panhandle like you've done. I just want to let you know that your father and I are going to love you no matter what you do.’ Lisa: Wow, what a mum. Dr John: That was an amazing moment. When she said that, my hand went into a fist of determination. And I said to myself, ‘I'm gonna match this thing called reading and studying and learning. I'm gonna match this thing called teaching and philosophy. And I'm going to do whatever it takes, I'm going to travel whatever distance, I'm gonna pay whatever price, to give my source of love across this planet.’ I got up and I hugged her. And I said to myself, ‘I'm not gonna let any human being on the face of the earth stop me, not even myself.’ I got out of my room. And that's when I decided with her help to do the dictionary. That was an amazing turning point. Lisa: And I can feel it, the emotion and what a wonderful mum you had. I mean, what a perfect thing to say when someone's down. Dr John: It was the most. If she hadn't said that, I might’ve come back to surfing. I might  be a surfer today. Lisa: Which would have been a good thing as well, probably because surfing is great. Dr John: It didn’t make money in those days. I'm in the mid 60s and 70s, early 70s. But,, now, the guys I served with, Laird Hamilton and- Lisa: Wow. He's a hero is amazing.  Dr John: Both Ben Aipa, Gerry Lopez, and these guys, those are the guys I served with. And so those guys went on to be incredible. Lisa: I wasn't aware of that. Dr John: I lived at the same beach park in Haleiwa, where Ehukai Beach Park is, near Pipeline, between Rocky Point and Pipeline. Laird Hamilton was dropped off by his mother there and lived there on the beach. I lived up on where the park bench was. We lived right there and I saw him on the beach each morning. He was seven, I was 16. He was going on seven, I was almost 17. We live there at the same place and Bill Hamilton saw him out there and grabbed him and took him in and trained them on surfing and found his mum and then married the mum. That's how I became. I hung out with those characters. Lisa: Legends. You became a legend in this direction and they have become a legend in a different direction. Dr John: Well, there's a book out called The High Surf by Tim Baker. That’s from Australia. He wrote a book on people that rode big waves. And he said, 'I'd like to put you in there.' I said, 'Well, I didn't go on to be the superstar in that area like these other guys.' He said, 'But I want you in there because you became a legend. Lisa: Became a superstar. Dr John: Yeah Lisa: Do you think that there's, you know, I come from a surfing family. My brother's a big wave surfer in New Zealand. I've tried and failed miserably, stuck to running. I was better at it. But do you think there's a correlation between the mindset that you developed as a surfer? Because going in those big waves is scary. It's daunting. It's frightening. It's challenging. It's teaching you a lot. Is there a lot that you took from that for this journey that you've been on? Dr John: Yeah, I didn't surf anything more than 40-foot waves. So I think that was about as good as about as big as you get back in the 70s. At 70s is when I was- Lisa: Oh, just a mere 40, it’s okay. Dr John: Well, 40-foot waves was the biggest thing out in outer reef pipeline was the big thing. They hadn't had tow-in surfing yet. That was just, that wasn't begun yet. So there was that idea, we had to catch those waves. That was not easy because they're too big to catch. you got to have big long boards, and you got to really paddle to get into those waves, and it's usually too late. But I think some of those, I used to surf 11 hours a day sometimes. When you're really, really committed to doing something, that's... Einstein said perseverance is the key to making things happen and if you just stay with something. So, if you're not inspired to do something, enough to put in the hours and put in the effort, and you don't have somebody that you can bounce ideas off of, kind of mentoring you, you probably are not going to excel as much. But I did that. And then I just converted that over into breeding 18 to 20 hours a day, feeding once I learned to read, so I just and I still voluminously read I mean, I read every single day. Lisa: That is incredible. And so you've taken that big wave mindset a little bit over into something else. So obviously, everything you, do you do to the nth degree, we can probably agree on that one. Dr John: I'm surfing the cosmic waves now. And in surfing big cosmic waves, radio waves that are big waves. I move from water waves into electromagnetic waves. Lisa: Wow. Now, you run something called The Breakthrough Experience, which you've been doing now for 40 something years. This is a philosophy and a system and a program that really changes lives and has changed lives all over the planet. Can you tell us a little bit about what you've distilled from all this information that you have in your incredible mind? And what you teach in this course, and how this can actually help people? Today, right now listening to this? Dr John: Well, the breakthrough experiences, sort of my attempt to do with what that gentleman did to me when I was 17. I've done it 1121 times into that course. I keep records, and I'm a metric freak. Every human being lives by a set of priorities, a set of values, things that are most important. Lisa: Podcast life. Dr John: Welcome to it. I thought that was off, but I didn't quite get it off. But whatever is highest on the person's values, priorities, whatever is truly deeply meaningful to them, the thing that is spontaneously inspiring for them to that they can't wait to get up the morning and do.If they identify that and structure their life by priority, delegating the lower priority things and getting on with doing that, they will build momentum, incremental momentum and start to excel and build what we could say is a legacy in the world. And so, the breakthrough experience is about accessing that state, and breaking through the limitations that we make up in our mind,  transforming whatever experiences you have into 'on the way' not 'in the way.' So no matter what goes on in your life, you can use it to catalyse a transformation and movement towards what it is that you're committed to. And if you're not clear about it, we'll show you how to do it because many people subordinate to people around them. Cloud the clarity of what's really really inspiring from within them, and they let the herd instinct stop them from being heard.  I think that The Breakthrough Experiences is my attempt to do whatever I can, with all the tools that I've been blessed to gather to assist people in creating a life that is extraordinary, inspiring and amazing for them. And if I don't do whatever it takes in the program, I don't know when it's going to be. I've seen six year olds in there write books afterwards. I've seen nine year olds go on to get a deal with Disney for $2.2 million dollars. I've seen people in business break through plateaus. I’ve people have major issues with relationships break, too. I don't know what's gonna be. I've seen celebrities go to new levels. I've seen people that have health issues that heal. I mean, every imaginable thing, I’ve breaking through. I've seen it in that course. And it's the same principles applied now into different areas of life. In any other area of our life, if we don't empower, the world's going to overpower something. And I'm showing I want to show people how to not let anything on the outside world interfere with what's inside. Lisa: And you talk about, it's on the way, the challenges that we have to look at the challenges that we have and ask how is this going to actually help me get wherever I am. And this is something that I've managed to do a couple of times in my life really well, other times not so good. But where I've taken a really massive challenge, I had my own listeners, I had a mum who had a massive aneurysm five years ago, and we were told she would never have any quality of life again, massive brain damage. We know that's not happening on my watch. I'm going to, there is somebody in something in the world that can help with her. And this became my mantra that I was going to get back or die trying. That was that total dedication that I brought to her because of love. When you love someone, you're able to mobilise for the last resources that you have. And that nearly bloody killed me as far as the whole effort that went on to it, and the cost and the emotional costs, and the physical and the health and all the rest of it. It took me three years to get it back to health, full health. She's now got a full driver's license back and a full independent life back and as my wonderful mum again. And that was coming from a state of being in a vegetative state, not much over a vegetative state at least. Hardly any higher function, no speech, no move, be able to move anything. Dr John: That’s a book there. That's a book or a movie. Lisa: It's the book. Dr John: That's a book and a movie for sure. Lisa: Exactly. And this is very powerful. Because I saw this and when you're in the darkness, everybody is telling you there is no hope, there is no chance. And these are medical professionals who have been to medical school, who have a hell of a lot more authority than you. You just go, ‘No, I am not accepting it because that alternative means death, basically, decline and death in being in an institution. And that is not what I'm going to answer. I'm going to find somebody who can help me’ and I did. I found hundreds of people, actually, and this is what tipped me into doing what I'm doing now, is finding world leading experts to give me the next piece of the puzzle for her and for the people now that are following me so that I can help empower people, not to be limited by the people who tell us we can't do something. It's because that means basically they don't have the answer. Not that there is no answer, is my understanding. And they were right. It was the hardest thing I've ever done. But I did it and my mum is alive and she's well, and that book. I really want to empower people with a story. I see that same like they're obviously your passion. What you went through with your learning problems when you were young and your mum standing beside you has actually propelled you into this lifelong journey that I find absolutely fascinating because that passion, and I can see that passion in you, is still very much alive 48 years later because you're doing what your priority is. Dr John: I'm definitely doing what I love doing. It's interesting that your story reminded me of something that happened to me when I was 27. If you don't mind, I'd like to share this. So I graduated from my professional school. I had a bit of a reputation there of being kind of the taking the cream of the crop clients, patients that were turned down everywhere else. I just tackled it, see what we can do with it. And I got a family from Mexico, with a son that fell three stories off an apartment complex onto the ground on his head. He went into a coma, been in a coma for three and a half years. And the mother, they assumed he was dead a few times, but there was still a breath. There were still something. It wasn't a strong breath. You couldn't see it but you could put a mirror in front of you and get a little bit of breath out there. So he wasn't dead. And he had decerebrate rigidity. So his whole body was so rigid that when I saw him, you could lift up his feet and his whole body would rock. It was so stiff. His hands are like this. A classical decerebrate rigidity. And he had gone to, throughout different hospitals in Mexico, where he was from, and nobody checked them. They came to America, they went to the Medical Center in Houston, which is the largest Medical Center America. And they got rejected. No one would accept it. There's nothing we can do. They went out to the professional school that I'd gone to. And they said, ‘We can't do anything.’ But we know this interesting character. West Houston, if there's anybody that would try something this guy might try, who knows? And they sent him to my office. I remember when they came in, they carried him wrapped up in a white sheet, and laid him on the armrest of the chairs on my office. I looked out there and I saw this Mexican man and woman and seven or eight other kids in a family. I'm in this. At first, I didn't know what this was, this thing wrapped up in this sheet. They came down my hallway and I saw him going down the hallway. And like, ‘What on earth is this?’ Then they unveiled him in my exam room. And there was this 58 pound tube in his nose, coma case that was so stiff. It was ridiculous. I mean, he had gauze on his chin and his hand was rubbing on it and to protect the chin from having an ulcer. It had an odor to him in the head. It was just nothing. Just stare. He just sat there. But the mother and father said, ‘No, he's still alive. Please help.’ So I didn't really have much to do an exam with. So I got him, we took him in and did a film of his spine and his skull from the history. We found his foramen magnum, his skull was jammed down on a spinal cord and his spinal cord is up in his foramen magnum. This opening in the bottom of the skull. And I thought that night, when I was developing those films, and I looked at that I thought, 'I wonder what happened if I lifted that skull? If I've got that off? It could? Could something happen?' And I was scared because you just don't do that. He could die just instantly. I sent them over to this health food store to get him some liquid vitamins and minerals and amino acids to try to get nutrients in him because they're feeding him beans and rice with liquid. It was just crazy. So the next day came in. We had four doctors on a preceptorship visiting my office, one doctor that was working for me, one assistant, the seven or eight kids plus him and the mother and father in this little room. It was packed. And I said to him that I saw that on the film something that might have make him, help. I don't know, I can't guarantee it. But if we, if I did a particular manoeuvre, it might open up the brain function. And the little woman held on to her husband and she said, 'If he dies, he dies. If he lives, we rejoice. But please help us. We have nowhere else to go.' Lisa: Yeah. Wow. Dr John: She said that there was something that took over me, I can't describe it. It was like a very powerful feeling, like I had a power of a Mack truck in me. I don't know how to describe it. And I had this manoeuvre that we could do this, what they call the Chrane Condyle Lift, that can actually lift the skull up the spine. And I said to myself, if I'm not willing to have him die in my hands, I can't raise the dead with my hands as a little quote that I learned from an ancient healing philosopher. And I thought, 'Okay, we're, I'm going to take the risk, and just see what happens.' Because, I mean, I don't know what to do. I'm just gonna do it. Because I mean, they've got no place to go and I only took a rip. As I lifted that skull with this powerful movement. He came out of his coma. He came right out of the coma. He screamed, and this whining noise you couldn't. It was not coherent. It was just this whining sound. The whole family went on their knees, they were Catholic. They just went to their knees and prayed. I was blown away. I saw the four doctors one of them ran down the hallway and vomited, couldn't handle it. The other just stared. And here's this boy squirming on the table. I walked out to let the family be with the child for a minute and just sat with one of my doctors. We sat there and just cried. Because we knew that the spinal cord expressed life in the body. But we didn't know what would happen if we took the spinal cord, it just scanned off. Theoretically, it could kill you. But there was some still life in the spinal cord. Anyway, this boy went on to gain 20 pounds up to 78 pounds. We took him off the tube, we got him to move, we had everybody in the family take a joint in his body and move his joints to remobilise him. Sometimes I think we probably tore some ligaments doing it. But we got mobility. And this boy came out of it. And I have a picture here with me of the boy actually graduating from high school. Lisa: You’re kidding me? Why is this not an? What is not? Why have I never heard the story?  Dr John: I don’t get to share it too often. I didn't many years ago. I haven't practised in a long time. But all I know is that that was a moment that you just, it's probably like you had with your mum when you saw incremental progress. Lisa: Yeah. Just grind. Dr John: And I think that that's a metaphor. That's a metaphor. It doesn't matter where you've come from, doesn't matter what you're going through, doesn't matter what you've been through. What matters is you have something that you're striving for. And are you willing to do some incremental movement towards that? What else just said is, he's got a diagnosis. Diagnosis means through knowledge, supposedly, but it could also mean die to an agnosis. You don't know. Even the doctors don't know. But the reality is,  he came out of the coma. And I had over the next few months, I had some amazing cases of a boy that was blind and couldn't walk, and all of a sudden see and walked again. I had a boy that was paralysed quadriplegic, was able to walk. I mean, I had some amazing stuff happen. When you're willing to do what other people aren't willing to do, you're willing to experience when other people don't get to experience. Lisa: Yep, it is just so powerful. And I'm just absolutely blown away from that story. Because, I mean, I know with my mum who was only in a coma for three weeks, and had stroke and so on, and in the specificity and the things that I've had to deal with. The whole vestibular system being completely offline, she has like a rag doll, having to read, programming her from being a baby, basically, to being an adult, within that three year period with a body that is now like 79 years old. And the doctors going like, your brain can't change that much. And in just going, I'm going to keep going. I'm only listening to people who tell me I can do something, I'm not listening to anybody who tells me I can't do something. And this is something that I've really integrated into my entire life like as an athlete, doing stupidly long ultramarathon distances. I was always told you can't do this, and you can't do that. It's impossible. And I was like, 'We'll see.' I'm going to throw everything in it. And that was my passion at the time have now retired from doing the stupid distances because I've got other missions on in life. But whatever it is, is always the big mission. And then everybody comes up against people who tell you, you can't do it. This is one of the biggest limiting things that I see. Dr John: That's what Einstein said, greatness is automatically pounded by mediocre minds.  Lisa: Wow. Dr John: I had a boy, a boy attend my breakthrough experience, who had a surfing accident and became arms and legs not working, He could move his neck. He got a little bit of function slowly into the hand that was about it, just a tiny bit. And I remember a man wheeling him in and having them kind of strapped to a wheelchair. I knew the father and I knew his brother. There were doctors who were colleagues of mine. And they brought him, they flew him literally from Los Angeles over to Texas to come to the breakthrough experience. I remember him looking straight down really depressed, suicidal, because he was a surfer and he was on his way to being a great surfer. If he couldn't surf, he didn't want to live kind of. I remember getting on my knees and looking up at him at this chair, and I said, 'It all determines inside you what you decide. I don't know what the limit you have in your body. I don't know what you can repair. I don't know what you can do. I don't want to say you can't. But all I know is that if you're going to, you're going to have to put everything into it. You're gonna have to have no turning back kind of attitude. There's got to be a relentless pursuit of your master plan to serve.' His name is Jesse Billauer. He made a decision at the Breakthrough Experience that nothing was going to stop him from surfing again, nothing. He is really, in the room was absolutely applauding him. The before and after in that weekend was so astonishing that it was tear jerking. Well, about 17 years ago, 16 half years ago, I had the opportunity to get, I was living on the Gold Coast of Australia. I had many homes in New York and different places. But I had one in the Gold Coast of Australia in Aria, lived in the penthouse of Aria. And all of a sudden, I found in my entrance of my penthouse, which you only can get into with my key somebody from downstairs, put it in there like mail, a DVD video of a surfing movie, called Stepping Into Liquid. And when I pulled that up and put that in there, there was Jesse Billauer, surfing. He found a way of using his head muscles, and designing a special vehicle, a transport system, a surfboard. He had to have somebody take them out into the water and push him. But once he got on a wave his head movements were able to ride and he was riding like 12 foot waves, which is 20 foot face waves. He was doing that. And he was an inspiration. He became friends with Superman who had quadriplegia and they became friends and he created a foundation to do something but he taught people how to go surfing as a quadriplegic. So when the wise big enough to house take care of themselves, you've proven that in your book. What little I've done in my life compared to some of these kind of stories is just astonishing what I see sometimes people do. I mean, mind blowing stuff that people, that determination to overcome that are absolute inspirations. Inspiration is a byproduct of pursuing something that's deeply inspiring and deeply meaningful, through a challenge that people believe is not possible. That's inspiration. Lisa: That's how we grow as a human race. We have these amazing people that do incredible things. And these stories, I mean, these are stories that aren't even out there in the world, in a huge way. There are hundreds of these stories and thousands of these stories and miraculous stories. These are the things that we should be talking about. Because why are we not studying the outliers? Why are we not? When I look at my book, or my story, which I share publicly and not a single doctor that had anything to do with my mum ever asked me, 'Well, how did you do it?' Nobody is interested in why she has not taken the normal path as long gone. Nobody has asked me what did you do? People do. My audience want to know why. The people that follow me, etc. But nobody that was involved in that case. And I see that over and over again.  Dr John: It's forcing him to face their own, you might say, belief systems about what they've been taught. There's an educated awareness by the herd and then there's an innate yearning by the master. The master transcends the herd, if you will. You can be a sheep or a shepherd. The shepherd is the one that goes out and does things that the sheep are not willing to do. But then once they do it, they'll rally around it. They are there watching you to be the hero instead of becoming the hero. Lisa: Wow. And why is it in the medical fraternity that there seems to be a very big herd mentality, like no one is scared to step outside of their norms, and they get slammed. I see this in academia and in science as well, where people who have brilliant ideas and hypotheses and studies and so on, they just get slammed because it's outside of the current paradigm.  Dr John: William James, one of the founders of modern psychology, said 'To be great…' And Emerson followed in suit, 'To be greatest, to be misunderstood.’ William James basically said that the majority of people fear rejection from the multitudes because that was survival. People that are into survival follow the multitude. People that are in thrival create a new paradigm. At first they're going to be ridiculed. They're going to be violently opposed to Schopenhauer and Gandhi said, but eventually becomes self-evident. And you're either following a culture or building one. The people that do that build a new culture. They build a new culture of idea. Emerson said in his essays on circles, 'We rise up and we create a new circle of possibility. And then that becomes the new norm until somebody comes up and breaks through that concentric sphere with another circle.' It's like the four minute mile. I had a gentleman on my program the other day who is striving to be the fastest runner in the world. He's got bronze and silver medals, but he hadn't got the fastest running. And he's not stopping. He's working sometimes eight to 13 hours a day on this project. I believe that the way he's so determined to do it, and how he works on it, and he doesn't need a coach telling him what to do. He just does it. He's inspired to do it. He'll be the fastest runner, he won't stop till he's the fastest runner in the world. And that’s determination, that to be great at that one thing, find that one thing that you really target like a magnifying glass, on that you become the greatest at that thing.  Mine was human development, human behaviour. I want to have the broadest and greatest width of information about that. That's my one thing. But each individual has something that they can excel in, if they just define it, and give themselves permission at it, and say, thank you but no thank you to the opinions. The opinions are the cheapest commodities on Earth that would circulate the most as a use value. There’s ton of those. But those opinions aren’t what matter. It's not you comparing yourself to other people, it's you comparing your daily actions to what's deeply meaningful to you, and the highest priority actions daily, that’s what it is. Lisa: How do you, this is a problem that I face, get to a certain level of success and achievement, and then you start getting lots of offers and opportunities and so on, and you start to lose the focus. You get distracted from the things that are happening in this day and age where the internet and everything that ends up like I get the shiny object syndrome. And say, 'Oh, this is an extremely interesting area of study, and I should go down that path. And then I go down that path, and then I go down that path.' It is adding to the whole picture of a general education. as someone who studied as much as you have, you've obviously encompassed all of these areas. But I think what I'm asking is, how do you find out what your highest priority is? And how do you get a team around you, so that you're not limited? I think there's a lot of business people that are listening to this, me included in this, who has struggling to get past a certain ceiling because the area of genius is one thing that they love and excelling at, and you'd like to spend all of your time doing that. But you're stuck in the groundhog day of admin and technology in the stuff that you hate. And not busting through because financially, you can't delegate to people. You also got to find people that are a good fit for you who can do the jobs, and then also have the finances to be able to break through to that near next level. Can you talk to that about? Dr John: Yes, absolutely. When I was 27 years old, I was just starting my practice. I was doing a little of everything, anything and everything, just to get the thing cranking. I had one assistant that I hired. But I realised I was doing way too many trivial things. And that'll burn you out after a while if you're doing stuff that's not really what your specialty is. I went to the bookstore and I got a book by Alec McKinsey called The Time Trap. I read this book. As I read it, I underlined it and extracted notes like I do. I decided to put together a little sheet for it. I'll share that because it was a goldmine. I made a list of every single thing that I do in a day, over a three month period, because each day I had sometimes different things to do. But I wrote down everything I might be doing in those three months in a day. I just wrote them all down. And I don't mean broad generalities like marketing or this type of thing or radiographs or whatever. I mean, the actual actions. The actual moment by moment actions I do in those categories. I made a list of those and it was a big list. And I looked at it. Then right next that list, every single thing I did from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed, everything —  home, personal, professional. I wanted to know what my day looked. I want to be an honest, objective view of what am I actually doing with my day. Because if I want to create my life the way I want, I've got to take a look at what I'm actually doing because if I'm not doing things that give me the results, no wonder I'm not getting there.  I made that list, and right next to it, in column number two of six columns is how much does it produce per hour. Which is a measure of actually meeting somebody's need as a service and people willing to pay. How much is that produced per hour? And that was humbling because there are whole lot of stuff that I will do without pay. I was minoring in majors and majoring in minors. I was doing all kinds of stuff that was just cost, no return. I stopped and I looked at that, and that was humbling, and frustrating, and a bunch of stuff went through my mind. I mean, I just, but I had to be honest to myself, what does it actually produce? I extrapolate. If I spent two hours on it, what is it per hour? Cut it in half. If I spent 30 minutes, I’d double the number to get an idea what it is per hour. There's a lot of stuff that was not making anything and there was a few things that were making a lot.  The third column I wrote down, how much meaning does it have? How much is it that makes me inspired to get up and do it? I can't wait to do what people can't wait to get. Those are the things I want to target. So I looked at it on a one to ten scale, how much meaning it was. I made a list on a one to ten scale of every one of those items, how inspired am I to do that? And there's a lot of stuff on there that was not inspiring, that I didn't want to do. I thought, 'Hell. I went to ten years of college for this?' I made this list and I put this one to ten thing. And then I prioritised the tens down to the ones. I prioritise productivity down from the ones that made thousands of dollars an hour to nothing an hour. I just prioritise them. And then I looked. There were some that were overlapped, where the thing that was most meaningful and inspiring match where it’s most productive. I prioritise that based on the two together. And that was really eye opening. Then I went to the next one because I realised that if I don't delegate, I'm trapped. Then I put what does it cost? Every cost. Not just salary, but training costs, no hiring costs, parking costs, insurance costs, everything. What is the cost of somebody excelling at doing what it is I'm doing at a greater job than me? What would it cost? On every one of those items? The best I could do? I had to just guess on something, but I definitely did the best I could.  And then I prioritise that based on spread, how much it produced versus how much it cost. Then I put another column. How much time am I actually spending on average? The final column, I wrote down, what are my final priorities with all these variables? I did a very thorough prioritisation system there. I sliced those into ten layers. I put a job description, I put a job description on that bottom layer, and hired somebody to do that but bottom layer. It took me three people to get the right person because I had to learn about hiring. I didn't know how about, hiring. I finally got the first person there, and that was free. That allowed me to go up a notch. And then I hired the next layer. What I did is it allowed me to go and put more time into the thing to produce the most, which was actually sharing a message of what I was doing publicly, with speaking. Public speaking was my door opener. I just kept knocking out layers.In the next 18 months, my business tenfold in increase in income and business. I had 12 staff members and five doctors working for me in a 5000 square foot office from under 1000 square foot original office in 18 months. Because I said goodbye to anything that weighed me down. Anytime you do something that's lower on your values, and anytime something hone your value value yourself and the world values you when you value. It's waiting for you just to get authentic and live by the highest values, which is your ideological identity. The thing you really revolve around you. Mine was teaching, so I call myself a teacher, right? So whatever that highest value is, if you prioritise your day and fill your day with high priority actions that inspire you, it doesn't fill up with low party distractions that don't, because it's now you're allowing yourself to be authentic. And it doesn't cost to properly delegate if you get the right people, and you go on and do what produces more per hour, it doesn't cost it makes sense. Lisa: That's the hard part, isn't it? As is growing. Dr John: You do your responsibilities. Go do the thing that knocks down the doors and goes and does the deals and then go and let them do all the crazy work. Like when I was 27, that's the last time I ever wrote a check or did payroll or looked at bills. I never looked at that again. Because that's a $20 an hour job and I could make way more speaking and doing my doctrine. So I thought, 'I'm not doing anything that's going to devalue me ever again in my life.' I've never gone back. 38 years, I've never gone back. Lisa: So systematise. This is a thing here, where I have a bit of a problem, a bit of a chaos, right? Dr John: I'm an ignoramus when it comes to anything other than research, write, travel, and teach. I'm useless. I'm not. I do jokes and say when I'm having I want to make love with my girlfriend. I tell her. I put my arms around I said, 'If I was to organise and have Hugh Jackman or Brad Pitt take care of lovemaking for you on my behalf and things like that, would you still love me?' One time if she said, 'No, I will still love you more.' I'm joking. That’s a joke. But the point is that if you're not delegating lower priority things, you're trapped. Lisa: And this is the dilemma, I think, of small businesses is giving that mix right and not taking on people before you can go to that next level. Dr John: But you go. You go to the next level by taking them on if it's done properly. Lisa: If it's done properly, because I've- Dr John: You want to make sure. That's why I have a value determination process on my website to determine the values of people I hire because if they're not inspired to do what I need to delegate, that's not the right person.You gotta have the right people on the bus, this column says. I have to be clear about what I can produce if I go and do these other things. And me speaking it, and doing the doctoring on the highest priority patients was way more productive financially than me doing those other things. So once I got on to that, I put somebody in place just to book speeches, and just to make sure that I was scheduled and filled my day with schedules with patients, it was a updated day and night. I've never gone back to that. I only research, write, travel, teach. That's it. Lisa: That's my dream. I'm gonna get there. Dr John: I don't do it. What's interesting is I became financially independent doing that because of that. I learned that if I don't value myself, and I don't pay myself, other people aren't going to pay me. If they're waiting for you to value you add when you value you, the world values you. You pay yourself first, other people pay you first. It's a reflection, economically, there. And that's what allowed me to do it. Because financial independence isn't for debauchery and for the fun life, in my opinion. It's for making sure that you get to do what you love because you love it not because you have to do it. Lisa: And having an impact on the world. But if you're stuck doing the admin and the technical, logical stuff, and the crap that goes along with the business. You're not impacting the world like you want to be impacting. Dr John: Weel, the individual that does the administration is impacting the world through the ripple effect by giving you the freedom to do it. Lisa: Exactly. Dr John: If that's what they love doing. That’s not what I love doing. But there are people that love administration, they love that stuff and love behind the scenes, I love doing that. Finding those people. That's the key. Lisa: Finding those people. I's given me a bit of encouragement because I've been in that sort of groundhog days I had to get through the ceiling and get to the next level of reach. Dr John: I finally realised that the cost of hiring somebody is insignificant compared to the freedom that it provides if you do your priority. Lisa: If you get your stuff right, and know what you… Dr John: Because the energy, your energy goes up the second you're doing what you love doing. And that draws business to you. Lisa: Absolutely. I mean, like doing what we're doing. Now, this is my happy place.  Dr John: We’re both in our element. This is why we're probably going to slow down. The point is, when you're doing something you love to do, when you're on fire, with kind of an enthusiasm, people come around to watch you burn. They want to see you on fire.  Lisa: I mean, they do, they do. And I've seen that in times in my life where I've been preparing for a big race or something, and I need sponsors. I just go out there.  At the start, I didn't know how to do a sponsored proposal, I didn't know how to do any of that fancy stuff. I just went out there and told the story. And by sharing the story, people were like, 'I want to get on board with this. That's exciting.' People would come on in and and when you don't know, one of the things that I've found in life is the less you know, sometimes the more audacious you are. When you actually h

In this episode of Syntax, Scott and Wes talk about using React with Typescript — how to set it up, components, state, props, passing data, custom hooks, and more! Freshbooks - Sponsor Get a 30 day free trial of Freshbooks at freshbooks.com/syntax and put SYNTAX in the “How did you hear about us?” section. Sentry - Sponsor If you want to know what’s happening with your code, track errors and monitor performance with Sentry. Sentry’s Application Monitoring platform helps developers see performance issues, fix errors faster, and optimize their code health. Cut your time on error resolution from hours to minutes. It works with any language and integrates with dozens of other services. Syntax listeners new to Sentry can get two months for free by visiting Sentry.io and using the coupon code TASTYTREAT during sign up. Linode - Sponsor Whether you’re working on a personal project or managing enterprise infrastructure, you deserve simple, affordable, and accessible cloud computing solutions that allow you to take your project to the next level. Simplify your cloud infrastructure with Linode’s Linux virtual machines and develop, deploy, and scale your modern applications faster and easier. Get started on Linode today with a $100 in free credit for listeners of Syntax. You can find all the details at linode.com/syntax. Linode has 11 global data centers and provides 24/7/365 human support with no tiers or hand-offs regardless of your plan size. In addition to shared and dedicated compute instances, you can use your $100 in credit on S3-compatible object storage, Managed Kubernetes, and more. Visit linode.com/syntax and click on the “Create Free Account” button to get started. Show Notes 04:55 - Components Strategies Example: type Props = { value: string; } const App = (props: Props) => Return type? JSX.Element FC or FunctionComponent It’s discouraged for this reason: It means that all components accept children, even if they're not supposed to It could be useful for a return type 12:13 - Props Default props: const defaultJoke: JokeProps = { joke: 'LOL JOE', id: 'YEAH', status: 200, }; function JokeItem({ joke = defaultJoke }: JokeProps): JSX.Element { return ( {joke.joke} = {joke.id} ); } Because props are always destructured, you often have to make a new type for your props. You can’t just type each argument by itself. 18:38 - State Just like Generics, State can be inferred If your type is simple and you’re using useState, it just works: const [user, setUser] = useState(null); 22:27 - useEffect Nothing special required Good use of void: If you want to use a Promise function but not worry about await or .then(), you can pop a void in front of it: useEffect(() => { console.log('Mounted'); // getJoke().then(console.log).catch(console.error); void getJoke(); }, [getJoke]); 26:09 - Refs Very similar to state however some interesting things with null: const ref1 = useRef(null!); “Instantiating the ref with a current value of null but lying to TypeScript that it’s not null.” 29:33 - Custom Hooks This is a great use case for Tuples 31:00 - Context This is probably the most complex thing in this list First define the types Use generic to pass in types OR null This can also be non-null if you have default values in createContext: const AppCtx = React.createContext(null); 35:21 - Events The React events system is better than Vanilla JS Can handle them inline and have it inferred: onClick={e ⇒ yeah(e.target)} const onSetType = (e: React.ChangeEvent) => setType(e.target.value) React has a bunch of events built in — many of them take a Generic argument so you can specify the type of element that triggered it. Handy for native API methods like play and pause. 39:27 - ForwardRef Again use of to pass in forwarded ref type as param 1, Props types as param 2: type Props = { children: React.ReactNode; type: "submit" | "button" }; export type Ref = HTMLButtonElement; export const FancyButton = React.forwardRef((props, ref) => ( {props.children} )); 41:30 - ESLint Typescript-react is good Extend your own Most JS rules apply to TS 46:20 - React as Global React 17 Also add JSX: True to eslint globals for typing things like JSX.Element global.d.ts import * as react from "react" import * as react_dom from "react-dom" declare global { type React = typeof react type ReactDOM = typeof react_dom } 48:08 - TSConfig jsx: "react" React emit .js files with JSX changed Preserve .jsx file output React-native → .js files with jsx not changed 53:05 - Frameworks? Next.js makes this a TREAT Gatsby just use .tsx extensions https://www.gatsbyjs.com/plugins/gatsby-plugin-ts-config/ Links https://github.com/typescript-cheatsheets/react Tanner Linsley https://github.com/wesbos/eslint-config-wesbos Deno Architect https://fav.farm/ Snowpack Vite Parcel 2 Foam ××× SIIIIICK ××× PIIIICKS ××× Scott: Obsidian Wes: Folding Allen Keys Shameless Plugs Scott: 1: Level Up Tutorials Pro Spring Sale - 50% off annual subscriptions! 2: SvelteKit Course Wes: Beginner Javascript Course - Use the coupon code ‘Syntax’ for $10 off! Tweet us your tasty treats! Scott’s Instagram LevelUpTutorials Instagram Wes’ Instagram Wes’ Twitter Wes’ Facebook Scott’s Twitter Make sure to include @SyntaxFM in your tweets

Having now finished 'Lead: 12 Gospel Principles for Leadership in the Church' by Philadelphia pastor Paul David Tripp, let us do some soul searching and be Bereans about some of what is in the mix here. Much of what Tripp has to say I readily agree with - not because he said it, but because it is sound and Biblically clear-cut and incontrovertible. Unfortunately, also in the mix is a brand of woke Christianity designed to subtly but surely strip us of what the theological and political Left calls patriarchy, toxic masculinity, sexism, racism, xenophobia, et cetera. This brings me to a question my neighbor recently asked me. "...Where is the line, or points where we say 'Yeah, we may agree with them on some biblical points, but they are too far in error on these other unbiblical points, to where we cannot recommend anything they have to say?'" He asks a good and necessary question, and the answer to it may not be easy. But one thing we must know is that the Bereans in Acts are held up as an example for us. We are also warned throughout the New Testament to teach only what accords with sound doctrine, and to keep watch over our doctrine. Similarly, we are told to contend for the faith, and to confront those who are undermining the gospel of Jesus Christ which was delivered once for all, and to guard against deceptions and diversions which would fundamentally transform that gospel into something contrary to God's character, promises, and commands. The Apostle Paul's confrontation of Peter over his catering to the Judaizers at Antioch is relevant here. Substitute Woke Christians for Judaizers, and you will understand my meaning. Perhaps also the disagreement between Paul and Barnabas over what to do with John Mark should be instructive. That said, I would only recommend reading the works and listening to the words of Christian leaders on the Woke side of the fault line to mature, discerning Christians. And even there, I would strongly advise viewer discretion. Otherwise, impressionable brothers and sisters may be taken in by virtual signaling missives like this one from Paul Tripp published almost a year ago. If someone handed you a pan of brownies and you knew there was a turd hidden somewhere amidst the chocolate morsels, you might study it. But you would not consume it uncritically if you valued your health. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/garrett-ashley-mullet/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/garrett-ashley-mullet/support

How often have you found the answer you were seeking, only to tell yourself, 'Yeah, I already knew that' ? Well, if you already knew it, why aren't you taking action now? Why are you still seeking the answer? The reason, I think, is because you didn't really know it all. Sure, maybe you knew it intellectually or even superficially. But deep down, in detail, in your soul, you didn't really know it. At least not to the level where you were willing to act on it. Or maybe you're just looking for another excuse to procrastinate? Maybe the answer has come from someone lower than you on the totem pole? So then to accept that they have the answer is to admit that you didn't. It's a statement we've probably all made to ourselves at some point in time and it's got some interesting dimensions to it. Let's explore. NB: Thanks to @TheStoicEmperor over on Twitter for the inspiration. #nomoreexcuses #takeaction #procrastination

Raelynn's father, Davey, died recently of colon cancer. He was just 41 years old. Raelynn was devastated. "It was a cry that was pure heartbreak," Lacey said. Enter Emily Beineman, who happened to be jogging with her dog, Blue, the day of Davey's visitation. She was running past the funeral home when she heard a tiny voice call out from the chapel steps. "She was like, 'May I pet your puppy?' And I was like, 'Yeah, of course, as long as your parents don't mind,'" Beineman said, not knowing the circumstances.

Entertainment career coach, author, speaker, CBS Writing and WGA Showrunner Training Program director Carole Kirschner talks to Write On about mentorships, fellowships and training opportunities for writers and showrunners. “You cannot teach somebody how to be a showrunner in six Saturdays, but what you can do is…  give an idea of what to expect."   Carole breaks down the role of the showrunner and what it takes to be in charge of a TV show. “The job [of a showrunner] is all-consuming, and throughout, people say, 'This is an impossible job, this is a huge job, this is a terrible job, this is a big job,' and so I always have to say, 'Well, why would anybody do it then?' And then you hear the great parts about how wonderful it is to have a group of people create something together, how satisfying it is, how wonderful it is to be the person who gets to say, 'Yeah, we're gonna do it this way.'"   Don’t forget to subscribe to the Write On Podcast on iTunes!

On this episode of 'Yeah, That's Probably an Ad' Ko Im is joined by Brooklyn-based LCSW therapist Elle Bernfeld, who specializes in therapy for creative professionals. Elle and Ko discuss the unique stresses of working in a creative industry, building creative confidence, and guide you through a short meditation that you can turn to in moments of stress.

"I was talking to my mom the other day and she said, 'It's important to be who you are so that the right people love you.' I was like, 'Yeah. That's what it is.' I just felt like it is really important to continue to show up as myself in all areas of my life so the right people are on my side, the right people are following me and I can lean into that more than anything." Nikki Hiltz is now a two-time guest on this show. Our first episode together April 17th, 2019 during the Boston Marathon weekend. For this one, I’m joined by David Melly, the host of the Run Your Mouth Podcast, for another crossover episode. April 2019 was just the start of Nikki’s hot streak that year. They finished third at the U.S. Championships and qualified for the world championships. They went on to make the final in Doha and ran a personal best of 4:01.52. Expect Nikki to be in the mix for that Olympic team in the 1,500 meters, which is shaping up to be one of the must-watch events at Hayward Field during the Trials. We touched on Nikki’s recent announcement that they identify as trans non-binary on Transgender Day of Visibility, which was March 31. Now if you caught us using multiple pronouns for Nikki during this episode, it’s because Nikki explains that they now use she/they as personal pronouns. We also touch on plans for the 2021 Pride 5K, Olympic Trials training and much more.

At prime time on Sunday night, April 18, an hour-long special designed to relieve hesitancy around the Covid-19 vaccine will air on NBC. The special, Roll Up Your Sleeves: Presented by Walgreens has brought in big names, including Barack and Michelle Obama, Shaquille O'Neill, Jennifer Lopez, Dr. Anthony Fauci and more, to get out the critical message. With the help of these and other actors, athletes, musicians, healthcare workers, national political figures and more, the special aims to encourage Americans to get the Covid vaccine, as well as dispel misinformation surrounding the vaccine. 'Yeah, That's Probably an Ad' host Ko Im sat down with Walgreens CMO Pat McLean and ATTN: co-founder Matthew Segal to discuss the upcoming special, what we can expect, and how events like this have influenced public perception in the past.

On this episode of 'Yeah, That's Probably an Ad,' Adweek's international editor David Griner is joined by our growing international creative coverage team to discuss worldwide trends in creativity and some of the campaigns that have made waves in the industry.

I wrote Fast This Way to explain both the spiritual as well as physical side of fasting but what people get wrong is that they will try to use the spiritual practice of fasting in the middle of a work day. There's such a thing as a working fast which you do for more energy, high performance, and anti-aging and then there's something called a spiritual fast which is something that you do for spiritual development and they're just fundamentally different. Until you do a longer fast with rest, relaxation, meditation, and introspection, you're not going to see it. So, I see a lot of people trying fasting and then it doesn't work and they say they couldn't do it right because it sucks. Well, when you do intermittent fasting right it doesn't have to suck. - Dave Asprey   Get 15% off your CURED Nutrition order with the code WELLNESSFORCE   ---> Get The Morning 21 System: A simple and powerful 21 minute system designed to give you more energy to let go of old weight and live life well.   JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP | *REVIEW THE PODCAST*   Wellness Force Radio Episode 389 New York Times bestselling author, podcast host of Bulletproof Radio, as well as Founder and Chairman of Bulletproof, Dave Asprey, returns to discuss his latest book, Fast This Way, how mitochondria dictate our willpower, the benefits of prebiotics and soluble fiber supplements during a fast plus whether you should fast alone or with a group.   What is the right way to do a fast? Can fasting really help you burn fat and eat like the high performing human being that you are?      Join us as Dave shares the truth about fasting, his top biohacks from Fast This Way, and how to have a successful experience.   Belcampo Farms Get 20% off of your first Belcampo order HERE Belcampo was founded with a purpose: to create meat that’s good for people, planet and animals. What started as one mom’s desire to feed her family the healthiest meat possible became a mission to revolutionize the industry from the inside out. Belcampo is the pioneer of hyper-sustainable, organic, grass-fed and -finished, Certified Humane meats, broths, and jerkies. The company is on a mission to revolutionize the meat industry for the well-being of people, the planet, and animals by farming meat the right way – with Certified Humane, regenerative, and climate-positive practices, which means it’s better for you, the planet and the animals. Conventionally raised animals are confined to feedlots and eat a diet of inflammatory grains, but Belcampo’s animals graze on open pastures and seasonal grasses resulting in meat that is higher in nutrients and healthy fats.     Listen To Episode 389 As Dave Asprey Uncovers:   [1:30] The Spiritual Side Of Fasting Belcampo Dave Asprey 250 Dave Asprey Fast This Way by Dave Asprey Bulletproof Game Changers by Dave Asprey  Bulletproof Radio with Dave Asprey Bulletproof Upgrade Labs Head Strong by Dave Asprey The Bulletproof Diet by Dave Asprey His past health problems and why he sought out alternative practices to help heal them including going to a cave to meet with a Shaman and do a vision quest. Previous programmed thoughts he had about food and how often he should eat and why he was afraid of being hungry. The importance of having a spiritual practice for fasting and the most appropriate time to do it for personal development. What a working fast is to help you achieve more energy, high performance, and anti-aging. How to properly do a longer fast with rest, relaxation, meditation, introspection, and journaling. The trap that people often find themselves in when they do intermittent fasting, keto, paleo, or exercise without proper preparation when they first begin a new practice. Why you can't follow specific diets like ketogenic for long periods of time. Breaking down the best way to fast for your personal health goal.   [16:30] The Science Of Self-Care Practices Why going to the extremes can sometimes bring us back to the middle and become centered once again. His journey to seek inner peace and wholeness with guidance from all over the world. What we can learn from ancient practices that do work and how to apply them to our lives. How he got into biohacking and what it has proven to him about wellness practices such as meditation. Molecules Of Emotion: Why You Feel The Way You Feel by Candace Pert How Your Attachment Type Defines Your Sense of Self – Daniel P. Brown, Ph.D., with Dave Asprey – #719 The fact that people have been meditating for thousands of years and why we should include it in our daily wellness practices. What guidance Dave gives in his book, Fast This Way, to help you fast during the workweek to make it an enjoyable experience. The reason why groups from all over the world do traditional spiritual fasting. How spiritual fasting opens you up to ketosis, space for thoughts, an elevated energy state, and heightened sensory awareness.   [25:00] How To Do A Successful Fasting Practice Why it's our mitochondria that's really dictating our willpower. Mitochondria—Fundamental to Life and Health What happens when you start a fast but your mitochondria are untrained to go without food. Why the calories in, calories out model does not work and it's actually mean-spirited because all calories are not the same and it's denying people reality. Unpacking the top benefits of fasting: insulin doesn't rise and you maintain autophagy. Common fears and concerns about fasting that make people hesitant to try it at first. Why a safe environment is important when setting up a space for fasting. How trauma passed on from generation to generation can impact your mitochondria. The importance of recognizing that your family's trauma and passed on thoughts, feelings, and beliefs aren't you. Programming that we all have wired in us including "hunger equals fear" and if we don't eat all the time, we're going to die.   [36:00] Exploring Emotional Intelligence & Fasting 40 Years of Zen What insight he can give us to begin a fasting journey when we have experienced trauma. The fact that 15% of the average person's thoughts every day are about food. Food trauma that we may experience during our lifetimes. Why we feel hungry if someone else is hungry because "hunger equals death" and this is why parents force their children to eat breakfast when they don't want to. Why there is no food trauma in Dave's household because he has made hunger not be a scary thing for his children. The two different states that people have mixed up around hunger: cravings and actual hunger. Why most cravings are caused by eating inflammatory foods that also make fasting harder to achieve. The science behind charred meat and browned onions and direct inflammation in mitochondrial membranes. Exploring the relationship between the microbiome and the mitochondria and how they drive hunger together. What happens when you eat something that stresses out your gut microbiome. How to tell if you ate the wrong thing if you're hungry 30 minutes later after your meal.   [46:00] Should You Fast Alone Or With A Group? Josh's plan to do a 5-day vision quest with a group and what he's excited to receive from the experience. His recommendations on fasting with a group compared to doing it on your own. Benefits of doing intermittent fasting alone; especially for women. The best way to start fasting and why you shouldn't do it in the middle of a workweek. Why it's totally safe to do a 3-day fast and whether or not you should do a longer one with assistance. How to do a self-inventory and know if you're a candidate to do a longer fast. The power of taking small steps and starting with something simple like an intermittent fast to build healthy mitochondria before getting into longer fastings. What the "Keto Flu" is and how it's similar to the "Intermittent Fasting Flu." How activated charcoal can aid your fasting experience especially during a Fasting or Keto "Flu." The three biggest biohacks in Fast This Way for during your fasting experience. Valter Longo   [55:00] The Benefits Of Prebiotic Soluble Fiber 297 Mike Mutzel: The Truth About Fasting Dr. Jason Fung What surprised him the most from his findings as he wrote, Fast This Way. Taking a closer look at the body's metabolic expression when it's in a fasting state. Prebiotic fiber: What it is, how it helps with fasting, its association with anti-aging, and why people are not getting enough of it. Why soluble fiber is so important for our gut's health to feed the good bacteria. Super Human by Dave Asprey 365 Dr. Paul Saladino Kick Veggies to the Curb and Go Full Carnivore – Dr. Paul Saladin‪o Good sources of prebiotic soluble fiber to include during your intermittent fasting practice. Why soluble fiber dramatically reduces your hunger by making you feel full while also increasing the number of different species of good bacteria. Breaking down leptin and ghrelin and how they impact your hunger and fasting experience. You’re Actually Not a Badass and Here’s Why – Scott Barry Kaufman, Ph.D., with Dave Asprey – #775 How he defines wellness now compared to when he was on Wellness Force for episode 250. breathwork.io M21 Wellness Guide Wellness Force Community   Power Quotes From The Show   Can You Ever Fast Too Much?   "I know intermittent fasting works but I also see this trap that I've been in several times. There's a fasting trap, a vegan trap, a keto trap, and an exercise trap and they're all from the same basic human behavior which is, 'You know what, if something is good, more is better.' If you go into keto and you stay in keto all the time, you will hate your life eventually. You'll feel great for a while and then when it stops working, you'll think it's because you're not keto enough and you'll go from 15 grams of carbs to 12 and wonder why it's still not working and then you'll be stuck there and fasting is the same way. If you fast heavy every single day, it might not be the best idea. Fasting in moderation and learning how to have less stress and more energy during a fast is sufficient." - Dave Asprey   Building A Stronger Mindset   "In Fast This Way, I found this study that 15% of the average person's thoughts are about food every single day. So, if you turn off your hunger - Wow! You just got 15% more of your thoughts back. If that's just our thoughts on food, then it's a lot more for our fearful thoughts. Is it half your thoughts? Are two-thirds of your thoughts about the fear-running thoughts, inner critic, and angry voices in your head? If most of your thoughts are hunger and fear, there's just a little bit left for personal development and self-improvement." - Dave Asprey     Cravings vs Hunger     "From a somatic perspective, understand that there are two different states people have mixed up around hunger. One of them is cravings and the other is actual hunger. Most people only have cravings and they never get to feel hunger. A craving is, 'If I don't eat soon, I'm going to die;' you have to have it and it's an intense feeling. Cravings can be caused biologically when you eat certain foods; in fact many or most cravings are caused by eating the wrong stuff. Then you have hunger which is that mild feeling of, 'Yeah, it's probably about time to eat but it'll be okay if I do or don't." - Dave Asprey     Links From Today's Show  Belcampo 250 Dave Asprey Fast This Way by Dave Asprey Game Changers by Dave Asprey  Bulletproof Radio with Dave Asprey Bulletproof Upgrade Labs Head Strong by Dave Asprey The Bulletproof Diet by Dave Asprey Molecules Of Emotion: Why You Feel The Way You Feel by Candace Pert How Your Attachment Type Defines Your Sense of Self – Daniel P. Brown, Ph.D., with Dave Asprey – #719 Mitochondria—Fundamental to Life and Health 40 Years of Zen Valter Longo 297 Mike Mutzel: The Truth About Fasting Dr. Jason Fung Super Human by Dave Asprey 365 Dr. Paul Saladino Kick Veggies to the Curb and Go Full Carnivore – Dr. Paul Saladin‪o You’re Actually Not a Badass and Here’s Why – Scott Barry Kaufman, Ph.D., with Dave Asprey – #775 Top Ten Supplements That Everyone Should Take | Bulletproof Leave Wellness Force a review on iTunes breathwork.io M21 Wellness Guide Wellness Force Community Dave Asprey Facebook Instagram Twitter LinkedIn Bulletproof Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube   About Dave Asprey Dave Asprey is the Founder & Chairman, Bulletproof. He is a three-time New York Times bestselling science author, host of the Webby award-winning podcast Bulletproof Radio, and has been featured on the Today Show, CNN, The New York Times, Dr. Oz, and more.   Over the last two decades Dave, the “Father of Biohacking”, has worked with world-renowned doctors, researchers, scientists and global mavericks to uncover the latest, most innovative methods, techniques and products for enhancing mental and physical performance. Dave has personally spent over $2 million taking control of his own biology – pushing the bounds of human possibility all in the name of science, evolution and revolution. Bulletproof Diet & Coffee The creator of the Bulletproof Diet and innovator of Bulletproof Coffee, Collagen Protein supplements and many more advances in commercial wellness products, Dave’s mission is to empower the entire globe with information and knowledge that unlocks the Super Human in everyone at any age. The proof of these advancements are better sleep, energy, and expanded capacity for all. Be a better partner, parent, provider, and overall human being in every aspect of life. Be Proof. Be Bulletproof. Through the Bulletproof Diet, Dave has maintained a 100-pound weight loss, improved his sleep cycles, and upgraded his brain, ultimately transforming himself into a better entrepreneur, a better husband, a better father, and overall better human being.     Build Immunity. Breathe Deeply. A simple, powerful 21 minute morning system designed to give you more energy to let go of old weight and live life well. Get Your Calm Mind + Immunity Building Guide  *6 science based morning practices guaranteed to give you more energy and less weight in 21 Minutes. *7 day guided B.R.E.A.T.H.E breathwork included.   More Top Episodes 226 Paul Chek: The Revolution Is Coming (3 Part Series) 131 Drew Manning: Emotional Fitness 129 Gretchen Rubin: The Four Tendencies  183 Dr. Kyra Bobinet: Brain Science 196 Aubrey Marcus: Own The Day 103 Robb Wolf: Wired To Eat Best of The Best: The Top 10 Guests From over 200 Shows Get More Wellness In Your Life Join the #WellnessWarrior Community on Facebook Tweet us on Twitter: Send us a tweet Comment on the Facebook page

Does chasing prospects feel like chasing waterfalls to you? Was it the 90's girl band TLC who sang 'Don't go chasing prospects, please keep to the clients and the lists that you're used to?'' No? Okay, but what I'm trying to say is when you get into the murky waters of continuous conversations with prospective new clients, how do you pin them down to start working with you for real or decide maybe they're a fish you should throw back into the river? Perhaps I should quit with the water & fishing analogies and get to the point, which is all about sizing up whether your prospective client is a real catch (Sorry, that's the last one, I promise). In today's episode, I discuss a common problem for coaches who don't know when or how to push their prospect for a definitive decision to begin working together. I explain how you can direct conversation with deadlines that don't have to be pushy or hard sell and can leave a channel open for the client to come to you. I ask you to consider how such prospects interact with you and how you should evaluate the possible coaching outcomes of those who do not respect you enough to communicate properly with you before signing them up. I also explain the difference between reminding a prospect they have an opportunity to work with you to chasing down an option just because you need to get some cash in your wallet, which we all know is not the right way to go. "Nobody likes to be forced into anything. No one - with very few exceptions - no one likes to feel pressured into doing things." – Jos Willard "The point of the email is to get them to restart the conversation. So they're going to respond. They're either going to say, 'Yeah actually, I'm sorry I've decided to go in another direction. Okay great. Now you know." – Jos Willard "Your role is to help people make the best decision for them at the time. And quite often that decision will be 'it's not time to work with me yet." – Jos Willard "You DON'T chase them. You DON'T try to force that conversation early. You DO remind them that they have the opportunity to work with you. You DO put out calls to action." – Jos Willard "Do your best to avoid being in that situation where someone is constantly putting you off and putting you off. And the best way to avoid being in that situation is to avoid trying to force sales conversations before the prospect is ready." – Jos Willard  This week on Profit For Coaches: How to avoid being led on by noncommittal prospects Why you need to look after your time resources What important information you can elicit about your client when it comes to their communication and commitment styles How to create a 'no pressure' conversation that will still give you a definitive Yes or No Why you should ask yourself, 'Do you really want to work with them anyway?' The FREE eBook you can access today! Connect with Jos Willard: Profit For Coaches Website Jos Willard on LinkedIn Jos Willard on Twitter Jos Willard on Instagram The Four Must-Haves for a Profitable Coaching Practice I want to make sure that the time you invest here is profitable. And the best way to do that is to make sure you grab a copy of the free eBook The Four Must-Haves for a Profitable Coaching Practice. It's absolutely free, it's worth every penny. It outlines the four areas that every profitable coaching practice on the planet has in common.  And thus, they're the four things that you must have nailed down in your coaching practice if you want it to be consistently profitable. So if you want an easy to understand very specific tool that makes it crystal clear where to be focusing your attention in your practice, and what you can safely ignore to ensure that your practice is consistently profitable and supports the life that you want to be living go to: Profitforcoaches.com and download your copy of The Four Must-Haves for a Profitable Coaching Practice today.

On this International Women's Day themed episode of 'Yeah, That's Probably an Ad,' host Ko Im is joined by guest co-host Nicole Ortiz, Community Content Manager Luz Corona, and Senior News Writer Katie Lundstrom to discuss International Women's Day through the lens of marketing.

On today's podcast, Jerry reflects on a rocket explosion, Matt retells the story of Starlight McIntosh and the boys run a 'Yeah or Nah' on the Royal family... 

You know you're at or near the peak of the market when you're seeing bandit-signs for daytrader training, and couples record videos on Tik-Tok extolling their investment "strategy." Younger, inexperienced investors, who've never been through a bear market, rely upon, 'Yeah, but the Fed...' What goes up, always comes down, and if you're up 400%, but lose 100%, you've lost it all. - Chief Investment Strategist Lance Roberts -------- Articles mentioned in this podcast: https://realinvestmentadvice.com/technically-speaking-topping-patterns-popping-up-everywhere/ -------- Get more info & commentary: -------- SUBSCRIBE to The Real Investment Show here: -------- Visit our Site: www.realinvestmentadvice.com Contact Us: 1-855-RIA-PLAN -------- Subscribe to RIA Pro: -------- Connect with us on social: https://twitter.com/RealInvAdvice https://twitter.com/LanceRoberts https://www.facebook.com/RealInvestmentAdvice/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/realinvestmentadvice/ #Stocks #Money #Finance

A South Auckland city councillor says he is getting online abuse from conspiracy-believing churchgoers for supporting the upcoming Covid-19 vaccine rollout.Efeso Collins revealed today he had received a number of angry messages from disgruntled South Aucklanders on social media attacking him for his pro-vaccine stance.He said ongoing conversations with people in his South Auckland community who had concerns about Covid had taken a turn for the worse in recent days, with their vitriol now directed in personal barbs attacking his faith and integrity."I've received a number of messages today with people saying the church should ex-communicate me and calling me to repent for supporting a vaccine rollout in South Auckland," said the Manukau ward councillor."The thinking is the church should shut its door on me, that whole fraud, he doesn't belong here, he's not one of us."To be honest I'm really surprised because I've been communicating with people who believe conspiracies since we went into the first lockdown around this time last year."All I'm trying to do is provide a platform where they feel like they're being heard but over the last few days it's really taken quite a sour turn."He said many messages were from people he had known for a long time, and who were connected to breakaway charismatic Christian factions in the area.They had previously been sending him Covid conspiracy "evidence" on Viber and Messenger.He said he was one of a number of community leaders that had been subject to the online abuse."There's a number of church leaders who are being attacked like this all the time, too."It's just a reflection of frustration people are feeling, that borderline fanaticism among people out there."He said authorities needed to realise that it wasn't a matter of one errant family who held these views, but a collective that needed to somehow be won over through informed debate."My message to these people is I understand their very strong position but I think it's important we have open and robust discussion and that's not going to happen if we start throwing accusations at people."That's not how you have a discussion. You don't just stop listening and you don't get angry and walk away. You've got to thrash out these issues. Whilst my example is a sad one, my thoughts are toward the families who are in the house now locked down with someone in their family who is only preaching that kind of message."Collins said as a member of the South Auckland community he needed to balance all the conversations and this was a particularly difficult one to navigate.It was about allowing ways for people to vent their frustration but at the same time allow freedom of thought."I know that these people will go home to a whānau. Whilst I'd rather just say, 'Oh, I can't be bothered' I know that when we're in lockdown, if they've got young people in the house, those young people are going to be hearing the messages on TV and probably say,'Yeah, it's not a bad idea just to take precautions'."But if you've got Dad in the house preaching this kind of message the cultural nuance is if you're a young person you just shut up and listen - they've got no recourse - so by me providing them a chance to talk through this I'm hoping that at least they don'ttake out some of that anger out on the kids at home and force feed them what they want them to believe but give them some room to share their views as well."Collins said everyone needed to be engaged in a more mature, honest conversation rather than just throwing threats about ex-communication. 

How do you land a job at NASA? How can you learn from failure? How do you pronounce Louisville? These are some of the questions we asked NASA engineer Tracy Drain. And later, we get into a story about a group of women who helped map the universe. Update: Since this interview was recorded, Tracy has been promoted to Lead Flight Systems Engineer for the Europa Clipper mission! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hi hello welcome to our fifth episode where we discuss both our and our listeners juicy and controversial unpopular opinions as well as the bad treatment of Meghan Markle and the David Letterman interview that may end his career. The best way to support the 'Yeah, Right' podcast is by subscribing on Apple Podcasts as well as leave us a review.  You can find us on Instagram @yeahrightpodcast  WE LOVE YOU GUYS!

Welcome to this special episode series! Recently I recorded a training video for my 2CCX students and I made them commit to taking on 5 different challenges that would help them strengthen and grow their businesses. On this first episode we discuss challenge #1, Simplify your business. So tune in and see how these challenges can help you and your business get to where you want to be. Hit me up on IG! @russellbrunson Text Me! 208-231-3797 Join my newsletter at marketingsecrets.com ---Transcript--- What's up, everybody? This is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to Marketing Secrets Podcast. All right, I want to share with you guys something really cool. So recently I did a training for people who were inside of my Two Comma Club X, high-end coaching program. And the training chat really cool, and I thought it'd be fun to share it with you guys. So I'm actually going to break it up over the next five episodes. There are five challenges that I gave them to do to be more successful inside their business. So, that's kind of the game plan. So each episode we'll cover one of the five challenges, and this very first challenge is called Simplify Your Business. So we're going to cue up the theme song, we come back, you guys will have a chance to hear and behind the scenes of a private training I was doing with my Two Comma Club X, high-end coaching students, and I hope you love it. Whenever I would go to bed, I always like trying to do a lot ahead of time, this is my business model, I know what it is, it's like I'm driving traffic to a landing page, and then from here I'm upselling people on the phone, or I'm doing a webinar, or I can have a structure, like what you're doing, right? And it's all the speakers are coming in that are giving you ideas. The goal is not to be like, "Nevermind, I'm believing that," rip it up and start something new. And the next speaker, you throw it away and something new. Instead, it's like listen to every single speaker and listening to their model and be like, "That's really cool, I love how they're doing that." And then be like, "That piece right there, that one thing that person said, that's something I can take and I can apply to my existing framework, the existing business I'm trying to do." Okay? Because if you're not careful, you're going to hear all, again, we have so many amazing speakers, all of them had their own take on how to do business. If you're not careful, you're going to rip up and rewrite your business plan 20 times in the next two days, which is not going to help you. It's not going to get you to momentum, it's going to get you out of momentum. Right? So the goal of this is to keep the frame or keep the business that you're working on, but then looking for what's the piece of gold from each presentation. Right? I'm going to be sharing these five different things. And each of these things, some of you guys might thing, "That one's not for me. That one's not for me," and, "That's the piece of gold I needed, I can add here, and I can apply to the framework that I've already built. It's going to help me to speed up and help me get to that next spot faster." Okay? And so that's the way I want you guys to start looking at this week, not, "I'm rewriting my business plan 20 times over," it's, "I have 20 amazing people coming, what's the one piece of gold I can take from each speaker that I can apply to the existing thing that I'm already working on to help amplify it and help get me back into momentum?" Does that make sense? So that's kind of the goal. So with that said, I'm going to jump into five different things I kind of wanted to go through with you guys, and I think they're fun. I'm excited for it. So, all right. So the first thing, so again, I got a bunch of just things. So my first thing I want to put out there for everybody is the thought process of how can I simplify my business? How can I simplify my funnels? Last year, we did an affiliate retreat, some of our top affiliates came, and they came to Boise, and then Dave and Miles and everyone, took them out to McCall where they did water skiing and everything. Before they went out to have the big party, because I wasn't invited to the party. I'm just kidding, I was probably invited, I just wasn't able to go. But before they all went, I sat down for like an hour with everybody and kind of asked everyone about their businesses, and everyone asked me some feedback on this stuff. And I remember one of the people who was there, her name is Alex, she asked me the biggest advice. I kind of asked some questions on her business. And really quick, I found out that basically she had like, I don't know, half dozen or more funnels that she had, she was driving traffic to, she was trying to do all these different things. And I said, "Ma'am, my biggest piece of advice for you right now is to simplify everything." I said, "Pick the one funnel that you like the most and delete the rest." This should not be something where we're driving traffic to six or eight or 10 different offers. If you are, it gets very, very difficult. It's hard to focus all your efforts. I think a lot of people see my business and they're like, "Russell, you got eight offers." I'm like, "Yeah, I have 400 employees." You know what I mean? We're doing 10, $15 million a month. Don't necessarily model me because we've got more staff recently. When you get the point where you're trying to go for the billion dollar company, then look at me. But right now, what most guys are trying to zero to a million, million to ten, and ten to a hundred. So in those windows, the thing that's going to drive you is simplicity, one funnel. And what's crazy is as I'm doing this book launch, Alex, she interviewed me on her thing, and she said, "Man, the biggest thing that grew my business the last year is when you were in Boise, and you said I need to kill all my funnels but one. She's like, "I left all stressed out because I love all these funnels. I put so much time and energy, but I thought, everyone says, 'Do what Russell says,' so I'm going to do what Russell says." And she's like, "I killed all these babies and I kept one." And she's like, "Because of that, all my focus is on my ad dollars, my promotions, my content, everything's focused on one thing, and because of that, it's grown." And so I want to challenge you guys today. Again, this comes back to this whole over the next 20 speakers, don't try and reinvent 20 different business models. It's simplifying the one you have and figuring out the nuggets of gold you can apply to it. Okay? So I'm going to show you guys if I was to start over right now, like the most simple model on earth, and this is all I would do, if it was me and I'm trying to make a million to $10 million a year company, I would do this. Okay? And I'm going to show you, it's Ben Settle slide, because Ben is the most consistent, simple business model I've ever seen, and it's exactly what I would do. So Ben has got one product. Since the last couple years, he's developed a couple of other ones, but the reality, all those other products are... so he publishes a monthly newsletter. It's 97 bucks a month. You get a physical print newsletter in the mail every single month. And that's kind of what his business model is. And if you see, he sells other things, all he's done is over the last 10 years, he's been publishing this newsletter. He'll be like, "What are all the newsletters on this topic?" And he'll take like 30 issues, and he puts them with the others, like, "Here's my new product." And it's literally just his issues that are grouped together based on topics. So he only has one thing he does. Every month, he writes the newsletter and he sells it. It's 97 bucks a month. And that's it. Right? And then he's got a squeeze page, and a squeeze page is basically, "Come here, give me your email address, and then I'm going to sell you my newsletter." Right? So people come here, they go to bensettle.com, they put their email address in, and then he has his one product he sells. Basically, what he does is he sends out an email every single day, selling his one product. That's it. That's his business for the 10 years I've known him. I'm on his email list. I get an email every day, sometimes twice a day. And all he does is he promotes one thing and that's his newsletter. That's it. That's the business model, simple, easy, million dollar a year business right there, one product. And he sends an email a day. So you come in and here it is. I was just pulling this today, I took a screenshot just to show you guys. March 11th, there's email. March 11th, there are two emails. March 10th, there were three emails. March 9th, there were two emails. March 8th, my birthday, there were two emails. March 7th, there was email. And just consistently, consistently, right? So his whole business model is get people to come to my squeeze page, they give me their email address, I email them every single day to tell them to buy my one product. And you'll go, "Russell, what if they already bought the product, then what do I email them?" The same thing! Okay? Because guess what it does? It gets people to stick. It's funny, the biggest growth I had in my business was five or six years ago, we decided we were going to focus 100% of our efforts on click funnels. And prior to that, most of you guys probably didn't come into my universe prior to that, but if you would have looked at it before, we had so many different offers, they were all over the place, like something selling this, and this, and this. And so I'm emailing my list, I'm like, "I don't know, I'll promote this today, and then this," and they're all sorts of random things, right? And when we said, "Okay, we're going to sell click funnels," everything's focused on this one thing, one product, one service, then everything grew for us. Right? And even now, if you look at my business, we have front end funnels, like the books and things like that, but the only goal is if you want to buy the book is that you get into click funnels. Everything leads to this one road. And so the business model could be as simple as a squeeze page, get somebody email, to opt in, and then a print newsletter, or a webinar, or a membership, just one thing, right? Or my high-end coaching, whatever the one thing is, and then every day email about it. And even if they bought it, you still email them every single day because it increases their likelihood of sticking. Right? They're seeing another promotion. It's like, "I did buy it. I remember buying that, that was a good thing I bought it. It's a good reminder." It's a stick strategy. Probably three or four times a year, someone on my marketing team will come back and be like, "Russell, we need to use all the Actionetics complex features where people who have already bought this, it pulls down, they don't see any more messages about this and that." And like, "No, stop trying to be so technical and geeky. I don't care some about the book and they get 15 other emails about the book, because guess what? Now they're more likely to actually read the book because I keep selling them." I'm like, "Selling them on buying, it's one thing, but selling them on actually consuming it is another thing. So I'm going to keep telling you about it, and telling you about it, and telling you about it. I don't care if they bought it five times, I want them to keep getting it. If they got it and they've read it, I want them to keep reminding like, 'Yeah, that book was good, I need to go back and read it again, let me reference that thing.'" Right? So don't think that even though Actionetics and every email autoresponder has all these complex features where you can after someone's done this, pull them out so they never see the emails again, that's not necessarily good. Right? Simplify, keep things simple. During Funnel Hacking Live, after Garrett White had his presentation, we had this really cool moment backstage. I would love to, in fact, we did record, I just did the recording of it, but he told me, he's like, "A year ago," he's like, "My technical marketing team just convinced us to move off of Actionetics so we can move to, I can't remember what the other one was, something else, because that we could do all these more complex things and more split testing. And if they bought this, then like," he had this huge map. And he's like, "A year ago, they convinced me to do that." And it was funny because I had tried to convince Todd to let us use a more complex email software too, because I was like, "we can get so much more complex and so much better if we did this." And Todd laughed and he's like, " Dude, Russell, you haven't even finished the follow up sequence, like one, like you're trying to get more complex and you only have a simple, basic one right now." And we told Garrett that year. It's like, "You know what's funny?" He's like, "In the last year, working on this super hyper amazing sequence, it's going to do a million things." He's like, "Because of that, we've never sent an email out to our list during that time, because we bought the complexity, now it was so complex we never actually used it." And he was like, "I'm going home. We're canceling everything, we're moving back, we're just getting back to the simple, send an email every single day." I don't know, there's so many tools that create complexity, and I think that's what's keeping most of us from where we want to be. So strip complexity. And I don't care if you use the Actionetics, or active campaign, or anyway, it doesn't matter, but just simple. Like Ben's model is simple. He doesn't stress out. Every day he spends 15 minutes writing an email, sends it out, sells his one product and that's it. And once a month he writes print newsletter. That's the business. And the guy's written like eight zombie novels since I've known him because he's got nothing else to do all day, other than write a 20 minute email, send an email, do the once a month newsletter he publishes, and then he writes zombie novels all day. That's it. So, simplify. How can we simplify our businesses and quit overcome complexing them. We can do that. Our company now, "Let's pull things back, let's simplify it, simplify." And I think some of you guys may have heard me told this story, I went, this is probably, I don't know, maybe a year ago, I went to John, and obviously I'm obsessed with funnels, right? I'm like, "John, okay, in a perfect world, how many funnels do you want from the funnel team that we can give you, the traffic team, to go to market and drive traffic to?" And I was hoping it was like one a week or two a week, whatever. And he's like, "Two." I'm like, "Okay, what is that two a week, two a month, two a day? You let me know, we will do it." And he's like, "No, two total. That's all we need. I don't need more funnels." He was like, "In fact, if you stop making funnels, we would be completely fine." He was like, "Well, we're good now. We just need you guys focusing more on getting traffic into the funnels we have." That's what he told me. And I was like, "Oh." I remember Brandon and Kaelin Poulin came to our office in Boise. And I was showing them everything like, "This is our funnel building team." And there's like four or five people. And he's like, "What do they do all day?" I'm like, "They build funnels." He's like, "You guys still build funnels?" Like, "Yeah, dude, that's what we do." And he's like, "Huh." He's like, "We built a funnel three years ago and we just keep driving more traffic to it." And I was like, "Huh." There's the aha, right? You guys saw Brandon and Kaelin on stage getting the Two Comma Club C Award with one funnel. So simplicity, simplify things. Don't make them more complex. Okay? So many guys don't want complex things. I'm the same way, because I love creativity of the creating. Focus your creativity on new creative to get people into the one funnel you're focusing on. That's the shift in mindset. Okay? So, number one, simplify. Look at lead magnet, email daily core offers. Here's Ben's: people opt in, he sells them his newsletter, and he sends an email every single day about the newsletter. Okay? This is kind of something we've been talking a lot over last couple years about, publishing daily. I think some people stress out about it. Like, "I don't know how to do it, I'm not going to be able to do it." I want to simplify it again. Okay? Look how Ben Settle does it. Okay? He sends out an email every single day. Here's a snapshot of just since February 23rd, like literally, every single day. So he sends an email every day, and then he takes that same email, and he goes to his blog and he posts it, copy and paste it to the blog. Now he's posting a blog post every single day. Email a day, blog post a day, it's the same thing word for word, copy and pasted, but he's publishing every day. So if you know like, okay, if I'm publishing every day, I've got to send an email to my list every day. I know that. I'm going to log in, send an email to my list, and I'm going to copy the email, and I'm going to post to my blog and boom, now I'm done. Okay? I think so many times we get so scared about, "The publishing everyday thing, how am I going to do it?" It can and it should be more and more simple. Okay? All right. So the first challenge I have for you guys, I got five challenges today. Challenge number one, I want you to look at the funnels you are creating, the funnels you're working on, the business model you have, and think, "How can I simplify this? How can I make it where I can do the entire business in one hour in quarantine, then go play with my kids the rest of the day?" Right? How can I simplify my business? That's the first challenge for you guys. Okay? Challenge accepted? Can you guys all do that?

"I'm more comfortable with betting on myself now than I have been in the past, and I think it comes from just accumulating achievements that I look back on and think, 'Yeah, I'm good enough to do this.'" My guest for today’s episode is the Roots Running breakout star of 2020 not named Noah Droddy. Frank Lara was the US Champion in the 15K despite finishing second after the winner tested positive for EPO. We hear his thoughts on that. He ran 27:44.65 for the 10,000 meters and 61:50 for the half marathon last year. We recorded this episode a few weeks ago so we touch on his hopes for the new year and he makes his pitch to a potential sponsor. Frank will be among the athletes competing at the Trials of Miles Texas Qualifier next month.

A man in England failed his driver's licence test an absurd amount of times, spending the equivalent of what your first car would cost you. Surely you'd take the hint after the first ten and give up. Erin and Soda were in disbelief about how horrible of a driver this man would be when Producer Rach reminded them of her...er...interesting driving skills. Somehow she managed to pass her driver's licence test, though not because of her adequate driving. Erin had a similar experience getting her US license with the examiner ending with 'Yeah, that'll do'. I don't think I'll be wanting to hop in their cars anytime soon. Find out how Erin and Producer Rach got their licence in the podcast!

Talking Tactics discuss Tottenham 2-0 Man City, and the meaning of Guardiola signing a new contract, after they talk about Chelsea beating Newcastle. Liverpool keep on ticking, and Carl details what's happening with Man United. Zlatan is an ageless wonder, but does he need to win Serie A to bolster his historical standing? Atletico took out Barcelona via Carrasco; China isn't so bad. Before taking Twitter questions, Haaland won the Golden Boy award: does it mark a great career to come? - Check our Patreon page, and think about supporting us! https://www.patreon.com/join/talkingtactics - Rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts! https://www.getpodcast.reviews/id/1127264410 - Follow Talking Tactics https://www.twitter.com/taIkingtactics https://www.instagram.com/talkingtactics https://www.facebook.com/talkingtactics352 - Talking Tactics Special Coup de tête: https://bit.ly/2DXSMVk - Have Hope's Website https://havehopefootballhut.com - Follow us https://www.twitter.com/HaveHopeHut https://www.twitter.com/Ankaman616 https://www.twitter.com/DanielTiluk

When the demand for potatoes plummeted during the outbreak of COVID-19, Ryan did something unthinkable. He dumped 2 million pounds of potatoes on his farm and, through a Facebook post, invited anyone to take what they needed. Little did he know that this post would reach a single mother in Kenya and give him the opportunity to act on the Savior's invitation to feed His sheep both physically and spiritually. Show Notes:  To see pictures and links for this episode, go to LDSLiving.com/thisisthegospel Transcript:  KaRyn  0:03  Welcome to This Is the Gospel, an LDS Living podcast where we feature real stories from real people who are practicing and living their faith every day. I'm your host, KaRyn Lay. At the time of this recording, I am currently in quarantine waiting for the results of my COVID-19 test. I'm okay. It's okay. But it is amazing how quickly a little under-the-weather feeling sends us into a downward spiral of brain frenzy. Where have I been? Who was I with? Did I take off my mask somewhere forget to wash my hands that one time? Who did I give this to? It's enough to drive you crazy, whether it's COVID or not. But it also has me thinking about this week's theme and story because in the midst of all the uncertainty and exhaustion I have been fed, literally and figuratively, a simple warm bowl of soup from Chick-fil-A on the porch from a neighbor, a just-checking-in text from a friend, an offer to take things off my work plate, bless you. And a well-timed scripture in my "Come, Follow Me" study that's bringing me a lot of hope. All of these things have helped me to know that I am not alone, even when I'm feeling really vulnerable. And they bring me a sense of safety of peace, and, like I said, hope. I think that regardless how we interpret or act on the Savior's charge after His resurrection to feed His sheep, the end result for those that we care about will be the same—a sense of safety, of peace, of fullness, and of hope. And in today's episode, we have one story from Ryan, a farmer in Idaho who thought he was being prompted to do what farmers do: feed people from the land. But it wasn't the potatoes that ultimately made the biggest difference. Here's Ryan. Ryan  1:47  We farm about 20,000 acres. We do a lot of potatoes and sugar beets, and a lot of other crops as well as cattle. We grow potatoes for both the process industry, which is companies that make french fries, that's our biggest customers is the french fry. And then we also do fresh pack where we're part-owners in the company that packs potatoes into boxes and bags that go to grocery stores and restaurants. This last year, was in 2019, was a great year. We were super excited at the end of the harvest, we had a great crop, things are looking very good and the economy was doing well. People were out in about, you know, eating and restaurants. And there actually was a really good demand for potatoes, specifically. And there also was a little bit of a tight supply of potatoes and so potato prices looked like they were going to be at record levels. So we were really excited about how things look for us. And so a lot of optimism going into the first part of 2020. And then, you know, sometime around, you know, the end of January, in the very first part of February, I started to hear a little bit about this virus. I remember, right at the very beginning having kind of a sick feeling in my gut, you know, this could be something very serious, both for the world but also for our company. And then we started talking about how are we going to control this, we're going to do shut downs and things like that, then the reality really start setting. So the first thing that we saw here was the food service side, the restaurants really took a beating as they began to close down. And so we saw our customers' demand go from very strong to almost a complete stop. I felt a sense of almost panic at the time. I felt like that, you know, we could be in financial jeopardy, that potentially it could take farms out of business. At this time, we were praying as a family that we would be able to sustain through this difficult time, asking for Heavenly Father's help to get through it. I also asked many times, "What is it we need to learn from this experience? What are the correct decisions might be that we continue to support our family here for generations to come?" So I guess April time is planting time, but it's also the time of the year where we have still have potatoes in storage from the previous year's harvest. Usually, we can either sell those to other farmers or we can take those to the dehydrated market make dehydrated flakes. And so I made the usual phone calls to the dehydrating companies. They just laughed at me, they're like, "We're not buying anything right now. We don't see anything opening up." You know, farmers were cutting back because of their contracts and what they were going to plant so there was no one to sell the potatoes to. They were beautiful potatoes. You know, I really struggled with what to do with them. And the other only option that we had was to be to feed them to cattle as we have some of our own cattle. So that's kind of what our initial intent would be to dump them on the ground, we could feed them later to our own cows. But as a as a dumped them there looked at how pretty the potatoes were. And when we were all said and done, we had about 2 million pounds of potatoes. And if you figure about, you know, a half pound is a potato, there's probably 4 million potatoes there. I'm like surely there's got to be something that would be a better use than cattle feed. So I pondered that over for a part of a day. And I had the distinct impression to give some of them away. I knew that people were, some people lost their jobs, maybe struggling financially. So I just made a post on Facebook or something along the lines of, "Due to COVID, we're gonna have to dump some potatoes, you're welcome to come get some if you'd like some." Really, I had no idea that people will take that as seriously as they did. I thought maybe a few friends, neighbors would come gather a few up and the rest would go to cattle feed. But I was wrong majorly wrong. The first day, people started to show up, you know, friends, neighbors, just car after car after car. And I would say hundreds of people the first day came. We were just blown away. We couldn't believe the amount of traffic and it was like a almost like a highway. So then, the next day, I thought things would be over and it would quiet down. But by early morning, this traffic started up again. And same thing, steady stream of traffic going by. And so during this whole time, the Facebook posts started to spread. And I started to get a lot of comments, but a lot of shares, ended up with over 10,000 shares when it was all said and done. So we started to see, after the first few days, people come from far away into you know, Utah, up into the Boise Valley, both a three, four hour drives. Then even brass even farther and I saw people come in from down into Nevada and Elko and Wells, you're starting to talk no more like a five or six hour drive. And then as far as way as Las Vegas and Moscow, Idaho, straight, you know, 10-hour drives. One lady called from Kansas, which is like an 18 hour drive. And after a day or two what really started to stand out to me was the reason why people were coming to get the potatoes. The gas money was way more than what the potatoes were worth in, all circumstances. But I started to get a glimpse of the people just wanted to come and do something good for somebody else. It was the beginning of the lockdown, they been locked in their home. And I think it was just a great way for people to have an opportunity to get a glimpse of something they could do, something kind for other people. And that's really what amazed me. I would say 95% of everyone that came came in for somebody else. You know, I made a connection with a man out of New York City and we shipped a full semi load of boxed potatoes to the Bronx. And they were just trying to do something good for their community. And that was really the story of what I saw. As people reached out, many people wanted to help. We'd get anonymous donations from as far away as New York and Canada. And they felt like, you know, with the potatoes that we were giving away, that was, you know, going to bankrupt us. That really wasn't the case. Initially, I refused that. I didn't want to take money for this. This was something we kind of talked about as a company that we would continue to just give them away. Somebody tried to slip envelopes here and there, but we'd give them back. But I really couldn't stop the money that was coming in from distant lands and anonymous money. So as the Facebook posts expanded, I started to hear from some news agencies. I did interviews with CNN, Fox News, ABC, NBC, I do a little podcast with NPR. And then some of those stories ended up into the national or the world media. And so I started to have messages and comments and emails from people from all over the world. And one of the people that I noticed on one of the Facebook comments, was a lady named Susan. She's from Kenya, and, for whatever reason, I'll just remember, seeing her picture and this impression that I wanted to just see what she had to say. And so I clicked on her comment. And the comment was something along the lines, "I wish you could send some of those potatoes to me." But just, you know, shipping potatoes to Kenya or even other parts of countries, you know, it's cost prohibitive so it's not going to work. So I responded, "Well, I wish I could. What is it like in Kenya with COVID?" She just commented that she lived in Nairobi, Kenya, and it's a city of about 4 million people. We're talking dirt floor, tin shack, cardboard-type homes, and she just explained how they were living hand to mouth as it was, you know, trying to feed her family. She's a single mother of three children. And then with the lockdowns that the government had put on, imposed upon them in Kenya, you know, they really didn't have an opportunity to go into work and, you know, bring food home to the family. And so as I thought about a little bit, I come back and asked her a little bit later, you know, if there's nothing I can do to help? She really says, "Well, I don't think there's much you can do to help. But we just need something to eat." So I think I thought about that a little bit and in my pickup, I've had $100 bill that had been floating around in the center console of my truck for almost a year. And I'm like, "I'll just, I'm just gonna send her this money." And it's really not that easy to send money to Kenya. We finally figured out how to do it. And so I ended up sending the money over there to Susan. And a couple days later, I think it was over the weekend, so I think on Monday, she sent me a little picture of her family as they come back from the store with their groceries. And she brought back, you know, a big bag of flour, rice, and cooking oil and sugar, and just the staples, beans. And right on the very top a little there's one little teeny pack of cookies. It just struck me funny as we eat here in our country and go shopping, you know, you bring home for frozen pizzas and Snickers bars and ice cream and just things that didn't even cross her mind. And she wrote me back and she sent a picture and just saying, "Thank you. This will fit our family for months." So I continue to have money come into the company to help us. I've been thinking about you know, "Is there something I could do with this money, or something I could leverage to make this something bigger?" And in one of my conversations with Susan, she said, "My dream and prayer is to educate my children and to see them go to the university. I don't want them to raise their children in the ghetto like I have raised them." I don't know, there's something that really struck a chord with me on that. And so almost immediately, I had an idea, I'm like, "That's what I want to do. I'm gonna, I'm gonna help her children receive an education." And so I had the thought, "Okay, I'm gonna take the money that have already been given and put that toward the cause. I'm going to do a GoFundMe and I'll send this out to everyone that was wrote these nice comments and things on my Facebook page, I linked that to it. And so I pondered over it on a Sunday, all day. I started to do a little video to put that out and asking people for help. And I thought people responded really well to it. So we were able to raise more than enough, I think, to put most her kids through college. I think some people felt like maybe it could be a scam, or something like that. But I really felt in my heart, I knew that it was not. I had big, long conversations with Susan. I knew her heart. And so I was so excited about it. I'd share it with the family every day, we sit around the dinner table discussing where we're at what to do, and we've decided that even if we come up short, we as a family, we're gonna pitch in and make the dream happen for them one way or the other. And about then I kind of lost contact with Susan. At first, I was, I was a little bit wary. I'm like, okay, you know, what if something happened to her or. . .  But then I saw a post, and I think she had maybe even posted it herself, on Facebook and of like bulldozers bulldozing buildings and stuff down. And so I clicked on it and it was following that a little bit. And so I looked it up on the news and there was an article on it in the Kenyan news about how the goverment was working on a big waterworks project and this sewer plan, so they decided to knock those homes down. And, and so, as that was all demolished and twisted up in the metal and some of the belongings, and that, you know, I know that it was probably very devastating for, for her. And so the excitement of raising, you know, the money to help her children was kind of overcome with, we just needed to survive the next while. I was very nervous about how they were. Prior to and during this process, I made another friend in Kenya in Nairobi, his name was Titus. And he's a member of the Church there was in the bishopric in one of the wards and he seen an article on LDS Living that had been done about the story. So he reached out to me and just asked if there's something you could do to help. So I asked him if he'd go see if you could find Susan. And I had her phone number, but he was able to track her down and to check in on her. She found some shelter in a church, somewhere in the city for a few nights. And she had family nearby. And so her one sister let her stay with her for a shorter period of time while she got her feet back under underneath her. And so eventually, I heard back from her, and she, you know, she told me what had happened. They were safe. They were sound, they just needed somewhere to stay. She's was very discouraged, and in quite a bit of despair, I would say. So it was about this time that we started to have a little bits of discussions on occasion about God, talking about faith. And I asked her if she'd be willing to meet with the missionaries from my church, and that they would have a message that they would share with her that potentially changed her life, for the better – forever. She willingly accepted. And said she'd be happy to meet with the missionaries. So how do you get in contact with missionaries in a foreign country? Our friend, good friend, Titus, connected us with the missionaries and was able to get her phone number, make the connection, and so the missionaries like right away, they started to teach the first discussion. She'd come over to the church where they met and did a discussion and gave her a little tour of the church, and  . . . But as I've seen before, as I served on my own mission is, you know, sometimes as people start to learn and hear about the gospel, life can get really complicated for them pretty fast. And so, again, I couldn't make contact with Susan for quite some time. Finally, Titus, I think was able to track her down, and she's been robbed, and had been her – had her phone stolen. And I just thought, Well, yeah, this is – she's starting to learn about something that really can have life changing meaning in her life as she prepares to learn about the Savior and the Gospel. And then she's robbed. Like, what else could possibly go wrong? Again, an impression come to me that, you know, sometimes during our darkest hour comes – next comes the light. I really felt like that was going to be the case that Susan would soon see light in her life. And I didn't know exactly what that meant. I really wasn't that optimistic that things would go far with the missionaries, but I knew that there was going to be something good that happened in her life. In all our discussions with Susan, she never asked me for a single thing, and one day, she sent me a little message. And she said, "I feel like that I'm becoming a burden to you." She wanted to become more self–reliant and to be able to take care of her family. She expressed her concern in doing that. She didn't want to be a burden to others. She said that her doctor had told her that she needed to quit doing what she has done for an occupation to help feed her family, and that was doing construction. I have pictures of her packing these huge concrete blocks on her shoulders into the construction sites. And she talked about how how little money that paid how hard it was, and it had done damage to her back. Many times the women over there were taken advantage of and sometimes not even paid for their work. She said that she has an opportunity, that something she knows, to start her own business. And so she asked me the first time for something, and that was "Would you loan me some money so that I'll be able to start this business?" It was just a few hundred dollars, a very small amount. So I told her, "Yeah, I'd be, I'd be thrilled to help you start your own business." And so it had come to me the thought about the self–reliance course on how to start your business. And so I reached out to Titus and asked him if he could come up with the manuals and the books. And he did. And he took them to Susan and gave it to her. And so a week or so later, I asked her, "How's the business start–up going?" And she says, "No, I'm not, I'm not doing any of that, I  want to finish reading the self-reliance manual first." And so she was like, really into it, you know, reading the self-reliance program and how it can help her, and then Susan was able to start her own fruit stand business. So it's about this time that she was pretty quiet about things. And Titus actually told me first that she made a decision to be baptized, her and her daughter. But then the next day, in the conversation with Susan, she told me that she decided to be baptized and become a member of the Church. I was thrilled. I expressed to her that I wish that I could be there for it, because I really wanted it to be. I wish I could just jump on an airplane, fly out there, but I knew that wouldn't be realistic. I asked, "Could you make sure you send me pictures?" And so I asked her that, and she – and they did, they sent lots of pictures. And Titus was there too and he sent me pictures. It was a really special day, just to see the smiles on her face and see them all dressed in white. It was kind of surreal, but it was something that really touched me and our family was in celebration for the whole day. It was just a great experience to see. And I knew this could be a great beginning, that could really change her life and the lives of her children. She's expressed to me many times about her testimony and God and His desire to help her and that she's recognized that things will come in their own due time, in God's own time. We've since taken some of the education fund, and we've got her kids enrolled in private school. Public school in downtown Nairobi, you know it's a very difficult circumstance – 150 kids shoved into one classroom, there's not a lot of learning going and so we felt like if they're gonna have a chance at the university, that private school is going to be the best for them. And it's not a lot of money, a small amount. She sent me a pictures of her boys on the first day of school all dressed in their little uniforms and their books. It was the cutest thing you've ever seen. Her daughter, Serena just enrolled in school, but because of COVID her schools are still shut down, and so we haven't been able to get her in yet. At times in our life, when we think times are the most difficult, and are the most challenges it's really something that can end up being our greatest blessings. And I've seen that many times in my life. It's something that we see on the farm all the time, if the rain comes for 30 days straight – at the time it seems like the worst possible thing in the world because we can't get the work done, can't get it done timely. But six months later, when we're harvesting our crop and we have record crops – then comes the blessing that we see the law of the harvest, of how what seemed like the most difficult thing really ended up being something great. And I think we're seeing that in, in this circumstance with, you know, having to dump potatoes, you know, what seemed like a total disaster ended up being such a wonderful blessing, lead to a family in Kenya, on the other side of the world that could potentially have their lives changed forever. I just couldn't envision that at first. But I knew that as they had prayed, what could we experience, what could we learn from this COVID and from the whole tailored experience of being patient and waiting on the Lord's time for that to come to pass. I really feel like that has come to fruition and really just see somebody's live blessed as we learn to listen to the promptings of our Heavenly Father that come to us and follow them. It's really how we accomplish going about doing God's work that He would do if He was here Himself, to do our Heavenly Father's work. And I really want to envision and look just to see if Susan's family, a decade from now, a generation or two from now, to see what kind of difference that made. Something little, a little thing like dumping a few potatoes out in a, in a pile on the edge of a field, how that can lead to change the lives of many generations to come and really to see great things come to pass. That's really a testament to me of really how God works. We have to have trust in Him and what He allows us to go through and the trials that we have that that He – iti is maybe be what's best for us and really can be our greatest blessing.   KaRyn  26:28  That was Ryan Cranney. LDS Living first shared Ryan and Susan's story in a written article this past spring, and we loved that we could get it in Ryan's own words here on the podcast. And because you know that we love to have all sides of the story here at This Is the Gospel, we did reach out to Susan to see if we could make that happen. But the time differences from Kenya to the US and technological challenges made it impossible right now. We're so grateful for her willingness to be part of the story and we will have more of her own words in our show notes as soon as we possibly can. You know, when story producer Katie Lambert was working on this story, she remarked to me several times, pretty much every time we talked about it, how much she enjoyed Ryan's unassuming demeanor. She is well acquainted with the Idaho farmer life and said that he is an Idaho farmer through and through. Matter of fact about the loss of a major part of his income for the year, and matter of fact about his decisions to give the potatoes away and matter of fact about his prompting to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with Susan and her family. I'm in awe of Ryan solid faith in God's timing and His plan for each of us. He understands something that I feel like I'm still trying to learn every single day. The loss of the potatoes and the money that those potatoes represented was a temporary and temporal setback. But the joy in feeding thousands or helping one soul come home to the Savior's fold, that's an eternal and everlasting joy, nothing temporal about it. And that kind of perspective is exactly what Elder Holland was talking about when he gave his beautiful 2012 General Conference address titled: "The First Great Commandment." There isn't time here to recount the entire address, we'll put it in our show notes, you really need to go and reread it. It's so good, and so important. But Elder Holland shares the story of the resurrected Savior coming to His apostles who have turned back to the work they did before they were first called to leave their nets and follow Him. And after showing them his power to feed the world, physically, by filling their empty fishing nets, He implores Peter three times, "Do you love me?" And when Peter answers have after each question with "Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee." The Savior responds with these words, "Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep. Feed my sheep." Elder Holland goes on to say, quote, "I am not certain just what our experience will be on judgement day, but I will be very surprised if at some point in that conversation, God does not ask us exactly what Christ asked Peter, 'Did you love me?' I think he will want to know if in our very mortal, very inadequate and sometimes childish grasp of things. Did we at least understand one commandment, the first and greatest commandment of them all? Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength and with all thy mind. And if at such a moment, we can stammer out, 'Yeah, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee,' then He may remind us that the crowning characteristic of love is always loyalty. 'If ye love me, keep my commandments, 'Jesus said. So, we have neighbors to bless. Children to protect. The poor to lift up, the truth to defend. We have wrongs to make right and truth to share and good to do. In short, we have a life of devoted discipleship to give in demonstrating our love of the Lord. We can't quit and we can't go back. After an encounter with the living Son of the living God, nothing is ever again to be as it was before." End quote. When I think of Ryan's story, I think of this kind of love. This kind of loyalty. The kind of love that started with a pile of potatoes in an attempt to feed a hungry world. The kind of love that presented a willing heart that some may have seen as naive, ready to engage with someone very different from himself and his circumstances. And finally, the kind of love that knows that the true soul food of this sometimes treacherous, and confusing earth life, the real sustenance for those of us who hunger and thirst looks a lot less like potatoes, and much more like the making and keeping of sacred covenant as disciples of Jesus Christ. So this week, my friends, regardless of what your test results say, or a relentless year flings at you, I pray with all of my heart that we will seek to be filled with that kind of love. And as Elder Holland invites us to do, that we'll move forward, ever forward, to show that love by feeding His sheep. That's it for this episode of This Is the Gospel thank you to our storyteller Ryan Cranney and Susan. We'll have more information about them and their story including pictures, as well as the link to Elder Holland's talk in our show notes at LDS living.com/Thisisthegospel. You can also get more good stuff by following us on Instagram or Facebook at Thisisthegospel_podcast. The story in this episode is true and accurate as affirmed by our storyteller. And of course, if you have a story to share about living the Gospel of Jesus Christ, please call or pitchline and leave us a story pitch. We're currently looking for Christmas stories. Stories about getting it right, getting Christmas right. The best pitches will be short, they'll be sweet and they'll have a clear sense of the focus of your story. So call 515-519-6179 and leave us a message. Did you know that when you leave a review of this podcast on Apple, stitcher or wherever you listen, it makes it so that more people can find the podcast? If you can't figure out how to leave a review, which I totally get, check out our highlights on our Instagram page for some tips. This episode was produced by me KaRyn Lay with help from Sarah Blak – bless you Sarah – and story production and editing from Katie Lambert. It was scored, mixed and mastered by Mix at Six studios and our executive producer is Erin Hallstrom. You can find past episodes of this podcast and other LDS Living podcasts at LDSliving.com/podcasts. Be well everybody! Stay safe.     Show Notes + Transcripts: http://ldsliving.com/thisisthegospel See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Bob & Jeff discuss LaMelo Ball's NBA ceiling, what the Golden State Warriors should do with the No. 2 pick in this year's NBA Draft & the start of the 2020-2021 season in December 1:58: 2020-21 NBA season start date: December 22. Is this fair for the players? 3:30: The Olympics played a big part in the NBA's decision 8:25: Bob's LaMelo Ball evaluation12:48: Goodman's LaMelo-Rondo comparison 14:05: Why Minnesota Timberwolves need to trade the No.1 pick ASAP 16:00: Anthony Edwards' 'Yeah, but' factor 19:13: Are there steals in this NBA Draft lurking between No.8 - No. 20? 25:08: Golden State & James Wiseman at No.2 29:34: Bob's scheduled two BIG guests for upcoming episodes

Is there an ideal size for an owner-operator as he/she adds trucks, drivers and freight? The answer to that question is probably, well, "it depends." It's certain, though, that whether leased or independent with carrier authority, any owner is bound to reach a point where administrative and/or sales/operational demands outstrip his/her ability to handle everything -- and still haul.  Cadle Trucking owner Ben Cadle is just about at that breaking point, and feels he may have reached his "sweet spot" of sorts at 11 full-time drivers and trucks in operation (12 if you count him and his "Joy Ride 3" cabover, too, though his hauling frequency seems less and less as time goes on). His fleet's size has doubled over the course of the last five years, and "I don't want any more trucks at this point, he said, “It gets to a certain point it's like, 'Yeah, I'm good.'” As have so many small fleet operators I've talked to through the years, Cadle credits his drivers as the bedrock of his success. Not that he's getting rich, he emphasizes, but rather “trying to get to a comfortable point, and that's about it. Trying to secure the future.” As are no doubt our three Small Fleet Champ finalists you'll hear in today's edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast: James Davis of JDT out of Oregon(platform freight), Evan Guckien of Indiana-based Ed Burns & Sons (mostly platform), and Louisiana tank hauler John McGee Trucking. All three here offer insights on hiring and retaining the best drivers, on the issue of size and manageability, on learning to delegate, on the huge challenges that small fleet owners with motor carrier authority are facing with insurance costs when it comes to primary commercial auto liability. And more.

This week Matt interviews Gines! Most of the time when people find out what distances Gines runs, their response is 'Wow, you can run,' while he simply replies, 'Yeah you can say I like to run.' During the chat the fellas explore what Gines has learned from running , why he does it and keeps bringing him back for me each time. They talk about being curious in finding out what the body is capable of and diving down a rabbit hole of running. Running has taught Gines first hand that the body is stronger than the mind initial thinks and when you can master your mind you can train your mind to be stronger than your body. This is where a form of resilience is born. The resilience that is needed to push through a tough point in an ultra marathon has taught Gines to face day to day challenges with a higher amount of ease. We learn that running is not just running, the mental side is very strong in the sport. Gines also talks about his tribe. The difference between a 'cheer squad' and a 'commit squad.' The ability in the knowing what you need in a difficult situation, before the situation occurs. Plus there explore difference in what you need versus what you want. "All it is, is one foot in front of another." For more updates head to - lifelonglearnerpodcast.com Facebook.com/lifelonglearnernow

"As a medical student, you find potential patients everywhere. Whether you’re on an airplane or on a romantic dinner date, we’ve all heard those famous words, 'Is there a doctor in the house?!' Here are some of my favorite 'patient' encounters. The best friend curbside. I was playing ball with my boys – that’s right FIFA on the PlayStation – when my buddy drops the question, 'So listen man, you’re a doctor, right? I need some advice about my knee; it’s been killing me! I landed weird after jumping during soccer the other week, and now it’s been aching ever since.' Assessment and Plan: 27-year-old man, clearly delusional as he thinks I’m a doctor, presents to FIFA night complaining of right knee pain. Obviously, he should rest, ice it, use compression, and elevate the leg, right? He continued, 'So I went to my primary care doc, and he told me to rest, ice it, use compression, and elevate the leg! Isn’t that the dumbest thing you ever heard?' Uh oh, I couldn’t blow my cover, 'Yeah totally … maybe you should get that checked out!'" Daniel Azzam and Ajay N. Sharma are medical students and founders and editors-in-chief, Diary of a Medical Student. They share their stories and discuss their KevinMD article, "As a medical student, you find potential patients everywhere." (https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2020/09/as-a-medical-student-you-find-potential-patients-everywhere.html)

Hi guys, and welcome to another episode of the Delivering WOW Dental Podcast. I am so excited to be here. So today, I'm going to talk about something that is pretty real and honest, and it is about being an introverted dentist and how can we get more dental patients if we are an introverted dentist. So question for you, are you an introverted dentist? And the reason why I ask is that I, interestingly, am. So many people look at me and they're like, "Oh, Anissa, you're so extroverted. Like you get out there, and you're doing Facebook Lives, and I see you everywhere, and you're on social media, and you're having summits and doing all of this stuff." And people actually assume that I am an extrovert. But what's really interesting is that if you go back to the first episode of this podcast, what you will hear, and it's almost embarrassing, is that it actually sounded like I was reading. And so my office manager, at the time, comes to me after my first episode, and she says, "Dr. Holmes, I listened to your podcast, and it sounds like you're reading." And I was like, "You know what? I'm not going to delete it. It's okay." And what I said to her is perhaps the turning point, and will be the turning point for you, and it's been for so many people that have been through our challenges where I'm challenging people to step out of their comfort zone and do a Facebook Live. What I said to her is that, "You know what? There's something that I have inside of me that I have to give. I have knowledge of how to help people. And what's really important for me is that they find me, that they hear my voice so that I can help them." And so I continued to do my podcast. And as Facebook Live came out, I started to do Facebook Lives. And now it's really simple for me to do that. And I'm still an introvert, by the way. But what I recognize is that I have a gift and people need to hear my message. You're on this podcast right now. And if I had let being an introvert stop me from getting on the microphone and delivering the message, we may not be obviously where we are today. So I wanted to really look at that for you and really ask you that question. And the question is do you have a gift? Have you taken time to learn how to place implants, or how to help so many people, and actually save lives, and help marriages as well by understanding how to help patients who have sleep apnea? Have you made a time investment in understanding how to do beautiful cosmetic cases? Because so many times we have introverted dentists that love to learn. You're at conferences, you're taking the courses. Your hands are amazing. You can do beautiful dentistry. And what happens is that no one knows who we are. And so if you know that you have a message and a gift, it's almost your moral obligation to step out of your comfort zone, to do something that you've never done before, and to go ahead and put yourself out there, because that's the only way people will know about us. One of the fastest ways that I have found, at least to have people to start overcoming their shyness and their introvertedness and putting on an extroverted face, is by focusing on doing Facebook Lives. And what's been so amazing over the years, working with practices, and over the last year or so, working with practices in our marketing and practice growth challenges, I will from day one say, "You know what? I want you to come on. Do a Facebook Live. And guess what? It's okay if you do your Facebook Live and you stumble. It's okay if you stutter over your words. It's okay if the video is sideways." It's okay, because if it's not perfect, you're learning. And when we learn, we figure out what we need to improve on and we keep getting better. And so even in that group, what I'll say is, "If it's sideways, that's okay. Get in there. We'll show you how to fix it." And guess what happens? Even now, I've been doing, I can't tell you, hundreds of Facebook Lives, and there are times when I get on and I start fumbling over my words. And what do I do? I just delete it. I delete it and I start over. And guess what? You can continue and not start over. You just keep going. And guess what? The next day is another day. And what's been really interesting is seeing practices and owners and team members to start utilizing, using Facebook Live. And what happens is that now they get more clear with their message. It makes people think more about what is it that you want to say. And interestingly, a lot of the same things that we're doing on Facebook Live we're actually taking into the [inaudible 00:05:59]. And so when we're doing a Facebook Live about let me talk about three different ways to replace missing teeth, or here's why you actually need to go to the dentist. The difference between doing it at home and doing it in the office. Or anything that you're doing. Getting out of your comfort zone, doing the gift card giveaway to go ahead and get gift cards from other businesses. Man, that's really hard for people. A lot of times people are saying, "I'm very nervous to go and ask another business for a gift card." And all of a sudden, I'm challenging you, yes, I am, to go ahead and do it anyway. And now you step out of your comfort zone and you realize, "Wow, that actually wasn't that hard. I asked someone and they said, 'Yeah, I would love to do that.'" And guess what happens? Now you get more confident and you can do it again and again and again, and build more relationships and market your practice. And so again, today, I really wanted to talk about this because I see so many dentists who are introverted, including myself. But if your business matters to you, if your practice matters to you, if your patients matter to you, and people in the community that need to find you, then it's really urgent and important that you step out of your comfort zone and you do it anyway. So hopefully this serves you. I love helping you to be able to step out of your comfort zone. And so hopefully with this, you will take that next step. All right, guys, hopefully this was helpful. I look forward to chatting with you guys again soon. If you haven't yet signed up for our Marketing and Practice Growth Challenge, you definitely will want to do that, deliveringwowchallenge.com, so that we can help you get to the next level. If you're using the code dentalbosschallenge, the challenge is completely free, so we'd love to be able to help you with that. Again, thank you so much for being a listener to our podcast. If you are a member of our Dental Boss Movement Facebook group, I look forward to seeing you every week where we have free training for you and your practice. And if you haven't yet joined us, make sure you're joining us in that group as well, dentalbossmovement.com. All right, guys, thanks so much for listening. Take care and we will chat next week. If you're ready to take your practice to the next level, I invite you to join me inside of our next Marketing and Practice Growth Challenge. Inside of this challenge, you're going to create a full 12-month marketing plan, launch a marketing campaign that's going to allow you to be able to connect with your community as well as other local businesses. And I'm also going to show you how to use our whiteboard strategy that we've used with practices to be able to actually double their production, focusing on doing more high-value services. Again, I look forward to working with you, as well as your team, inside of our Marketing and Practice Growth Challenge. And to get started, all you have to do is go to deliveringwowchallenge.com. Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Delivering WOW Podcast, with Dr. Anissa Holmes. We'll catch you next time.

Episode ninety of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at "Runaway" by Del Shannon, and at the early use of synthesised sound in rock music. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode.   Patreon backers also have a ten-minute bonus episode available, on "Blue Moon" by the Marcels. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ ----more---- A note Almost every version of “Runaway” currently available is in stereo, and the stereo version of the song has a slightly different vocal take to the original mono version. Unfortunately, there appear to be multiple “original mono versions” too. To check that what I'm using here, a mono track available as a bonus on a reissue of the album Runaway With Del Shannon, is actually the hit single version, I downloaded two vinyl rips of the single and one vinyl rip of a mono hits compilation from the sixties that had been uploaded to YouTube. Unfortunately no two copies of the song I could find online would play in synch – they all appear to be mastered at slightly different speeds, possibly due to the varispeeding I talk about in the episode. I've gone with the version I did because it's a clean-sounding mono version, but it may not be exactly what people heard in 1961. Resources As always, I've created a Mixcloud streaming playlist with full versions of all the songs in the episode. This one is in two parts because of the number of songs by Del Shannon in the mix. Part one, part two. Only one biography of Del Shannon has ever been written, and that's out of print and (to judge from the Amazon reviews) not very well written, so I've relied again on other sources. Those include the liner notes to this CD, a good selection of Shannon's work (with the proviso that "Runaway" is in stereo -- see above; the articles on Shannon and Max Crook on This Is My Story, the official Del Shannon website,  and the Internet Archive's cached copy of Max Crook's old website. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them?   Transcript Today's episode is an odd one to write, as just as I put the finishing touches to the script I discovered that Max Crook, the keyboard player at the centre of this story, died less than two weeks ago. The news wasn't widely reported, and I only discovered this by double-checking a detail and discovering an obituary of him. Crook was one of the great early pioneers of electronic music, and a massive talent, and he's a big part of the story I'm telling today, so before we go into the story proper I just wanted to take a moment to acknowledge his passing, and to regret that it hasn't been more widely noted. One of the things we've not talked about much in this podcast so far is the technology of music. We've discussed it a bit -- we've looked at how things like the change from 78s to 45s affected the music industry, at the transition from recording on discs to recording on tape, at the electrification of the guitar, and at Les Paul's inventions. But in general, the music we've looked at has been made in a fairly straightforward manner -- some people with some combination of guitars, bass, piano, drums, and saxophone, and maybe a few string players on the most recent recordings, get together in front of a microphone and sing and play those instruments. But today, we're going to look at the start of synthesisers being used in rock and roll music. Today we're going to look at "Runaway" by Del Shannon: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Runaway"] Synthesised sound has a far longer pedigree than you might expect. The use of electronics to create music goes back to the invention of the theremin and the ondes martenot in the 1920s, and by the 1930s, people had already started using polyphonic keyboard-based electronic instruments. The Novachord was produced by the Hammond organ company between 1938 and 1942, and was introduced at the World's Fair in 1939, where Ferdinand Grofe, who we talked about a little in the episode on "Cathy's Clown", led a group consisting only of Novachord players in a public performance. The Novachord never achieved mass popularity because of World War II halting its production, but it was still used in a few recordings. One that's of particular interest to those of us interested in early rock and roll is Slim Gaillard's "Novachord Boogie": [Excerpt: Slim Gaillard, "Novachord Boogie"] But also it was used on one of the most famous records of the late thirties. These days, when you hear "We'll Meet Again" by Vera Lynn on documentaries about the second world war, this is the version you hear: [Excerpt: Vera Lynn, "We'll Meet Again"] But the record that people actually listened to in World War II didn't have any of that orchestration. It was Lynn accompanied by a single instrument, a Novachord played by Arthur Young, and is notably more interesting and less syrupy: [Excerpt: Vera Lynn with Arthur Young on Novachord, "We'll Meet Again"] So even in the late thirties, synthesised sounds were making their way on to extremely popular recordings, but it wasn't until after the war that electronic instruments started getting used in a major way. And the most popular of those instruments was a monophonic keyboard instrument called the clavioline, which was first produced in 1947. The clavioline was mostly used as a novelty element, but it appeared on several hit records. We're going to devote a whole episode in a few months' time to a record with the clavioline as lead instrument, but you can hear it on several fifties novelty records, like "Little Red Monkey" by Frank Chacksfield's Tunesmiths, a UK top ten hit from 1953: [Excerpt: Frank Chacksfield's Tunesmiths, "Little Red Monkey"] But while the clavioline itself was in use quite widely in the fifties, the first big rock and roll hit with an electronic synthesiser actually used a modified clavioline called a musitron, which was put together by an electronics amateur and keyboard player named Max Crook, from Ann Arbor, Michigan. Crook had built his musitron using a clavioline as a base, but adding parts from TVs, reel-to-reel recorders, and bits of whatever electronic junk he could salvage parts from. He'd started playing electronic instruments in his teens, and had built his own recording studio. Sadly, the early records Crook made are not easily available. The only place I've been able to track down copies of his early singles in a digital format is one grey-market CD, which I wasn't able to obtain in time to include the tracks here and which only seems to be available from one shop in Cornwall. His first band, the White Bucks, released a single, "Get That Fly" backed with "Orny", on Dot Records, but I can tell you from experience that if you search anywhere online for "White Bucks Orny" you will find... well, not that record, anyway. Even more interestingly, he apparently recorded a version of "Bumble Boogie", the novelty instrumental that would later become a hit for B. Bumble and the Stingers, with Berry Gordy at some point in the late fifties. Sadly, that too is not generally available. But it wasn't until he auditioned for Charlie Johnson and the Big Little Show Band that Max Crook met the people who were going to become his most important collaborators. The Big Little Show Band had started as Doug DeMott and The Moonlight Ramblers, a honky-tonk band that played at the Hi-Lo Club in Battle Creek, Michigan. Battle Creek is a company town, midway between Chicago and Detroit, which is most famous as being the headquarters of the Kellogg company, the cereal manufacturer and largest employer there. It's not somewhere you'd expect great rock and roll to come from, being as it is a dull medium-sized town with little in the way of culture or nightlife. The Hi-Lo Club was a rough place, frequented by hard-working, hard-drinking people, and Doug DeMott had been a hard drinker himself -- so hard a drinker, in fact, that he was soon sacked. The group's rhythm guitarist, Charles Westover, had changed his name to Charlie Johnson and put together a new lineup of the group based around himself and the bass player, Loren Dugger. They got in a new drummer, Dick Parker, and then went through a couple of guitarists before deciding to hire a keyboard player instead. Once they auditioned Crook, with his musitron, which he could clip to the piano and thus provide chordal piano accompaniment while playing a lead melody on his musitron, they knew they had the right player for them. Crook had a friend, a black DJ named Ollie McLaughlin, who had music industry connections, and had been involved in the White Bucks recordings. Crook and Johnson started writing songs and recording demos for McLaughlin, who got Johnson a session with Irving Micahnik and Harry Balk, two record producers who were working with Johnny and the Hurricanes, an instrumental group who'd had a big hit with "Red River Rock" a year or so previously: [Excerpt: Johnny and the Hurricanes, "Red River Rock"] Johnson recorded two songs in New York, without his normal musicians backing him. However, Micahnik and Balk thought that the tracks were too dirgey, and Johnson was singing flat -- and listening to them it's not hard to see why they thought that: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "The Search"] They told him to go back and come up with some more material that was less dirgey. Two things did come out of the association straight away, though. The first was that Charles Johnson changed his name again, combining a forename he chose to be reminiscent of the Cadillac Coup deVille with a surname he took from an aspiring wrestler he knew, Mark Shannon, to become Del Shannon. The second was that Johnny and the Hurricanes recorded one of Max Crook's instrumentals, "Mr Lonely", as a B-side, and you can hear in the Hammond organ part the kind of part that Crook would have been playing on his Musitron: [Excerpt: Johnny and the Hurricanes, "Mr Lonely"] Shannon and Crook recorded a tape of many other songs they were working on for McLaughlin to play to Micahnik and Balk, but they weren't interested -- until they heard a fragment of a song that Shannon and Crook had recorded, and which they'd then mostly taped over. That song, "Runaway", was the one they wanted. "Runaway" had been an idea that had happened almost by accident. The band had been jamming on stage, and Crook had hit a chord change that Shannon thought sounded interesting -- in later tellings of the story, this is always the Am-G chord change that opens the song, but I suspect the actual chord change that caught his ear was the one where they go to an E major chord rather than the expected G or E minor on the line “As our hearts were young”. That's the only truly unusual chord change in the song. But whatever it was, Shannon liked the changes that Crook was playing -- he and Crook would both later talk about how bored he was with the standard doo-wop progression that made up the majority of the songs they were playing at the time -- and the band ended up jamming on the new chord sequence for fifteen or twenty minutes before the club owner told them to play something else. The next day, Shannon took his guitar to the carpet shop where he worked, and when there were no customers in, he would play the song to himself and write lyrics. He initially wrote two verses, but decided to scrap one. They performed the song, then titled "My Little Runaway", that night, and it became a regular part of their set. The crucial element in the song, though, came during that first performance. Shannon said, just before they started, "Max, when I point to you, play something". And so when Shannon got to the end of the chorus, he pointed, and Crook played this: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Runaway"] When they were told that Micahnik and Balk liked the fragment of song that they'd heard, Shannon and Crook recorded a full demo of the song and sent it on to them. The producers weren't hugely impressed with the finished song, saying they thought it sounded like three songs trying to coexist, and they also didn't like Shannon's voice, but they *did* like Crook and the Musitron, and so they invited Crook and Shannon to come to New York to record. The two men drove seven hundred miles in a broken-down car, with their wives, to get from Michigan to New York. It was the middle of winter, the car had no heating, and Shannon smoked while Crook was allergic to tobacco smoke, so they had to keep the windows open. The session they were going to do was a split session -- they were going to record two Del Shannon vocal tracks, and two instrumentals by Crook, who was recording under the name "Maximilian" without a surname (though the "Max" in his name was actually short for Maxfield). Crook was definitely the one they were interested in -- he rearranged the way the microphones were arranged in the studio, to get the sound he wanted rather than the standard studio sound, and he also had a bag full of gadgets that the studio engineers were fascinated by, for altering the Musitron's sound. The first single released as by "Maximilian" was "The Snake", which featured Crook and Shannon's wives on handclaps, along with an additional clapper who was found on the street and paid forty dollars to come in and clap along: [Excerpt: Maximilian, "The Snake"] After that, the two women got bored and wandered off down Broadway. They eventually found themselves in the audience for a TV game show, Beat the Clock, and Joann Crook ended up a contestant on the show -- their husbands didn't believe them, when they explained later where they'd been, until acquaintances mentioned having seen Joann on TV. Meanwhile, the two men were working on another Maximillian track, and on two Del Shannon tracks, one of which was "Runaway". They couldn't afford to stay overnight in New York, so they drove back to Michigan, but when the record company listened to "Runaway", they discovered that Shannon had been singing flat due to nerves. Shannon had to go back to New York, this time by plane, to rerecord his vocals. According to Crook, even this wasn't enough, and the engineers eventually had to varispeed his vocals to get them in key with the backing track. I'm not at all sure how this would have worked, as speeding up his vocals would have also meant that he was singing at a different tempo, but that's what Crook said, and the vocal does have a slightly different quality to it. And Harry Balk backed Crook up, saying "We finally got Del on key, and it sounded great, but it didn't sound like Del. We mixed it anyhow, and it came out wonderful. When I brought Ollie and Del into my office to hear it, Del had a bit of a fit. He said, 'Harry, that doesn't even sound like me!' I just remember saying, 'Yeah but Del, nobody knows what the hell you sound like!" Like most great records, "Runaway" was the sum of many parts. Shannon later broke down all the elements that went into the song, saying: "I learned falsetto from The Ink Spots' 'We Three,'": [Excerpt: The Ink Spots, "We Three (My Echo, My Shadow, and Me)"] "I eventually got hooked on Jimmy Jones' 'Handy Man' in '59 and would sing that at the Hi-Lo Club.": [Excerpt: Jimmy Jones, "Handy Man"] "I always had the idea of 'running away' somewhere in the back of my mind. 'I wa-wa-wa-wa-wonder, why...' I borrowed from Dion & The Belmonts' 'I Wonder Why.'" [Excerpt: Dion and the Belmonts, "I Wonder Why"] "The beats you hear in there, '...I wonder, bam-bam-bam, I wa-wa...' I stole from Bobby Darin's 'Dream Lover.'" [Excerpt: Bobby Darin, "Dream Lover"] Listening to the song, you can definitely hear all those elements that Shannon identifies in there, but what emerges is something fresh and original, unlike anything else out at the time: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Runaway"] "Runaway" went to number one in almost every country that had a chart at the time, and top five in most of the rest. In America, the song it knocked off the top was "Blue Moon" by the Marcels, one of those songs with the doo-wop progression that Shannon had been so bored with. At its peak, it was selling eighty thousand copies a day, and Billboard put it at number three hundred and sixty four on the all-time charts in 2018. It was a massive success, and a game-changer in the music industry. Maximilian's single, on the other hand, only made the top forty in Argentina. Clearly, Del Shannon was the artist who was going to be worth following, but they did release a few more singles by Maximilian, things like "The Twisting Ghost": [Excerpt: Maximilian, "The Twisting Ghost"] That made the Canadian top forty, but Maximilian never became a star in his own right. Shannon, on the other hand, recorded a string of hits, though none were as successful as "Runaway". The most successful was the follow-up, "Hats off to Larry", which was very much "Runaway part 2": [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Hats off to Larry"] But every single he released after that was slightly less successful than the one before. He soon stopped working with Crook, who remained at the Hi-Lo Club with the rest of the band while Shannon toured the country, and without Crook's Musitron playing his records were far less interesting than his earliest singles, though he did have the distinction of being one of the few singers of this era to write the bulk of his own material. He managed to further sabotage his career by suing Micahnik and Balk, and by 1963 he was largely washed up, though he did do one more thing that would make him at least a footnote in music history for something other than "Runaway". He was more popular in the UK than in the US, and he even appeared in the film "It's Trad Dad!", a cheap cash-in on the trad jazz craze, starring Helen Shapiro and Craig Douglas as teenagers who try to persuade the stuffy adults who hate the young people's music that the Dukes of Dixieland, Mr. Acker Bilk and the Temperance Seven are not dangerous obscene noises threatening the morals of the nation's youth. That film also featured Gene Vincent and Chubby Checker along with a lot of British trumpet players, and was the first feature film made by Richard Lester, who we'll be hearing more about in this story. So Shannon spent a fair amount of time in the UK, and in 1963 he noticed a song by a new British group that was rising up the UK charts and covered it. His version of "From Me to You" only made number seventy-seven on the US charts, but it was still the first version of a Lennon/McCartney song to make the Hot One Hundred: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "From Me to You"] He made some interesting records in the rest of the sixties, and had the occasional fluke hit, but the music he was making, a unique blend of hard garage rock and soft white doo-wop, was increasingly out of step with the rest of the industry. In the mid and late sixties, his biggest successes came with songwriting and productions for other artists. He wrote "I Go to Pieces" which became a hit for Peter & Gordon: [Excerpt: Peter and Gordon, "I Go to Pieces"] Produced the band Smith in their cover version of "Baby It's You", which made the top five: [Excerpt: Smith, "Baby It's You"] And produced Brian Hyland's million-selling version of a Curtis Mayfield song that I'm not going to play, because its title used a racial slur against Romani people which most non-Romani people didn't then regard as a slur, but which is a great record if you can get past that. That Hyland record featured Crook, reunited briefly with Shannon. But over the seventies Shannon seemed increasingly lost, and while he continued to make records, including some good ones made in the UK with production by Dave Edmunds and Jeff Lynne, he was increasingly unwell with alcoholism. He finally got sober in 1978, and managed to have a fluke hit in 1981 with a cover version of Phil Phillips' "Sea of Love", produced by Tom Petty and with Petty's band the Heartbreakers backing him: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Sea of Love"] He also came to people's attention when a rerecorded version of "Runaway" with new lyrics was used as the theme for the TV show Crime Story. In 1989, Del Shannon was working on a comeback album, with Jeff Lynne producing and members of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers as backing musicians. The same people had previously worked on Roy Orbison's last album, which had been his biggest success in decades, and Lynne was gaining a reputation for resuscitating the careers of older musicians. Both Lynne and Petty were fans of Shannon and had worked with him previously, and it seemed likely that he might be able to have a hit with some of the material he was working on. Certainly "Walk Away", which Shannon co-wrote with Lynne and Petty, sounds like the kind of thing that was getting radio play around that time: [Excerpt: Del Shannon, "Walk Away"] There were even rumours that Lynne and Petty were thinking of inviting Shannon to join the Travelling Wilburys to replace Roy Orbison, though that seems unlikely to me. Unfortunately, by the time the album came out, Shannon was dead. He'd been suffering from depression for decades, and he died of suicide in early 1990, aged fifty-five. His widow later sued the manufacturers of the new wonder drug, Prozac, which he'd been prescribed a couple of weeks earlier, claiming that it caused his death. Max Crook, meanwhile, had become a firefighter and burglar alarm installer, while also pursuing a low-key career in music, mostly making religious music. When Shannon was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Crook volunteered to perform at the ceremony, playing his original Musitron, but his offer was ignored. In later years he would regularly show up at annual celebrations of Shannon, and talk about the music they made together, and play for their fans. He died on July the first this year, aged eighty-three.

Why stick to any one genre? Our guest this week is Catherine Newman: memoirist, middle grade novelist, etiquette columnist and now the author of How to Be a Person: 65 Highly Useful, Super-Important Things to Learn Before You’re Grown-Up. While she’s at it, she writes a cooking blog, co-authored a book on crafts for kids and edits ChopChop, a kids cooking magazine. And she pens frequent funny essays for everything from O to the New York Times to the Cup of Jo website. In other words, she’s putting a pastiche of writing together and making it work with an insouciant disregard for any and all advice about self-branding or owning an niche or sticking to one topic or identity.In fact, I’d argue that “insouciant disregard” might just BE her brand. This episode also includes the immortal words “I’ve never had to kill anything during the podcast before,” uttered by Jess—so that’s a reason to listen right there. But there are plenty of others—this is a real nitty gritty episode on building a career and getting things done.#AmReadingKJ: Henna Artist by Alka JoshiRecipes for a Beautiful Life by Rebecca BarryJess: Sure Shot by Sarina BowenAnimal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara KingsolverMissing You by Harlan CobenCatherine: Know My Name by Chanel MillerSea Wife by Amity GaigeThe Chicken Sisters by KJ Dell’AntoniaThanks to everyone who supports the podcast financially. To join that team, click the button below:But it’s all good. The pod is free as it always has and always will be. This shownotes email is free, too, so please—forward it to a friend, and if you haven’t already, join our email list and be on top of it every time there’s a new episode.Find more about Jess here, Sarina here and about KJ here.KJ Dell'Antonia 0:00 Hey writers KJ here. Usually I write down what I'm going to tell you in our pre episode, promotional blurb, whatever you want to call this, and I will say right away that of course we are, as always sponsored by our friends at Author Accelerator, who we love. This week, instead of writing down some great reasons why we love them I just wanted to take a minute to read to you from the email that I got from Jenny Nash this week. This is her weekly email that goes out to anyone who's on the Author Accelerator list, or read every single one of those and I cannot say that about almost any other weekly email I get, there a couple. Anyway, Jenny writes, "I was speaking with a writer this week who could see the light at the end of the tunnel on her novel. She was almost done and she was terrified. She could feel herself panicking and turning to other shiny new ideas. Anything that wasn't this almost done idea. Being done would mean that her work could be rejected. Being done would mean that her work could be judged. Being done would mean that her limitations and weaknesses as a writer would be on display for everyone to see. Being done would mean that whatever she had on the page was as good as she was able to do. Even if it wasn't anywhere close to the perfect story in her mind. Being done would mean that she would be exposed." I could really, really relate to that. And I think I'm not the only one. A lot of us start to let things go the minute we get anywhere close to the finish line, because the finish line is scary. And if that's the place where you are maybe now is the moment when you want to reach out and see about working with a writing coach. You might not need much a few weeks, a little bit of a push, a little bit of help, just to take that thing that you're working on, and get it through to not the almost best you can do (which you know allows a lot of room for imagining other things) but the actual best you could do and then make a real decision about what it is you'd like to do with it. If you're game for that, you should head over to authoraccelerator.com and click your way through to all the great places because we love them and there's also a lot of other good stuff there. While I'm here I also want to say that this episode includes a couple of small swear words here and there and also some weird commentary on vaginas. Because this is one of our dearest friends we're interviewing this week and we got a little bit weird. So letting you know that so if you have tiny ears around that you are concerned about? Honestly, it's no big on this one. I don't think that it will bother you, but I wanted to give you a heads up. Alright. Enjoy it. This is a great episode. Is it recording?Jess Lahey 2:51 Now it's recording. KJ Dell'Antonia 2:53 This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone trying to remember what I'm supposed to be doing.Jess Lahey 2:57 Alright, let's start over.KJ Dell'Antonia 2:58 Awkward pause. I'm gonna rustle some papers. Okay, now one, two, three.Hey, I'm KJ Dell'Antonia. And this is #AmWriting. The podcast about writing all things, from fiction, to nonfiction, pitches, proposals, emails, essays. This is the podcast about sitting down and getting your writing work done. Jess Lahey 3:27 I'm Jess Lahey, I'm the author of The Gift of Failure and the forthcoming book The Addiction Inoculation, Raising Healthy Kids in a Culture of Dependence, who the subtitles are always so tricky, and you can find my work on the old interwebs at The Atlantic and the New York Times and The Washington Post and lots of other places.KJ Dell'Antonia 3:58 I am KJ Dell'Antonia, the author of the novel The Chicken Sisters coming out on July 1 of this year, which is 2020. For those of you listening in the future, when I hope things are not what they are now, but that is not what we are going to talk about today. We have a guest, our guest is Catherine Newman, who we've actually been trying to record with Catherine since like since like our 10th episode. But wait, I want to tell you about Catherine, she is a memoirist, a middle grade novelist, and etiquette columnist and now the author of How to Be a Person: 66 Highly Useful, Super Important Things to Learn Before You're Grown Up.Jess Lahey 4:57 It's actually 65, but I think that we should invent a 66 while we're here.KJ Dell'Antonia 5:22 Okay, no, I wasn't done. I wasn't done - because while she's at it, Catherine writes a cooking blog, she co-authored a book on crafts for kids, and she edits Chop Chop, a kid's cooking magazine, which I didn't even know till I just recently read her bio because I never read the bios of my friends because I'm supposed to know all this stuff, but I didn't. And she pens frequent funny essays for everything from O to The New York Times to The Cup of Joe website. In other words, she's putting a pastiche of writing together and making it work with an insouciance disregard for any and all advice about self branding, or owning a niche, or sticking to one topic or an identity, and in fact, I would argue that insouciance disregard might just be Catherine Newman's brand.Catherine Newman 6:10 Oh, my God, that's it. I just feel like that's the mic drop. I'm so happy. I also feel like you just fully explained all the problems I have. It's my insouciance disregard.Well, I loved your intro. My intro really would have been you know, this is Catherine Newman for me is the writer that, not only a person I adore and know personally, but as a writer she's the one who always figures out the new way to say the thing I have been feeling and yet felt so cliched that I never wrote it down. She always has some new amazing way to state it and then I'm like, 'Oh my gosh, how has no one ever said it that way before?' and it's so true and perfect and beautiful. And you know, for a lot of writers that write about parenting and this whole racket that we call life, often if they have a favorite piece, I often will say let me guess was it by Catherine Newman because her pieces just rank as people's favorites.Jess Lahey 8:00 We love your stuff. But you guys, you and KJ have a much longer relationship than you and I do, Catherine. So KJ, tell them where you guys met.KJ Dell'Antonia 8:09 I don't know where we met. I know that Catherine wrote for me at Motherlode but it must have been Wonder Time. The late great that says that it's not the greatest like the more I say the name now that it's gone, the dumber it sounds, but it really was. Yeah, okay. Soft sigh of regret. And while we're having soft sighs of regret for demises of magazines, I hear Family Circle just tanked. I mean, I know that was like in the fall, but... Catherine Newman 8:49 I know I always feel like I'm there on that tiny little island of sinking magazines.Jess Lahey 8:57 I'm just about to send out an email today saying Hi, want me to write anything? Anything you got - I'll write that thing.KJ Dell'Antonia 9:40 Great. Okay, so here we are, finally, at last.So okay. 65 (not 66) Highly Useful, Super Important Things to Learn Before You're Grown Up. Why that after a resume that includes two parenting memoirs, one crafting book, and one middle grade novel that was my middle grader at the time absolute total favorite, he even reviewed it for Parenting magazine. Yeah, he still looks back on that with fondness because he has a hard time finding books that he likes. Anyway. And so from there you thought I know, the best thing and the easiest thing for me to market next would clearly be a book of useful things to learn before you're grown up. I don't think that's really how you did it.Catherine Newman 10:37 Yeah, no, no, I know. Isn't that crazy? Really, the dirty truth is that I pitched it as a much worse book. I wanted a book, I went to the library to look for a book, I don't know if you ever end up writing this way where it's like, oh, this thing doesn't exist that I assumed existed. But I went to the library to get a book for Bertie, because I wanted her to do more helpful stuff in the house, but she didn't know how to do it. And she didn't want to be taught how to do it by anybody. So this is, second child has been wanting to do it by herself since she was two. And it's really hard with a person like that, who doesn't want to be shown how to do something and then you ask them like, 'Hey, can you clean the bathroom?' And she's like, 'I don't know how to do that.' But then if you try to show her she's pissed. So for Bertie it worked, so I went to the library to get I assumed like DK had made one of those like photo illustrated guides to chores, you know...KJ Dell'Antonia 11:52 I might need that, there are things I don't really know how to do. Truth. Catherine Newman 11:57 So I went to get that book from the library, like I walked in confidently, talked to the librarian and they were like, 'Yeah, we don't have a book like that.' So I was working with Story at the time (the publisher)and who I love and my editor there is an old person from Family Fun who I used to write all this fun stuff with. KJ Dell'Antonia 12:22 That was also a fun place to write.Catherine Newman 12:25 Oh my God, so fun. So she and I had worked on a piece that I think killed me called Chores Fun. So I pitched her the book Chores Fun and I wanted it to be photo illustrated, step by step, DK style. And she was interested, but needless to say that got higher up over there and they were like, 'No...'KJ Dell'Antonia 12:50 And me, I want that book. I would buy 500 copies of that book. Catherine Newman 12:58 So they then said, you know, can you expand it so it's not just that? And so the other thing I really had wanted to write was, I want to say etiquette, but I don't mean in the like uptight, sort of like how to talk to the Queen of England sons, just the like how to communicate sense of etiquette, like how to be a person who needs to communicate with other people. I had wanted to write a book about that, too. And so we sort of merged those. And the book for me is primarily that but then we broke it down a little so it seems like it's many more topics than communicating and like cleaning a bathroom. So there's some stuff about cooking, and some stuff about money, and some stuff about just general skills like you know, changing batteries and that's how it came to be. And so I have found both of my kids with galleys of the book open to learn whatever it is they need to do. Bernie has used the book to tie a necktie and swears it works. And when I had asked them to clean all the bathrooms at Thanksgiving, I went in and the book was like, propped up on the counter in the bathroom.Jess Lahey 14:16 Oh my gosh, that's so brilliant. KJ Dell'Antonia 14:17 I had not thought of that. We've been cleaning bathrooms like crazy around here and yeah, I discovered that one child claimed to have been taught to wipe the toilet with a Clorox wipe and then flush it. And when I tell you that we're on septic I can also tell you that that ended extremely badly with men in the basement and saws. Oh, God, yeah, that's not how to clean a toilet. And I really didn't tell her that either.Catherine Newman 14:47 No, I can imagine.KJ Dell'Antonia 14:49 Anyway, I have now taught this skill, but I feel that it needs refreshing so I'm gonna prop that up. Jess Lahey 14:57 I'm gonna do the same thing. There's that forgetting of things that technically they should know. And as we've talked about a bajillion times for me - that one was laundry and we solved that with the dry erase markers on the washer and dryer with all of the instructions and the bathroom one seems to be the next frontier that we have to handle around here.KJ Dell'Antonia 15:22 Well, the truth is that in this moment, any of us who did have someone who sometimes cleaned for us whether that was frequent or infrequent, don't have that. Anyway, most of us are, even if there's stuff that maybe we didn't have to do before, or we were teaching our kids to do it but they didn't necessarily have to do it I could kind of poke at it and that was fine because the person who really could do it was gonna be there in two weeks. So now it's like yeah, this is how you clean the toilet. Jess Lahey 16:17 Here's the nice thing about this book also is that there are so many times when you show a kid how to do it and you're being a little overly controlling or they're like no one else does that, no one cleans behind the toilet seat, Mom, you can show them a book and say, 'Look, this is how an arbiter of how these things should be done is actually doing things. KJ Dell'Antonia 16:55 So what has it been, like getting out there to share this book that is, in many ways, so different than from what you've done before?Catherine Newman 17:18 I could ask you the same. You know, it's funny. The funny thing for me is that my first two books were so intimate that actually, it was really like trial by fire in terms of publishing. So when people would blur together sort of criticizing the book with criticizing me as a parent or even just me as a person, because the memoir genre kind of invites that and it was really little nerve racking, honestly. And so then after that there was fiction, which is so delightful because it's fiction. And there was a book I did with my friend Nicole, that craft book, which is so delightful, because a) it's a craft book, so no one's gonna, like take my character apart over it and b) it was with a friend. So you know, it's like how I used to love co-teaching when I was teaching, like it's so dreamy to have a partner in something because you're not stranded. So this is none of those. This is not a memoir. It's not fiction. I don't have a partner in it, but it doesn't feel dangerous to me. It just feels like oh, kids need to know how to do stuff. And I feel pretty good about it being useful. So I don't have like weird shame, you know the memoirs for me, I promoted them with shame. I mean, I had blathered on and on about all my deepest fears about parenting and my kids and then I had to go sell it and it was so humiliating and I just am feeling a delightful absence of shame around this book. So I don't know if that's what you asked or how I ended up there. So I'm feeling pretty happy. I feel like it's coming out. I actually weirdly feel like the timing for my book is good because lots of kids are home. Jess Lahey 19:46 I'm in total agreement with you on that one. Catherine Newman 19:50 And I feel like lots of parents genuinely need help. So it doesn't even feel artificial. You know, sometimes you have to teach your kids stuff even though it'd be much easier just to do it. I know you both know that because You both have talked to me about that, but I feel like this moment where I can say hey, I am well to welcome someone make dinner you know it doesn't feel like a learning avenue it's just real life and the kids are in it with us and they're old enough to see it, it doesn't feel contentious and so I guess I feel like this is actually not a bad moment for a book like that. You know, I'm so glad I don't have some book coming out about I don't even know. I think we're lucky like KJ I weirdly feel like this about your book too, that your book even though it's fiction, and it's like this total romance, it's so perfect because it offers something that people need in this moment, like I needed to read about these feuding fried chicken places. And it was like this ace in the hole for me that I knew I could just relax and read it and it was so that it was like the most incredibly pleasurable comforting diversion. So anyway, I feel like it would just be terrible to be coming out with a book that was like entering the workforce or you know, something that was like so not the moment for it...KJ Dell'Antonia 22:06 Thank you for saying lovely things about The Chicken Sisters, I'm super excited to share it. And I am kind of with you, I had a lot of angst around How To Be a Happier Parent because I kept going, it's happier, and not better, either. I felt like, you know, who was I to talk and to say those things and so I felt a lot of stress around that, that I don't feel. You know, it's a fun novel. That's what it's supposed to be. And it is that and it's got pretty yellow cover, and I am looking forward to everyone being able to buy it.Catherine Newman 22:54 No one's hoping to solve a problem with it, except maybe just wanting to be diverted. You won't fail, you know...KJ Dell'Antonia 23:17 Did you find people pushing you to do something else that was more in line with what you've done before? You know does your agent say like 'Well, could you just write another memoir? Or a collection of essays perhaps.'Catherine Newman 23:51 The funny thing is I'm a terrible pitcher. Like I really like for people to come to me and be like, 'You know what we need?' And I'm like, 'Sure, you know, because I am, as I have said for 20 years, I'm just a writing tramp. I will write whatever, as long as it doesn't like conflict with my politics, you know, but I've written you know, whatever copy to say that the tampons not gonna fall out of your body without ever using the word tampon or body. I mean, give me whatever and I will write it. Like I even like being assigned weird stuff because then it's like doing a crossword puzzle. You know, it doesn't ask that much of you emotionally. But, all of that is to say that I am not dying to publish another book of essays or another memoir and maybe at some point, I will. I mean, I have a lot of interest in all of us doing an anthology about like menopause. That would be really, really funny. But, I feel like something collaborative that was like more a collaborative essay project. And I feel the same way about writing about older kids. I would love to do it collaboratively. But I definitely don't want to write a whole book about it. My guess is if I do another book after this, it'll be an adult novel. Adult novel always sounds like it's porn... I have an adult novel I want to write that I've been sort of writing and it's that thing where now I don't know how to write it because I'm starting to lose track of the world before the pandemic, even though I lived in it for 50 years. So I don't know, that's always lingering around as a thing I want to write and then, you know, I want to write another book in this genre for Story for sure. And I wouldn't be surprised if that something happened, I don't know if it would be a follow up, or we would have to see, I guess.Jess Lahey 27:25 So for writers that are wishing they can cobble together this Higgledy Piggledy, a little writing here, a little writing there a little of this genre. How I mean, I know it's impossible to say, I'm assuming you're not going to say, Oh, yes, I had this all written out. 10 years ago. This is exactly the path I have designed for myself.Catherine Newman 27:44 You mean when I was getting a PhD for 10 years, but I then went on to not use? Yeah, that really wasn't the plan. Jess Lahey 27:52 Yeah, that was while I was at law school, learning how to be a juvenile attorney. So you know, for those writers who look to us to have some sort of takeaway about how to create a life around writing for themselves? I mean, do you have anything you could share for us in terms of how you've managed to cobble together this really interesting career?Catherine Newman 28:15 Well, thank you for calling it both Higgledy Piggledy and interesting because I think of it really as both of those. Yeah, I guess so. I mean, nothing that you haven't heard on this podcast before. I feel like the old improv yes and advice I do think about, I say no to nothing. Again, only if it conflicts with my politics. So I've never been proud and I continue not to be, I will write most things and I will work on most projects and I will give it away if it's a worthy cause. I'm more than happy to write something for someone doing something that's important. So I ended up with tons of relationships and I know you're both the same that for both of you that sort of one of the treasures of your writing and publishing life is these ongoing really well nurtured relationships and I don't I do it as well as you guys, truly. But that said, I do maintain relationships with everyone I've ever written for and they end up who knows where like, you write the shitty Kotex copy and then that person goes to O Magazine, I just feel all the time like people move around so much. And as long as I make myself easy to work with, and available, then I feel like I get a lot of assignments just because those two things turn out to be, I think marketable skills weirdly.Jess Lahey 30:10 I find it shocking that you say you're not as good at it because we had never met, I admired your writing so much, and you agreed to have coffee with me never having met me before when I happened to be in your town. So I disagree that you are not very good at cultivating these relationships and you know, whenever I talk about your writing, people talk about the fact that they really admire you as a writer, so I think that you do a really good job of that.Catherine Newman 30:42 Well, thank you. I loved the idea too, that you like called me out of the blue. I totally was already stalking you. KJ Dell'Antonia 30:58 Catherine, I think you have a gig right now that a lot of writers would both kill for and also feel like well hey I could do that, I could weigh in on etiquette issue real simple and getting a column is kind of the gold standard of what people want that's hard to achieve and I get a lot of questions about it and I'm not at all helpful. So I would like to give you the opportunity to be not at all helpful - like how did it happen?Catherine Newman 31:36 Oh my god, it was so like a one thing and another and it was exactly the thing of an editor I'd worked with somewhere unglamorous ended up at Real Simple. And then I wrote something for her there and their etiquette columnist was leaving, they asked me to audition which was so nerve racking. so I The question was something like my cousin without talking to us named her twins after my twins like what would you do?So I it was just luck but a lot of my luckiest things (seemingly luckiest things) come from having said yes to really outrageous things either low paying things or things that I wrote for a good cause. I would just say for me, I think almost everything good in my career has come from a certain openness and willingness. You know, it's like when my kids were little and they were writing thank you notes for shitty presents, you know that they didn't like and weren't happy to get and I would say there's always something true you can say that's gonna be real, like someone gave you a gift that in and of itself is something to be thankful for and you can express that. That sounds so corny, but whatever. That's how I am. And I think like almost any opportunity I'm given to write I do feel like there's an opportunity to make some kind of meaning out of it, if that makes sense. Either to take pleasure in the writing or to say something funny or to get a little philosophy into it or a little politics into it. And so I guess I think of even the weirdest stuff as an opportunity, which I think is a head game I play with myself because I'm never going to be successful enough to not need to keep writing all this stuff all the time. You know, I am just constantly writing and that feeling I have of everything being a little bit of an opportunity, you know, we're all writers, because we're curious about the world, I feel like at bottom, that's probably the main thing we all have in common. And you can always express that, you know what I mean? Even if it's something that feels sort of random. So that's a long way to say that I think every writing gig is an opportunity. I mean, unless somewhere wealthy is grossly under paying you then don't do that. Like they can't do that. That's wrong. But I just mean, you know, some of the stuff that isn't like a perfect fit or isn't high profiler isn't very glamorous, those things have always led to other things for me, almost, almost inevitably, in a way that I feel like is karmic in the true sense of what you put out into the world comes back to you.KJ Dell'Antonia 34:51 We talk about things in that category a lot because we make a practice of getting annoyed with each other whenever we say I got lucky because yes, we have been lucky but yeah, fortune favors the well prepared. You know, Dax Shepard can't ask you on his podcast and Kristen Bell can't share your book unless you have written it and perhaps presented it to her. Yes, some things land and some things don't. But if you don't throw any paper airplanes up ain't nothing gonna hit.Catherine Newman 36:05 I feel like it's partly luck and partly this other gendered thing, which is I am a pleaser and I have really mixed feelings about that because on the one hand like I have raised Bertie to not be a pleaser...KJ Dell'Antonia 36:25 You wrote about that for me at Motherlode and it's such a hysterical piece and it made people so delighted and so angry at the same time.Catherine Newman 36:32 Yeah, but I am such a pleaser and that has served me really well in my career. And I never as a feminist, I always have really mixed feelings about it because some of it feels really gendered to me that I'm friendly. Let me say as a side note to my own comment that I was just making. I think one of the beauties of freelancing is that you can't take any of your relationships for granted and you shouldn't anyway, I mean, I really feel that right. If you're in a workplace, you should always be nurturing your relationships and taking care of everybody in that way. But freelancing, no one ever has to hire you again. It reminds me a little bit, if you will, of waiting tables, which I was excellent at. Where you're always gonna do best if you were your sort of best self if what you put out is the best version of yourself it's gonna bring you the best work and connect you to the best people. And the truth is, it actually makes my life good because I mostly have positive interactions and that's so much better for me than getting into bed at night and be like Oh God, I had the worst interaction with somebody. So if something's kind of weird I'll like die about it. And I just feel like freelancing I mostly have to be somebody that people would want to hire. You know, I know I keep sounding like such a w***e. But there it is.KJ Dell'Antonia 38:21 That's kind of how it works some of the time. So Catherine, what have you been reading?Catherine Newman 39:59 So truly The Chicken Sisters was my segue back into reading but I wanted to mention a book that actually I was reading right before that, which was (I don't know if you've talked about it on the podcast), but the Chanel Miller book, Know My Name. I admired it so much. I just love her and I love her as an illustrator and I just love everything about her. And as a memoir, I thought the gift of being able to write about something so terrible, with so much love and optimism just blew me away. Like, it's everything I ever sort of wanted to be as a writer. And that book just killed me. I thought it was so incredibly good. I almost wanted to read it again to study it.Jess Lahey 41:32 I didn't know she was a writer, so I was a little nervous. And then I was so blown away, especially towards the second half. I found there were a few moments in the first half where I wasn't totally with her, but then it just picked up steam in terms of it felt to me almost that she got to be a better writer during the process of writing it and at the end of it I went off for a walk in the woods by myself because I had to sort of just process that book. It was exquisite. It was so well doneCatherine Newman 41:59 I had honestly just the exact same. I read it because I felt like this kind of moral obligation as a feminist not to turn away from the story, was so I felt like I should read this book. I picked it up with a dread of obligation. And then it's just sang, it was so beautiful. So that book and Bertie read it after and was crazy about it. And so that book, I have other books, but I want to hear what you're reading, too. Jess Lahey 42:47 KJ, you want to go next?KJ Dell'Antonia 42:57 I've started some books. Okay. I'm going to tell you that I'm rereading a book, because I can tell you with confidence that I love this book and I have enjoyed it. I think this is a multiple read. I've read this many times because it's just soothing and kind of wonderful. And I think I've talked about it on the podcast. Catherine Newman 43:15 Can I guess? Is it I Capture the Castle?KJ Dell'Antonia 43:19 No, but I do like that. No, not at all. It's a memoir, and it's called Recipes for a Beautiful Life by Rebecca Berry. She wrote it in like 2008 or it takes place in like 2008 so it's got a lot of the the economy crash in there as she and her family are moving. We all know I'll read anything in which a family moves to a small town in a rural place and makes a new life for themselves. Anyway, I have really enjoyed that. So that is what I can guarantee for you. I have started The Henna Artist and I really like it so far. I'm gonna mangle her name so I'm going to look it up for the show notes. At chapter three I'm really liking it, but we all know how that could go, but I don't think it will.Jess Lahey 44:22 Well I have to start with I listened to the audio of Sarina Bowen's newest book Sure Shot and I got to talk about it with her because she did some really interesting things in there and we were talking a little bit. We were talking about authors who are gardeners and they plant seeds for new things and Sarina just did an exquisite job in this book. I love her books from just a listening to the story perspective but I also love watching her go and sort of planting the seeds for the books that will follow in the series because she writes books in a series and this is one of the Brooklyn Bruisers hockey books and I just from a technical perspective adored listening to Sure Shot her new hockey romance. But it's funny KJ that you said the thing about small town and comfort and making a life in a small town thing because my comfort listen this past couple of weeks on and off has been Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver because I've been prepping my gardens, I've spent so much time not writing as much but doing a ton of gardening and so listening to Barbara Kingsolver while I do that has been has been just wonderful. And the last thing I just finished last night was another Harlan Coben, this one was called Missing You and it was really clever. And we have to try to get Harlan Coben on the show because he does this thing that Sarina had told me about that he's known for, which is the the climax at the end of the book, except it's got two peaks, not one. Like you think you've hit the climax and you have the answers and then he hits you again, with a second sort of twist climax. And it's so it's his thing. He does it over and over and over again. And he's so good at it. The guy plots a book like nobody's business, so I'm dying to talk to him. So if anyone out there knows Harlan Coben, I would love to talk to him about how he plots his books. But anyway, so that's been what I've been listening to and it's been all listening. A little bit of reading books in hand but mostly listening because I've been out in the garden. Catherine Newman 47:25 Can I mention one other book? I just so what I just read is my friend Amity Gage's book, Sea Wife. And it's not at all comforting at all takes place on a sailboat. And it's a young family, a married couple and kids on this sailboat and it's a kind of a thriller and kind of a mystery. And I feel like it's one of the best books I've ever read about parenting even though it's a novel, and I tore through it but it's very breathless and like terrifying so...KJ Dell'Antonia 48:10 Well that has its place at the moment, too. Because then you forget where you are. Catherine Newman 48:15 I was really caught up in it and it's also just incredibly lyrical. Like some of the sentences I would read twice just because it was so gorgeous. So I'm recommending that as a total escape-like thriller.Jess Lahey 48:54 I went yesterday, I have to say I went yesterday to pick up a book from the Vermont Bookshop in Middlebury, Vermont, and there was no one at the shop but they had this beautiful cart outside the door with everyone's orders labeled and covered with some plastic and it was just the most delightful way to get out and and go 'shopping' even though I couldn't shop it worked really nicely. Booksellers are working so hard to make that work. Catherine, thank you for being so patient with us while we worked out the details of how we were going to have you on the show. It shouldn't have taken us this long, but we're very happy that you were patient with us.Catherine Newman 49:48 Oh my gosh, my pleasure. Talking to you is a highlight of my week and life.Jess Lahey 49:55 Well, and I'm going to recommend that people go ahead and preorder How to Be a Person...KJ Dell'Antonia 50:03 They won't have to preorder it will be out by the time this is out.Jess Lahey 50:07 It's just such a delightful book. It's such a fun read, I'm going to be giving it as like part of a baby gift. I'm going to have copies around to give to people constantly. I have a neighbor I'm giving it to as a gift. So I'm so excited to have just multiple copies around the house.Catherine Newman 50:26 You guys are so supportive I could cry. Jess Lahey 50:33 Oh Catherine, where can people find you if they want to find out more about your higgledy piggledy career?Catherine Newman 51:06 CatherineNewman writer.com I think.Jess Lahey 51:44 Until next week, everyone, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game. This episode of #AmWriting with Jess and KJ was produced by Andrew Parilla. Our music, aptly titled unemployed Monday was written and performed by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their services because everyone, even creatives should be paid. This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

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