Barbell Shrugged - Diesel Dad Strength, Family, and Fatherhood w/ Anders Varner, Doug Larson, and Travis Mash - Barbell Shrugged #523

Episode Date: November 20, 2020

Diesel Dad Class 1 registration is open now through Sunday, November 22nd. Time is running out, all the dads are gonna get jacked, and training starts Monday November 23rd.   In this Episode of Barbell Shrugged:   The Diesel Dad Code How to balance family, fatherhood, and fitness Effort and leadership Being unreasoably positive Practicing aggression   Anders Varner on Instagram Doug Larson on Instagram Coach Travis Mash on Instagram   Diesel Dad Class 1 registration is open now through Sunday, November 22nd. Time is running out, all the dads are gonna get jacked, and training starts Monday November 23rd.   ————————————————   Training Programs to Build Muscle: https://bit.ly/34zcGVw   Nutrition Programs to Lose Fat and Build Muscle: https://bit.ly/3eiW8FF   Nutrition and Training Bundles to Save 67%: https://bit.ly/2yaxQxa   Please Support Our Sponsors   PowerDot - Save 20% using code BBS at http://PowerDot.com/BBS    Inside Tracker: insidetracker.com/earlyaccess to be the first to hear about InsideTracker’s BEST DEAL of the year    Fittogether - Fitness ONLY Social Media App   Organifi - Save 20% using code: “Shrugged” at organifi.com/shrugged   www.masszymes.com/shruggedfree  - for FREE bottle of BiOptimizers Masszymes   Garage Gym Equipment and Accessories: https://bit.ly/3b6GZFj Save 5% using the coupon code “Shrugged”

We are Diesel Dads and we train hard to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Through three training programs to build strength, combining west side barbell dynamic effort with functional bodybuilding to focus on top end strength, speed, and power. Hypertrophy, combining old school bodybuilding and interval weight training to build muscle, burn fat, and get jacked. And density weight training, the set it up and get after a program with higher intensity functional movements targeted to build muscle and Metcons in under 20 minutes. The Diesel Dad is for dads that love lifting weights, for dads that want to be savage fathers, for dads that want to be savage husbands, for dads that want to be savage husbands, for dads that want to be savage at their jobs, and for dads that want to be savage in the gym. We are Diesel Dads and we train hard

to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Diesel Dad Class 1 registration is open right now through Sunday, November 22nd. Time is running out. All the dads are going to get so jacked and training starts Monday, November 23rd. You can start today by going over to barbellshrug.com forward slash diesel dad, D-I-E-S-E-L-D-A-D, all one word, barbells shrug.com forward slash diesel dad class one registration is live now it closes on sunday november 22nd training starts monday november 23rd come get strong lean and athletic being the best dad that you possibly can be we are stoked to get this out to everybody we're creating a little place for all the dads a little spot where we can kick it in the Diesel Dad Dojo. Come rage with us, barbellshrug.com forward slash diesel dad.

Today on Barbell Shrugged, we're talking about the 10 commandments of the Diesel Dad. We always talk about the strength and conditioning side of being a strong role model, why we love strength training, all the different pieces of it. We talk about a lot of that as well today. Um, but we also get into kind of what it means to be a leader in your household and some of the, the, the parts that really matter, um, inside

your house and, and what we really think about when we think about being a great dad, a great husband, running a great business or being, or being great at your job, and how it all brings itself together through the Diesel Dad. Come and join us and enjoy the show. Welcome to Barbell Shrugged. I'm Anders Varner, Doug Larson, Coach Travis Smash. We're just sitting here talking about weightlifting. We might as well make it legit. Today, we're going through the second half of the Diesel Dad Code, which our boy Doug Larson put together of all of the virtues of the Diesel Dad. I'm sitting here running my mouth about soreness. Dude, the first day that

I came back from, I say come back, I'm still not 100%, but I did legs, of course. What are you going to do? Not squat the day that you decide you're coming back to training? And I was squatted 225 for five sets of 10. And because I don't get sore on – that's like Monday. Then Tuesday, I was like, damn, your boy is in good shape. I haven't worked out in five weeks. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, I couldn't walk. It took me all the way until Saturday to be able to do anything positive with my legs,

which then I realized if I squat heavy for high volume, it's a full week affair now. I can't handle that. It's too much. Dom's is crazy. Yeah. I used to get sore on Tuesday. Now I'm Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. It's like a hangover.

It's like a three-day affair now. I can't. It just ruins my week if I squat just the average amount of weight for 50. No doubt. If it's somewhere I know I'm going to be super sore, if I squat just an average amount of weight for 50. No doubt. If it's somewhere I know I'm going to be super sore if I'm doing RDLs or like you know high rep like pec flies or something like that where I'm getting a big stretch on the muscle guaranteed I'll be sore the next day. I might peak on day two but if it's something like I'm just I'm just doing front squats for like set to eight I'm not going to be sore the next day. Maybe a little bit sore on the second day, but I feel like the RDLs like creep up on me much faster

than a lot of other movements where I'm not hitting peak tension at full muscle length. Yeah. Actually, this morning, maybe we should just do a whole show on your hamstrings or your back. But this morning, went uh kettlebell swings and uh good mornings it's what i've been trying to do whatever my training session was the day before doing the same movements the next morning as soon as i get up and get out of bed just to

like get some blood flow and and move that's what louis simmons would say to do that's because louis comes to me for advice i would i have nothing to do That's because Louie comes to me For advice I have nothing to do with What he just said Louie So many sins you guys And It feels really good

And it means I don't have to fully clean up I just lighten the weights And just leave it out the night before But while I was Doing some good mornings this morning, it felt so good. Hamstrings and then pairing them up with just some high-rep kettlebell swings to move a little bit. It felt amazing. We're going to roll through the second half of the Diesel Dad Code here in a second.

But first, for the Diesel Dad 100, what's the big picture behind that? How do you kind you structure that? Why don't you kick it into the waking up early? We can do that here. I'll roll through the first five. Matt likes calling them precepts. I like calling them precepts.

The first five precepts that we covered in the first episode, the first one is the mission statement or tagline for the whole Diesel Dad program. The Diesel Dad trains to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Number two was the Diesel Dad humbly leads, listens, and learns from his family. The Diesel Dad focuses on things he can control, his mindset, his habits, and his behavior.

The Diesel Dad takes complete ownership of his actions, never blaming, shaming, or complaining. The Diesel Dad knows effort is a choice and always does his best. So those are the first five that we covered on a previous episode, and today we're rolling through the second half. And to Andrew's point, the first one on the second half is the Diesel Dad wakes up earlier than his family to study, work, or train. We'll cover that first here in a second with the Diesel Dad 100. The Diesel Dad trains hard, eats right, and gets enough sleep, which is basically what 80% of this show is dedicated toward.

The Diesel Dad chooses to be kind, yet trains to be dangerous, and aggressively protects his family. The Diesel Dad is unreasonably positive and focuses his attention on what's going well. The Diesel Dad has a daily practice of expressing love, appreciation, and gratitude for his family. So we'll start back at the top. The Diesel Dad wakes up earlier than his family to study, work, or train. I didn't wake up early before I had kids. In college, if I didn't have a morning class,

I basically would sleep as late as I possibly could because if I knew that I didn't have a morning class and that I could sleep in, I was going out. I went out all the time. All the time. Too often. How did you go out in college? I probably went out drinking you know we'll say averaging you know three nights a week something like that

yeah definitely the weekend nights thursday friday and saturday week yeah dude tuesday night i'm just better at nighttime like i i when when when like eight o'clock rolls around like all of a sudden i kind of wake up and like i. And like I have more creative thoughts. Me too. I'm just better at nighttime. In the morning, I'm just like, oh, my God, what happened to me? But that's kind of shifted over time now that I've been waking up early very consistently. I wish it shifted with me.

I still do better at night. You sit up and write books at night. I try to, but then, you know, it just seems like i try to like do you know to get up at a normal time with my family and then stay up late but you know now i just feel like i stay up late and get up early and just don't sleep but it's probably not good yeah oh yeah all of my most productive friends especially people that that do a lot of writing it seems they either do it really early in the morning for hours where nobody's texting them calling them no one's no one's you know requesting their attention in any way or they stay up super late

they just work through the night and that seems to work for a lot of people once you have kids you kind of have to you want to get stuff done you got to do it early before they're awake or you got to do it after they go to bed if you're not even worried about the kids part of it it's the everybody else that we work with like i try to. I have to beat not just the kids to be awake or the one child and my wife, but I feel like once our whole team wakes up around the country, if you can wake up at 5 and start working by 6, 6.30, everybody on the West Coast is still at like 3 a.m. You can get so much work done before the team, the whole team wakes up. It's incredible.

It's as soon as people start asking for your time that things start to go a little crazy. I love waking up now. You just need to wake up early and do whatever it is that needs to be done that you just don't have time for. And that to me, that's, that's studying, working or training. I mean, we work throughout the day, so that's, that's already, that box already checked. But studying is one thing that totally gets thrown out the window with, with kids. Like people stop reading. They stop, They stop trying to educate themselves. They don't take a random Coursera course and go back to college. That's your Travis. That's your Travis.

This is crazy. Yeah. But yeah, that can easily get kind of thrown off to the side. When was the last time, if you have two little kids, when was the last time you read like a full like physical nutrition book or training book like a lot of stuff just kind of falls away and so i'm doing it early and read 20 minutes a day that goes a long way i'm reading uh steroids is the sport after we interviewed um jim it's awesome it's awesome i am so mash I'm gonna get Pat Mendez on the phone I know you're mad at people that cheat I know you're mad at them especially in Olympic weightlifting but when you talk to him I'm sure you have you ever talked to him yeah yeah we've talked a few times yeah you guys I don't know all the details of your childhood and getting brought up uh and your families and and the struggles that everybody

went through but um when i when he tells his story in the book i just nod my head and i go this sounds like travis i will do whatever it takes to lift as much weight as i possibly can to get the fuck out of what i am doing right now and just make my life better. And everybody on day one from the person, you know how he's saying that he won like the, the power clean competition, power cleaned like almost 400 pounds with no hook grip and just like a, basically like an RDL to his chest. Basically everybody that he ever talked to just said you need to do this

and they handed him a box of supplements that had andro in it do you remember andro yeah of course um and that because that's what all the baseball players were doing and then and he was in vegas so they you know you kind of get into that scene but it's kind of like your entry point. If your entry point, this is kind of like how I view after reading it and just kind of like the stories that we all live by in our life. If you're introduced into weightlifting by Travis Mash at Mashley Performance, you believe in this clean route to being great at lifting weights if you enter through this dirty world of high school sports where someone hands you a bag of andro on day one and then you walk into bros and iron mind is on and they're watching these little tiny midgets yeah clean and jerk 400 pounds you go what are they doing how how's the midget doing that and you go well they're all on drugs because yeah they're on drugs they're on drugs i

need to be on drugs give me some let's do drugs right because the goal is podiums world records there's no it's just your entry point just is different yeah i mean i don't necessarily i'm not mad at him like uh i would be tempted to you know when i was in weightlifting i remember being tempted because of course everyone thinks about it it's just like you know i guess it's really more me being protective of my boys who are not taken and so um you know i want i want a fair you know i want a yeah in a fair playing field because i'm my question is what you go to go to powerlifting you know of course there's no olympics i get it so but you know you go to powerlifting then then you're an equal playing ground you know and then see what happens if you win there awesome yeah i kind of remember some of his videos too like when he squatted 800 that thing

exploded on youtube before youtube was like a viral thing i remember seeing it and i and even then i knew that you know that weightlifting was drug free i in my head thinking, holy cow, this is drug-free. I thought there's a drug-free guy who just squatted 800 pounds. With no belt on. Yeah. That's what I was like. I was like, he is a freak. You know, I was like this dude.

And he was young. He was like 20 years old or something. Yeah. But I remember seeing him. I think he was still in his teens. I thought he was like 18, 19, squatting 600 pounds, whatever it was. I remember people just being like, that dude's juiced up. He's got to be.

I was hoping, but he's in America, so he must be drug free. But I was like, that's insane. I thought he was the most insane lifter of all time when I saw. What did he snatchatched like 200 kilos or something or 19 and i'm like wow yeah he put on i mean the the gains the the increases that he made i mean he was on the the juice of the juice like the ones where you say i'm amongst your friends and you're like yeah i'm on trend you're like well i'm not but like you yeah you hear the word trend and you're like whoa you went for it huh great job yeah good job awesome this is the first this yeah go ahead whatever happened to andro like you mentioned andro a minute ago like i feel like it got really

popular during like the mark mcguire barry bonds home run derby not home run derby home run um contest basically they're trying to break all the home run records and and they i don't know if the claim was that they were on anderson dion they weren't taking steroids and that was legal but it's a precursor molecules or something like that pro hormone something yeah yeah they made it illegal i think yeah is it become illegal oh yeah i remember there being one that you guys have have you ever heard of M1T? No. I mean, it was legal. I remember taking that when I was palatine. And, like, all of a sudden, I'm like, oh, my.

I'm like, no one believed me. They're like, yeah, you got to be taking the real deal. I'm like, I promise I'm taking this and this bottle right here. I bought it at GNC. Man. I mean, like, I don't know what happened to it, but it was the most potent anything I've ever taken. That's the first book I've sat down and read.

I got to do my lap and I listen to all the audio books, but going back to it, there isn't like a ton of time to just sit down and read a book. I feel so good about it right now. Every time someone sees it, like my in-laws are here right now and they walk in the room and I'm reading a book i feel like i'm just not i'm actively not participating in anything that's going on because i have a book in front of my face yeah i feel like

you're like ignoring them like they're like wondering when you're on your phone. Oddly, a phone is less – it's less aggressive. It feels a lot less aggressive to be scrolling Instagram while your family is there than reading a book because you have to like actually engage in a book to read it. Instagram, you're going to have continual partial attention the whole time. time that's such a great question i haven't even thought about that you think reading a book would be one you feel good about yeah i feel like oh wow look how responsible he's being reading a book what a mature person totally five years ago they would have been like anders is learning something well granted the book is called the sport is steroids or steroids is the sport but what is he learning yeah um but yeah i feel like a book is like a an actual hard copy book is like a very aggressive statement now that i am not tuned into anything yeah that means he can't listen to us at all right you know and he doesn't care to

listen to us or he would put the book down. Yeah. But going back to the morning routine though, I feel like the waking up early has turned into the magic potion of my life. I have this – I don't know if it's an actual tagline, but I kind of say it all the time to Adelaide as well as myself of let's just keep the most important thing the most important thing so that you are constantly focused on like what is giving you the highest ROI on all of your activities and thoughts. And one of the most important things every day in my life is I have to go work out. But when the whole world wakes up, I might not be able to. So I have to set my alarm.

And I just created my little morning routine, the Diesel Dad 100, which is me just going to the garage, picking two exercises, and accumulating 100 reps so that I can, at a minimum, check the box of what I consider to be the most important thing of my day, which is go get a pump. Get after it. It probably lives somewhere on the relative intensity

of a six, a seven. Some days I'll leave 225 on the bar and see if I can front squat 225 for 10 within five minutes of being awake. That's a fun one. Just seeing how you can move heavy weights. It's not ideal.

You shouldn't do it if you don't have a couple decades of lifting weights in you. But I feel like my mobility has gotten significantly better in the last nine months of doing this uh i feel like overall my my mindset has like changed into instead of trying to kill myself while i'm in the gym it's like i'm working out multiple times a day but all of it is just like relatively there's like higher intensities and lower intensities but but it's kind of like walking, except you're doing like front squats with 135 and trying to get to 50 reps or break it into sets of 25. You're going to do some S&M stuff, man.

You get up and start squatting anything for 10 times. You're messed up. Well, that's like the very rare occasion where i just want to see if i can do it um it's not i think i squatted 315 for a single within 10 minutes of being awake which isn't i don't recommend anybody doing that but it's also interesting to walk out 315 dead cold with no blood in your muscles and see if you can do it. Yeah, once again, I don't know. It sounds terrible.

I don't know if I could do that. I think I'd walk out and be like, no. It hurt my joints. All I can think about is how bad would that hurt. Especially my hip would be like. Yeah. But that is like the very rare occasion. The bigger thing is just getting up, going to make coffee,

and going straight into just moving and getting blood flow. And then having a cup of coffee, and I go walk a mile. And that sets my day. By the time I get back, it's 6 30 in the morning and we're either recording um so we all hop on here and hang out or i actually have like an hour maybe 90 minutes to sit down and do uh some creative work which is awesome usually a bunch of writing and that that's like that's my my happy time so quiet i'm in my gym slash garage and um i think that that that morning routine is like has turned into something that i

even do on saturday and sunday like i just sleep a little bit later i'll set the alarm for like 5 30 instead of 5 um but it's like it alleviates so much stress when I don't have to sit there and think like, am I going to be able to train today? I didn't train. Should I train? Do I need to train? How do I get out of the house so I can train? No, it's just, I just wake up an hour before everybody else gets out of bed and then I just go do it. And especially if you're like a, sorry, go ahead, finish. No, I was going to say, and what I what i really love um when my shoulder gets back to healthy is i want to start doing um those density sessions that you have in the program doug because they're the perfect little 15 minute um like you don't have to go balls to the walls if you don't

want to but for me it's like here's here's like a well outlined workout that's going to cost me 15 whole minutes. I can just get in, breathe, get it done, and go about my day. Yeah, when I'm the most pressed for time, that's what I do. If I know I have a month where I'm going to get smashed, I'll do the density weight training because it's just super fast. It's functional bodybuilding 15-minute AMRAPs. You can warm up, jump into it. It's functional bodybuilding stuff, so it's not particularlyps yeah you can warm up jump into it it's functional bodybuilding stuff so it's not like particularly heavy so you can warm up quickly for it and then just 15 minute amrap you know you're done 15 minutes and you're out and back to life it's

great yeah i uh those sessions that's kind of basic i'd say that's the the general idea of like what the the 100 reps is or the diesel dad 100 that I just kind of coined. Just get in. Try to get some sort of Metconny type thing. Try to get some sort of weightlifting thing so that you're just – I mean when you wake up in the morning and you go right to the gym, I used to think those people were nuts coming to the gym at 5.30, 6 o'clock in the morning. Now I totally get it. And I wake up so well i don't have to um like i kind of joke about doing

like stupid feats of strength early in the morning but the truth is i think my body is more tuned up to do those things because i practice it now where i just wake up and i don't really need to warm up that much my my joints and my mobility are just kind of like there and it doesn't it it feels better now than it did eight nine months ago when i started doing it and um i've noticed that my mobility specifically i think because i'm getting more movement during the day just in like smaller smaller doses has all of my joints except my shoulder have gotten a lot better.

That crash. If you're a person that has a real job, not like us, where we have a lot of flexibility throughout our day, we can train whenever we're in this industry. I just assume I'm going to train. I don't have to plan it necessarily. I just know that I'm going to do it at some point. But if you have a real 9-to-5

where you're working for FedEx or whatever it is as an executive. FedEx! Memphis! That's right. Everybody! The easy one for me. But if you're working at a real corporate job, in Memphis it's

FedEx, International Paper, AutoZone. They're all based. If you have one of those types of jobs where you have to go in and you have to be there the whole time, etc., then you have to work out in the morning. If you're leaving to go to work at 8 a.m. and you get back home from work at 6 p.m. and you have kids, before and after work is kid time. And so you have to wake up early or stay late. You can stop at the gym on the way home, but at that point you're is kid time and so you have to wake up early or or stay late you can stop at the gym on the way home but you're at that point you're missing kid time especially you want to know what was like a massive switch that i didn't realize when we lived in san diego when you work at a like corporate america job all of those things all of those places have really nice

gyms in them because san diego's like a little fitness culture and it's like part of it's the expectation that your gym your your office is going to have a nice gym in it Ashton's office does not have a gym none of them have a gym and they don't even have gyms near them like all of those big office buildings in uh RTP and in Raleigh, there's no gyms. It blew my mind. I was like, what are you doing during lunch? She was like, no, this is not San Diego anymore. We do not just have all these facilities where working out is so easy. I think from her office within walking distance in San Diego

they had a gym inside there with a massive corporate wellness and like personal training thing that you could do and then there was like three or four CrossFit gyms within walking distance of her office so she could go anywhere and in mainstream America

not just in a little bubble of San Diego that's super fitness oriented it just doesn't happen that people have the option to go in and train in the middle of the day. I wonder if that's like maybe a job potential for people. I know this is not about that, but just anyone listening, maybe corporate wellness might be something, especially with COVID, maybe a good thing to consider. Yeah, setting up training programs for people that are stuck at home.

Yeah, or stuck, or even if they're able to go to the office. All the gyms are going to close down. We just got to start thinking, you know. All of them. Yeah. You already played that game once, doing the corporate fitness thing, didn't you? And it was just not fun. It's not what you want to be doing.

I'm going to tell you a story about corporate wellness. We did do it. I'm not against it. It's just corporate wellness is tough. So the first contract that I had in corporate wellness was at a call center. And I was supposed to come in and teach basic fitness to the people, which I was stoked on. I was like, dude, I got this sweet little gig.

I get to come in. I get to do some talking. I'm going to teach these people how to squat. And I'm envisioning like the barbell shrugged audience. Like people that are already interested in lifting weights and fitness. And I walked in and to get to where I was going, I had to walk through the cafeteria. And there was a girl at like 9 a.m do you remember andy's hot fries like they're like they're like fried sticks with

um i don't even it's like just loaded with texas pete is it's all i can it's like just loaded with Texas Pete is all I can – it's basically just like a – it burns your mouth. Suicide. Awesome. Yeah. It's disgusting. They should – if you can handle Andy's hot fries, your gut biome hates you. Yeah. You're like fast-tracked to really long-term health problems.

Yeah. to really long-term health problems. So this girl, I'm walking through, and she had dumped Andy's hot fries into a bowl. And next to her, she had another bottle of Texas Pete, and she took the Texas Pete and started dumping hot sauce on the hot fries at 9 a.m. And I just wanted to walk over to her and go, I need you to know something. I'm here for fitness, And what I just saw you do is so far from what I thought was even possible.

You took Andy's hot fries, which are disgusting and steaming hot and burning your mouth to begin with. And that wasn't enough of a stimulus to just totally destroy your morning. And now you're dumping Texas Pete hot sauce on them. What are you doing to yourself and then i realized there's a bit of a disconnect between how i feel about fitness and how the call center people and then you can imagine for the rest of the day i was just realizing like this is not the place for me i had to get out i had to break out because i what was it like over the people like they just didn't want to be there?

I mean, this is such an interesting thing about our lives and the bubble that we live in, in the fitness space. I don't know anybody that's out of shape. They might not be in their best shape, but they're all in good shape. Sometimes they're in great shape, but everybody's pretty much in good shape. And when you walked in there, people were just in bad shape. They were so far gone that they didn't even know what shape was. They just couldn't – there was – it was a long – it was like if I was to legitimately write like a training program for many of them, it'd be like, yo, we're going to go walk today.

And I had just sold a gym that produced 75 regionals athletes at CrossFit. And I was like, I can't go from this level of coaching down to the walking program. I can't change your life like that. Squat to a chair. And I was in there wearing effing corporate America shoes. I had dress shoes on. Yeah. Because I needed to – it was a tough time.

It was a tough couple months. But corporate America needs fitness very, very badly. And I didn't realize that they just don't have resources in there, right? Like the place that they work out or the gym that they go to is like, it's nothing. It's like a room with like a kettlebell or like a BOSU ball. And there's just no, there's just, it would take somebody that's very motivated even like us in fitness to get in there. And we would look around and go, well, shit, what are we going to do today? I don't know.

Should we just do some like push-ups and swing this thing real hard like and then go back to work? It's just – it just a giant leap. So, yes, if you are interested in that, I would highly recommend getting on LinkedIn because there's about a billion parents right now, kids running around their house, they're not going to offices, and they're just sitting there all day long trying to figure it out. They need help bad if that's who you want to coach. All right. Here, let's jump into the next. This is that precept here. So, that was, this is what dad wakes up earlier than his family to study, work, let's jump into the next Diesel Dad precept here.

So that was Diesel Dad wakes up earlier than his family to study, work, or train. We talked about a lot of other stuff too. And then now we're moving on to kind of the core of the show. The Diesel Dad trains hard, eats right, and gets enough sleep, which for us, like being in this world, like that's like just so obvious. We're trying to do that every day subconsciously it's like just ingrained in us uh but it's good for your kids to see you being the role model in that world that's actually i mentioned this on the show before that one of the best things about quarantine and being cooped up at home with my kids is that they

consistently many days a week see me training whereas before i was just i was hidden in a gym somewhere doing it before or after work like where they're not around and they didn't see me training whereas before i was just i was hidden in a gym somewhere doing it before or after work like where they're not around and they didn't see me train like i trained every day but to them i never trained and so it was really awesome that it's been eight or nine months now and my my four year old comes to me and goes goes you can work out with me i want to do deadlifts like you don't have to do deadlifts there's a kettlebell he picks up and and he calls it deadlift but uh they ask me about training now because they've seen it they've seen it so often and so that this this whole precept comes down to just being a role model for your kids not telling them what to do but doing it and them seeing you do it and then

they they want to emulate that or copy you or participate in some way. I mean, that is awesome because right now kids in America need that with, you know, obesity skyrocketing. And I heard the other day that now type 2 diabetes amongst youth is equal to type 1 diabetes now. So something that we're causing that's preventable now, as far as the number of cases, has become equal to type 1, which is genetics. And so it's a sad, sad state right now. So that's good. Matt, you got kids slamming barbells, though. Five-year-olds just crushing it in the garage.

And now my three-year-old started finally. You know, he did it finally. Finally! He just learned how to walk like a year and a half ago. He's only been walking half his life. It's just that he is a tank. Like, you look at him, and as a coach, I think even if he were not my son, I would see him and be like, I'll coach you.

You know, I would want to coach him. He's just, I mean, he's a block, man. Like, he's so thick naturally. Like, he's, you know. He looks like his dad. Brock is going to be taller and naturally skinny, and Bear is going to be a block. He's literally going

to be a square. Perfect. Yo, regarding we kind of talk about training hard, but eats right and gets enough sleep. The sleep thing is obviously one of the tougher parts of being a parent. So let's talk about eating first. We are Diesel Dads, and we train hard to be strong, lean, and athletic

without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Through three training programs to build strength, combining west side barbell dynamic effort with functional bodybuilding to focus on top end strength, speed, and power. Hypertrophy, combining old school bodybuilding and interval weight training to build muscle, burn fat, and get jacked. And density weight training, the set it up and get after a program with higher intensity functional movements targeted to build muscle and metcons in under 20 minutes. The Diesel Dad is for dads that love lifting weights, for dads that want to be savage fathers, for dads that want

to be savage husbands, for dads that want to be savage at their jobs, and for dads that want to be savage in the gym. We are Diesel Dads and we train hard to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Diesel Dad Class 1 registration is open right now through Sunday, November 22nd. Time is running out. All the dads are going to get so jacked, and training starts Monday, November 23rd. You can start today by going over to barbellshrug.com forward slash diesel dad. D-I-E-S-E-L-D-A-D, all one word, barbellshrug.com forward slash diesel dad.

Class 1 registration is live now. It closes on Sunday, November 22nd. Training starts Monday, November 23rd. Come get strong, lean, and athletic. Being the best dad that you possibly can be. We are stoked to get this out to everybody. We're creating a little place for all the dads. A little spot where we can kick it in the Diesel Dad Dojo.

Come rage with us. BarbellShrug.com forward slash Diesel Dad. Today on Barbell Shrugged, we're talking about the 10 commandments of the Diesel Dad. We always talk about the strength and conditioning side of being a strong role model, why we love strength training, all the different pieces of it. We talk about a lot of that as well today, but we also get into kind of what it means to be a leader in your household and some of the parts that really matter inside your house and what we really think about when we think about being a great dad, a great husband, running a great business or being great at your job and how it all brings itself together through

the Diesel Dad. My kids eat pretty damn good because there's there's no bad food in my house and i only eat good food you know 99 of the time it's like it's rare that i have anything like in a normal meal like i'll if i go out to ice cream with my kids like i'll i'll take a i'll taste their ice cream i rarely order for myself that type of thing like occasionally they see me do that enough on holidays and birthday parties and whatnot to know that like I'm a normal person and that stuff also tastes good to me. But I don't really like it very much. But at home, all they see is me eating like well-prepared meat and vegetables, fruit, nuts, seeds, et cetera, all real whole foods. I feel like if you're a parent and like you're eating mac and cheese, your kids are going to eat mac and cheese all the time because they just think it's normal.

And if you try to talk them out of it, like you guys go eat chicken and broccoli and you're eating mac and cheese, it's not going to work at all. So all the friends I have, they're like, how do you get your kids to eat so well? I'm like, they just eat what we eat. There's no other option. The key is don't start the other. Just never, ever let them taste mac and cheese. That's the key.

Because once you feed it a couple times, I mean, they're human. They get it. They don't understand that it's bad for you. They just know it tastes delicious. Yeah. I just tell them that junk food is for special days, for holidays and birthday parties. And that's what they think all junk food is for. Anytime they walk by a vending machine, they go, I want to get something.

You go, oh, no, that's for holidays and birthday parties. That's junk food. We eat healthy food on normal days. They go, oh, yeah, okay. They generally fall in line with it because that's what I've always said. It's truth. It's truth. You have boys, so baking is not a thing in your house.

They're not interested in making breads and cakes and things. I mean, my wife. I was like, don't do that. Yeah, that's a fun activity for the whole family. We don't make breads and whatnot that often, but every once in a while. Like the other day, I came downstairs and there was already like some type of a muffin mix

that had been pulled out of the pantry and was already opened in a bowl and already had water poured on it. Not measured. like my five-year-old is doing this on his own so i came down there and like salvaged the situation and helped make it but yeah it was a fun baking activity i feel like that's a good creative pursuit with a with the actual end goal where there's a sense of accomplishment and and it's just it's just fun in general and then i think cooking is a great activity because i can teach them about nutrition while we're doing it totally yeah my boys love cooking so yeah i think there's a rice crispy something getting made in the house this

afternoon for no reason outside of grandma's hair and uh it's party time it's party time for the whole week what do you got oh damn damn Nitro baby, I needed it I needed a boost Emily Drew Mash is in the house Dropping off Starbucks runs in the middle of the show today That's so good You got like a milk mustache and everything Rubbing it in

Nitro mustache Nitro mustache Yeah the food thing is an interesting one Because I get There's i get more um anxiety about bad food in my life than anything else it's like the it's like it's it's really unfortunate how much anxiety I feel when there's bad food in the house and – because I know I'm going to eat it. It's impossible for me not to eat it.

The only way to do it is to just not have it there. When it shows up, I get really excited like you're talking about. Baking, baking cakes, cookies, breads, whatever it is, muffins. I'm like, this is amazing. But I know I'm going to eat like four of them. I know that whole day of nutrition is going to go to crap. And then instead of thinking, oh, I could just throw this away, what I end up doing is just throwing it away in my mouth just to get rid of it

so that tomorrow isn't a bad nutrition day. That's what I do too, man. Same thing. I just go ahead and eat this. And I'll even say to myself, I'm going to do my kids and my wife, I'm going to do them this justice. I and eat this and i'll even say to myself i'm gonna do my kids and my wife i'm gonna do them this justice i'll eat it so they don't have to right i do that a hundred percent yeah but all the meals that we i mean you're you're down like 15 pounds in the last couple months right it's more yeah yeah total total in the last few months. I have to see where I started. Yeah, between 12 and 15.

Yeah. I'm like right at 190 pretty much for the last 30 days, which is 190, 191, which is pretty awesome. But, dude, I still track all of my calories. You do? Roughly, yeah. It's the only – I feel like I haven't not been – I haven't had my identity not be a strength athlete for so long that if you want me to – if there was like two pounds of meat sitting at a table with cheese on it, I would just eat it all in one sitting. There's no end to the amount of food that I could eat. That sounds delicious too what you just said.

Yeah, just a big plate of grass-fed beef with cheese in it. Maybe put some ketchup on it. Just smash. But, dude, I love thinking about all – my breakfast used to be eight whole eggs. Yeah. And then like four hours later, I would just eat a pound of meat multiple times a day for the rest of the day. That sounds awesome.

Yeah, that was just what I ate on a regular basis. And now my body – it's kind of like a wrestler wrestlers have no problem being lean because they're so used to cutting weight all the time that their body's like i'm not putting this shit on if we're just gonna go lose it in the most miserable way possible i feel like i'm the opposite way of that where it's like i can just see it sit there and eat and eat and eat forever and i gotta put the pump the brakes or things go crazy absolutely absolutely how much sleep are you guys getting these days? Six and a half hours a night. Last night, I got eight. It was good.

But I went through several nights of three and four because I had this huge project due by mechanics. Eight last night felt like heaven. Honestly, I thought maybe I'm dead because it felt so good. You guys do naps at all?

No, no. It's impossible. Yeah, can't do it. No, I wish I could do a nap. But, you know, once I'm up, I mean, I'm up. I mean, it's hard to take a nap here in my office. I was, you know, my, what do you call it? Office mate.

There's two of us in here. Office mate. Is it you and Drew or you got someone else? No, I have a – yeah, Drew just came with me today because we were going to work on our house. But I have a guy who he's the coach for a triathlon here. He comes in. I'd hate to be asleep when he got here because he's like super fit. He's like still living.

He'll like come to the office on his bike, pulling his little outfit on and everything. And I'm like – It's funny like that. it's like you don't want to be caught sleeping everyone sleeps every day why why when why is it a big deal why when someone calls me and i'm taking a nap do i like if i naturally pick up and be like hello and you can kind of tell someone was sleeping you know but but instead of letting them know that i was sleeping, I wake up and I'm like, hello? Yeah, what's up? I like play it up. Like I wasn't sleeping.

I'm not lazy. Yeah, I'm good. Like sleeping makes you lazy as opposed to just being like a fundamental biological thing that you just need to do. Yeah. I know. One day last week, I actually laid down to take a nap. And I felt so guilty you know because you know drew's away the kids are awake but i was exhausted and i laid and i just couldn't do it i could not

go to sleep i felt so bad about it so i got up i just looked at my thing six hours and three minutes last night okay that's not a lot what'd you look at what do you have that's not enough i actually uh rocked this little fitbit, which I'm kind of stoked on it. I've been anti. Yesterday was six hours and 16 minutes, so six to six and a half hours a night. I actually really enjoy the Fitbit now just because I have a general. There's some things that I, like if you're following the calorie counter that's saying because I've walked a mile this morning and did some kettlebell swings and good mornings that I burned 800 calories, don't eat that much. But total number of steps, I just enjoy going and making sure I get like four to five miles of walking in a day. And then the sleep one is cool.

Not that I like actually follow like the REM cycles and deep sleep and light sleep and all that. But, um, just actually seeing how low my, my heart rate can get or not how low it can get, but when it's in like the low fifties, high forties,

mid, whatever it is. Um, I know I'm at least sleeping sleeping so six and a half hours is is pretty standard um you know i looked at corey gregory's fitbit information it was insane because you know i'm like he only gets like five or six hours yeah i'm like bro how do you i mean how do you look so good with sleeping so little but he showed me and like his quality of sleep is unbelievable and like really i would

love to do a study and be like why is because he says he wakes up feeling great and i believe him because like his REM sleep and his deep sleep are both like way above yeah every witness i think you're you have to practice it in a way and this sounds terrible because i don't want people on the show going and saying i think you could sleep six hours a night but um i i don't really like you said when i look at the numbers of the rem sleep and all that everything's fine i typically get like whatever it's like a 75 percent of best sleep possible when they like rank where your sleep's at um on the app i don't really know how much i believe in all that but um yeah i wake up fired up i think also like i really enjoy getting out of bed and getting

after it like making some coffee and going to the gym is like yeah it's what i would if i had nothing to do and all i was was like some pro i would sleep till like eight o'clock wake up and make coffee and then slowly stroll into the gym to go hang with my bros all day yeah now i just do it at 5 30 instead of instead of 9 30 um but on the sleep thing, when my shoulder was really bad, just like hanging off my body, I noticed – That sounds terrible. I stopped waking up because I needed to get my shoulder healthy as fast as possible. So I was sleeping as late as I could and like going back. So I would like naturally wake up at 5, 5.30 and then force myself to go back to sleep until whenever Adelaide got moving,

which would be like 7, 7.30, something like that. I noticed on the days that I slept over eight hours that my arm got significantly better on the recovery side by just getting an extra hour, hour and a half of sleep. It was like a very noticeable difference the next day. Did you do that subconsciously or did you do that on purpose, sleeping longer?

I did it consciously. I stopped waking up and going. And it's funny because I was talking to Corey and he was doing a power clean or something like that and tweaked something in his knee. It was, I want to say, whenever I talked to him

about stuff he's got going on and um he he was like he was like dude my wife just knows that i'm like whacked out right now because i'm not waking up i'm not getting to the gym at four uh i can't do my lunges he's like my whole thing is whacked out i'm sleeping late and it's super fucking with my mood like i just can't get happy right now he's got a bunch of business stuff going on and i was like dude i totally get it i wake up at 7 30 and i feel like my whole day is shot i can't figure out how to even like move forward when i just wake up and then all of a sudden now i'm just like dad wow i gotta go make breakfast i'm like i don't get it get it. I need some bro time.

I need to get in the gym and get my mind right before I'm capable of handling anything else in the day. The best thing I got going on in my life is that, you know, I'm school. Everything revolves around the university. So I'm just like a week away from having like two months off. I honestly feel like a kid. You know, like how you get so excited. Like I'm feeling that. two months off. I honestly feel like a kid. You know, like, how you get so excited, like, like, I'm feeling that, yeah,

I feel like I'm so excited about this, you know, Christmas break. Almost two months because of COVID. Like, I hope I'll sleep a little bit, but I doubt it, you know. I have two little boys who, like, get up, you know, 5.30, 6 o'clock now, and they're like, Dad, I'm like, no, please sleep. Yeah yeah doug you're up at

like 4 30 though you were like our cory gregory i usually wake up at five uh occasionally i'll wake up earlier than that i was waking up at four at the beginning of covid just because i knew that i was gonna be with my kids all day long every day seven days a week and i just i just needed more work time and so i was getting up early. I backed that down to 5 o'clock. I did 4 o'clock for a long time. My kids also just started staying up a little bit later over that time. With COVID and no school, their bedtime would creep back 30 minutes, 45 minutes, an hour.

Then all of a sudden, that's an hour of sleep for me. Their one hour staying up later is an hour of sleep all of a sudden and then all of a sudden i'm that's that's an hour of sleep for me like their their one hour staying up later is an hour of sleep that i lose and so i had to push back yeah my 4 a.m time to 5 a.m but but i do i like waking up early and doing something for myself or whatever it is um yeah i train no matter what i mentioned like reading and studying earlier like i usually read most of my books from 5 30 in the morning till six. Uh, and that's, that's been fantastic. I feel like it's like a very, it's quiet.

It's very, it's peaceful. I'm doing something for myself. I feel like I'm, uh, I'm moving my, you know, my goals,

so to speak in the right direction. Like, like my, my pursuit of mastery in the, in the domain of, of intelligence, uh, is only happening from five 30 in the morning to six.

Um, so I, I, i didn't start doing that until covid and now you know covid's still here of course we're not we're not quarantined in quite the same way uh for me personally here in nefesa to see right now but uh i'm keeping that habit though because i feel like it's been it's just been phenomenally good now now when my kids wake up i'm like i'm like ready to go hang out with them because i already did something for myself rather than being like, fuck, did that thing work yesterday? Did that person text me back or that email that I wanted to get or whatever it is? If I can just – all the little worries that I have, I can check on them in the morning, read my book, maybe stretch a little bit, and then I feel totally ready for the day compared to just waking up and going straight to doing kids stuff. I mean, if you think about 20 minutes, if you do 20 minutes a day, only five days a week, I mean, that's 100 minutes. I mean, you know, that is like an hour and like 40 minutes every single week of reading.

If you do that, you could crush a lot of books. I mean, that would be like 87 hours of reading a year. I mean, you could kill somebody i mean you do that you're going to definitely be enriching your your life like yeah um and the wisdom you're going to gain would be outrageous i think that's one of the coolest parts about this like diesel dad not just like the the strength programs that we're writing that's kind of like the entry uh like the thing that we we do the best um is programming and getting people moving in the gym but the fact like doug you mentioned it where it's like if you wake up and you go straight into having to be with your boys and now you're

breaking breakfast and you got to get them to school and you got to go to work and then all of a sudden it's what five o'clock at night four o'clock at night or in the afternoon and now you've got two hours and in that time it's like dinner and kids and getting up to bed and bath time and all this madness and then by the time it is eight o'clock what are you going to go to the gym at 8 30 no no nobody's going to gym at 8.30. You're ready to go sit on the couch and do nothing. And you just lose that whole, it only takes like a week and then a week turns into two weeks, turns into a month. Next thing you know, you just haven't really committed anything to yourself because you're just getting steamrolled by family and business and everything else. And waking up is the only time that you're guaranteed to own that part of

the day. Because most people just don't want to get up that early. They want to sleep as late as they can. And it's really uncomfortable, but your body will adapt to it. I mean, I'm not saying that everybody needs to go sleep six hours and three minutes a night like i did last night but i'm fired up about hanging out with you bros in the morning in fact i get to get a little pump on and go walk around and turn on an audiobook i feel like i'm a hundred percent you do that every morning the walk you do a walk with audio every book every every morning um and I typically listen to each book like twice. Because if I'm listening to a book and walking, what I end up doing into a 20-minute walk, 15-minute walk, something like that,

is I'm going to listen to the book for five minutes, and then all of a sudden it sparks something in my brain, and I'm just off into. So I listen to them a couple times. They're like $20. Yeah. You own it forever. You can go back and listen.

Well, I mean, I have – what is it called? Audible. And, like, you know, you can get – you get books for free every – I mean, not free. You pay a subscription, and you get X amount. And so I just – I mean, I've got so many books on there loaded in there. Yeah. But I think that it's just the mentality of like finding the spots in the day

that you own, finding ways to not maybe like, if training used to be this like giant process of getting in and doing your mobility and then squat or snatching and then squatting and then some sort of hypertrophy and then some sort of metcon and all that like that there's no way that's going to happen but if you can organize your day so that you get these like efficient effective ways of increasing strength and just being around weights or committing 20 minutes a day to it, you're going to be able to stack those really good habits on top of each other and you're going to accomplish your goals. That's why diesel dad is awesome because you got

two, you got all these different choices. You know, you got, you got the long, longer route and then you got the shorter route. So it kind of like for me right now, honestly, the shorter route would probably be better for me because I need to be able to go there, get it done, get out, and start studying some more so I don't fail out of college. College dropout. I made it through my undergrad, but, man, I dropped out at 47. I couldn't take it. A bunch of stuff, man, I dropped out at 47. I couldn't take it. Much stuff.

Man, it's getting a lot. Yeah. What else is on the list, Doug? Yeah, I was going to say, all right, so that was Diesel Dad trains hard, eats right, and gets enough sleep. Moving on to the next one, the Diesel Dad chooses to be kind, yet trains to be dangerous, and aggressively protects his family. So I feel like this comes from two places. Number one, I've done martial arts my whole life. I just think it's just a good idea across the board for anybody,

but especially guys, to know how to fight, to know how to physically protect yourself. That way, if you end up in a minor conflict where it's just verbal, at least you know if it goes off the rails, you can protect yourself, you can get away, or of course you can just win the fight if that happens to be the right thing to do in that moment. But I feel like it helps with verbal conflict,

it helps with negotiation. It's actually one of the reasons I think Joe Rogan does such a great job as a podcast host, in addition to many other reasons, because he's good at many things. But he knows how to fight. He's been a lifelong martial artist. And he's had conversations with some of the baddest dudes on the planet. He calls their fights and he says what his honest opinion is.

And you don't think after the fight, after some guy who's top five in the world hears him say, Oh, it looks like his conditioning really isn't up to par, blah, blah, blah, blah, that that guy doesn't come find him and be like, what the fuck did you say about me? That happens to him all the time. All those UFC fighters are not his buddies. He's friendly with many of them, but there's a lot of them that just, they will

come talk to him about, what the hell did you say about me? I've seen behind the scenes footage of him talking people down, and he's not just talking down a regular person. He's talking down a train killer. Yeah. So he's had that level of conflict with people that know how to be physically aggressive. And I feel like that is something that lets him have a conversation in a way where he can be very honest about his opinion and he can

and he can say what needs to be said without fearing retaliation in the same way as like most other journalists or random podcast hosts can so that that's a piece of it and then also jordan peterson talks about this a lot like a good man isn't a person who's just nice to other people because you could be a weak person and be nice to other people only because you're afraid. Yeah. Well, that's not good. You want to be someone who's strong, athletic, and knows how to fight. And then because you are this person who has these abilities, you choose to be kind to other people because you know you could win.

You know, just like you choose to be kind to your five-year-old because you know you could win the fight, whatever that means with a five-year-old. And so you don't need to prove to him over and over again that you're tougher than him or that you're stronger than him or whatever. It should just be obvious in that dynamic that I am the stronger person here and it's my responsibility as the leader to be kind and gentle because I know I could easily win. So if you can stretch out that dynamic a little bit with people across the board where you're a very strong athletic person, you know how to fight, and you choose to be nice, that is the ideal. That's where you want to be.

Yeah, I'm excited to take Rock and Bear to martial arts. I have a friend who's really good. Actually, he used to work with me, too, because he does strength and conditioning as well, but his main gig is wrestling and MMA. He's a fight. The kids like him. He's nice, and so I'm excited to get him.

I just want them to be confident is the key. I think it helps with all kinds of points in life. If I'm confident in just my ability to win a fight, I'm probably confident in my abilities in a lot of ways. It just, you know, I know it built me, you know, martial arts and just the fact that I was, you know, I like to fight. I used to like to fight in not a good way. But, like, it just made me a very confident person.

I am the softest person on this podcast right now, for sure. You played hockey, though. I've been in two fights playing ice hockey, and at no point in either of those was I concerned about the other person. Fighting in ice hockey has a whole lot to do with who's just a better skater. And you get away with a lot of things when you're just better on your feet and have better balance, better skater,

better just athletic to be able to move somebody around at will. But I would love to learn how to do all that. When I was a little kid, I don't even know how old I was, but this is the first. This is my introduction to fighting, which probably isn't the best. I came home, and somebody at school got in a fight, and I told my dad about it. And he brought me down to the rec center, and they had a boxing gym in there.

And it was like the most terrifying thing because these guys were like dead serious about boxing. And there was no windows. most terrifying thing because these guys were like dead serious about boxing and there wasn't there was no windows the door just had like a little tiny square window in it like you didn't just go to this boxing gym just to learn how to hit the bag like you were there and everybody was training and he picked me up and i remember he he just had me peek through the window, and he goes, if you want to get in a fight at school, you are going to go train with these people so that you do not lose. And I was like, I'll just not get in a fight

because that looked terrifying in there. Unfortunately, I would have loved it. I'm like, let's go. I feel like the Jits rabbit hole is like it's deeper. It's deeper than strength training. I see that. It's endless. Every person who loves the barbell, when they get into that world, gets lost.

You saw Chad Wesley Smith or Alex Macklin. Once they're in there, it's like endless how much they can learn. And like, you know, we're, you know, the barber wants you, once you know, you know, kind of thing. And you get, learn some little things, but I feel like, you know, jujitsu is like endless the things you can learn, like big, learn a whole lot more. But yeah. And the number of people that are, it's since 2004 and on a daily basis on Instagram, I see people do stuff, and I go, whoa.

I've actually done that before. I'm going to try that today. Every week, every week, where I go, whoa, I can't believe I hadn't seen this before. I've been doing it for 20 years almost. And with the barbell, you don't see, oh, somebody just did a hang snatch. You don't say, oh, I've never seen that before. Right. But I've seen that 10 million and one time now.

Yeah. Yeah. There's many, many thousands of moves and styles and whatnot. Yeah. I think being dangerous and aggressively protecting your family doesn't just come down to just beating people up and knowing how to fight. I think there's like a verbal component to that as well like like how well you handle conflict with other people um you don't need to be to try to hurt somebody in a verbal conflict but do you know how to like stay calm with conflict you know how to

de-escalate conflict like as as a leader you you need to be able to do those things because that's one of the biggest parts of being a leader is is managing conflict yeah freaking out and conflict when your dad is like you need to brush your teeth or time to go to bed or get in the car or whatever it is like it can be very simple stuff but um you could easily in those situations i know because i've done this many times and i'm always working on it it's like you could escalate those situations and and make it make the conflict grow or you can de-es escalate those situations and and make it make the conflict grow or you can de-escalate those situations and calm everybody down um and it's it's actually easy to do both but it's easier to escalate the situation if you're if you're running late or you're frustrated

or you've you know told your kid a million times or whatever whatever it is um i have learned over time that it almost never works to escalate the situation. Rarely does it work, especially for like any long-term outcome that you want to measure there. And so I'm always focusing on staying as calm as possible, you know, giving real rational, like logical reasons for why I'm saying what I'm saying, catering to the emotions of the other person, like trying to meet them where they're at, understand their feelings, validate their feelings, et cetera, et cetera. It's like there's a huge dynamic there that I'm always working on. But staying calm seems to be the best route that I've found. Man, let me tell you a quick story. I was in spring break. I was 19 years old, and we were in Cancun, Mexico. And my roommate, John Strotter, we were both linebackers.

I want to go back. Yeah, yeah, Mexico. And my roommate, John Stratter, we were both linebackers. I want to go back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we both – we found these two girls. My wife's right behind me as I'm telling this. We were just friends, the two girls. I felt that look from behind you. Burn me. So we get these two girls and we rented a Jeep in Cancun, and we're just driving.

Well, we're driving. We're doing stupid stuff. Like, this is not a good idea what I'm about to tell anybody, but we were drinking, driving, partying. Next thing you know, we pass these people, and, like, I'm pretty sure my roommate, like, flipped them off. We were just being stupid. Anyway, we pull into this like look like like an abandoned house and these dudes pulling behind us and block us in we can't get out and so i'm getting out prepared to fight i'm like all right we're about to fight awesome i

thought awesome i get out and this dude puts a nine millimeter right into my ribs i'm saying nine millimeter as if i knew i didn't know it was a guy. I assumed nine's what comes to mind. And he looks, and thank God he can speak English. And like, and we're in the middle of nowhere. So I quickly, like, look at where we're at, and I'm like, I'm dead. He's fresh.

I knew I was getting killed. So I was like, I was like, so then I calmly, it was cool. It was the weirdest thing. Like, I was like, look, I calmly, it was cool. It was the weirdest thing. Like, I was like, look, I know you can, we just don't kill these girls. You know, I was like, I don't want to be responsible for the last thing on this earth of getting these two girls killed, you know? And he starts yelling at me. He's like, I was in your country and you treated me.

But I was like, look, I didn't. I was like, you know, I love all you guys. Like, please come. Somehow, obviously, I survived the situation. He just took our money. I was like, he take my money, man. I didn't even try to talk him out of that. But it was amazing how calm I got.

And this is how, when I looked around, I'm like, yep, I'm shot. For sure getting shot. Mexico. Mexico, in the middle of nowhere. He literally could have tossed me in the bushes. I would have never been found. It was no traffic on this road we were on. What a dumb idea.

Everything I just told you to do was dumb. Dumb. And this is why when I talk about Bear, I get so upset because I don't want him to be like that. Because he's got that gene of like just craziness and i'm just like oh please lord not anything too far man that's my story i don't have any stories like that i always just try and make people laugh that's all i want two minutes like laugh and when you talk shit really really well helps to have

somebody with a big jaw next to you in case you go a little too far there's always somebody that can come in and go hey let's settle this down guys you gotta get through this jaw before you go get to that loud guy yeah we gotta wrap this up because I gotta go

do dad stuff. I'm going to combine these last two real quick and talk about them together. The Diesel Dad is unreasonably positive and focuses his attention on what's going well. The Diesel Dad has a daily practice of expressing love, appreciation, and gratitude for his family.

These two are just obvious advice. You should show love to the people you love. But it's easy to just go through the day and not do it as much or as genuinely as you should. I make a very strong effort to hug my kids every day, tell them I love them every day. And same with my wife. When I don't do those things as often as I know I should, I can feel the dynamic of the family shift a little bit. And when I do do those things, it shifts back in the positive direction.

My kids are more cooperative. It's more fun for everyone when I set the tone by being calm and loving. And family life is much more peaceful when I can set up that dynamic. I can give some great advice here. You know, with Bear, I actually talked to Gabriel about Bear and like, because, you know, we're so much alike. I almost know what he's thinking, which makes me mad because I can see him saying, you know, F you dad.

In his brain, I can see that. And so like Gabriel said, if you make an effort to give him twice as many affirmations as you do, like like you know counseling or whatever he's like uh he said it could make a difference it made a huge difference like i'm i've purposely gone above wait trying to go way above the affirmations and telling him how proud i am and loving him and it's been a bit big difference in our relationship so there's that yeah i feel like my neighbor yeah i was gonna say i feel like it's difficult to have like love appreciation gratitude etc if you're being negative all the time and so

the the diesel dad is unreasonably positive which i like the unreasonableness of being positive because sometimes things are just bad and it is unreasonable to be positive about them but any any change or or thing that happens anything that happens to you there's inevitably going to be positive about them but any any change or or thing that happens anything that happens to you there's inevitably going to be some upside to it and some downside to it there's there's an opportunity wherever there is a change and maybe maybe the downside is really big and so you kind of want to downplay any any potential opportunity you don't want to think about it yet or whatever but they're they're always there There's always something going well in your life or some new opportunity that comes from some big change.

Like we look at COVID, COVID happens and we go, fuck, like, you know, just in our company, we go, Oh,

what are we going to do? Like people are, people are on these longterm training programs. They, they need gyms to do the one ton challenge or whatever it is. A lot of people don't have, you know, you know,

500 pounds of weight in their garage, or, you know, maybe they live in an apartment. They don't have their own home gym and gyms are closed. Like, what are we going to people don't have, you know, you know, 500 pounds of weight in their garage, or, you know, maybe they live in an apartment, they don't have their own home gym, and gyms are closed, like, what are we going to do? And so, you know, we got to change directions and find something else that works. But if you're just negative and pissed off about things changing the whole time, then it doesn't free up brain space to be like, oh, wow, look at these opportunities, and thinking from the positive, and focusing on what's going well for me over time has become more of a conscious choice and for the better.

Like when I'm focusing on the positive, it's much easier, again, to express love, appreciation, gratitude for my family because I'm thinking about what's going well all the time rather than what I'm pissed off about all the time. Totally. I dig it. I love the positivity side. The unreasonably positive thing, I think you brought that up for the first time on a show when we were talking to Mark England when we were in Tahoe last year, which I can't believe was a whole year ago. I totally stole that from you in my own mantra of living of oh yeah of course we're gonna do that like that

just is such a better way to go about it i see people uh i think i've talked about it on shows before of like um in the buddha's brain they talk about um people always have darts getting thrown at them and it's so easy to go once you once you get hit by one dart to go which is just like a bad occurrence of something that's out of your control just you start playing out all of the other bad things are going to happen in your life because of that one singular bad thing and just figuring out some way to one deflect any um future negative thoughts of what could be, which always just turns into more anxiety, which does nothing.

But just trying to figure out how to keep a level head. I think it's actually a frustrating thing to many people when you are unreasonably positive because when something bad happens, if you just kind of say it out loud, like if you're a gym owner and you lose 10 members in a day, you just go, oh, well, I just lost 10 members. It's not, I lost 10 members

and I'm not going to be able to pay my bills and I'm going to lose my house and I'm going to, no, you just, okay, I got to go find 10 more people. We're going to have to go make more money. Okay. I'm going to find 11. Let's just, the problem is, is we have to go make more money. So let's go make more money. We're going to have to go make more money. Okay. I find 11. Let's just, the problem is,

is we have to go make more money. So let's go make more money. Sounds good. Yeah. Yeah. I like the positive at it. It's such a happier place to live than thinking doomsday is around the corner at all times. I think all great entrepreneurs would have this trait because if not,

you would go crazy. Like you, if you were not overly optimistic you would never do this in the first place because you'd be too afraid totally yeah um let's wrap it up i gotta go do some breakfast i hear the i hear the madness happening i hope the coffee's made doug larson's looking at marcy right now is drew making earrings in the back she is she's making earrings damn she's crushing it. Where do we find Emily Drew Mash's earrings?

We're going to go emilydrew.com emilydrewmash.com Look at that. Our 90% male audience is going to be buying earrings now. Look at that. That's awesome. Travis Mash, where do they find you?

Just do that. That's mine. Bash where do they find you just do that that's my oh you can find my wife at at emilydrew art dot art emilydrew.art

on Instagram there it is look at that Doug Larson my wife doesn't do art so you can follow me on Instagram Doug Larson

I'm Anders Varner at Anders Varner we are barbell shrug to barbell underscore shrugged at Barbell underscore Shrugged. Get over to BarbellShrugged.com forward slash DieselDad. That is where all the cool dads are hanging out that like lifting weights, want to get strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, and fitness.

And you can get over to Walmart. We are in San Diego, L.A., Orange County, Palm Springs. I actually know for a fact that Barbell Shrug people have been buying programs at Walmart. We're learning a lot. You're probably going to have to potentially get a cage opened up to get to the programs near all the proteins. We have a whole lot of things that we're working on with Walmart right now, trying to figure out how Barbell Shrug gets into 5,000 stores. I love how they just assume

that our stuff's going to be so valuable that they have to put it behind a locked cage. I can't. I feel like I'm going to be on shows in like 2025. We're going to be in 5,000 stores. We're just going to be crushing it. And every day I'm going to be like,

I'm still learning. We've made it to all the stores and it's just an endless learning process. So, um, yeah, get over to Walmart, walmart.com soon and a barbell shrug.com forward slash diesel dad, where a class one is in the middle of the launch right now at in Sunday, the show is airing on a Friday. So you've got two days to get in, get strong, get lean, get athletic, and let's roll. We'll see you guys next week. We are Diesel Dads, and we train hard to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness.

Through three training programs to build strength, combining west side barbell dynamic effort with functional bodybuilding to focus on top end strength, speed, and power. Hypertrophy, combining old school bodybuilding and interval weight training to build muscle, burn fat, and get jacked. And density weight training, the set it up and get after a program with higher intensity functional movements targeted to build muscle and metcons in under 20 minutes. The Diesel Dad is for dads that love lifting weights, for dads that want to be savage fathers, for dads that want to be savage husbands, for dads that want to be savage at their jobs,

and for dads that want to be savage in the gym. We are Diesel Dads, and we train hard to be strong, lean, and athletic without sacrificing family, fatherhood, or fitness. Diesel Dad Class 1 registration is open right now through Sunday, November 22nd. Time is running out. All the dads are going to get so jacked, and training starts Monday, November 23rd. You can start today by going over to barbellshrug.com forward slash Diesel Dad. D-I-E-S-E-L-D-A-D, all one word,

barbellshrug.com forward slash diesel dad. Class one registration is live now. It closes on Sunday, November 22nd. Training starts Monday, November 23rd. Come get strong, lean, and athletic. Being the best dad that you possibly can be. We are stoked to get this out to everybody. We're creating a little place for all the dads. A little spot where we can kick it in the Diesel Dad Dojo. Come rage with us.

barbellshrug.com forward slash Diesel Dad. Today on Barbell Shrugged, we're talking about the 10 commandments of the Diesel Dad. We always talk about the strength and conditioning side of being a strong role model, why we love strength training, all the different pieces of it. We talk about a lot of that as well today, but we also get into kind of what it means to be a leader in your household and some of the parts that really matter inside your house and what we really think about when we think about being a great dad, a great husband, running a great business, or being great at your job, and how it all brings itself together through the Diesel Dad.

Come and join us. We'll see you guys next week.