Habits and Hustle - Habits and Hustle Re-Release! Episode 5: Tom Bilyeu – Co-Founder of Quest Nutrition and Impact Theory – Importance of Mindset, Routines, and Habits

Episode Date: May 14, 2021

This is an ultimate throwback but one of the best episodes we’ve ever had on Habits and Hustle. Tom Bilyeu, co-founder of Quest Nutrition and Impact Theory is the epitome of everything Habits & Hustle is about. On this episode, he talks about the very specific habits that make him successful including how meditation changed his life, handling email, his fitness routine, keto, intermittent fasting, why he is obsessed with building the next Disney, staying focused, scheduling, the importance of being a “learner” and Elon Musk. Tom also shares the story of his friendship with Steve Aoki and how they partnered on a comic book together.  Youtube Link to This Episode Tom’s Podcast: Impact Theory ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Did you learn something from tuning in today? Please pay it forward and write us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. 📧If you have feedback for the show, please email [e-mail]  📙Get yourself a copy of Jennifer Cohen’s newest book from Habit Nest, Badass Body Goals Journal. ℹ️Habits & Hustle Website 📚Habit Nest Website 📱Follow Jennifer – Instagram – Facebook – Twitter – Jennifer’s Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Get grilling at Whole Foods Market Terms Apply. Vitamin water's zero sugar just dropped in all new taste. It was zero holding back on flavor. You can be your all-filling. I'll play and all self-care you. Grab the all-new taste today. Vitamin water's zero sugar. sugar nourish every you vitamin water is a registered trademark of glass oh So today we have Tom bill you who I've been so I've been wanting to meet for a long time now because I'm a huge fan of what you've done and what you've accomplished

a long time now because I'm a huge fan of what you've done and what you've accomplished. From quest, impact theory, just also how you live your life and how you've your mind stand, how you structured everything. I find to be not just inspirational and motivational, but I think very practical in ways of how people can take those and kind of live more productively and more authentically, I guess. And I'm so happy to have you here. So thank you for coming. Super excited to be here. Thanks for having me.

Of course. I don't even know where to start with you. Is it number one I was saying when you walked in, I feel like we have two things in common, right? We have quest bars, which is my favorite protein bar, and I'm not getting paid to say it, and it's always been. And of course, the whole matrix, red pill,

blue pill situation, but we'll get to that in a minute. I guess a good place to start is just how, I really love your morning rituals. And I think they're and I think I think they're I think it really kind of keeps people on point when they have routines and good habits and I read that you wake up at four or five o'clock every morning you don't ever use an alarm clock is that true? It is I'll say that I'll set emergency alarms if I have a flight or something like that. That's really early and I can't afford to miss.

But 98.9% of the times I don't wake up to an alarm. Wow. So your body just automatically, just your body rhythm. Yeah, there's a couple things. One, I try to get as much sleep as I need. So I'm not trying to pull a fancy trick. It's like I just prioritize sleep. Right. And then on top of that, you can actually give yourself the like intention of waking up

at a certain time. It's pretty scandalous how often I'll wake up within say five or ten minutes of when I told myself to wake up. So if you, I mean, that's not like an hour and a half later, you know, I'm giving myself plenty of time to sleep. Absolutely. But if I give myself at least six hours to sleep and I tell myself, wake up at, you know, 330 or wake up at 4.30, like I'll wake up

within minutes of that time, which is pretty crazy. Unless I'm really tired. So if I've been doing that for, let's say, five or six days in a row and I've been short-changing myself a little bit, then I might have a hard time hitting that. Right, I mean, I think everyone has like, their body clock, I mean, I think everyone has their body clock.

I mean, me too. I'm so used to waking up at the same time. It's usually a varies within 10, 15 minutes maybe, but I think you just become part of your, you know, you become habitual in life, right? When you do something over and over again, that's just part of it. And then let's just say on your morning routines, I love it, because then you do meditation. You're a big fan of meditation.

And then the What's it called think thinkitation? Thinkitation. Yes, so let's talk about that So why meditation and then thinkitation which I think is kind of a unique one. Yeah, so I think that I was just talking to my mom about meditation last night and I was, it's really like sometimes you'll say something changed my life and you're being a little hyperbolic for real with meditation, it changed my life. And it really can give me anxiety just to think about

what would have happened if I hadn't discovered meditation when I finally did, because in the most stressful times of my life, thankfully I had meditation. And the way that I think about it is we all have in the most stressful times of my life, thankfully I had meditation. And the way that I think about it is, we all have background radiation. So it's like, you're worried about this, that or the other, I've heard it explained,

is like a computer with too many windows open. Even if they're minimized, like they're just taking resources. And so, because I'm so obsessed with cosmology and stuff, I think of it as the background radiation in the universe. It's just sort of there. And you have this sense of unease about something, generalizing anxiety, waff and manifest.

It's just a sense of dread. And you have no idea what it's related to. And so that had really developed in my life over a 15 year journey of becoming an entrepreneur, starting from absolutely no entrepreneurial instincts whatsoever. And having to like literally train myself and the ground up to think in a radically different way, to act in a different way, to create momentum,

all this stuff, and in constantly being in over my head, I just got to the point where I was like, this sense of background radiation is so insane, I'm anxious all the time, like this is crazy. And so I didn't want to meditate because to me it felt really soft. It felt like totally weak and just what I had to learn as an entrepreneur because by nature I am I'm weak. I mean that's just the truth. And so to give you one quick example playing soccer as a kid in Tacoma, Washington, it's cold to ball hit your leg to leave the imprint of

the soccer ball and it hurts. And I just wanted to be taken off the field so that I could whine about it. And nobody taught me like, look, you have an objective that objective is to get good at soccer. You're going to have to push to the pain or you're never going to get good. So I had no sense of like, oh, yeah, I have a goal. And oh, yeah, I'm going to have to push to this. And there's something that I want that's on the other side of this pain. For me, it was just like, my parents are making me be here.

This hurts the sucks and I want to cry about it. And so getting into business and starting with that pathetic attitude, it was like, I had to beat that out of myself and I had to get to the point where I toughened up. And so for me, getting tough is really powerful. Now being emotional and being in touch with yourself, that also is powerful, but I started there. I was plenty in touch with myself.

And so for me, it was really learning to harden up. And so getting going through all of that and then people telling me that, oh, meditation is this way to like really regulate yourself. I just thought, that's woo, woo, man. That's like really soft. That feels like me going backwards. I'm not interested.

And so I just kept saying, no, no, no, like, hey, I get it. It works for some people's not for me. And then I met a Navy SEAL Mark Divine. And he said, Tom, stop being an asshole and meditate. And I thought, coming from this guy, like this guy is tough as nails. And so if he's telling me that this is one of the most powerful things that the Navy seal could do, then I have, you know, no reason not to at least try it. And it was one of those from the first breath. I was like, this is different.

Now, I wouldn't even say I'm a good meditator now, but I would just say, when you learn to diaphragm breathe properly and you feel yourself shift out of the sympathetic nervous system into the parasympathetic, which for anybody that's never heard those terms, the sympathetic nervous system is fight, flight, or freeze. The parasympathetic is rest and digest.

They are two different parts of your body and they're basically on a teeter totter. So as one goes down, the other one necessarily goes up, as one goes up, the other necessarily goes down. So as you ramp up your parasympathetic, you're going into rest and digest, you will feel more calm. And one of the physiological hooks,

and this is always big to me, like what's the physiological way into this? And thank you for saying practical that my mind says practical, which definitely is what I've tried to build. Something that actually has utility. Right. Diaphram breathing is a physiological way to change the neurochemical state of your brain. And so you will instantly begin to feel better just by breathing from your diaphragm. And so as somebody who grew up a little bit chubby,

I was always sucking your leg up. Yeah, well, so first of all, I come from a morbidly obese family. Hence why you did the quest bars in the first place. Correct. And so by today's standards, I wasn't chubby, but by the standards of when I was growing up, I was chubby, which I actually didn't realize.

But that's a whole new story about this woman going when I had lost weight, saying, oh my god, I always thought of you as the chubby kid. And I had to play my whole life in reverse, like in six cents and realize, oh my god, people knew I was sucking in my gut, like the whole thing. Oh, wow. So anyway, for decades, I just walked around sucking in my gut. So I'm never diaphragm breathing. So the first time I take a real die for

imbreath and I feel this like wave of calm. I was like, wow, there's really something to this. So I started meditating every day and it was transformational, got rid of that background radiation. And at first it just gets rid of it while you're meditating. And then it will wash back in really fast. And then the more you meditate, the longer that pause, then the more you meditate, the quicker you can get into that calm state.

And so it just really, really became amazing. Can I ask you a question? Do you do a particular kind? I know a lot of people have a particular kind that they're really, really passionate about. Is that with you? I'm the world's most clumsy meditator. And for anybody who thinks meditation is about doing it right or clearing your mind

That that's not what meditation is so I will say for me meditation is really the simple act of Breathing from your diaphragm in a comfortable position and bringing your mind back to the breath once you realize that you're thinking about something Which will happen Frequently like your mind is going to constantly go to something, the groceries, something you're stressed about, whatever. And you just gently bring it back to your breath. So, I use a variation of what's called box breathing, which is a breath of four equal cycles. So you've got the inhale, the inhale hold, the exhale, and the exhale hold in traditional box breathing, all four of those take the same amount of time. And I found that when I tried to do that, I felt at a breath.

So I was like, okay, I'm doing this wrong and I go through all the normal generations, but I'm just arrogant enough to be like, then there's a better way to do this. And I'm going to figure it out. And I just started changing the breath cycle for me to maximize the pleasure. So I'm going to inhale for the exact amount of time that it's deeply pleasurable to inhale. I'm going to hold the inhale for the exact amount of time it's deeply pleasurable, so on and so forth. And what I found was a sort of normal inhale.

I just take a breath in through my nose. I hold it very briefly at the top, which just doesn't feel natural for me for some reason. And then my exhale is entirely, I just let the oxygen out. I don't try to control it. I don't try to double its length. Some people do your exhale. exhale should be twice as long as your inhale. I just found if I just let it out,

that in no way trying to control it, that that felt good. And then my exhale hold, it just felt awesome. And the best part of the breath for me, oddly enough, was just sitting in that space where I had just exhaleed, but I wasn't yet taking any breath. So I might hold the inhale for, I don't know, call it two seconds.

And then on the exhale hold, I might hold that for 15 seconds, and it just feels awesome. And so if I'm tired and I'm meditating, I'll fall asleep on the breath hold on the exhale. It's the part of the cycle that's most relaxing, the most like where I feel my heart rate slowing down, I feel that real deep sense of

calm. But I don't know that may not work for other people. So I always tell people just maximize each part of the breath cycle, the pleasure of it. And once you're doing that and you're into a rhythm that makes you like gives you a sense of well-being, that's the breath cycle for you. So how long are you doing this for in the morning? You wake up, you exercise first, though, right? I do, yeah. Okay, I forgot to ask you, what kind of exercise are you doing? Running, are you doing yoga? Super, super lame, really the minimum amount that I need to optimize cognitively.

And I've just found that I resent that my body needs as much attention as it does, because like my wife, when she works out, it's really funny. So my wife is a beast. And she would, I heard, that's why I heard. And I mean this sincerely, my wife could do something like Navy Seal Hell Week, 100%. Like she just physically,

she gets something out of taxing her body in a way. And so she used to train with this woman who I will say borders on the statistic. Like she liked to break people, she liked it. I'm not joking, she ran a bootcamp and they were all of the women there would be crying by the end of it except my wife. It would just be like, let's go, let's go, let's go. Let's do it again. Yeah. But I would have been with the other women crying. Yeah. Like I'd be like, this sucks. I have no interest in doing this. My why is not big enough. So working out for me is truly about cognitively optimizing.

I only do it for that, that and longevity. So those are compelling enough that I go in, I do my five days a week, I put in there. Reading cardio though, you do straight. Usually it's mostly lifting. And I lift because it makes me feel strong and tough and I dig that. Right.

Like most guys. Yeah. And it shapes my body. Like I've changed the way that my body looks from lifting. And so there is enough of like I enjoy certain aspects of that to keep doing it. But if you told me you could look the way that you look now for the rest of your life,

which is a suboptimal physique, by the way. Like I'm not stepping up on the Arnold stage. Anytime I'm not competing in a physique competition, let alone a bodybuilding competition So and I know that but if you said that hey, you could maintain this physique forever You don't need to do anything other than eat right But it means you'll never be in better shape would you do it? Yes Like I would never set foot in a gym ever again if I could avoid it

So you're doing it for maintenance and for some cognitive. It's it really is cognitive optimization and longevity. Those are the big ones and then yes I like looking good naked. Those are but like in descending order they go cognitive optimization longevity and then a fairly distant third would be the aesthetics of it. Yeah like looking good naked. Exactly. And then what are you eating them? Because if you were as you call yourself a chubby kid, what did you do? Like how, what is your diet? So my diet now is on point. My diet did not used to be on point. Like, I remember I had a tub of red vine licorice and I thought, well, it's fat free. So it literally doesn't count. I can eat as much red vines as I want. This is amazing. I remember that. Like, it was all about

the calories, not about anything else. Calories and make sure that there's no fat. And so I remember my roommate going, did I think if you don't use the sugar, it turns to fat. And I was like, that doesn't even make sense. Like how can sugar become fat that's absurd? And so that shows you where I started. And then now it's, I eat whole food wherever I can, you know what I mean?

Like even at Quest, if you'd called, I can't swear to it now, but when I was there, if you'd called and said, Hey, I want to get healthy, what should I eat? The answer was going to be chicken breast and broccoli. Right. And not because we were incentivized to say that we weren't, we didn't still chicken breast or broccoli. We said that because it's true.

And we wanted people to know that you could trust us. And so while I still am, I probably consume too many quest products. We too, by the way. And this is, you know, I mean, look, I'm beyond biased, but like we made the stuff that we wanted to eat. But whole food is the right answer at all times. Right. And the only time you should deviate away from that is when it's for like, just I need

something that tastes like potato chip Or a cookie you know what I mean? It's like you're going to have something so you might as well have the thing That's at least the healthy version of that right? So I use it is like the the cookies and cream when it as a dessert. Yeah, you know, I'm sure most people I'm not most but a lot of people I'm sure did that as well for sure blazing deals Boundless options it's hot grill summer at Whole Foods Market from June 14 through July 4. Fire up the grill with quality cuts at the best prices. We're talking animal welfare certified meat.

Check out the sales on Bone-In-Rib-I, beef kabobs, and New York strip steak. Round out your barbecue with plant-based proteins, slice cheese, soft buns, and all the condiments. Plus, sales on fresh strawberries, peaches, and more. Don't forget to pie, either. Get grilling at Whole Foods Market Terms Apply. Keep coming back! You got plenty of space! Oof, not how you would have done that. You like working with people you can rely on. Like USAA, who has helped guide the military community for the past 100 years. USAA, get

a quote today. So then you kind of, it's all about Whole Foods, but you're not following a keto diet, intermittent fasting, nothing. Well, so I do both of those. Oh, you do. Pretty, pretty intensely. So intermittent fasting is like a religion for me.

So I do a 16 hour fast almost seven days a week. In fact, I'm aiming for it seven days a week, but sometimes schedule will just mess it up a little bit. Right. I can't tell you the last time that I went less than 14 hours. And then once a year, I do a five day fast, and then there are times where I'll do 18 to 24 hour fast throughout the year, which I have found helps not only with body composition, but certainly helps you be metabolically flexible, which I think is huge, changes your relationship

to food and hunger for sure. Yeah. And then, again, longevity, which is an obsession of mine. Right. And so, that's like the non-eating portion, and then the eating portion, I definitely am ultra-high-fat, moderate protein, low to no carbohydrate. The only carbs I take in, unless I'm cheating, come from vegetables, green leaf leafy and that has served me well because I struggled with inflammation for about 15 years of the most ungodly proportions. I had burn marks on the back

of my hands from icing my wrists. So I would ice him twice a day just I would probably clock close to two hours a day icing my wrists And that was just to function. Wow. Yeah, that was really gnarly. And I thought that was forever. And then, so I lived in what I'll call a rabbit starvation diet. It was basically about 80% of my calories came from protein. I tried to keep fat to basically zero.

And my carbohydrates were almost zero. And I took in a little bit of carbohydrate from vegetable, but even back then I would tell people you don't need to eat vegetables Like those are totally optional and so I lived like that for years and by the way got shredded I was the leanest I've ever been it was amazing. I'm not gonna lie But it hurt and I my wife and my business partners pulled me aside and said you no longer have a personality And it was like my calories were just so low and I had no fat in my system It's really really gnarly and I definitely would not go back into the brain

Your brain needs fat to even think and to focus and to be alert I mean and being an entrepreneur. I mean, you know that's you had to have you had to have that ability no question right So that that was a stupid period of time. But then for when we started working with Peter Atia and Dom DeGasino, they came in and said, guys, you have to be eating fat. Like this is crazy. You can't do this. And ketogenics may have anti-cancer properties. So going back to my obsession with longevity, I said, cool, I'm going to try this, but I'm going to do it at a therapeutic dose. So I did a four to one. So for every combined gram of protein and carbohydrate, I ate four grams of fat. That is so hard and so gross. And of course, I'd keto flu, because I was doing this like

being a sugar burner hardcore. And then switching into that was disgusting. I hated it so much, but my wrists were perfect. And all of a sudden I went from 15 years of pain to pain-free. And I was like, this is bananas. And I haven't had to ice my wrist since I started doing high fat. And that was four years ago. Wow. Four years. Are five, six years ago? So you've been doing like a keto diet for four years. I won't say a keto diet, but I've been doing high fat. High fat. Kind of like that can also be called ackins. That can also be called. I mean, yeah, ackins is probably a little more tolerant of non-hole foods than I am. Right, right. But, yeah.

Wow. So your wife Lisa, is she also, does she do intermittent? Does she also do keto? She does. Now my wife is a whole host of problems with her microbiome. Some self-inflicted and then some because she just had four years chronic chest infections. So she was taking antibiotics three and four times a year for years. And like she used to get sick so much that when we first met, I actually before I proposed to her, I had to ask myself, am I really prepared to deal with somebody who's sick this often. She was sick a lot. So that decimated her microbiome. So now she eats not just for physique and longevity. She eats for like, I have to re-regulate my microbiome.

If I eat, she has massive debilitating pain. So that's been an incredible journey. And anybody listening, if you're struggling with that, follow her at least a bill you on Instagram. She is so raw about what she's going through and what she does to address it. And I went from the arrogant asshole who thought he knew everything about diet.

I mean, I built a billion dollar company in the food industry. I really thought I knew some shit. And this whole process has been insanely humbling. And now, man, like, you can talk to crazy shit about energy healing. And I'm like, let's try it. Like, it is, I'll try anything to help her.

Because a lot of the things that I thought I knew, I've just like gone back and said, nope, it just wasn't right. Nope, it wasn't right. It wasn't right. And so now, really being of the mindset of I have strong convictions very loosely held. And so I'm always looking for the next right answer. And somebody who knows something that will actually help her

and work, you know, and just going back to practicality, right, what works? And so that- That's trial and error too. You have to be okay with that, right? Because not everything works for the same person, right? What works for you may not work for me and vice versa. So, but then we kind of, okay, so then we know your exercise,

we know your diet. Let's go back to that thinkitation. Yeah. So then you basically meditate and then you write out everything, like tell, I mean, you know more than I do, but you then write your thoughts. Yeah, so I'm your on. Think, think, think, think, think,

and was like many things in my life born out of frustration. So I was meditating and I found, so you get into what's called an alpha wave state when you're meditating. It's the same thing you feel. I think the closest thing is when you're in a hot shower, you take a long, relaxing hot shower, that space that you get into where you just have, you feel like more creative somehow. And an alpha wave state is often referred to as calm and creative.

So you have the calmness that you have sort of as you're winding down and about to go to sleep. So people will often say, oh, it's like that moment right as you're falling asleep. But when you're doing it through meditation, you're not sleepy, you're calm, but you're not sleepy. And so I'm getting into this thing. I'm gently bringing myself back to the breath.

I'm breathing in a way that is insanely pleasurable and calming. It's just crazy. It feels so good. And I would start having these really creative ideas, business problems, story things, because I don't know how much you know about that side of my life,

but we're trying to build the next Disney. So I think about movies and storytelling all that. You know what I hear? Listen, I know I was gonna get to that. Well, we're jumping ahead. Yes. So in that. Listen, I know. I was going to get to that. Well, we're jumping ahead. Yes. So in that.

I did a research. Nice. I know you're all more research. Getting recognized. I'm absolutely. So getting into that state, I was having like all these super creative ideas. And so I started to get frustrated with that the part of meditation was I have to come back to the breath when what I wanted to do was start writing down these amazing ideas.

And so I found that if I carved out time and I said, well, after you're done meditating, you stay in that state and you can take notes. And so it was just giving myself permission to leverage that state to then take advantage of the creative ideas. So I really only meditate to get into that common creative state. So some days it may take me 45 minutes to get into that.

Some days it may take me seven. And so once I'm in that state, I'm feeling good, my background radiations at zero, I feel completely calm, I can feel my brain going into calm and creative, then I just put my computer on my lap. And if I have an idea, because I'll set an intention before I begin meditating.

So it's like, this is the problem that I wanna work on when we get to the thinkitating part. And so you just find that some part of your subconscious is mulling that over. And then once it starts kicking up ideas and I feel myself completely calm and relaxed, then I'll start taking down the ideas. And 70% of the time it's sort of nothing. And you just meditating, it was great, it was a rad meditation session. And then 30% of the time it's like, holy hell, like these ideas are amazing. I can't believe that this problem that's plagued me for so long now seems so self-evident.

So basically, how long does this whole routine take between the exercise and meditation and the thinkitation? Everything comes down to how much time I have. Okay, so if I wake up super early, so let's say that I have been sleeping well, I go to bed at nine and I wake up after six hours. Okay. That's 3 a.m.

So now I've got all the time in the world. I don't let anyone take up my time before 10 a.m. So I've now- I have emails right outside of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The email will be the downfall of Western civilization. Turn off all of your alarms and notifications. Like, you could be texting me like mad.

And I'm holding my phone and looking at it, and I'll never know. Because I don't allow badge iconsikons, alerts, nothing. It's possible. So that to me is a mental trick that would take so much discipline for someone not to do that because of, it's impossible. You hear a ding, ding, ding, we're all psycholot. We've got to go look at that.

How did you train your brain not to do that? You ready? Yes. I have the answer. Are you going to have to lean in? You're going to have to be ready for this. I'm ready. Because most people are not like they, they miss what this trick is really about. You have to want something so badly that you would burn Rome to the ground to get it. Once you're there, then all the sense like, wait, I don't

have to burn Rome to the ground. All I have to do is shut off all my notifications. That's a pretty easy ask. The problem is most people don't want anything and they think that you're born with a want or born with a desire, which you are not, you cultivate that you're into your life. So you have to decide, do I want that? Like I've become truly obsessed with building the next Disney. I think about that shit, morning, noon and night.

Now the reason that I think about it is because of the result that I'm trying to get. There's a reason this is called impact theory because this is my theory on how to impact people at scale, but I'm really obsessed with that. That's a for real thing in my life. I think about it all the time.

And that level of obsession is something that I've cultivated in my life. Like, what I'm doing right now by stating it this emphatically in a podcast publicly to the world is to reinforce to me of how meaningful it is, how obsessed I am with it, and that makes me more obsessed. And it was this self-reinforcing process that made it real in my life, right?

Absolutely. So at the beginning of impact theory, it was like, impact theory. Now it's like, impact theory, motherfucker's like, you know what I mean? But you just keep building that into your life, reinforce, reinforce, reinforce. And so because I want something so badly, I'm constantly on the hunt for what in my life

is stopping me from getting that. Well, you're very, you have a very single goal in mind and just work, you're doing everything possible to get to that goal. I think a lot of people don't have a goal. And they're like, they're, they're kind of wavering. I may be a little bit of this, maybe a little bit of that. I read, you said something. I watched one of your videos

and I was like, oh my God, I love that quote. It wasn't your quote, but you said it, which was don't compromise what you want now for what you want, for what your big dream, what you really want later on. I think I screwed it up, but you know. I mean, you've got the sentiment, don't compromise what you want most for what you want right now.

Right, and it's the truth, though, right? But I think people, A, people want short-term gratification, or they don't have a clear concise goal. So your mental trick is basically just shut off notifications and just kind of want something bad enough to be obsessed about it, to then work towards it. Yeah, and then to keep this super practical, and then your schedule needs to reflect that.

So it's like, there are just certain times, like just today I was, I pinged my, my EA because she put for me to get a haircut on I have two sacred days during the week, Wednesday and Friday, Wednesday and Friday, if there's anything on my schedule, like we have a problem. Why would you do on Wednesday and Friday?

Right. So, and I need to get into the zone and I write and I think. So all of my strategy, all that stuff, that's all going to be happening on those days. And one thing that I found that you want to talk about what works for me may not work for anybody else, I journaled to myself and I found that is insanely powerful. And so I will type exactly what I'm thinking. So if I'm thinking, well, come a man, what should we be doing today, question mark?

I will write all of those things out. And there's something about the way that that actually slows me down and bifurcates my mind. So it takes me into what I'm writing, and then I can write at one speed, but I can think at another speed. And the sort of weird friction between those two speeds allow me to sort of think something

at a almost feeling subconscious level, but then have to process it in my conscious mind and it slows me down enough that I'm, you know, the act of actually having to type it out and make word choices and spell and all of that stuff. It creates this really interesting synergy where I feel like I'm actually talking to somebody else. And so it becomes this really powerful like, well, what if we did this?

Yeah, if we did that, this would be a problem, but we'd get this. It is so weird. It's the only thing that I found for me other than actually talking to somebody else that has this effect. The problem with talking to somebody else is they keep interjecting their own agenda. And so not even necessarily intending to. And so you and the social dynamic wanna give them a win sometimes with their ideas.

And so you end up ending up somewhere that isn't where you would have ended up if you'd been just with your own thoughts. Now the problem is at least for me, I'm a very slow processor. It's ridiculous. Now when I process something, I process it fucking deeply, but it takes me a long time to get there.

And so when I'm with other people, the speed of it becomes intoxicating, but you end up somewhere that may not be as interesting or true to where you were trying to get is if you'd had your alone time. And when I heard that Warren Buffett spends 88-0% of his time thinking and reading, I thought yeah, I'm doing something wrong.

So I carved those two days out. So when I see something on my schedule that doesn't reflect what those two days are meant to be, I address it immediately. You know, I really like what I really love what you're saying. You seem to be very self-aware and know what you're like pitfalls. And what because of that, what you do is you struct, you're big on structure. You structure your week, your days. So you eliminate those pitfalls for yourself, right?

And you know, you have so many things you wanna accomplish. You know that you need to have things written down and have a structure and know that this was and only doing this. That's like, that to me is also, right? Like people have to, and me as well or anyone. Like it's good to have like be realistic and be self-aware or work on that

because it does further you in what your goals are as well. Like you, did you learn, were you always self-aware like this and always this kind of knowing yourself or did you have to work on that just with through trial and error or as you got more successful?

You kind of had to figure out ways to kind of get so much shit done basically. None of us are born blank slates. I wish that we were. That would be far more interesting to me from what my sort of life philosophy is. Okay. So we all do have predilections. Right. So things like for me, any amount of time that I spend investing in my verbal ability, I

get a let's call a 1.3 return on my investment. So, if you put me next to somebody else and they're putting the same time and energy into verbal skills, I will most likely be farther ahead of them. Now, if I don't put the energy in, then I stay flat. I stay where I'm at, and so the other person could outwork me and win. And I think we all have something that gives us that sort of 1.3x return on our time, but take being an entrepreneur, for instance, I didn't, I get maybe 0.8 return on my time. It's ridiculous. But I could still learn it. And because I kept going in day after day and I faced all of my inadequacies and inadequacies

and all that, like over time, I really did get pretty extraordinary at it. But that took me a long time. That was a lot of gut checks on that. But to give you an idea of how unself-aware I was as a kid, when I was probably 23 or 24 I went to a friend's wedding from high school and another kid came up to me from high school. I didn't like I remembered his name but like only barely and he was like man I just need to apologize to you. I was so mean to you in high school and I was like bro I almost don't remember your name.

And I had no literally no idea that you were ever mean to me once. It was serious. Literally had no idea. And I just thought, whoa, like I was really oblivious in high school. And that served me really well. Yeah.

I started to become more self-aware in my 20s because I could see that I had certain personality deficits that were causing me problems in college. And so I thought, which ones besides being not self-aware, you said, but? Well, when you're not self-aware, you can really get lost in what you think is interesting with no input from other people that they're actually finding it interesting.

Right, right now. And so that was definitely like my downfall. What other personality issues would you say you had? That was the one that I'm most aware of. Well, then I was super lazy. But in terms of what impacted other people, but you, this gets weird. So yes, I've come very far.

And people tend to look at the after picture and think that's just how you were. And my thing is you should be working so hard that people look at you and they have to believe that you're naturally talented because they're not willing to believe that you can just work that hard and become that different. Right. And so that's where I am. And people dismiss me and say, oh, well, you're naturally this other the other. And just isn't true. And so when I first started in the world of entrepreneurship, my only contributions to conference calls were to say goodbye. And I remember getting so excited, I could tell the calls wrapping up. Here we go, like I'm ready. Goodbye.

And like that was the literal sum total of my contribution to a conference call in the beginning. And I just had to learn and learn and learn. But that's where I started. And so I started there. I started with lack of self-awareness. And out of pain, basically anything is possible. And so I started there, I started with lack of self-awareness and out of pain, basically anything is possible. And if you suffer enough, you'll begin to ask yourself, like, where am I going wrong? What am I doing wrong? What are my personality deficits? But the one like key to all of this is realizing that what you build yourself a steam around matters. And so there's a great movie called Amadeus. Of course, I know Amadeus.

Soliari, as a character, really changed my life because it made me stop and think about, like, I identify with Soliari a little too much. And Soliari lamented to God, why have you made me just talented enough to recognize how much more talented Mozart is? If I could be ignorant like everybody else and just appreciate his music,

that would be phenomenal. I would be fine with that. Or make me as good as Mozart, but don't make me just good enough to want it, to want to be as good as him, and yet recognize that I never will be. That's a great, yeah. And I was haunted by that for a very long time,

because I thought I'm just smart enough to realize how not smart I am. And that really tortured me. And so one day I realized, all right, if I'm really gonna do this entrepreneurship thing, I have to, it's very real, you need to be in a room with people that are smarter than you. But if you're in a room with people

who are smarter than you and yourself, a steam is built around being smart, you're gonna self-destruct. And most people do. And they can't be around it. And they go in rooms where they're the smartest person and Ego or that it's 1,000 percent, but here's the great news about ego. It can be built on anything. I have a raging ego I'm an ego maniac. You've never met somebody more self-obsessed and would just driven by their ego than me

But here's the great news my ego is built entirely around one thing. I'm the learner. I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. And because I'm just obsessed with being a better learner than anyone else, the more I indulge in my egotistical fantasies and obsessions, I'm more open to other people's opinions. I'm more open to being wrong. I'm willing to stare nakedly at my inadequacies. I don't fight against it. When somebody says, you're really shit at this.

I go, wow, what if they're right? This could be amazing. If I can really see that they're right and then improve upon that, then I can get even better. And so you just get this obsession with self-improvement. It's true, and that's why that's one of your 25 bullet points

of how do you have how to change your impact your life or what do you have to do with it? The belief system, the 25. And that's on there. A lot of these things are, and I think that's very valuable on impact theory.com which I thought was very valuable. So then let me ask you a question. So when you when you did impact theory it was all about your brain in your mind right and quest was more about the I saw this that is all about the physical and then now impact theory was all about the mental. So I'm curious when you were growing up

or when you were even doing quest, was it just like did you ever think number one that quest would ever be what it was? Number ever. Yes, you did. For sure. Because the growth of that, I mean, if number two, an ink across every industry,

number two, number two, most fastest growing company in North America. Not just health, not just fitness, but overall. It grew like 57,000%. Like, that's crazy. It was crazy. Crazy. And fairness, I didn't expect it to grow that fast.

Okay. But I fully expected it to become one of the biggest food companies on the planet. You did? Yes. And then because of what more, the social the social impact, as you are, I thought more you're saying about initially it was about like you making a profit in your life and then you switched and you pivoted into now making a social making impact and like helping people.

And you said that when correct me, and this is just a very bad, you know, mits quote, but I saw that when you change your priority, that's when things really shifted. Is that correct? 100%. So I chased money for almost a decade, just literally, I'm here today to get rich. And that sucked. And that was not a fun way to live my life. And there are five things that motivate people. Money is one of them. But I'll say for most people, while it's in the top five, it's usually the last of the I'll say for most people, while it's in the top five,

it's usually the last of the five. And for most people, it's about purpose, it's about meaning. And though I was driven by that, I was also driven massively by gaining mastery. And in chasing money and putting that as sort of a false number one, it just eroded my sense of self.

It eroded my enjoyment. I just couldn't show up every day and love what I was doing. I wasn't passionate about it and care. It was just what I thought was the opportunity that would most rapidly take me to wealth. And so it was just a bundle of misery. And so there I was, living the cliche of Money Camp by Happiness.

I thought this is stupid. It like, how many people have to tell you the Money Camp by Happiness? Before you go, PS, it actually can't buy happiness before you go PS? It actually can't buy happiness, do something else, figure out a way to be happy in the moment. It doesn't mean that you can't pursue something that can generate wealth, but when wealth generation is your like just, you're all in focus, you will make dumb decisions in terms of actually enjoying your life.

So I went in and I quit. This was back at awareness technologies. The same guys, by the way, the three of us that ended up founding Quest. But I just was so miserable. I was like, I have to go do something that makes me feel alive. So I went in.

This was like, in the retelling of my story, it ends up being cool. But at the time, it was shameful. And I was deeply ashamed of going in and quitting. And so I went in and told my partners, like, I can't do this anymore, I'm so unhappy. I'm gonna go do something that makes me feel alive. I've been lying to myself, I've been lying to you

about money being my highest priority. I realize it just isn't. And so the thing that I value far more than money is camaraderie, connection, community, like being passionate, all that stuff. And so very long story short, they said they felt the same. And so we decided to build a new company that was going to be predicated entirely on adding value to the consumer.

And so we're not dumb. Like we understand that profits are the only way to create a self-sustaining business. So you're going to have to be profitable, but it doesn't have to be your number one priority. So we started talking about building community, adding value, like what could we do that we'd be passionate about every day. And so even if we are losing by the way. So for three very different reasons, we decided to start quest. And for me, it was growing up in a morbidly obese family. I wanted to help my mom and my sister. And so I could think about them every day. And when it got hard, I could think about them and how it would help them. And my sister ended up losing 125 pounds. And she was just crazy amazing. And so that became my obsession

with those other intangibles. So what was that tipping point in Quet With Quest that went from just going along doing well to then just becoming so massive and so successful? Besides, of course, we said like having a purpose and social impact. Was do you remember that we said like having a purpose and social impact. Do you remember that exact name? There was never like one day. It was, when you have something growing this fast, it is both right product, right marketing at the right time. Like opportunity,

lock time. Do you think a lock had anything? If you're going to call timing lock then definitively. Yeah. And since we didn't do anything to make the timing happen short. Right. Right. So the best example or best explanation I've ever heard of luck is luck is like a bus. There's always another one coming along. The question is do you have the fare to get on the bus? Absolutely. And so we had the fare to get on the bus. And so we were able to capitalize on something that nobody else was at that time, which was we had broken our obsession with money. We were focused entirely on value creation. We knew that we were gonna have to steer

by metabolic realities, that that was gonna be the life and death of our company. And that just made us make different decisions in everyone else's making. And then I was obsessed with content creation, storytelling, getting away from fear-based marketing and all that and just really uplifting people using community.

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It's a great segue because I was going to say to you, were you always someone who wanted to tell stories and be, or is it an evolution of your career? Like, you know, you love storytelling and content creation. And obviously that's what you're doing now. So it's such a beautiful, big degree. With it, like I said, an evolution, like as you were kind of's what you're doing now. So it's such a beautiful big degree. With it, like I said, an evolution, like as you were kind of doing what you were doing, your priorities were shifting, your passions were kind of growing, and then, boom, you know, your quest is now, you know, one project, and now you're onto the next one. Like, is that something,

like, talk about that a little bit? Yeah, so I think the biggest misconception that people have about passion or purpose, meaning, is that it is innate within you, and it's merely a question of going back to your childhood, uncovering something, and then realizing this is what I was always meant to live for, and it just does not work like that. Nothing in the human mind does. Like, if you grow up, this is an easy way to explain it, if you grow up, and certainly back in the 80s, this would be even cleaner, if in the 80s, you grew up in England, the sport you were going to want to play is soccer. It's that simple.

And if you grew up in the 80s in America, the sport you were gonna want to play was football. And so- In Canada hockey, I have to say that. Yeah, exactly. So it's like, was that innate to those kids or was that it was born of the culture and because the culture celebrates it, then you as a member of that culture begin to celebrate that thing and you

want to do it and all that. So it was inculcated into you. It was reinforced. It became an obsession because you had the post of the person. They were on the nightly news. Your parents were talking about it. Your friends were talking about it at school. And so it's the rare person who grows up in Bristol, UK, and supports an NFL team.

Right, right, right. Doesn't, not that it never happens, but that is the outlier among outliers, because we all want to be a part of that social group. And so what you have to realize, though, is you can take control of that process. Like you can decide, as I did, marrying a Brit, that to bond with her family, I was going to connect with the soccer team that they supported. And so I started doing anything and everything I could. I asked for if somebody wanted to get me a gift, get me one of their t-shirts or take me to one of their games,

like all these things so that I can invest in that. And then I tied, it's time with my family who I want to bond with. And I'm going to going to associate knowingly associate the warmth that I have for them and the celebrating the wins with them and suffering the defeats with them with this team. And so now, almost 20 years later, you could put me in an FMRI machine, scan my brain and show me their logo versus some other soccer teams logo. And I'm going to light up on that logo because I've invested in it so much and intentionally tied it.

So now it's like, I really have an affinity for that. Now you can do the same thing. The reason the real infinity is important is you need a neurochemical reward for that thing that's your passion, that's your mission, whatever. So when I was at Quest, I fed into all day every day. I'm an end metabolic disease. That's what I was about morning and noon at night. I thought about my mom and my sister. I was just obsessed, obsessed, obsessed. And then as I realized that I was helping people with their body, but I wasn't helping them with their mind, and that really the transformation began with the mind, that I started going back to, okay, well storytelling was my first love. I cultivated that passion over a very long period of

time, invested, invested, invested in that. So I have that real neurological reward for that. And now I see that the people that I want to help, So I have that real neurological reward for that. And now I see that the people that I wanna help, that I have this deep connection with, it's my new theory of how to impact them is evolving. And it can't be just the body. And I have to also address issues of the mind. And so, I began investing in that.

And so then it became, okay, well, now my purpose is to impact people at scale, to pull them out of the matrix by giving them an empowering mindset. And I'm gonna to repeat that. I'm going to tell other people about that. I'm going to invest in it. I'm going to put all the social pressure on myself. And I'm just emotionally going to time myself my identity to that. Now, the question I actually get asked very infrequently is, but wait, how could you go from I'm going to end metabolic disease to I'm going to pull people out of the matrix by giving them an empowering mindset. And the answer is because there is no one real purpose in your life, there is simply

what are you dedicating yourself to in that moment? What are you calling your purpose? What are you going all in after? And if it's based on like a real spark of interest, then you can fan the flames of that spark into a raging inferno. And if you feed that raging inferno, it will rage forever. And it's only when you begin to, you know, have dereliction of duty, you're not feeding the fire, you're not going after it, you're not doing the psychological tricks that you

have to do to keep that burning so that you are obsessed that it begins to fade away, but it does not have to fade away. And so, but you can switch it at any time. Like tomorrow I could decide I'm going to begin building a new fire firearm. I'm going to go in a new direction. And because I understand the mechanisms of that psychologically and from a neurochemistry standpoint, it's easy for me to switch directions when I want to. But it's also easy for me to keep momentum going in the area if it's serving me. So now it's all into impact theory. And you have like different, like you have impact theory, relationship theory, women theory, we're talking like a little bit over before, but how are they all

intersected and how are you like what is your grand plan to be the next, well to be the Disney of content of impactful content. So the grand plan, I'll start with that and I think that will help make sense of the content that we're creating now. So what made Disney interesting is that actually I'll back up even farther. So I'm looking at the real problem of how do you impact people at scale? And this was something that I've had two big experiences in my life that really made me obsessed with this notion. One, I started big brothering when I was 18 for a kid named Rashan. He was eight and a half years old and He grew up in the inner cities of South Central Los Angeles so just grew up as hard as you can imagine and

Like working with him and realizing that I didn't actually know how to help him and so I showed him that somebody loved him And I'd like to believe that that had real value. And I tried to show him that there were beautiful things in the world that wasn't just the sort of cement jungle that he was used to, that there, you know, since movies cost the same no matter where you go to see them, I would take him to see movies in Beverly Hills, even though I was dirt poor at the time.

And we would go there just to see there's something beautiful. I would drive him around. In the most beat-up car you can imagine, I would drive him around the big houses in Beverly Hills and be like, hey, you could have this one day. I'm dreaming of this. This is what I'm chasing.

And I just tried to show him all that, but I end up failing and I don't end up changing his mindset. Okay, so that haunts me, right? And I worked with him for about eight and a half years. And he, very long story, but it was meant to be an eight-week program and it turned into over eight years because I made him a promise that if he would just do his homework that as long as I lived in Los Angeles I would help him. And so I

stayed true to that and it became just an incredibly beautiful and transformative thing certainly for me. And where is he now? So I lost contact with him. So he was being abused by his adoptive mother, which unfortunately I was too stupid to realize. And so when he got taken away by the courts, I became his guardian to help him into the court system. And I helped him into foster care. And I was just too young and dumb to be useful to him.

But I helped him into that. They kept moving him farther and farther away. And so ultimately he was living like two hours away from me. And I couldn't afford to drive that far and we just lost contact. This is all before the before social media and that so it was like it just wasn't as easy and so and I've tried to get back in contact with him but have been unable to. So now Flash Forward 15 years and I have roughly 3,000 full-time, part-time employees and about 1,000 of those

employees grew up hard, hard, hard, hard. Like my sister was shot to death in the heart with an AK-47 when I was 12 years old. I held my stepfather while he bled to death from a gunshot wound to the head. My hit under a car while my friend was about eight inches from my face was bleeding to death from a point blank, shotgun blast to the stomach.

I mean, just like, talking to people who've watched their friends hold their intestines in while they're dying, like, that's on a whole nother level. And this is right here in Los Angeles. Like literally, you drive seven miles in that direction and it sounds like people are describing Afghanistan or Iraq. It's in Sanity. And so I was like, okay, wait a second. Absolutely, it's terrible. And sanity.

Crazy. And so I was like, okay, wait a second. I'm getting wealthy building this company. These guys are getting a good paycheck, but I feel like I owe them to teach them how I went from being an employee to owning my own business and to create what we called Quest University. To teach them, the minds and stuff, this is where the 25 point belief system came from. It was like, here are the 25 things I had to do to my mind to go from being a good employee, meaning I kept my

head down. I did this little work as possible and I avoided punishment at all costs. That's where I started. So I want to help you out of that so that you can think like an entrepreneur. You don't have to want to start your own company, but to think like an entrepreneur, to solve problems, to own your own life. And in trying to do all of that, I realized, this is really interesting. This works for about two to five percent of the people, two to five percent of the people you can give them this podcast and it will change their life. But 95 to 98 percent of the people, one, they're not listening to this because they just don't think like that. And their frame of reference is so

skewed that the world is working against them that they're never going to be able to achieve anything that I thought, okay, no bullshit. What would it take to give them an empowering mindset, to pull them out of the matrix, even though they don't realize they're in the matrix, they don't want out. They're actively antagonistic to change. How would I actually do that? And talking to researchers and neuroscientists, you'll hear one consistent message over and over and over. The only way that human beings assimilate truly disruptive information is your narrative. So you hear a story, whether it's about yourself, whether it's about your dad or someone that you sports hero or someone in a fictional story. You hear a narrative of how they changed and became who they are that makes you think you can do the same thing. And that, over and over and over, throughout history for all millennia, has been how humans have said,

okay, I'm now gonna go do it, and I'm gonna put myself on a track. I can change my real superpower's ability to adapt, which is given to all humans at birth. So, cool, you can change in any direction you want. And so I thought, all right, no bullshit. If I'm gonna do this, that's actually what I would have to do. Now, are there any examples of people swaying culture? Because what I realized was there's only three ways to impact somebody's mindset.

You can change who their parents are. You can change where they grow up. You can change who their friends are. Those are the three things and where they grow up, I'll lump in with culture. So I can't change who their parents are. I can't change where they grow up, but I can influence culture. So I began to think, their parents are, I can't change where they grow up, but I can influence culture. So I began to think, okay, who's influenced culture? Like really single-mindedly had a massive influence on culture. So Disney. Did he thought this way? Yeah. That's amazing. So it's a game that I play called no bullshit what would it take? So whatever you want to do in

your life, ask yourself, no bullshit what would it take? So don't fool yourself, don't stop it, what seems like, oh yeah, that would work, no bullshit. Like really go into it. What do you want to do in your life? Ask yourself, no bullshit what would it take? So don't fool yourself, don't stop it. What seems like, oh yeah, that would work. No bullshit. Like really go into it. What would you have to do? You may not like the answer. You may not be willing to do the answer. But if you're starting from a place of it would work, then you can work your way backwards

to where am I now? What's the chasm of skill set that I would have to cross to get there? And my favorite example is Elon Musk. That motherfucker said, I want to colonize Mars. So when I think about, all right, you got one dude is trying to colonize Mars. All I'm trying to do is build the next great film studio. Yeah.

Compared to terraforming a planet. It's all relative. That sounds pretty easy. So he realized, okay, no bullshit, I'm gonna have to build the rocket ships because they're too expensive right now. So it is at our current rate of progress, essentially, is never going to happen. So I have to start there.

Okay, so he starts there. And they're planning on, like, how do we deal with, like, you're probably gonna have to detonate nuclear weapons at the polar ice caps so that they release enough CO2 gas, like, and he's singing through, so no bullshit. Maybe people won't be willing to do it, but it would actually work. And so I was like, okay, who's done this before? And the answer was Disney.

Disney's the only film studio that's had the discipline to only tell one kind of story. They tell from a thousand different angles, but because of that, the brand means something. So if I say I'm gonna go see a Paramount movie, a Sony movie, Warner Bros. movie. You have no idea what that can mean. No idea.

But if I say I'm gonna go see a Disney movie, you Sony movie, Warner Bros. movie. You have no idea what that can mean. No idea. But if I say I'm going to go see a Disney movie, you already know something about it. Their brand identity is so unpointed and perfect, exactly true. And no one else does that. No other studio has ever done that. Correct. So then that's why you think impact theory. You want to do, you basically want to emulate that kind of...

The consistency. So they picked an angle that isn't our angle. So their angle is all about what created Americana that there's a simpler time that right always wins. It was clearly especially in the beginning aimed exclusively at children. So they're their their their actual approach is not our approach. I'm not interested in creating the next Americana or anything like that. But very credible historians credit Disney

with helping America get out of the Great Depression by creating the song, Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? And this is the power of repetition and the power of narrative. So in the story, obviously, somebody overcomes tremendous odds to beat these wolves. And the song who's afraid of the big bad wolf became synonymous with the big bad wolf was the great depression. And the more people saying that, the more that that was their response, the more reinforced in the culture that yeah, we don't need to be afraid of this thing. We can

actually rise up. And of course, depression is our largely about people's mindset, about money and the scarcity. And once people stop being afraid of that, then the economic system starts to thaw and look, I am not an economist, and so you can completely disregard my emotions on that. But just know that very credible historians credit that song, like believe it or not, from a Disney cartoon with helping America get out of the Great Depression.

So I thought, cool, I have my blueprint. So now that I have my blueprint, how do we do this when our end goal is to pull people out of the matrix by giving them an empowering mindset. So to make them believe that they can do more than they previously thought they could do. So every film show anything that we put out. It's empowerment. It's empowerment. It's one goal that at the end of whether you're watching this podcast, whether you're watching one of the videos that we put out, that at the end of that, you believe you're capable of more than you did when you press play.

And so that's our goal. So films that we wish we had made, the Matrix would be the most perfect example, Star Wars, Shawshank Redemption, Rocky, Karate Kid, like all things where it's like, at the end, you feel like, holy shit, maybe I really can't do it. So are you acquiring scripts right now? Are you right? You said you're writing a lot of stuff. I know you're doing a comic book

or you did a comic book. What is the comic about? Who is the kuzik? It's not an archie or maybe. No, no, it's, so that one is, we did in conjunction with Steve Aoki, but I know Steve, yep. So I try to use celebrities wherever I can

because the PR that they open for you is insane. And so. But why him? Well, we actually had a real friendship. wherever I can because the PR that they open for you is insane. But why him? I kind of that. Well, we actually had a real friendship. So he was a guest on the show in Pack Theory. We really hit it off when I was researching and I realized that he actually plans to have himself cryogenically frozen when he dies

in the hopes that they can solve whatever problem and bring him back and reanimate him. And I thought, that's my kind of guy. Did it be the longevity piece of it? I thought you should be that. Exactly. Yeah, I probably should. I don't know that I have enough faith in cryo yet,

but I definitely like the sentiment. So we hit it off over that, and I wanted to create a world in which reality is manipulatable. And so the story takes place both in the real world and in a digital world. And so the story is set 30 years in the future in a world where advanced technology has been outlawed,

which I think is really going to happen, by the way. And I think that's about the right timeline. And there's going to be mass joblessness and what we wanted to do is show people that there's a hopeful path out of that. And instead of being technophobic, like there's a way, and it's in many, many ways, it's our riff on Nelson Mandela's third way. So whenever you're being oppressed, there's three ways to handle it.

One, you can continue to be oppressed. Two, you can become the oppressor through force. Or three, you can find a way to create union and unity between the two groups. And so there was a massive constituency that won in Nelson Mandela to authorize violence, to be violent, and he said that's not the way. And to come out and simply oppress the people who oppress us would be to lose our humanity.

And I just always thought that was so beautiful that if you haven't read the long walk to freedom, by the way, read that book. Before mindset. No, nothing should be read before mindset. Don't you identify research? Yes, very, very useful information there. So, extraordinary. And so we want to do explore those same themes. So we have our story takes place. It opens on the most famous anti-tech crusader dies and is resurrected using the illegal technology that he tried to get rid of. And so now he has to, and his death, or his resurrection really, sparks a civil war between the people who've embedded technology in their bodies and the people who have not. And so he has to decide what side of this war do I fight on and how do I fight? Is it am I going to, you know, use violence

to oppress or am I going to find this third way? And so that the whole story is about that conflict. And where is this going to, where will this be distributed? Is it, like what's your plan? So you can buy it right now online at impact3.com or you can go to comic shops starting March 27th. Very excited. It's a long time coming. March 27th, it's a weekly, sorry, it's a monthly book that will come out for at least the next six months. And then we may be wrapping the series at the end of the six. Is your idea also to create the content

and then let's say a Netflix or an Amazon to obviously be the distributor or. 100%. That's the plan, right? So it's not just always gonna, it's not gonna only live on impact theory. Your idea is legit to be like the next Disney where you're gonna be able to find this

and mass, mass, mass, I don't know, mainstream places, right? Like all over in theaters or wherever else. Yep. Wow. And so are you gonna be, are you gonna start acquiring scripts and doing all that other stuff?

We would. It would just have to be so on point right now. Right. Yes, if somebody had a script that was impact worthy from start to finish in terms of the ethos and what we're trying to put into the world. And I believe that if people oftentimes in these kinds of stories, there's a Yoda character or a Morpheus

character. And it has to be true that if you took their advice in real life that your life would be better And that's true of Yoda that's true of Morpheus I'm just true of a lot of these great characters So if somebody can write that then sure we would buy it But so far I haven't seen anything that that hits the exact note that we want to do so we've been creating it in house So let's just touch on that you said Morpheus said matrix, like what is your fascination with the matrix? Is it canneryves?

Is it just morphine? Is it the matrix? Like, is it just because like the amadeus reference, it just kind of symbolizes a bigger message for you? Yeah, it is the perfect metaphor for the human condition. So, Neo isn't actually the one until he believes he's the one. And then once he believes he's the one, it doesn't matter if he was the one before or not, it just once he believes it, then he can execute against it.

And that is so true of humans. So true. I love that. Okay, go on. I love the fact that you like, but you actually like that to me, I, I, I, first of all, so many things that you say, even in this conversation, when I was reading about everything and just knowing about you for a, for a while, it's just like, it hits home and resonates so deeply. And I feel like a lot, I think that you did it with a lot of people because there really is no bullshit. Like this really is what it is, right?

But with that being said, like, red pill, blue pill, like all that stuff, like, what is it because, like, again, do you feel most people want the blue pill? Like I was telling you, my friend and I have this joke, like he always wants the blue pill and I always want the red pill, right? And I find that like, it's a great analogy. I just love it. Yeah, you and me both. So I have desperately tried to get in contact

with the Wachowskis if for no other reason than to thank them. But my initial move as impact theory was to get the rights to the matrix It's gonna say so that would have been amazing. It probably would have been a brand to misstep Just because it's not something that we created or would own But man, I really wanted to revitalize that franchise. I think that it is it should be the most important film franchise in history because of the message the message. The message, I agree. But sadly, that I was unable to convince people to give me the rights.

Really? Yeah. So, but. But you can also make a, I mean, not to rip off the movie, but I mean, you could, I mean, you could, I mean, you could, you could technically, like, you know, Patents or whatever, or Licenses or whatever, you just tweak it it a little bit.

And it's a whole new thing. And I trust me, I think about this a lot. So George Lucas tried to get the rights to Flash Gordon. When I wouldn't give him that, he created Star Wars. So it's like, that could have been Flash Gordon. So yeah, it's, they wouldn't give me the matrix, so I'm gonna have to make my own. Oh my gosh, well, I love that reference for obvious reasons.

So, I'm not obvious, but I was telling Tom earlier that this podcast would have been called the Keanu moment for the breakthrough moment because how impactful he was in my life. So when I saw that, I was like, oh my God, I love him too, you know, you, I think we're kind of out of time. I know you have like a heart out because you have another meeting or somewhere to go.

So I don't want to keep you for the rest for much longer, but I wanna say thank you so much for coming on. It really was a pleasure. I learned a lot. I hope people also took some of this very good information, practical tactile information and for them to apply to their own life. And where could people find, I mean, tell everyone

where to find you and your comic and everything else about you. At Tom Billu is definitely the place to start. So I'm super active socially on Instagram, especially, and YouTube. And then Impact Theory is the website. You can find everything from our content to the comics to everything that we do. And if there are any comic fans out there,

you can also follow us at at IT Comics. And don't forget March 27th. That's right. It becomes available. There it is. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. This is wonderful.

Next time we can, again, we're talking about women's theory and all the other ones. Yeah. So women of impact, which is done by my wife, Lisa, is extraordinary. So that is definitely worth checking out. Women of impact and the other one's relationship. Relationship theory. Right. And have also health. Yeah, health area all can be found at YouTube.com forward slash Tom will you except for women of impact that's a women of impact Thank you. Bye

As it thank you Hope you enjoyed this episode I'm Heather monahan host host of Creating Confidence, a part of the YAP Media Network, the number one business and self-improvement podcast network. Okay, so I want to tell you a little bit about my show. We are all about elevating your confidence to its highest level ever and taking your business right there with you.

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