Kyle Kingsbury Podcast - #268 Ryland Engelhart

Episode Date: September 9, 2022

Ryland Engelhart is the mastermind behind the film "Kiss The Ground". He is also heavily involved in a couple nonprofits furthering the success of regenerative agriculture in America. Jump on board and get your hands dirty in this world with us through his phenomenal organization.   PS Please please go leave us a 5-star review with a blurb about how the show has helped you. In doing this you are automatically entered into a giveaway with Organifi. At the end of each month Organifi and myself will pick a “random” dope review to ship out my favorite product of theirs to you for FREE! Love y’all and cannot wait to dig into these reviews. Connect with Ryland:   Website: kisstheground.com - regenerateamerica.com  Instagram: @kisstheground - @lovebeingryland   Facebook: Kiss The Ground  Twitter: @kissthegroundCA  YouTube: Kiss The Ground  Show Notes:   Help get regenerative legislation happen in USA @ regenerateamerica.com  Sponsors:   Organifi Go to organifi.com/kkp to get my favorite way to easily get the most potent blend of high vibration fruits, veggies and other goodies into your diet! Click that link and use code “KKP” at checkout for 20% off your order! HVMN - Ketone IQ This is legit jetfuel for your brain. Whether you’re fat adapted or not, this will work. Get 10% off by heading to https://hvmn.com and use code “KKP” at checkout.  Desnuda Organic Tequila Sometimes being fully optimized entails cutting loose with some close homies. We have just the sponsor for that occasion. Head over to www.desnudatequila.com for the tippy toppest shelf tequila in the game. Use Code “KKP” for 15% off your first order!!  Our Sponsor - Aura offers all-in-one digital safety for your entire household. Identity theft, fraud, and malware are just some of their offerings. Go to https://aura.com/kyle for 14 days free and 40% off your plan.    To Work With Kyle Kingsbury Podcast   Connect with Kyle:   Fit For Service Academy App: Fit For Service Academy  Instagram: @livingwiththekingsburys   Odysee: odysee.com/@KyleKingsburypod  Youtube: Kyle Kingbury Podcast  Kyles website: www.kingsbu.com  Zion Node: https://getzion.com/ > Enter PubKey  >PubKey: YXykqSCaSTZNMy2pZI2o6RNIN0YDtHgvarhy18dFOU25_asVcBSiu691v4zM6bkLDHtzQB2PJC4AJA7BF19HVWUi7fmQ   Like and subscribe to the podcast anywhere you can find podcasts. Leave a 5-star review and let me know what resonates or doesn’t.

All right, everybody. Sorry if that was too loud in your ears. I realized sometimes I like to stretch. Actually, every single time when I start to do intros, I stretch. And if I exhale or that's the opening statement that I make, that it might be a little bit loud in your ear holes, depending on how you're listening. My apologies. I promise a much subtler and smoother experience in your listening experience today.

We've got Ryland Englehart on the podcast, who's somebody I've wanted to have on since I saw his documentary, Kiss the Ground, on Netflix. It is an incredible, incredible documentary on regenerative agriculture. And it's my favorite movie since The Biggest Little Farm. Also an amazing, amazing film that was, I think, only available on Amazon Prime. Definitely worth watching. Was a huge, both huge inspirations in us starting our farm. Kiss the Ground was great. We got, they got, we got, they got, I think Woody Harrelson to narrate it, which, you know, I'm a huge Woody Harrelson fan.

They'd be like, hey, we got Bill Murray to do this. Like, oh shit. All right, cool. Super cool with Woody's overlay. You know, it's a great, it's just really well done. Let me put it that way. I'm rambling about this. It's very well done. It's easy to access and it paints a very important

story of how we heal the earth. They brought in many experts, people that I've been following for a very long time. I think I even mentioned it to Ryland. Kristen something. I don't know. I'll fucking get that wrong. I want to say Kristen Stewart, not the actress. Kristen something, I don't know, fucking get that wrong. I want to say Kristen Stewart, not the actress, uh, Kristen something who wrote the soil will save us, uh, is, is one of the

featured experts in the film. And she's somebody I first heard back on the Ben Greenfield podcast, I think all the way back in 2017, I want to say, uh, as her book was launching and read that book immediately was blown away and just loved the content and love the fact that she's one of the people they reached out to, to be in the film. And she does an excellent job of explaining carbon sequestration and what happens in the soil cycles and doing it in a way that's not boring, but in a way that could grab people. And part of the reason this grabs people and part of the reason this grabs me is because it shows us that when we live in right relation with the land,

that it doesn't just solve one thing. It solves many things. If it's good for the soil, it's good for the grass. If it's good for the grass, it's good for the animals. If it's good for the animals, it's good for humans. And it's good for the totality of the environment. Meaning as we heal the soil, the ability to sequester carbon increases exponentially. And in that, we can reverse a lot of the issues that we see today. Now, it doesn't matter if you stand on the side of the fence of Apocalypse Never by Michael Schallenberger, in which all the tales of the left wing around climate change is complete nonsense. Of course, this is a terrible paraphrasing and that there is no real energy crisis because nuclear works and it is quite safe. And X, Y,

and Z that goes for that book, that's a phenomenal book if you want to listen to one side of the story or the other side of the story where you're like, ah, we're going to burn alive. It's going to be like living in a sauna here in 20 years. The other book that is the flip side of that, I think, is a fictional novel, The Ministry of the Future. And that author actually has written a number of books that start with the template of we're going to be living in 100 degree, 80 degree heat waves, which I don't believe. I really don't. Is climate change happening? Absolutely. Is it solely caused by us?

I don't think so. I think the sun has a much, much bigger role to play in that. And that's not letting humans off the hot seat by any means. Can we do a better job with the things that we drive? Sure. Are we ready for that yet? I don't know. I got buddies that own Teslas that they say they break down. They're always in the shop. Buddy that works for Tesla and his car is always in the shop. Can that technology get to a certain point if we keep feeding it and participating in it? Sure. No question.

I've got solar panels on my house. I'm getting some Tesla walls put in in the next few months with the upcoming grid issues that everyone's foreshadowing from the government. I think that's a smart move, having kids and living in a place that freezes in the winter and boils in the summer. So that's, you know, I do try to put, and that was the other thing that I had an issue with Schallenberger on in Apocalypse Never is, it's a good technology right now. If that saves on my energy bill and it does so in a green way, sure. Where is lithium mined? Is that in a green way, sure. Where is lithium mined? Is that in a green way? Maybe not.

Maybe we're still practicing or using the same thinking that got us into this position in the first place to solve the issue. So maybe that's not the overall move in the future, but I love my solar panels. I love having under $100 a month electricity bill. I think that's cool. Especially coming from California, where it was God knows how much with PG&E.

All right, I've digressed enough on that. Ryland's awesome. The documentary is awesome. Kiss the ground. Make sure you watch it. Also watch The Biggest Little Farm on Prime. What else? I think y'all have already seen Food Inc. by now.

I've been talking about it for years. If you haven't, that's a good one to watch as well. But all these things layer into a particular story and a particular way in which we grow our own food that is in right relation. What does that mean? It means that it is a benefit to all. It is a benefit not just to all of humanity,

but it is a benefit to all of the microorganisms, all of the plants, all of the things that live in a functioning ecosystem. And I spent a lot of time in conversation with Daniel Firth Griffith on this exact topic out at Tim Scholl Farms. He was recently on the podcast. He wrote Wild Like Flowers. And he's brilliant. He's a mentor. He's somebody that I'm going to study with on an annual basis at minimum. We're going to go out at least once a year to spend a week with him in Virginia. And so these are all important pieces of conversation for us. And I think that this documentary does such a good job of capturing the importance of what we're doing. And really, from Daniel's perspective, continue to give him a shout out, how do we do this sustainably? Because I can regenerate my land, but if I'm doing it at the cost of someone else's land, is that truly regenerative? Is this sustainable? How many inputs do I have in my land, all these things. And not all of that's covered in the film. The film does a great job of giving people your entry point. And Ryland and I talk quite a bit about his background, which is phenomenal. I knew that they had opened up a bunch of vegan stores that did quite well.

To get to hear where he stands with that now, having participated in regenerative agriculture is amazing. And I'm happy he has the balls to talk about his experience with food and how it's come full circle. So, all right, that's enough on the topic of regenerative agriculture from my standpoint before this episode. There are a number of ways you guys can support this podcast. First and foremost, leave us a five-star rating.

I'm actually going to give you a gift for that. Organifi wants to give you a gift for that. It does matter. It helps people get eyes and ears on the show. So what's going to happen now is Organifi wants the audience to help the podcast by leaving a five-star review with one or two ways the show has helped you out in life. That's what I've been asking for at the beginning of every podcast for the last couple of years. If you do that, we will select a winner at the end of each month, randomly select a winning listener. And I say random, but if it's a fucking dope review,

like, hey, randomly you've won. Yeah, it's random like that. Sorry. So leave a good review. And I'm going to send you my favorite Organifi product. End of each month, all the way through the end of the year. So that makes a short September, October, November, December. We've got a minimum of four winners. And if this keeps going well, we're going to just keep the ball rolling. And so I really appreciate this from Organifi.

Love you, Drew. We've got one of their higher ups. I forget her name. I'm sorry, but she's coming on the podcast soon. So we'll dive right into more good stuff around Organifi. Love you, Drew. We've got one of their higher-ups. I forget her name. I'm sorry, but she's coming on the podcast soon. So we'll dive right into more good stuff around Organifi. But I love their company. They have made eating healthy very convenient. And convenience isn't always a bad thing. Convenience actually can lead to consistency. And consistency is absolutely essential if you want to build momentum. So whether that's through Dr. Diet, continually putting good things in your body until you start to feel different and actually get that and grab it and go, holy shit, that made a big difference. I'm going to stick to this thing as opposed to crash course dieting, cutting calories,

and all of a sudden you're starving and you're like, oh man, this bagel looks too good. I can't help myself. Or the cinnamon roll looks too good. I can't help myself. Or the cinnamon roll looks too good. I can't help myself. And then you go off the wagon for three days and you're constantly on this roller coaster. No, consistency is king. That builds momentum.

And it's that habit change that's actually going to change your life. So these guys have done that through food. They've made it convenient to access really healthy superfoods that are low carbohydrate, that taste phenomenal. My kids absolutely love their stuff. The red, the green, low carbohydrate, that taste phenomenal. My kids absolutely love their stuff, the red, the green, the gold, you name it, and many other amazing products that

they continue to make. Check it all out at Organifi.com slash KKP and use code KKP at checkout for 20% off. Once again, www.organiifi.com slash KKP. And do not forget KKP at checkout for 20% off everything in the store. These guys are one of the fattest deals in the industry. They're one of my longest sponsors and I absolutely love them. And don't forget, if you leave us a five-star review on iTunes or Spotify or Google, wherever you can, that will enter you in to a contest, likely not against a ton of people. I'm going to be honest. I mean, we have a good amount of listeners.

We've been in the top 10 in health and fitness two of the last five years and still do very well, even with the data crunch, wherever they decided to, when Apple decided to start changing the algorithm on how they view your downloads. Still, we have a lot of listeners

and I still doubt you're going to be up against a lot of people leaving reviews. So you have a very high likelihood of winning this if you leave us a review and that really does help the show. So thank you Organifi for doing this. And I look forward to the upcoming podcast we have again with somebody from Organifi. I'm terribly sorry that I keep forgetting your name right now. We're also brought to you today by Ketone IQ. Ketone IQ is a phenomenal product that really has changed the game of the ketone industry. I mentioned this on a podcast with one of their founders that I created ketones that on it. It was one of the first things I said we needed to do to Aubrey. I was like, we have to have our own ketone product. We created a beta

hydroxybutyrate powder that was really good. It was not a ketone ester. It worked. It raised blood ketone levels. It felt great. And it wasn't this. Ketone esters are its own thing, and Ketone IQ has mastered this. These used to be $30 a shot, and I would take it only on race day or only when I was going to have a double day doing MMA. And a lot of people say, oh, ketones aren't going to help with explosive and glycolytic bullshit. They help you recover and they help your brain. So anything that gives your brain, the central governor of your body, more energy and endurance is going to allow your muscles to work harder, point blank. So is it going to help me lift higher in the one to three rep range? No. Will it help me recover faster? You betcha. Will it give me mental clarity on my third and

final working set? Absolutely. And perhaps more important for most listeners is this can help you go at a caloric deficit. So if you're trying to intermittent fast and you're like, fuck, I'm flatlining when I skip breakfast or I'm flatlining if I just wait till dinner and do the warrior diet. This can give you a spark that helps you get through the day. It helps you show up to your workouts. It helps you become consistent in the fasting or in the thing that you're doing to shape shift. There we go.

Shape shift your body and get it to the point where you're going to be optimized. I use this stuff for just about everything. I'm on it right now, pre-podcast. I am on it when I jump into the gym. I take it before boxing. Again, that's a glycolytic workout. But if my brain power improves, I'm going to have more to do with the glycolytic. And it just works that way. It's kind of a weird thing. And of course, for endurance training, this stuff is phenomenal. Anytime you go for a run, whether that's one mile or a marathon, you will be surprised how much this helps you, giving you energy and allowing your body to burn a clean fuel that is less oxidative than

carbohydrates. Point blank, this stuff works. It is the best and they've improved the flavor. They've improved the cost. It is not $30 a shot. Thank God anymore. You can get a one month supply for a very good price. And they just recently came out with RTDs. There's these little two ounce shots. So on the go, these things are phenomenal. You crack it, you give it a little shake, crack it open and pound it. They've improved the flavor and the taste. It does no longer taste like jet fuel, like Peter Tia once mentioned. It just tastes good. I mean, it goes down smooth. It's not good. I mean, it goes down smooth. It's not the best tasting, but it goes down smooth. And what you get from that is far, far, far better than any other ketone product out there. Visit ketone-iq.com and use promo code

KKP at checkout to save 10%. Again, that's K-E-T-O-N-E-I-Q.com and use promo code KKP and you're going to get 10% off everything in the store. It's no wonder these guys, HVMN has an active $6 million contract with the US Special Operations Command. These guys are doing great things in the world. I absolutely love them. Both are co-founders I've become friends with and I really want to hang and have them on the podcast more, but they have become a mainstay in my supplement routine and they should for you guys as well. So check it out, ketone-iq.com,

promo code KQP at checkout, 10% off everything in the store. We are also brought to you today by Desnuda Organic Tequila. Tequila, you're like, what the fuck, dude? This is a health show for the most part. We do get into the weeds on what health is, and we go counterculture and counter-narrative quite a bit. Why talk about alcohol? Well, alcohol is, truthfully, it's the world's drug of choice outside of coffee. Alcohol is the world's drug of choice. It is the thing that happens socially. Nobody's serving LSD at weddings. People serve alcohol at weddings. And there are choices you can make when it comes to alcohol that actually do make one

hell of a difference. How do I feel the next day? Am I paying for my experience on credit? That's something that I've really thought about. Burning Man just ended. And I thought about my last burn with my wife. We went hard for five days straight. And we didn't have any expenses while we were there, thankfully. But we went hard for five days straight. And we didn't have any

expenses while we were there, thankfully, but we did pay for everything on credit. We paid for our experience on credit because for the next three weeks, we had to pay that back. Our neurochemistry was flatlining. It was not great on the back end of that experience. And seeing a lot of my friends trickle back into town from the burn, I'm sure they had an amazing experience. But I was deadlifted in 365 for sets of 10 yesterday. I feel amazing. I've been going to boxing class. I've been going to jujitsu. I hit sheepdog level two.

This is the stuff that I want to focus on right now and feel good about it. And when I want to celebrate, when there is something to celebrate about, when there is a way to connect to friends, Desnuda is easily the best organic tequila I've ever had. It's clean, it's phenomenally tasting, and it's a premium tequila that is the best on the market. They launched in January of 2022 and Indianapolis-based co-founders Nick Bloom and Brian Eddings selfishly wanted a tequila that didn't have them feeling terrible

after a night of drinking and a spirit that fit into their health and wellness lifestyle. Out of necessity, they created Desnuda, which means naked. Their blue Weber agave plants have been organically grown in Jalisco's Amatian region for seven years. Desnuda is certified USDA organic and GMO and additive-free, meaning zero pesticides or herbicides, for seven long years. Their domestic competitors grow for only three to four years, all the while zero pesticides or herbicides for seven long years. Their domestic competitors grow for only three to four years, all the while using pesticides and herbicides. It's got zero sugar. Zero sugar is added to the Snoda, giving their tequila a low,

nearly non-existent glycemic index. Other tequilas on the market that do add sugar tend to yield larger profits at the expense of your nasty hangovers the next day. This is an important piece. I've been saying this about dry farm wines. The sugar added to wine along with sulfides, dyes and all the other shit, pesticides, herbicides, that's what's fucking you up the next day. If you remove that stuff, you can have a good buzz within reason.

You can't, obviously you drink a bottle of stuff, you're not going to feel good the next day. You're not even going to feel good that night. But when you drink within reason with a clean organic product, you're going to wake up the next day. You're not even going to feel the good that night. But when you drink within reason with a clean organic product, you're going to wake up the next day and feel fine. That's just how it goes. And obviously that takes responsibility. And they always say, drink responsible, blah, blah, blah, with some shit alcohol on TV. This is not that shit alcohol. This is the creme de la creme that has been hand-selected from people that actually understand

health and wellness. They're like you and me. They go to the gym three, four, five days a week, and they have jobs, and they have families, and they still want to participate in the world's drug, but they want to do it in a way that is going to leave them more whole than when they started. De Snuda Organic Tequila is the very finest in alcohol. It's got all of the good stuff with none of the bad stuff, and when you drink within reason, you're going to have a great time, and you're not going to hurt the next day for it. Check it out. Order Desnuda at www.desnuda.com and use the code KKP for a 15% discount on your first purchase.

That's the first purchase. That's not a wrong thing. That's how they're doing it. Your first purchase, get 15% off at daysnooter.com using code KKP. Last but not least, we are brought to you by Aura. Thank you, Aura, for sponsoring this podcast. Do you know what the fastest growing crime in America is? For years, this crime rate's been surging and affecting millions of Americans.

I'm talking about identity theft, and it happens to 1 in 20 Americans. Yet despite this, those who have had their identity stolen are often shocked when it happens. Imagine trying to log into your email account one day only to see the passwords had changed hours ago. Then you start getting notifications or activity from your bank, credit cards, crypto accounts, or you get text messages from your friends like, hey dude, what's happening on Facebook right now? Are you in Nigeria and need five grand? That's when the feelings of panic, fear, anxiety, paranoia, disbelief, shock, anger, frustration, and guilt all set in. That's why I'm excited to partner with Aura, who is sponsoring this podcast. Aura is identity theft protection, fraud monitoring, a VPN, password management,

and antivirus software all combined into one easy-to-use app. Aura monitors the dark web for your emails, passwords, and social security numbers and sends alerts fast right to your phone and email. When it comes to fraud, every second matters. Connect your credit and bank accounts and get notified of any changes up to four times faster than Aura's competitors. Their VPN allows you to stay anonymous online while keeping your browsing history and personal information safe and encrypted. And their antivirus software will block malware

and viruses before they infect your devices. Protect you and your family from America's fastest growing crime. Try Aura free for two weeks and see if you or any of your family's personal information has been compromised. This is awesome, right? You get to try it for free.

They're going to run you through their program and they're going to see, is your shit on the dark web? Like, have you been compromised? You get that for free just from signing up with them. And you can cancel at any time within the first 14 days. But protect yourself. Check it out. This is very important.

HTTPS colon forward slash forward slash A-U-R-A dot com slash K-Y-L-E. Thank you again, Aura, for sponsoring this podcast. And you get to try it again for free. 14 days. This is awesome. Super convenient. I have it on my iPhone. And you can do a family plan as well, which will hook up a number of devices from iPads to iMacs. Or if you're not into the Apple game, I get it. They've been a little shady the last couple of years. If you're a Google guy or a PC guy or all that stuff, they've got you covered there. you can get your whole family protected for just a slight increase in the fee and it is worth every penny.

Nothing could be worse than having your stuff compromised and not being able to access it. And then spending hours on the phone with banks. Um, good luck getting your, your accounts back on Instagram, things like that. It's just very,

very hard, very challenging to do. And if you're busy like me, that's not how you want to spend your day. I want to know that I'm protected and not worry about this stuff. And that's what you get with Aura. Aura.com slash Kyle. And you'll get yourself and your family protected.

And without further ado, my brother Ryland Englehart on the podcast. Aubrey, like me, if I can brag about one thing about the two of us, is that we are connected to really awesome people. And we connect awesome people to awesome people. And that's something that connected us together. But something I'm continually blown away with is since I've known him, it's like magnified my power to do that. But I've also, you know, written in his wake

and been connected to many awesome people just through him. So it's a fantastic, uh, it's fantastic friend to have because he's the friend that plants more seeds for more friends and more awesome people to meet. And I appreciate that about Aub. Yeah, I, I, I would say that, yeah, that's definitely one of my, uh, great, great joys in life is being able to, um, people together and um yeah be be in the wake and joy of um the alchemy of human beings coming together uh such for you know that birth

create creative and beautiful things so hell yeah well you had a question and i was like man we got to get started here you asked about the farm i got going um it's actually i was in aubrey's ear for the last two years because we worked together in fit for service and when they shut things down yeah i bought in initially and then over time i was like man stuff really isn't adding up to just uh really put it in a little box and shove it aside to not spend too much time on it and i was saying you know our our events really run face to face. We need to land where we can still gather the people. You know, there's only so much you can do online. Charles Eisenstein spoke at one of our events about the power of going through, not necessarily right of passage, but your initiatory experiences

together, you know, in group. And even just the power of hugging somebody or having conversations face to face is such an important piece that you can't lose. You can't get that on Zoom or Zencaster like we're on right now. So I look forward to getting to meet with you in person. But that became such a pressing issue for me because even going to Sedona, which was pretty cool during the pandemic, they still would only allow 20 people at a time. And, you know, we've got 150 or 300 people at our events most of the time. And, um, I was really just in his year, like, Hey, we get, you have land there, let's terraform the backyard, let's get this ready. And that was his idea as well. And then I was in his year a lot about having something local here where we

could provide for ourselves, um, our own food. We could participate in regenerative and sustainable agriculture, which is something that I've been big on for a long time. And he was about it. And then we'd have land for our events as well. So multifaceted, obviously tax deductible because we're using it for business and many things, but also a place where I could steward the land and raise my kids on. And we start building our house there in October, but we've been doing a lot of work there. It's almost like a second. It's full-time at times and then part-time at others,

but it is definitely a draw. I want to be there as much as possible. I bring my family out there as much as possible, and we've done a lot. Our first phase build-out was a 400 was a 400 uh tree fruit nut tree food forest uh with chad johnson who's a sepholter understudies but on the podcast and then um we put in probably a thousand plants in the ground and in a matter of three weeks after digging out the spiral so we we had we had you know sun up to sun down pretty much all of March and some of April earlier this year. Just so I can land in the place with you because I'm feeling the disc.

This is in Arizona or this is in Texas, this property? This is in Lockhart, Texas. Yeah, sorry for not making that clear. He already had land. He's got like 40 acres in Sedona which proved to be great during the pandemic because we couldn't bring in you know we would have had to split groups like eight different groups of breathwork we would have taken three days just on breathwork and a five-day event wouldn't cut it um but seeing that pan out it was like all right cool let's let's

do this in Texas too that way we've got multiple locations and um so yeah we got 118 acres out in lockhart texas about 30 minutes south of austin so really close to the airport um definitely countryside it's its own deal it's its own soil type um still get 32 inches of rain a year which is really really nice we just had a nice pour the other day and um yeah we've been really working on that full steam since we got it late last year. And that's been one of the best things. I've done a lot of work with plant medicines, and it's really awesome to have those experiences and get illumination. But one of the best ways to ground something is to actually change 3D reality. And so like manipulating the earth and working with it in that way is is something that just is credible you know it's incredible for adults to see it but

especially for kids like when you plant something with your hands and you watch that thing grow they're like your little babies you know they're still infants but i mean i imagine coming back to that 20 years when you know they're 20 30 feet high and we've got canopies and it's a whole different microclimate that's going to be something, it's already is something really special, but it's going to continue to develop. And it's been an amazing piece to be a part of that. Wow. Wow. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm so much more, I'm so excited to have this conversation. You know, I didn't really, uh,

I wasn't present to, you know, um, yeah, what, what your personal passions and what you're, what you're up to, but that's really, really exciting, um, to hear just bits and pieces of what's being shared, uh, you know, initially. So, so you've been working with Audrey and producing events and, you know, that, that lead people through transformational experiences through breath work, uh, et cetera, et cetera. Um, and bringing people together on land. Um, and now this is a secondary location that will host events is how you're seeing it. Yeah. We've actually had a few events. I've put people through smaller groups, uh, immersives through fasting, mimicking diets for five days. Um, with Eric Godsey dropping

Jungian psychology on them and really trying to get it full circle, you know, different body stuff from while we're fasting, we're doing sauna and cold therapy. We're mobilizing the body, getting a lot of Dr. Kelly Sturetz work and just tuning the body on every level. And, you know, we have our first core event of the years every year in March. So we have that out the farm now. We're gearing up for our second annual coming up this in 2023. So really exciting. We've got great people coming out for that. That's, again, you know, on the topic of meeting great people. It's always, it's awesome that I get to work so close with

Aubrey and a couple other coaches. But the fact that we bring in such great people, we were just out in Vegas and Dr. Zach Bush was staying at the same house with us. Jamie wheel, Charles Eisenstein. It was, it was pretty fucking cool. Matias and Stefano.

I was like a little kid, you know, we're staying up till 4am working. And then I come home, I crash. And right when I wake up, I'm having coffee and just sitting next to these guys, like during conversation,

like, fuck yeah, I'm a fly on the wall for the coolest conversations on earth right now. Yeah, I love Charles Eisenstein. Yeah, a more beautiful world that our hearts know is possible is definitely a continual notion and thing that I love to be reminded of and remember. Yeah, because as easy as it is to get cynical, there is a place within our hearts that is pure and good

and holds the potential of so much beauty. And if we can continue to connect to that, we can continue to be a source of love and light in the world in the most sincere and real way. And so, yeah. Absolutely brother. Yeah. That was, that was actually the one of the driving factors to create our last event. Arcadia was that very notion, the more, the title, you know, a more beautiful world of hard snow as possible. It last event, Arcadia, was that very notion, the title, you know, a more beautiful world our hearts know is possible. It's like, let's do the damn thing.

And he crushed it speaking. It was probably my favorite time listening to him and Zach speak on stage. Same with Jamie. But let's rewind. You know, we're 10 minutes into this thing. Tell me about what was life like growing up for you? What were your passions as a child? What would you learn in school and what drove you to get into what you're into now? Yeah, thank you. Let's see. So yeah, my childhood was definitely unique, I would say, in that my father didn't go to college, was a back-to-the-lander, graduated high school and went and lived at a teepee in upstate New York near Lake Champlain for a couple of winters, cooking every meal on a campfire in a teepee. Met my mom. They got pregnant with my sister at, I think, 20 and 21. You know, I came, you know, a couple years later.

They had taken a VW van from New York out to California, to Laguna Beach, to study with a Maharishi, the TM Meditation guys, sort of under of understudy guy named Charlie Lutz. And, uh, well, well out there on that, on that trip, got pregnant with me and, um, you know, had to get serious about life and went back to, went, went back to New York and ended up purchasing with the help of their parents, a 20-acre plot of land in upstate New York outside of Ithaca. And my dad, who had married my mom, his brother married my mom's twin sister. So brothers married twin sisters, and they were all living in one house on one bank account in this sort of homestead situation, kind of a little bit of a hunyette

house on an old dairy farm where we had vegetable garden and fruit apple orchard and a pond. And yeah, definitely Waldorf school education. And yeah, a lot of, yeah, unconventional in singing songs uh believing in fairies and gnomes uh you know elementals of the the you know the living universe uh did your family sorry to jump in but did your family practice biodynamic farming since they were into Steiner's education standpoint? Early on, they were definitely aware of Steiner. And there was a little bit of knowledge. But we were mostly gardening with some apple orchards. And so there wasn't a deep, deep knowledge. My dad more got into Steiner and biodynamics sort of in a chapter, you know, sort of of San Francisco and bought a piece of property and,

you know, called it Beloved Farm, which was about 20 years ago. So at that time, he did get more into biodynamics. But that kind of rush, so just, yeah, I guess, yeah, basically, you know, Waldorf education, parents deep in their spiritual exploration. They had a different guru teacher, spiritual guide throughout different phases of my life. But definitely led me to a relationship to that God is love and God is the totality of the universe, that there's this whole, yeah, that we're all cells in one body,

and how do we be the best cell in this body as an expression of service to love and to the divine? That was sort of the basis of the philosophy that I came from as a child. Within education, I went from Waldorf School into public school, which was actually a pretty big challenge because I learned that I hadn't learned a lot of the basic standard educational pieces. And I also learned that I was under a normal framework, was dyslexic, had attention deficit disorders. And so I ended up struggling through high school of sort of finding my way into the resource room and finding that was the way that I could sort of make it through education was essentially – it wasn't even like – I basically found myself needing the resource room and pulling the resource room towards me such that I can kind of survive through high school just because I was, you know, I read much slower and my sort of normal education cognition was behind. But I would say where that led me to was a level of being able to create human relationships and emotional intelligence and the ability to connect deeply with adults as a child and really dive into much more, uh, meaningful conversations, um, as a way to create relationship, you know, whether it was a survival mechanism or a, just a way to, um, because I, I w I wasn't able to sort of survive in just the general sense of the, the learning, the education. And so, yeah, I found myself much more connecting to the

nuance of the human experience as the place that I found relationship and found connection, found joy in life. Yeah, that's beautiful. I think that I can count maybe on one hand, the amount of teachers that really took me under their wing, but they stick out like a sore thumb. It happened at exactly the right intervals. But when it did, my grades would excel. Everything would excel. And I didn't do great in school. I've learned far more.

I talk about this a lot, too, on the podcast. But I've read more books and learned far more post-college than I ever did prior to college and in college. And fighting was a big impetus for that. But having direct contact with somebody that's willing to take you under their wing and mentor you and having those adults that really help steer and shift and broaden you through story and through conversation is such an, it's an easier way for me to grasp and understand things. One of the reasons why podcasts land so well, it's like I'm in the room listening to two people have a conversation. It's an excellent way to learn. I just finished

the book Ishmael and the story of B, you've probably read them. They're incredible books by Daniel Quinn. And the way he frames the fiction is through two people, you know, hanging out with each other, a man and a gorilla. And the gorilla is teaching this guy through story. And it's really cool because if he was telling me the shit, if he was trying to say factually, I think a lot of people would have a hard time digesting it. But how he lays it out and the way that he does is it's one that makes it far easier to grasp. And I really appreciate that style of writing. Yeah. Yeah.

Uh, yeah. I mean, my, I've, I've actually, I think I've learned majority of what I know through dialogue, through conversations.

I've read very few books and I've, you know, as I've gotten older, you know, I've tried to make a practice of, you know, putting, you know,

but there's actually, I actually, you know, I've tried to make a practice of, you know, putting, you know, but there's actually, actually, you know, truth be told, there's actually a wound that I still carry, which is sort of this concern of, you know, traditional education or my ability to learn is still limited because of my story of learning disabilities. And, you know, where I, where I have been able to thrive is in the human interaction of learning. Um, so yeah, uh, it's, I'm just seeing that in, in, in, in this moment that, um, yeah, that, that actually, and actually it's one of the, the place that I've found a little bit of depression and disconnection and struggle over the last couple of years, such as many people. But for me, I worked in restaurants the last 20 years of serving people what I call hand-to-hand service, which is the thing that has has, you know, lit me up and kept me alive. And, you know, I feel like I learned through the interaction of dialogue and, you know,

just operating through the interface of technology is, um, you know, I can see is sort of, I'm a little bit, there's an aspect of wilting the, the energetic wilting without the human, the human connection, um, which actually brings me back to a story of, you know, a critical piece of education and also, you know, something you spoke to earlier, you know, plant medicine, which has definitely, you know, been a big part of my life. Um, but when I was 18, um, my folks took me to, you know, this place in Marin County where they, where the, there was a, yeah, ceremonial, yeah, ceremonial church ceremony where they, you know, using the plant medicine and, you know, had this experience and it was, you know, 2008, um, when the.com thing had taken place and I was, you know, I had, I didn't go to college because I didn't think I was insufficient to, you know, further education because of sort of my story. I, you know, I was working in San Francisco at a.comcom company as the maintenance man filling the coolers with Costco sparkling beverages and pretzels.

And I was kind of in this big challenge of where do I take my life? Where do I go? What's my purpose? All these things that we, we oftentimes confront in our, in ourselves. And, um, and so that's kind of what I was faced with. My folks take me to this, this ceremony to tell me, all right, it's going to be this meditation. We're going to take this tea and we're going to have this experience. Um, you know, and it'll hopefully give us some communion with our, you know, our divine essence. And so we go, it's like 30 people, everyone's dressed in white and blue.

And there's sort of the little symbol of the church on the patch of the facilitators. And we're standing in a circle, in a circle of redwoods. We take this very very very bitter tea and um you know i'm i'm essentially watching as watching as my cognizant as my body kind of gets taken over with this experience of you know something's taking over and you know you're standing up and reading these these icaros and and these kind of Spanish, uh, indigenous hymns also miss mixed with like Christianity,

you know, songs. And we're singing these well, stepping to the left, stepping to the right. And, you know, I'm,

I'm looking for the eyes of compassion of people feeling this experience of, um, you know, I'm going away and I'm not having control of this experience. And I see, you know, I, I see my mom kind of, you know, I'm going away and I'm not having control of this experience. And I see, you know, I see my mom kind of looking a little bit like totally, you know, sort of tongue to the side, a little bit, you know, just out there. And I start to go through this process of fear of seeing what's around me and my mind is going into paranoia. Where am I? What am I doing? What is this? Is this a cult? Just all these things. And more and more fear,

more and more contraction, and then blackout to a completely new presence of life, just a new, like, total innocence, no awareness, can't, don't even know what and who human, like, no cognition of understanding, yet I'm still looking through my eyes and trying to, you know, put the pieces back together. And, you know, ultimately, it comes to this moment of surrender, um, where I surrender to trust this experience. Um, and in that it like being plugged into the wall of an energy source and well being plugged into the wall, feeling this vibrational sort of continuity back and forth, feeling this just presence of love taking me over. And, you know, in that moment, there was this, there was this recognition of this fear and concern of where I was in my life and what I was, you know, should I go towards technology and should I go towards, um, you know, uh, chasing the technology dream of San Francisco

and the.com era or, um, and, and, and, and, and it was clear like the, the seeing the visual experience of being, you know, plugged into the matrix of technology. Um, and ultimately what that would, you know, whether it was myself or just in general humanity of, you know, the condition of life being, you know, plugged into technology and seeing a very grim existence explicitly, at least for me. And then seeing this sort of counter reality, which was visually me seeing, you know, my fingers, my shoulders being sort of the soil, the side of the mountain, seeing the viewpoint of what was happening in that circle, my experience from the viewpoint of this sort of red tail hawk that was circ um, you know, having the experience of, you know,

being connected to the life in the soil, um, and ultimately, uh, a feminine, um, mother presence, um, you know, basically calling for my devotion, calling for my service, calling for me to, uh, to care for her and to protect her. And, um, and the experience of, you know, the honor of that call, um, like to, to, you know, brings me to, it makes me weepy in this moment. Um, but the, just the, the honor of serving that level of purity and that level of life and that source of love and being able to contribute and serve her. So that happened at 19 and was clearly later, you know, still a very present experience. Um, and, you know, I think that, that, that really set the, the pathway of, you know, the trajectory of my life, which has really been about, um, you know, being a source of love, you know, how, how to be, um, in the world as a source

of love and that really being the, the guiding, uh, tenant, um, of, uh, what, what I'm, what I'm, what I'm here for. And, you know, even, even in the, um, you know, in, in the masculine sense, it actually got articulated. I have a tattoo. I only have one tattoo. It says be and love on my arms and actually a couple years after that experience, me and my dad went through something called

the New Warrior Training, which was a men's work training, um, where I witnessed the most, you know, intense vulnerability of men being with each other, um, you know, to a degree that I, you know, never seen possible, um, or seen, you know, in my experience and a level of trust, vulnerability, and openness, um, that became so illuminated, uh, and through a meditation, uh, reflecting at the end of that experience, um, you know, led me to this idea of, uh, who I am and what I'm here for is to be a presence of love. And that, that as a, the initiation, um,

into manhood, which is oftentimes, you know, in our modern culture, we don't really have any threshold of initiation. It's, you know, um,

and, and so here was this threshold of initiation, which was questioning the question of, um, you know, who are you choosing to be as a man and what is, what is masculinity and, you know, in, in, in a conscious, aware way of what, um, is masculinity going to be in your life and who are you going to be as a man in the world? And the insight, the download, the feedback loop was being a source of love. And, you know, that commitment led me to ask my dad, hey, let's go. I never on our arms where, uh, where, uh,

on the place where the, uh, David Carradine in the Kung Fu series got the dragon into his arms. Uh, and I was like, all right, that's, that,

that, that's going to be, um, you know, we'll, we'll sear this in facing ourselves as a reminder for, um, what, what life is for and what, what is for and what we're here to do, knowing that

the condition of human beings is that we continuously have amnesia and we forget who we are. And so if we can leave a memento note, a sticky note to remind us of who we are when we forget, that will be that one note, that one message that will remind us and get us back on track when we've lost the plot. That is such an incredible story. That is so good, brother. That's so good. Thank you for diving deep. I've sat with the bitter tea, as we'll call it today, 27 times. I've had some experiences with my father. I've had one with my mother. Neither one of them were able to fully let go.

Thankfully, I was able to have a different experience with psilocybin and MDMA with my dad, which was ultra deep. He felt like the bitter tea was prepping him for that night so um so uh to be able to experience that with a loved one is you know i've done it many times with my with my wife natasha it's it's it's there's nothing like it there's nothing like it you know like to really have that but i think of the direction i got came at a pivotal point in my life when I was in fighting and then leaving fighting. And, um, you know, I think of how much pain and suffering would have been alleviated had I had direction like that prior to fighting and prior to, to, to college, even, um, such an important piece. It truly, that bitter tea is such earth medicine. You know, it is such Pachamama medicine and it, and it really does direct us home into a deeper understanding of, of what we are and what we're here to do. And that's

such a beautiful, beautiful story, man. It's such an inspiring story. At what point did you decide now, I mean, with carrying that with you, um, and obviously you're, you're born and raised on a farm, you know, you've got, you've got all this background. Um, what was leading you up to, to the documentary? You know, what stuff was coming out? What books were you reading? What was kind of directing you to like, Hey man, this is something I gotta, I gotta put together. Yeah. So, you know, really it was, um, you know, my, my path went from, you know, high school, I moved to the West Coast to try to become a pro snowboarder. That ended up, I had a couple of years doing that, which was fun. And then through a life tragedy, I needed to go help my sister in Los Angeles.

But yeah, so that brought me to Los Angeles. I had a whole chapter in the music business, building a recording studio with my sister in the music business. And then that sort of fell apart around the Napster time and the music business falling apart. Um, and you know, I've always, um, I've always leaned towards healing, um, uh, food as medicine. Uh, you know, I've always been sort of in unlikely circles, giving people advice on, you know, health, wellness, and wellbeing. Um, you know, in my, in my early twenties, um, you know, when the health and wellness thing wasn't really a thing. Um, and so, uh, that, that ended up leading to, um, that, that ended up leading to my, my folks, my, my father and step, oh, well actually, so a critical piece was I left home and really wanted to make it on my own.

I wanted to make it on my own. I wanted to make it without my family. I wanted to sort of prove that I was, you know, and that was a journey that had its ups and downs. But ultimately, after the recording studio bit, my folks were starting a restaurant in San Francisco called Cafe Gratitude. And I had been working at a place called Follow Your Heart in the Valley, which is the place that made the whole vegan mayonnaise, vegan-aise thing that people have probably seen. And so I'd always been

into food, wellness, and my folks were starting this restaurant. Uh, it was humbling to eat at the time. It felt like it was a backstepping to go back and, you know, do something with my parents. Um, but ultimately it was, uh, you know, I, I, I called them up and said, Hey, I'd love to come and learn the business. Um, and then, you know, I had a girlfriend in LA at the time. Can I come learn the business in a year or two and come back to LA and open a restaurant there? Uh, he of course was happy to receive his son to come back and, you know, work in this, um, you know, business, uh, experiment that he was creating. And so I moved to San Francisco. This was in 2004.

And, you know, we helped them open the second restaurant, third one. And, you know, in sequence, you know, opened seven restaurants in the next five years, six years in San Francisco, you know, both Cafe Gratitude and Gracias Madre. And you're familiar with those restaurants or no? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've heard of them. I'm not sure that I've been there though. I grew up in Sunnyvale and Cupertino. I've been to the city a whole bunch of times throughout my life, but I'm not sure that I've been there. I've always heard of it though, both of them.

Yeah. So it definitely in an era was like the health and wellness restaurant of the West coast and, you know, a total social experiment in, you know, raw plant-based foods, uh, you know, totally clean ingredients. You know, we didn't have a stove or, uh, you know, it was quinoa and miso broth were the only hot things in the early days. The whole restaurant was designed around a transformational board game called The Abounding River, which was a board game that was guiding people into an abundant state of consciousness. You know, and it was literally a game that would, you'd pull cards that would have you inquire into questions that would shift dialogue and conversation. And the restaurant was designed to be this virtual game to bring you into that state of gratitude, Cafe Gratitude. became, you know, my identity, my life was like being the exuberant, eccentric sort of muse of Cafe Gratitude and really being an embodiment of this energy of love, gratitude, kindness, service.

And, you know, that was, you know, ultimately like a 10-year run of my life was just in hospitality, community, feeding people, I started, my folks had developed some different tools. They had written a book called Sacred Commerce. They had developed some workshops that I started leading as, and that actually brought me to New Zealand where I was going to, well, actually, did you ever see the film May I Be Frank? I made a film called May I Be Frank? Um, I didn't see it. No. Um, yeah. So for those that don't know, again, cafe gratitude was in San Francisco and now in Los Angeles, but plant-based organic restaurants. And one of the unique things about the restaurant is, um, you know, the whole menu is designed around affirmation. So, uh, if to order a coffee, you get to say, uh, I am courageous. Uh, so, and then when I bring you your coffee, I say, you are courageous. And I look you in your eyes and I, you know, bring the presence of,

um, you know, truth and reality and sincerity. Um, and, you know, with a, with a playful spirit, not with some, you know, dogmatic sincerity some dogmatic sincerity, but not some dogmatic truism about it. And so one day, a guy by the name of Frank Ferrante, who's about 300 pounds in his mid-50s, walks into Cafe Gratitude, he asked, you know, he, he, you know, he's like, what kind of, is this place for recovering people? Cause gratitude is a big thing in recovery. And, you know, uh, I say, well, we're all recovering from something. Um, but ended up getting into a conversation. I under hearing his life story. Um, and one of the unique things about cafe gratitude is we have a question of the day.

A question could be, what are you grateful for? What do you love about your life? What moves you from your head to your heart? And it's, you know, at this point, at this day and age, there's lots of, you know, people understand like questions that prompt new dialogue. But again, 20 years ago, that was pretty a unique thing in a restaurant to have a question. We're not only curating your food, but we're also curating, uh, your potential conversation that you're having over, over food. And so the question, the day that he walked in was, uh, was, uh, what's one thing you want to do before you die? And he said, wow, what I want to do before I die, well, I want to fall in love one more time before I die. And I don't think anyone's going to love me because I don't love myself. And I was struck by that moment. I was struck by that conversation.

And I had had an idea that it would be amazing to use the framework and philosophy of cafe gratitude, um, to take someone from sickness to health. And, um, and so in that moment, I knew that this was the guy and I asked him if he'd want to try and experiment and allow us to feed him and nurture him and coach him from his current state of, you know, he'd been on antidepressants for 10 years and had diabetes or had hepatitis C. And I just, you know, just off a whim asked him if he wanted, you know, didn't own a camera, never made a film before, but was clear that was going to ask him. And he asked him and he said, yes, we ended up buying a camera and making a film called May I Be Frank, which shows this man's transformation of healing from a physical sense.

He loses a lot of weight, but ultimately he sheds a lot of trauma, emotional pain, healing. And, you know, you see this, you know, this, this old, this old dog learning new tricks and becoming new again in his innocence to life. And so anyways, I created that, I created that film with some friends in the context of the restaurant as an expression of the restaurant. That brought me to New Zealand. By the way, Frank actually lives in Sedona. He'd be a great guy to have come and be a part of one of your events. That would be awesome. He helps people on the recovery journey.

But he's still healthy and well and in love. He has a love in his life. And his life really, yeah, in a beautiful way turned around. So anyways, me and him got invited to go to New Zealand to speak at a healthy living conference, show the film, share about the transformation that ensued from it. I also got, you know, one was going to give a talk on sacred commerce, which was, you know, this philosophy that was imbued in the work culture of Cafe Gratitude. And so I went there and, you know, part of it was like, at the time I was thinking I was hot shit. I was like, you know, we're in LA, we've brought health and wellness to LA. You know, I moved to LA really with this, like, you know, I've always, I've always had an exuberance and enthusiasm for like possibility that is not, is, is somehow like, I'm, I'm not grounded in reality, but my enthusiasm somehow creates some reality around my, you know, it's

like, uh, you know, most, it's like, you have no idea how that's going to happen. And mostly I don't have any idea how it's going to happen. Some reason the people and things come around me, you know, in, in the wake of the, the, the conviction and enthusiasm for something being able to happen. So anyways, you know, and, and yeah, my vision for Cafe Gratitude was like, all right, we're going to change the world through bringing health and wellness to Los Angeles, the belly of the beast. You know, sort of, if we can create health in the belly, all right, we're going to change the world through bringing health and wellness to Los Angeles, the belly of the beast. If we can create health in the belly, early understanding of microbiome, then we can create health in the whole body. And that was really the source of our intention for Cafe Gratitude coming to LA was to bring that more to the mainstream.

So anyways, we were in LA, it was, uh, you know, it became a huge buzz. It became, you know, one of the most popular restaurants in LA, uh, you know, we opened in 2011 and, um, you know, packed, packed. We thought, we thought we'd be doing like, you know, four to 5,000 a day. We're doing, you know, $22,000 in sales a day, packed, you know, can't get in, you know, turning, you know, turning celebrities away. Sorry, we have no room. You know, it's just, and we're like, how is this happening? You know, it's just, it was an unbelievable lightning, you know, lightning in a bottle.

So anyways, I went to New Zealand thinking, you know, lightning in a bottle. So anyways, I went to New Zealand thinking, you know, like I knew it all. I was on top of the game of sustainability, this, you know, conscious capitalism business. Um, and basically found myself in an audience of a panel discussion called can human beings sustain themselves on planet earth. And basically five experts spoke and they all said, were, you know, in many words, effed and that, you know, it's much worse than we thought. And, um, you know, and speaking about ocean acidification and the loss of phytoplankton, speaking about, you know, the permafrost and the methane being released there, speaking about deforestation, you know, just all these things. And the last

guy who spoke was a guy by the name of Graham Sate. And he basically said, you know, sort of choking back, you know, the emotionality of the intensity of the moment, you know, what they're saying is true. but there's a blind spot. And that blind spot is human beings don't see ourselves as part of nature. We see ourselves as separate. So we see our solutions as separate from nature. And nature is the solution. Soil is the solution.

Humus can save humanity. If we'd humble ourselves, if we'd be humus, humus, humility, humor, and humus all have the same hume, Latin root, which is, you know, of and for the earth. And, you know, if we could humble our hubris and actually see the intelligence of nature, see the brilliance of this living system that we're a part of, and take care of our soil, and grow and do agriculture in a way that honors the systems of nature, we could actually heal and reverse the challenges and the problems and the environmental catastrophes that are on the horizon. We can literally turn this ship around if we could do agriculture different. It could go arguably from the most destructive system on the planet to the system that could be the great

redeemer. And I'm thinking, I know everything about organic agriculture because I'm, you know, one of the, you know, most happening organic vegan restaurants in California. And I have no idea what he's talking about. I have no framework of understanding of what he's proposing and what he's offering as a solution. And yet it's like, to me, it's a spiritual awakening of the 10th power, like a thousand suns erupting in my mind of, like, I'm getting something like I've never gotten it before. I'm going, wait, you're saying that every living plant around on the planet is sipping carbon out of the atmosphere and pumping 30 to 60 percent of it into the soil. we could continue to cool and balance and that everyone who eats could actually participate in that revolution participate in that healing and they could and that would make food keep more healthy too and they would heal their bodies too so it would be this and and again not conscious not conscious but the you know sort of calling of that that experience at 19 with the mother calling for my devotion not conscious but but that was like oh here's here's you know have

be the void you know it's like the lorax being the for trees, be the voice for soil, have the world awaken to that soil is the living skin, the body of the earth. And if we don't take care of it, we don't take care of ourselves and soils, the arc, we can heal the soil and you know, the, the planet comes back into balance. We can, if we, if we heal, um, and it was just like so clear and so obvious and so intuitive. And so, um, and, and so I, I was just flabbergasted. I, I, I, I went and talked to Graham. I went and saw him the next day. I like just couldn't believe what he was saying was true. And so, um, I got back to LA and I found myself just sharing every, you know, as, you know, as I said earlier in the, the hand-to-hand service of serving people, you know, plates of quinoa and kale and sprouts and, um, you know, uh, turmeric lattes and, you know, and bringing them, you know,

this nourishing food, I started to be able to tell a deeper story just, you know, beyond, you know, healthy plant-based food, but that soil is the basis of life. Soil is the basis of food health and soil is the basis of our environmental health and our climate health. And that, you know, as I was proselytizing my new insight, you know, table to table in Cafe Gratitude, you know, basically people were getting it. People were compelled. People were intrigued. And people were like, how do I learn more? Um, so I was like, all right,

well go find this guy, Graham state online. Um, he's, he's the, he's the, you know, the, you know, he's got this message. And then I, I didn't even look at what content content was online, but when I went and looked at what content Graham state had online, I was like, Oh God, this is not going to do, uh, people are going to look at this and they're going to online, I was like, oh God, this is not going to do. People are going to look at this and they're going to go, okay, lost interest. And so I basically started gathering people in my living room in Venice, around the corner from the Venice Cafe Gratitude, customers, friends, musicians, activists, filmmakers, every Monday night for two to three hours to just sort of build, you know, how are we going to have this message become the prevailing message of hope for humanity. And for whatever reason I had, you know, my, my, my clueless exuberance was like, this, this can be, so we can change the, we can awaken the world to this message.

Um, and, um, and so we started gathering people. Um, we started, you know, seeing what we thought would be the mechanisms, uh, and the levers to making that happen, you know, seeing what we thought would be the mechanisms and the levers to making that happen. You know, because we were in Los Angeles, we were like, all right, let's use media. And yet let's use the power of celebrity to get this message out there, because ultimately, it doesn't, it seems like this is the most intuitive, obvious thing. And yet there's no, um, validation for it being a real feasible option. Um, and so, um, you know, it, it started with that little working group in my living room. Uh, we ended up starting a garden on Rose Avenue that was like a vacant lot that became like our first location of where we could sort of build this garden to gather people and tell people this story, bring them, you know, bring them again, back to the importance of spaces, being in spaces, proximity with people, having real conversations, you know, where an environment is informing, you know, the learning. And so um, and so we created that. And then we started working

on a piece of media called the soil story, um, which was a four minute piece of media, which was really one of the first pieces of content, um, you know, on the internet in a short sort of explainable infographic, beautiful way saying this, this story of how soil and regenerative agriculture could be this most important, um, pressing healing modality that we could all rally behind. Um,

and then, you know, the, to, to get to the film, um, basically the, the serendipity of that is that I moved into this after being you know having a hard time

moving finding a place to live in Venice a friend of mine called me and said their friends were moving out and these two filmmakers were moving out of this small little bungalow that they had lived in 11 years and their names were Josh and Rebecca Ticale and they were environmental filmmakers they had made you made 10 environmental films, had gone to Sundance with a film called Fuel and they were moving out. And as I was moving in, I was like, do you guys know about soil?

I gave them my soil evangelist rap and they weren't buying it. They were like, like yeah not really interested sounds boring um you know it's you know soil we have a hard enough time getting people interested in fuel making fuel interesting or alternative energy interesting um so and i was like no soil you know again but so we ended up um reaching back out like six months later and said they had also heard through other directions this opportunity of soil being a solution to, you know, putting carbon back in the ground and balancing the climate and balancing our environment, um, and that they were interested in partnering and they loved the name of the organization, Kiss the Ground, that we were developing and wanted to, you know, wanted to, wanted to partner, um, to create this film. And for me, it was like, oh my God, a film.

I've done that before. It works on telling a message and getting a message out there. Uh, let's, let's do this. Um, and it ended up taking seven years, um, to produce that film and, you know, many ups and downs and moments of like, it's dead in the water. It's not happening. Um, you know, we didn't, we didn't get it. Uh, we don't have the funding. Um, you know, people have lost interest. Um, and, you know, just again, similar to the, may I be frank thing? Uh, there was like this, you know, in, in moments of silence or in the shower, there'd be this whisper of, um, you know, take the next step, um, you know, call this person, uh, you know, and, and ultimately, you know, that led to, you know, so many of the serendipitous, miraculous connections to,

you know, how the film ended up on Netflix to, you know, getting Woody Harrelson to narrate as a vegan who, you know, getting a vegan to narrate a film that was talking about how, you know, the vegan narrative wasn't the whole truth at all, that there's actually this whole other, you know, reality of how to, which is a whole other story within my story, which is, you know, being a vegan for 35 years and then eating my first hamburger at 35, um, after me and my dad, you know, went through this process of, uh, you know, slaughtering two cows on our farm, um, after learning and my dad, you know, went through this process of, uh, you know, slaughtering two cows on our farm, um, after learning, you know, as, as Steiner said, if we want, you know, uh, a farm to mimic nature, nature always has animals.

So if we want a farm, you know, a farm to mimic, we have to have, you know, um, animals on the farm and a cow is, you know, a miraculous creature for creating bio biological health on a farm. And so I know I went on a long tangent, but I'll, I'll just pause and come back to grounding and maybe let you reflect and, and ask another question or redirect the conversation. Yeah, no, that was awesome, brother. Thank you so much for diving deep on that.

Yeah, that's really cool. I didn't know. I knew that from Cafe Gratitude and hearing about you that you were vegan, and that's not super surprising. Dr. Zach Bush is into soil health. He's also vegan. One of my good buddies who you probably know, Darren Olean from Southern California. Yeah.

Superfood hunter, you know, jacked, jacked to vegan. He, I think in his 44th birthday, he did a hundred pull-ups with a hundred pound weight vest on. At 30, I couldn't do that. So like hats off to him. He's dialed in, but yeah, there is a part of this, you know nature nature needs these things we are working in harmony in this closed loop system and the sacred hoop includes animals you know and they do so much for it it's one of the biggest things we just went out to central virginia to do a sustainable

regenerative agriculture crash course with a guy named daniel griffith author of wild like flowers brilliant brilliant human being. I'm going to have him on the podcast many times. And we were talking animal impact. And Aubrey initially didn't want cattle. He didn't want goats and sheep because he didn't want the farm to smell like a farm. We're having events there, things like that, like cool with exotic game, things like that, chicken, sure.

And over time, I've been working on them for a couple of years on this. Like we talk animal impact, large hooved animals are the thing that's going to cram their poop back into the soil. Like you need that hoof impact to stomp it in. And of course, you know, you touched on this. One of the things that really continued my education was somebody who you featured in Kiss the Ground was, I think her name's Kristen Stewart, correct me if i'm wrong the author of the soil will save us oh kristin olsen kristin olsen there we go damn it i was close um beyond the soil will save us i know she went on ben greenfield's podcast uh right when

her book came out and i was fascinated i got that book right then and that was one of the first detailed explanations of what you're talking about. Of course, you know, hearing that the documentary took seven years to produce is like, yeah, like, cause I remember that right when that came out, I was like, why is no one talking about this? Like, this should be, this should be in a documentary. Like this should be all over the fucking news. Like this is a big deal. And, um, that's super cool.

And it's cool to hear that, that, um, you know, in your path, you've had a hamburger down the road, you know, probably grass fed, grass finished, regeneratively raised, you know, all the good stuff. Yeah, no, it was a cow that we slaughtered and processed on our B-Love farm. After going through, you know, after moving to the farm, I mean, my folks moved to the farm, raw food vegans, um, and were living in, you know, living in a year and making, um, you know, they, they found themselves being cold and, um, you know, wanting warm food, but then also wanting more fats on the farm, taking on farm work. And, you know, ultimately warm food, but then also wanting more fats on the farm, taking on farm work. And, you know, ultimately that led to raw dairy and that led to, you know, male cows.

And, you know, that led to, you know, not necessarily enough space for them, you know, post being full grown. And, you know, some people were eating meat on the farm and did it make sense to buy meat from Safeway when we actually had cows that had a great life and could have one, you know, bad moment and ultimately turn into nutrients that sustained the human beings that were stewarding and creating this regenerative experience on life. And I got deep down in the whole Wendell Berry hole a couple nights ago just reading some of his essays. And I don't know if you know Wendell and have ever had him on.

You know who Wendell Berry is? I've not had him on the podcast. I think Daniel mentioned him to me, though, so it's somebody I want to dive into. Yeah. So he has a quote that's pretty deep and says, every day we must break the body and spill the blood of creation. Doing it knowingly, carefully, respectfully, and reverently is a sacrament. Doing it with greed, gluttony, carelessness is a desecration. And yeah, I think, you know, and the way my dad speaks to it is that sacrifice is baked into creation.

There is no life without sacrifice. Every plate of food has sacrifice on it. And can we be in reverence of that sacrifice such that we can exist and have life? Everything needs to eat. And in every meal there's death and that's baked in, that's inevitable. Um, and, um, so that, you know, that's definitely been an interesting, uh, transformation and conversation that as a family we've gone through because, you know, my folks got death threats. I got a woman spit in my face. We had protests out in front of our restaurants from the vegan community, you know, calling my family murderers. And because we had told the truth about our journey of discovering regenerative agriculture, biodynamic agriculture, and, you know, the journey of having a cow that one had a blood disease and

one was a full grown male. And then, you know, going through the process intimately to expose ourselves to what it's like versus, you know, having it be somehow, you know, behind closed doors. And, uh, you know, it was, I appreciate, I really appreciate you talking about that because it's not, that's not something, you know, um, and it shows where you're at consciously to be able to say like, Hey, this is actually, this is the honest truth of where we're at and how we got there. I told this story when I had Robbie on the podcast and force of nature, but I brought my son out. I've been hunting as a kid and went hunting, you know, started, started taking up hunting

a lot more since I, since I retired from fighting. But I brought out my son to Rome ranch for a bison harvest. And it's while my daughter was in the womb. And we made a seven directions prayer and prayed for the life of this animal and prayed that she'd give herself willfully to us. And out of the herd of 80 bison, about 100 yards away, she walked towards us and presented her broadside to us at 20 yards. And I was down on my knees and I had my son, I think he was four or five at the time, sit right on my lap and watch as the animal was shot in the head. And she gave, there's no question, there is no denial. She gave herself to us and I had so much gratitude. And while she was still warm, we came and laid tobacco down and placed our hands on her and thanks her for her body and made the promise that how we'll carry her forward, how we'll carry her nutrition forward.

And she built my daughter literally in the womb as my wife consumed that bison. She was contributing to my daughter's body. Like that's full circle. And that's the reverence you're speaking of, right? Like, yes. And I don't look at me the same way having had that experience, you know, it's, it's a very important thing. And I know, you know, firsthand what the guys at Rome ranch are doing and, and force of

nature. And that, that is a beautiful thing. It's like to hold that respect, to hold that reverence, to leave that up front and then to see how that's returned to us in real time. You know, like that could have been a hard, a harder deal. Obviously it's a harvest. It's not a hunt, but it could have been made a lot more difficult and challenging than that was. And, you know, just to feel that prayer heard and to witness that and to see it all kind of baked into our experience. And for my son's first experience, really understanding that, you know,

like this thing is alive. It doesn't come in a package. I think Food Inc. did a brilliant job with that. Like this wonderful cut of meat doesn't grow on a tree. It's not how the animal does it. Like there's a process that happens with that. And, you know, one of the things we learned out at Daniel's farm was how the USDA processes

meat. You know, we having our own farm, we brought in donkeys and emus to protect our chickens so we wouldn't have to kill a predator, but just something there to stand guard so that predators would avoid eating our chickens. And that's turned out great after losing two chickens,

we haven't lost any more chickens, but driving them, these animals were born and raised on those farms. We drove them 30 minutes or an hour to get to our farm, and they were shook up for a week. So you imagine the stress of an animal when they have to get taken from their grass-fed land as a young one to then get grain finished and then taken somewhere else to be processed. And they're locked up in the dark. They enclose their body in this metal clamp and then punch a hole in the back of their head. Like that's, you're eating that stress.

You're consuming those stress hormones that doesn't go away. Or you can participate in the harvest of it yourself. You know, you can know exactly how that animal died. You can pray ahead of time. You can connect with that animal. I mean, it's's a complete you're talking about two completely different things so um that's really beautiful that you guys were able to experience that absolutely beautiful yeah thank you for sharing that story i get moved hearing about yeah the the the consciousness of that death, well knowing that that death will create to the nutrient life of the growing embryo body, you know, being of your daughter. It's a really, really beautiful, you know, picturing of that process in a really

clear way. Yeah, it's really beautiful. So tell me, I mean, I love Kiss the Ground, recommended it to a ton of people. What do you see coming forward next? Obviously, you know, you were at Rome's event. I missed it. I missed you there. That's why I was like, fuck, let's get on the podcast. Let's get to know each other. Yeah. Um, yeah. So again, just to give a little, you know, um, you know, kiss the ground now we're, so there's a, there's a, we're, we're a nonprofit organization that we've been around for almost 10 years. And really, our mission is to awaken people to the possibilities of regeneration. We've done that four different ways with four different programs.

We've obviously created media content that awakens this message, short form and some long form. And then we have an advocacy education program where we create online courses to train people to be soil advocates, how to really understand regeneration, ecosystem function, how, you know, understand the implications on human health, environmental health, and, you know, what we can do as advocates and what transformation we can create. So we have an advocacy training program. We've trained over 5,000 people in 26 countries around the world around, um, you know, how to be soil advocates. Um, so highly recommend everybody to take the soil advocacy training. Uh, we also have courses for regenerative gardening

if people are sort of at the small scale, compelled, inspired, connected to the importance of soil health and food sovereignty and wanting to be more connected to their food system, how to set up varying sizes and scales of a little piece of land that's being consciously cultivated and grown in a restorative, regenerative way. So we have a couple, two courses on beginners and advanced gardening, regenerative gardening. So we offer those courses.

We also do that course or the soil advocacy training course as a cohort. So you can do it in community with people, um, and, you know, learn as a group. Um, and that all can be found at, you know, kiss the ground.com. Um, and then, uh, our third program is our farmland program where we provide educational scholarships to some of the best practitioner schools online as well as in person. So if farmers and ranchers, you know, learn about Kiss the Ground through some of our media content, and they are curious about how to sort of start walking down the path, we provide, you know, scholarship education to folks like Understanding Ag or the Soil Health Academy, Gabe Brown from the film, you know,

their course called Soil Health 101 or Regrarian's Darren Doherty, his course or Alan Savory, the Savory Institute's course on holistic management. So farmers and ranchers who are interested in getting education and maybe the cost of those educations are a barrier. We can provide scholarships to those educational courses. And then we also provide grants for implementing, you know, small scale improvements in infrastructure for farmers.

So that's our farmland program. And then our policy program, which is really kind of where we've stepped into over the last, you know, post the film of like, what's the next big thing? You know, the film, for those that don't know, you know, it's on Netflix, it's been seen about 6 million times, about a billion media impressions, won about 75 film festivals. It's really, you know, synonymous with regenerative agriculture. We're talking about regenerative agriculture. People oftentimes go, have you seen the Kiss the Ground film? Or, you know, it's a good explainer for that conversation to have you really have your own aha moment about how profound of an opportunity regeneration, regenerative agriculture is uh and um and so you know post the film was like all right how do we become most helpful for moving this uh awareness into uh you know structural change and so the the thought was after lots of deliberation and lots of ideation, we came up with, you know, and I can, we use our skill sets of, you know, communicators,

storytellers, conveners, connectors to build a massive community coalition that aligns in a bipartisan way, you know, having, you know, the politics, you know, aside, can we agree that soil is our common ground? And can we agree that to heal our soils is a good thing for our environment, for our food security, for our, you know, for, you know, rural economics, for, you know, human health, for public, you know, public health. And so we've been building a coalition and campaign called Regenerate America, Soils are Common Ground, with the goal to drive, you know, a continuum of awareness around the importance of regenerative agriculture, getting citizens, consumers, everyday people to understand this, align their voice and their support around regenerative America such that we can have thousands, tens of thousands,

hundreds of thousands, hopefully even by the Farm Bill time, millions of thousands, hundreds of thousands, hopefully even, you know, by the Farm Bill time, you know, millions of people saying this is what we want, as well as directly working with legislators, lawmakers, people who sit on ag committees and are decision makers on what are the rewrites of the Farm Bill, um, which the farm bill is a, you know, a bundle of legislation that gets changed every, you know, uh, three to seven years, uh, four to seven years. Um, and it's coming up for change in 2023. Um, and, you know, ultimately we'll keep, you know, the, the practice or the sort of systems of American agriculture in place have enough, you know, direct interaction and influence on, you know, legislators to really see the opportunity. You know, we've been awakening people to the possibility, we've been awakening consumers, you know, business leaders,

you know, thought leaders, celebrities, influencers. Um, but could we focus on the key people who make these decisions knowing that they're, you know, in embedded systems of, um, influence and incentives and things that keep things in place. Uh, but could we see them with, with the innocence of that all human beings can be touched and can have a transformation. Can we focus on those individuals with our best tools of storytelling and communication with our relationships of the best practitioners in the world to be sort of validating, you know, what we're talking about you know, speaking the message of like the salt of the earth message of this is possible.

And this is an un-able reality. Um, and so we're, um, we're about nine months into developing this coalition. We have about 90 organizations, about 10,000 people supporting it thus far. We launched May 17th and our goal is to, um, influence, um, six aspects of, you know, the Farm Bill related to education, you know, education and implementation of, you know, what are the conservation and the practices that are being encouraged by the USDA and NRCS. So, you know, giving an infusion of updated information, education, and financial stimulus to support the programs that help farmers and ranchers implement soil health practices on their farm. Right now, you know, there's, it's an

$850 billion bundle of legislation of taxpayer money that gets spent over 10 years. Um, and that, um, uh, about 1% of that is going to conservation and soil health. Um, so we're hoping that we can grow that piece of the pie even a little bit, um, you know, could, you know, the, the impact could be, you know, you know, astronomical as far as, um, you know, so we're, we're actually some exciting, um, you know, there's some hearings coming up around regenerative agriculture and we're able to bring in some amazing practitioners to testify and bring a lot of awareness to this important issue. And actually, one of the champions, David Scott, who's the head of the House Ag Chair Committee, who's potentially going to transition, really is wanting this to be a big moment, his legacy of like, that he moved things forward towards regenerative agriculture.

Um, so we're, we're helping him, uh, as an insider to really, you know, forward this, um, momentum from awareness into policy change. And, you know, as, as much as I'm not a huge fan of big government, um, and, uh, you know, the, the government making the decisions right now, our money is, you know, going into agriculture in all the wrong ways, uh, that are creating degenerative disease and, you know, malnourishment and poor health. Um, and also, you know, from incentivizing, you know, chemical monoculture, uh, and, um, and ensuring that agricultural system will not ensuring, uh, you know, diversified agricultural systems. Um, and so we, you know, we have an opportunity to really, even if we make a one degree shift at that level, the trajectory of impact could be magnanimous. So that's Regenerate America, soils are common

ground. You can check out regenerateamerica.com. My hope is that all listeners can go and support the campaign. We have over 2,000 farmers and ranchers behind us. We have a farmer leadership council guiding the coalition. We have about, I think, 15 different farmers and ranchers from different regions, including Will Harris from White Oak Pastures, which I'm sure you're familiar with. And he was at the Rome Ranch event as well. You know, Farmers Footprint, Zach Bush, you know, they're part of the coalition. Many other organizations and brands and farming groups are involved. And so, yeah, we're optimistic and it definitely feels like David and

Goliath. But again, we're bringing the naivete and the innocence that after a thousand no's, there is a yes. And upon that yes, our life depends. So beautiful, brother. Well, that's fantastic. We'll link to all this in the show notes. Let's finish with you talking about moving out to Texas. Tell us about Sovereignty Ranch. I mean, sovereignty was a big one. I was very fortunate to already be here the last two years and just seeing how things shaked out in the world and kind of how Texas handled it versus California and New York. And, you know, really just the ability to be sovereign, the ability to make my own choices, you know, that was not experienced unanimously. You know, a lot of people went back. A lot of people just kind of had a, you know, culture of amnesia. You know, you just went right back to things like, oh, everything's great.

You're not realizing like, hey, the rest of the world is still on lockdown. This is kind of a big deal. We're like, us in Florida are kind of testing. A lot of people are expecting us to drop like flies. We're having UFC events with 20,000 people in them, and no one's dying, thank God, but I mean, we're the guinea pigs here, and I think of that as, you know, proof in the pudding, having obviously seen this track over the last couple of years, but talk a bit about, um, you know, your, your reasons for

moving out here and what you guys are up to with, with, uh, sovereignty farm. Yeah. So, uh, two years ago, I decided to move out of the city, living in Venice, moved to my sister. Um, my sister's farm called so heart farm, Heart Farm in Southern California, we're a 17-acre regenerative organic fruits and vegetable farm. We have some animal integration, small little dairy. And, yeah, I had been a talking head for regenerative agriculture for a long time and I, I was feeling a yearning to get more connected to it at a personal, intimate level. And, um, so that, that's what took us here. You know, me and my wife live in, this is my little tiny house

office where I run Kiss the Ground, a nonprofit from, you know, we did, we, we, we renovated a little trailer. We got a little homestead situation, uh, 36 chickens. And when you, we bought them online, they can only sex them to 80 to 90%. Yeah. Accuracy. So we bought all hens, but just by the math alone, we should have four to eight roosters. We only have two,

which is really good, but the two roosters are awesome. I'm really happy we have them. And they just started. I mean, they're, they're not even the, the,

the hens aren't old enough to lay eggs yet, but the roosters just started getting themselves, you know, getting puffed up and making their little caw, and it's awesome. So I love that sound. That's the sound of good food behind me. This is just kind of a little, like, homestead hack of understanding that I've had. Two roosters can get dangerous. If you have three or more, they kind of balance each other out. Uh, cause two will lead to like, you know,

sometimes a fight to the death, uh, of, you know, that's a whole other story. Um, of like, you know, but if you have, if you have three, they kind of, of it's a triage no one's um but two become someone's trying to become the king and um we'll try to damn take the other one out um has been my experience over the last couple years of you know we had one develop almost instantly we were like oh that's a rooster for sure he got his comb like three weeks old or something like it was like it was way developed very early and he's um we have uh 10 barred rock Plymouth barred rock so they got the black and white kind of pattern and um he was more white and black than black and white like the rest of them and then a second one from the same group and we've had no

pecking order issues whatsoever. Like when we get outside, you know, they would kind of, you know, wrestle with each other, bow up and no, no real issues, no pecking at each other. Very loving and nurturing. We raised them in our house in Austin and then would bring them in the backyard daily. My wife and I would take their trough outside. We built a little run outside because we wanted them to know us and know the kids prior to us living at the farm and to know our dog. And then we brought them out to the farm once they were old enough and could defend themselves. And that's a custom made, Coop's made.

And still no issues. Like he's the Bengali is the big rooster. And that other guy who's a rooster, no behavior like a rooster. He knows that that's the dude in charge. He knows he's the alpha. So I think we've lucked out. But I agree with what you're saying for sure. And I'll, I'll keep an eye on it. Um, yeah. So anyway, so, uh, moved here two years ago, uh, you know, early COVID and yeah, I mean, I, I've always been, you know, I described my upbringing.

I wasn't vaccinated as a kid and have always just, you know, my philosophy of healing through nature, healing through plants, healing through nutrition, you know, call it again, overly, you know, who knows what the future will bring, but it's where I've had my investment of confidence. And, you know, you're not, you're not dead yet. Yeah, no, I'm not dead yet. And, and I'm, and I'm healthy. And, you know, for, for someone who worked in public service of servicing people and being around hundreds of people a day, you know, uh, dirty plates and, and, and, and, um, yeah, I, I never, I never missed, uh, I never missed a day of work working at Cafe Gratitude because I was sick. And, you know, so I've been healthy, you know, blessed. I'm grateful, you know, humble my hubris and the confidence around it.

But just I've been blessed to be really healthy. And, you know, there's a belief in what that has been. You know, I haven't bought into and been a proponent of the Western medical paradigm, you know, from birth, and it's going well. And so when, you know, COVID hit, um, sure there was initial fear, but pretty soon thereafter, yeah, I just, um, I, it just felt like, uh, I, I didn't, I didn't buy what was, um, yeah, it just, it just didn't make sense how it was all being managed. And, um, you know, it especially didn't make sense when I saw really credible doctors, um, being told that they couldn't be doctors and that the alternative was send people home until they're in critical care and then come back for a ventilator.

You know, and that there's no approved therapies or no approved anything to give people, you know, you know, it's like, you know, the victory garden movement when during World War II, the government stepped in and said, hey, let's get sovereign. Let's grow our own food. Let's support. Let's be patriotic. We had an opportunity to be like, hey, we're sick and unhealthy. Let's actually have this be a call to arms as a public health, public service announcement that we need to get healthy. Let's get outside, let's exercise, let's work out, let's eat, you know, let's, you know, get our vitamin D,

let's get our vitamin C, let's, you know, take these nutrient, you know, nutrients that are, we're often deficient in that we're seeing are connected to people who are more, you know, susceptible to the more severe experiences with COVID, you know, uh, susceptible to the more severe experiences with COVID, um, you know, and none of that, none of that was happening. It was, it was wait and see lockdown and, you know, everything stops until we get this vaccination. And, um, and it was just like, I don't, you know, I just, it just didn't make sense. And, um, and so, you know, we luckily were on the farm kind of in a bubble operating totally outside of the paradigm of fear and like, you know, the, the world is falling apart and everyone's dying from this.

Um, and and you know, again, I know lots of people died. Um, I know that it was a new thing that came in and there was confusion and a lack of order to, to, you know, understandable degrees of what to do, how to make the call, what the executive decision on that. Um, but, um, yeah, it just, uh, yeah, it, it, it, it didn't, it didn't make sense and it continues to not make sense. Uh, you know, as far as, you know, the mandates, the manipulation around the vaccine,

the, the, and then, you know, everyone who's been vaccinated is getting COVID two and three, you know, it's just like, and, and then there's just no acknowledgement that it, it didn't work. There's still a hanging on that, that somehow was a good thing, you know, you know, Texas, you know, here in California, you know, my, my kids going into school, you know, I don't want to get the schedule of injections, you know, for him to be able to go into school and to have a normal life, that's a big piece. And, you know, the, the way that California has just handled this, you know, I've definitely lost some confidence in, you know, the, the, yeah, the, the, where their, where their allegiance is and what, what their, what, what their, what, what's being served in sort of this, um, agenda of, um, you know, California politics and, you know, California narrative and, you know, what, what, what people have belief in. Um, and so, you know, again, it's strange because, you know, regenerative agriculture, soil health, you know, healing soil, everybody gets that. Even in the food movement, people got

like healing through food and not trusting, you know, the FDA or, you know, the food pyramid and, you know, all these other corruptions that have, you know, led us to believe what's healthy and, you know, but yet we had amnesia around, you know, a moment of big moment of fear. We, you know, it was like, all right, who has authority? All right, let's follow them. That's how you survive, you know, moments of crisis. And yeah, that feels like what happened. And, um, so, um, you know, my, my parents after 25 years of living in California, me at 25 years, my folks are moving to Idaho. Um, you know, they, uh, you know, and it's a combination of a lot of different things, but it ultimately is like, um, the, you know, where, what they want the environment of their next generation

and kind of their legacy to be held inside of. You know, they didn't want it to be here in California. And, you know, my sister got a very clear call for Texas. And, you know, we've been raising our family together, my son and her kiddos here in California. And so when she was considering jumping to Texas and then she, you know, had the opportunity to purchase a, an ecosystem of regeneration, an environment to invite people in to see a different new way of life. You know, I love hosting people. I love feeding people. I love, you know, creating experiences where people learn and have transformational moments. And to have a place to do that, as you know, is a key piece. And so it's still, there's a lot of unknowns of what the future may bring or how it's going to come to fruition.

But the property was purchased six months ago, and we've gone for a couple different stints. We planted, I think, 700 fruit trees in an orchard, got a few cows there. My Uncle Scott's there. We have another guy and his wife there, set up early infrastructure. And yeah, it's an exciting and big unknown chapter of being a, you know, a Californian for, you know, 25 years and then, you know, going to a whole new world. That's so cool, brother. That's such a parallel. That's what we're doing. And that's so cool brother that's such a parallel that's what we're doing and that's awesome to hear yeah that everything you were saying about the last two years completely resonated with me

in fact we got out when that legislature went through on um uh vaccination schedules in order to go to school i think my son was six months old and i was like look it doesn't matter how long we stay here we haven't made the decision to homeschool yet, but we're like, we know what this means when he goes to kindergarten and we're not doing that. And, um, yeah, you know, like, uh, much like you, my wife, I think I'd had maybe two shots her whole life, completely healthy. Uriah Faber, uh, UFC champion, you know, unvaccinated. My kids are completely healthy. They've never, they've never even needed antibiotics. You know, they, they get sick, they get over it, they get over it without any over the counter medication. We give them vitamin C and, um, you know, bone broth and

apple cider vinegar, and these kids just march right through it. And so, um, you know, take that for what you will. There are a lot of people that might not agree with it, but that's maybe because they have an experience to get for themselves. And I it yet for themselves. Yeah. My son had whooping cough early on and my wife found, you know, on love it or hate it, found a protocol on Instagram of a mom, you know, holistic healing, healthy mom, whatever. And, um, and, you know, did a protocol with whooping cough for my son, Rumi, um, you know, in his first year, yeah, first year of life. And they went to the doctor, she got the antibiotics and was like, not feeling it. Did this protocol with, um, you know, high doses of vitamin C. Um, and he, he started to turn and made progress and came out of it. Um,

and again, you know, could be, could be, it worked for us, you know, no, no, no guarantees, but it's, again, there's just been and faith of healing and how to balance our climate is through working with nature to heal nature. And working with nature, plants, with interaction with my body is also what feels intuitively right around living a healthy life. Absolutely, brother. Well, what's next? What's coming up for you? And where can people find you? Yeah.

So at Kiss the Ground is our Instagram. My name is Love being Ryland, as I said, because being love is, um, my, you know, my mission is to be a presence of love in the world. And so, uh, yeah, I'm a love being. And, uh, so you can follow me there. Uh, and, Regenerate America. Let's use our collective voice. We know if we want to go far, we must do it in community together. And so we're taking on an audacious goal of shifting the way our resources are being spent to support soil health and regenerative agriculture. So please check out regenerateamerica.com, sign on, support us, donate there. I run a nonprofit.

So if regenerative agriculture is something that inspires you, please check us out and fund the work that we're doing. And yeah, I mean, what's next? I'm excited to, I'm having, I'm giving birth to a new baby. My wife has given birth to our second child in November. We're going to do a home birth here in Fillmore. And so excited about that and excited about, yeah, excited about there's a second film that's going to be a sequel to the Kiss the Ground film that's being directed by Josh and Rebecca Takao. So excited for that to be coming out in early 2023. to see a massive transformation in federal legislation that leads to millions of new farmers being able to go in the direction of soil health and healing their land.

And I am a dreamer, but some of my dreams have come true. So I'm going to continue to dream. Thank you so much, Ryland. Thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for all the work that you're doing. It is, it's inspiring and it's awesome. Shoot me a text when you get to Texas. I'd love to have you out at the farm in Lockhart

and show you what we're up to and head out to your spot and see what you guys are into. I would love that. I'd love to give you a hug. I'd also love to know about, you know, your events that you're doing with Charles and with Aubrey.

I'd love to come participate and, you know, I'd love to come participate and tap into that community and that... So, yeah, thrilled to give you a hug and meet you in person. And, yeah. Thanks, brother.

Absolutely, brother. Thank you. Bye.