Mark Bell's Power Project - Power Project EP. 120 Live - Get to Bed

Episode Date: September 28, 2018

Post Friday Morning Skwaat edition of Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast. Today Mark Bell and Andrew Zaragoza got into how important sleeps is and ways you can get better sleep, some awesome quotes from Benjamin Franklin, your questions and Mark recalling his time with the late great Charles Poliquin ➢SHOP NOW: https://markbellslingshot.com/ Enter Discount code, "POWERPROJECT" at checkout and receive 15% off all Sling Shots ➢Subscribe Rate & Review on iTunes at: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/mark-bells-power-project/id1341346059?mt=2 ➢Listen on Stitcher Here: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/mark-bells-power-project?refid=stpr ➢Listen on Google Play here: https://play.google.com/music/m/Izf6a3gudzyn66kf364qx34cctq?t=Mark_Bells_Power_Project ➢Listen on SoundCloud Here: https://soundcloud.com/markbellspowerproject FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell ➢ Snapchat: marksmellybell Follow The Power Project Podcast ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/MarkBellsPowerProject Podcast Produced by Andrew Zaragoza ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamandrewz

I'm really bummed I don't know how to use a calendar. Like in your phone? Just in general. Like I looked at the date, and I was so excited that today was National Coffee Day, only to find out that it's not the 29th. So we're a little early. 29th. So we're a little early.

Well, if people listen to this tomorrow, they'll be lucky because it'll be National Coffee Day. But if they listen to it today and they're watching live, then they won't. The question becomes, when will then be now? And the answer to that is soon. I've watched Spaceballs enough to know that.

My Schwartz is as big as yours. Oh. Or wait, yours is as big as mine. I don't know. I'm not sure. We can go back to the bathroom and check. I was just thinking about something because of a joke I made earlier. And this is totally racist, so everybody bear with me.

But, you know, white people make jokes about, like like their girl leaving them for a black guy But and I thought like that is that is pretty like it's a racist thing, but we kind of we kind of know why right? There's a certain stigma about black males right about their ma maybe Having a little bit more downstairs than us Perhaps that perhaps that might be true, at least from some of the documentaries that Smokey's told me about. Um, but you know,

the reverse happens too. Um, it's usually not, it's usually not black guys though, that have this fear that a white guy is going to come in and sweep, sweep their girl off their feet. Right. Right. But we've heard it before about uh black girls making fun of other black girls uh for them uh getting left for a white woman right we've heard that before so i don't know i just thought that was funny i don't know just odd humor thing but um you know sometimes people just uh i don't know they just want to like they always want to sweep everything under the rug they always want to sweep everything under the rug. They always want to sweep everything under the rug in terms of, uh, certain races are better at certain things. And I know that people have been blasted on this kind of thing, uh, in the

past, but watching football last night and, uh, the defensive end for the Vikings just shredded, absolutely shredded. Now it's not like there's not any white guys that aren't shredded, but let's, let's make a comparison here. Uh, our version of LeBron James, the white version of LeBron James, the closest thing that I can think of, uh, in modern times, I have somebody different in mind, but kind of go going old school and thinking of a hall of famer is Larry Bird. There's a huge difference between Larry Bird and LeBron James. Huge. Huge difference.

Some can argue that Larry Bird is even better. And like Larry Bird won a lot of championships and Larry Bird was a winner his entire career. I mean, he was, he was a savage, absolute savage. But in terms of like athleticism, there's, there's a huge difference. And Larry Bird was very athletic for how big he was. And he, you can argue that he may have been one of the most athletic white basketball players of all time. Um, considering how, how big he was, he's like six, seven, you know? Um, but there's just a huge difference between him and

lebron james lebron james could quite possibly be the most athletic person we've ever seen um these are just observations these are just i'm not trying to like stir anything up i just it's just things that i've noticed when i was watching this football game last night and i was thinking okay like more modern times who is the equivalent to lebron you know that matches up size wise strength wise mobility all these different things you got somebody like gronkowski yeah you know gronkowski is very coordinated he's in good shape but he's still not lebron james lebron james is still just you know a mutant he's on another level tim tebow is pretty jacked. Tim Tebow is jacked. Yeah. And Tim Tebow is a hell of an athlete. Uh, NFL wise, he didn't turn into the monster that people, uh, maybe thought that

he would. Some people thought that he wasn't going to turn into anything, but he's one of the greatest college football players of all time. Um, I don't know. It's just, it's a really interesting thing. And it's just, I don't know. I was just. I don't know. I won't get into it too deep because I don't want to throw myself under the bus too much, but it's just, I don't know, just the way things are, I guess. Yeah. Anyway, Andrew and I benched with some chains last night, some heavy-ass chains. Each chain weighs 20 pounds. So what I was trying to explain to Andrew when we were doing the workout,

I didn't want to get in his head too much about it, but when you use the chains the way that we did, which we use them for pretty much the entire workout. Now, some people will add chains as they get to a certain weight. We decided. Oh, whoa. That was Eminem. Eminem came charging in. Hold on. That was sick.

Do that again. I don't know. I had the audio up. I don't think people heard that. I think just you heard that. Oh, anyway. So, yeah, we were using some chains and the chains help to accommodate resistance. And the way that we were using them, we used them for the most of the workout.

And the chains, excuse me, I just ate some breakfast. By accommodating resistance, you get more weight at the top, less weight at the bottom. It can help with acceleration. It can help with speed training. It can help with all kinds of things, but basically the weights are deloaded at the bottom. The weights are lighter at the bottom and they're heavier at the top. And so you could take advantage of this. You know, if you have the ability to use bands or use chains and when the weights are lighter at the bottom, it's, uh, it can feel really good on your body. Um, because when the weights are heavy all the way through the range of motion, sometimes it starts to kill your elbows and

shoulders and different things. And so we, um, you know, we decided yesterday to, to use the chains to accommodate resistance. And, uh uh and we went after it we went for it yesterday and uh i ended up uh with a pretty big weight but um what happens during the workout is when you use the chains for most of the workout and you're not adding them as you go you get fatigued really fast and i didn't want to like set and up for failure, but I was kind of just like letting him know ahead of time, like, you know, your best bench is, um, he's around 200 pounds or so. You're not going to bench, uh, you know, uh, 200 pounds with the chains on. Cause they're just, it looks like you should be able to do it.

Cause they don't, they don't seem like they're that heavy. Yeah. But when you start to add it up each chain is 20 pounds and when you do on rack the weight there's probably 35 and depending you know depending on arm length and stuff probably almost 35 extra pounds on there and i think you handled what 185 i did 185 and then so a chain on each side and you did 185 for um i think you did for two reps right for a double yeah yeah so 185 and it's it's did it for two reps, right? You did it for a double, yeah. Yeah, so 185, and it's actually, each chain is 20 pounds. So it's an additional like 30, 40 pounds.

You kind of add that up. The cool thing is, is that's more weight than you've ever bench pressed before. Correct, yeah. Which is awesome. I mean, I did 225 with the slingshot on, so that was cool. But what was awesome about the chains is right you don't really actually know what it's gonna what it is really so if you would have told me hey you're about to do 225 at the top i would have got really really worried i would have got nervous and i would have felt like i was gonna get stuck but with the chains it coming off at

the bottom you can really like load up and shoot that shit off like a rocket. Yeah. You can kind of accelerate into it. Cause again, the weights are lighter at the bottom. Right. You know, some people get all bent out of shape about the different techniques and different styles of training that you use. I've always been a huge proponent of why not use everything? You know, I think, I think just about everything is effective, um, unless you're just being foolish. Um, but even then I've seen a lot of people become really, really strong from using what I would consider foolish training methods, um, almost despite themselves.

Now that can be confusing because sometimes, you know, some of the best guys have these really weird methods. I actually remember one one one lifter in particular sharing with other lifters that whenever he got injured he would inject the injury with tren and then he said he would be fine and i was like i okay i'm like that doesn't you know there's there's no scenario that makes any sense at all um Um, but I mean, it works for that particular person and, you know, then go for it. You're just hating on bro science again. I know. Uh, somebody was asking, what about speed work for a beginner? Do you think that's a good idea? So when I think about our

workouts that Andrew and I are doing, Andrew is, is a beginner. Um, especially when it comes to powerlifting, it comes to strength training. You're relatively new to it all. So when I think about our training, I'm not just thinking about myself. Um, you know, that, and that's why we started out with benching yesterday. Uh, there's no more important thing that you can do than to figure out how can you handle the most amount of weight. That's why bench presses, squats, and deadlifts are so effective. Clean and jerk, snatches, front squats, overhead squats, all those lifts are great, but they won't allow you to use a great amount of weight because they're so challenging. They're so hard. For a more advanced lifter, it's important to find stuff that's really

hard and awkward to do all the way to the point where if you squat 405, you want to find stuff that's really hard and awkward to do all the way to the point where if you squat 405 you want to find something that is so challenging that you can only use like 135 pounds for it so but as a beginner lifter you're looking for the opposite you really don't want to like always be pre-fatigued going into an exercise sometimes it's good that and that's why we do it sometimes and if you kind of notice it's almost like every other week. Like kind of every other week where we're kind of overloading something. The situation with your lower back and stuff is a little different because I'm trying to get a lot of volume into your back. And that's just going to take a little bit of time to build some

of that up. But basically to answer that guy's question, I don't think that speed training is great for newer lifters, um, where it can be effective. The standard 10 sets of two or 10 sets of three from Westside barbell is you can work on your form technique. You can work on your, I'm sorry, your form and your technique. You can work on, um, practicing perfectly and lifting the weight with precision. So it gives you an opportunity to think about the weight and um in my book jacked and tan that i'm actually working on right now that is uh turning out to be many many pages long probably like 300 pages long

um it explains in there that i think that for newer lifters it's a little bit better to utilize speed training um um, to utilize the methods and to utilize, to apply some of the principles of speed training, but just to call it something different, because I don't think it's a great idea to try to go fast, to try to sprint when you haven't really learned how to jog yet. You know, that's kind of the way that I'm looking at it is, is from that perspective. So, um, I, I just don't think that speed training would be the best usage of your time. Um, although it can be, um, it can be really effective. Um, and again, my, my main thing is like, use those sets

and use those reps, uh, more for practice than anything else. If you want to really follow the West side barbell program, then i would that would be how i would do it i wouldn't have the speed day be like 50 i would call it more of a practice day and i would use uh 50 to 60 and i'd move a little bit slower on purpose makes sense because you don't want to try to you know if you basically basically here here's the truth of it. So somebody that can bench press 500 pounds can take 135 pounds with some bands on there and go absolutely crazy with it to the point where you're like, oh my God, that guy just went nuts with that weight. And he benched it three times and it was like insanely fast.

Now, somebody that benches, um, 315 take that same weight and it will just move a lot slower. So one guy is, is getting, is very productive with it because he's very efficient at moving the weight to a speed that is necessary for him to make progress. And the other guy is moving a lot slower. And so therefore, it's not the greatest usage of your time to always focus in on speed training, especially if you're a newer lifter. Yeah, I'd imagine just as a new lifter, just trying to get the proper technique is going to be way more impactful than worrying

about speed work. Yeah. Yeah. And, and again, that's how you can utilize, you know, Louie Simmons set up the speed day where it's 10 sets of three and there's like a minute rest in between each set. Um, but rather than going like hell, rather than worry about how fast you're going, I would worry about how good your form looks. You know, make every lift perfect. And 10 sets of three is a great way of doing it because if you do three sets of 10 and you try to do lift perfectly, then the amount of weight that you have to use is going to be reduced. And your form will probably break down because you'll get fatigued during the set so 10 sets of three is nice with a minute break in between each set you're you're breaking it up and you're getting three perfect reps three perfect

reps three perfect reps whereas if you did three sets of 10 you might get six perfect reps on each set. Uh, and that would kind of net you out at like around 24 or 24 reps or so rather than, um, you know, or, or 18, 18 reps somewhere in there rather than, rather than you, uh, you know, hitting out 30, you know, 30 really solid reps. And so you want to make sure that you are, you know, honing in on that form and technique. Um, something that I, you know, did yesterday too. And part of the reason why I did it is last week when I mentioned 405 for three, the internet, the haters, they said that that wasn't enough weight. So that's why I decided to put 40 pounds of chains on there to, uh, show everybody, Hey, I still got some strength and I'm

just building up. You know, I really, I really honestly don't care what people say, but I just think it's funny, you know, so I did a bodybuilding show and people are like, oh, that's cool. You know, he's going to get in shape and then they watch and it's like two weeks later and they're like, oh, he thinks he's cool. He thinks he has abs. And then four weeks go by and they're like, oh wait, he kind of cool. He thinks he has abs. And then four weeks go by and they're like, oh, wait, he kind of does have abs. And then six weeks go by and then finally the eight weeks went by and they ain't got nothing to say anymore, right?

So what's next? And, yeah, I know. And then, yeah, everyone's like, what's next, what's next? And, you know, I feel like Doug Flutie, when he played football, it was like he could never get a starting position but every time he played he won every time every he had to prove himself over and over again i feel like i just get stuck in this mode it's probably my own fault it's probably my own thinking um no one else probably really cares that much but you know i feel strong i feel good i'm going

to continue to push that i'm going to continue to get a little bit bigger and get a little bit more swole, uh, for the next couple of weeks. And then, you know, it'd be time to kind of cut everything back up again. But, um, you know, I, I just, it's just weird. You know, I see people that are like, Oh, you know, I don't know, like he's not, he lost so much strength and it's like, I don't know what you were following before. Um, yeah, I did used to rep 500 for like five reps and stuff, but I'm not, I'm not at that strength anymore, but I'm also, I also haven't trained that way in a long time. You know, like that was, that was a by-product of like 20, 20 years of training and really focused training for months at a time, um, focused eating, focused, focused sleeping on

just that one thing. And, uh, you know, now I'm kind of, I was coming off some injuries and I was coming off the bodybuilding show and now it's kind of focused in back on that strength. And I just like to show people like, Hey, it's not hard. You focus in on something, you give it the best effort you can. And I don't have any hopes, uh, or even care to get back to the strength that i was that would take too great of an effort and take too long and take too much time just in general but uh i just want to show people like look you can bounce back and forth between these things and it doesn't have to be it doesn't have to be difficult and i think that one thing that's the missing ingredient from most the missing ingredient that i see is just people believing in themselves.

I think that's why America's fat. I think that's why America is riddled with these diseases, heart disease, diabetes. A lot of these things are preventable. A lot of these things are preventable. I even think that a lot of times people's mental health is compromised by the foods that they eat. I'm not saying everybody. I'm not saying all conditions. But you look at a guy like, is it Jordan Peterson is his name?

Yeah, I look at a guy like jordan peterson extremely intelligent guy um he you know packs out some uh some huge facilities uh when he goes and speaks but uh he's a doctor very knowledgeable but he didn't have the knowledge to know that his eating was causing this giant cascade of problems uh that kind of messed up everything and then his own child kind of went through something similar and her circumstances were even worse and i'm not saying everything's always preventable but now he does the carnivore diet and he's you know he thinks everything's a lot better and um it's belief you know he at some point he didn't believe that that was true, or otherwise he would have done it, or he didn't believe that it would work for him, or he didn't believe that he could

actually do it. People are fat, and people are not acting on the things that they should be doing. Something that you should be doing, it's a very powerful word when somebody says should and could and, and, and would, um, like, you know, if you know, going for a walk is healthy, then why aren't you going for a walk? You know, an apple a day, fill in the blank, an apple a day, right? Like whoever made that statement, um, whether it's an apple, it doesn't really matter. The apple can represent, uh, whatever you think is healthy, right? But just some sort of practice or recognition of you need to eat healthy every day,

you know, you know, some, somewhere in the day, you got to have something at least halfway healthy or at least need to be mindful of your health and nutrition every day. You know, so it's, you know, what if a comment like that, an apple a day, what if a comment like that is actually true? And then nobody's doing, you know. It's so obvious and right in front of us and we never did it. Right. And it's just because of people's belief. There's people that are like, I don't really believe that. I don't really buy that.

I know, you know, my grandma used to have Jolly Ranchers every day and she barely ate. And she lived till she was 107 and she smoked. And it's like, okay, well, you know, and that's what, like things that people see uh change their beliefs and then the thing the things that people want to believe they're going to kind of just lean towards that more they're going to say oh oprah said it's okay that i'm not losing weight so i'm going to kind of believe her it's okay for me to continue to eat bread you know it's okay for me to kind of you know i should just be proud of myself i should just be happy with myself and all those things are great but they're not going to help you lose weight.

They're not going to help you make the change that is necessary for you to head in the right direction. You putting on the extra chains on the 400-pound bench just reminds me of Dr. Dre when he's saying, now everybody want to talk about guns like I ain't got none. What, you think I sold them all? People want to talk about't got none. What, you think I sold them all? People want to talk about me pushing weight. What, you think I don't work hard? That's right. Watch this, motherfucker.

That's right. That's right. So that's all I could think of when you were saying that. Because it's like, yeah, this is what we do. We're going to lift heavy weights. That's what we do. That's what we believe in. And that's what we'll always go back to.

What's next? People keep saying, what's next kind of thing. And it's not even what's next. It's what we'll always go back to. What's next? You know, people keep saying what's next kind of thing and that's, it's not even what's next, it's what's been always, you know, it's kind of the old adage too of like, you know, you don't, you don't, you don't ever worry about getting ready, you're just ready all the time, you know,

and I feel, I feel I'm pretty ready all the time to kind of go one way or the other, whether it be, you know, and I, I feel, I feel I'm pretty ready all the time to kind of go one way or the other, uh, whether it be, you know, getting leaner and getting stronger, um, or, you know, being flexible, uh, in everything, in everything that you do. You know, um, I was listening to something the other day, let's talk about Benjamin Franklin and everybody knows Benjamin Franklin is, uh, on a hundred dollar bill, first of all. And everybody knows, you know, he's associated with electricity and all that good stuff. But Ben Franklin was like one of the first people to talk about like kind of self-motivation. he would put, he would put these reports, he'd put this information within, uh, within these reports about, about crops. Cause that's all people cared about at the time. So he put this information, uh, it would say like the weather, you know, it'd say that there's different reports

and he'd put the information in there and he just had, you know, he just had these, these different thoughts about, you know, how just had these, these different thoughts about, you know, how people can, how people can work on, um, being better. And one of the things he said is your life needs to be plastic. You know, your life needs to be bendable. Your life needs to be, uh, flexible. And that's somebody who's, you know, talking from a long ass time ago. Oh, you know, that's, that's not's not somebody from you know that's not somebody saying something from uh an instagram post yeah it's not a not a more modern you know instagram post um a couple other things he said that i thought was amazing like um and i know that we talk about

these things all the time but i feel like they can't be talked about enough because I, again, I, I think that your beliefs are a really important thing. And I think the things that you could be doing and the things that you should be doing, um, that you're not doing, um, is something that you need to internalize. You need to figure out why aren't you doing it? You, uh, take a couple semesters at a local junior college because you want to be better at photography or you want to learn something about music or whatever. And then you don't even go to the classes or you're not even studying or whatever the case is. I mean, there's just so many different things. I deal with a lot of people and know a lot of people that won't make the leap to change jobs. I won't make the leap to change jobs i won't make the leap to move somewhere i won't make the leap to um just do something to to make to spark a change in their life um you know i have a friend

who's very successful and he's like i just want to quit my job and i just you know i'd rather just be a coach somewhere and and i'm like i don't understand why you don't. Right. And he's like, I make a lot of money. I'm like, uh, yes, you make a lot of money, but you have made a lot of money. So forget about your job. Go in there and tell him that you quit and figure out everything else from there. You'll be totally fine. People get so scared though.

Yeah. I mean, it's it makes sense it makes sense because you're the rationale is is like well i won't have that income anymore maybe i won't be able to live the same lifestyle but really not a lot of things will really change um you know if you were smart now if you were blowing your money that's kind of different you know if you're really spending some money and you don't but a lot of people don't, aren't in the position that I'm in where like, I have so much money out the door all the time because of the business that I run. Um, he's not in that, he, he's not in that situation. He, he actually just works for somebody else. So he's been able to accumulate money. And so he should be totally

fine to be able to, know make make that pivot um life's too short you know life's too short to not figure out what it is you want to do life's too short um for these kind of bullshit conversations with people you don't care about you know it really is like you know you go to a family gathering at christmas and you know it really is like you know you go to family gathering at christmas and you see uncle so-and-so and he's like hey mark like hey bill and then you both just sit there and it's all awkward and weird and like hey you still uh got that little gym thing going on or it's like oh my god i just want to just want to clothesline this guy i get it all the time you're still taking pictures and stuff yeah and stuff yeah why does it always seem so derogatory it really does it does for some reason

it's like uh maybe it's our own like internal thing that we're doing or maybe it's just them i mean i've i've met people you know and be like oh well what do you do and i'm like oh i'm a photographer oh like no you don't understand like i i do it like every single day yeah that's cool like no you like i just bought a house like we're doing really well and then at that point i'm like well i'm not trying to brag but like like you know it's like a cool job yeah like you don't get it uh okay cool like no i'm not hashtag entrepreneur you know like i don't actually work yeah like oh guy doesn't have a job he's an artist yeah exactly yeah that's that's the feeling i i get and i'm just like no you don't understand like i work that's a weird thing too because, why did someone even ask? What would get them excited? Right.

You know, I'm a writer. They would probably go, oh. You write poems in the park. Cool. You're a writer. What would spark them? What would get them fired up, you know? Yeah, it is a weird thing.

It's like, why the fuck did you even ask me in the first place? I think maybe just, like, if you were to say, oh, I'm a doctor. Oh, no shit. It's like, you make a lot of money i think maybe i like a dollar sign attached to it right yeah you're a lawyer they kind of think something is automatically yeah they they just automatically have assumptions right yeah some of the other things that i was looking at when I was listening to this thing, um, that, uh, Ben Franklin was saying, um, you know, he talked about, uh, happiness and how happiness comes to be. And, you know, people talk about success and then they get kind of confused and people say success and money are like separate things. And they, they're not really actually, uh, success and money go hand in hand in a lot of, in a lot of ways because the success and, uh, finances can

help with financial freedom, which can help with happiness in a lot of ways. So what we're really looking for all the time is we're really looking for progress and we're looking for, we're looking for being happy. Usually if you progress, usually you're happy, right? looking for being happy. Usually if you progress, usually you're happy, right? If you make progress in something, then you feel good. If he did a better job at something this week than he did last week. Uh, and someone says, Hey, that's a job well done. And you know, that's a job well done. You're like, hell yeah, that feels great. That's awesome. And then sometimes you get rewarded financially for it right and

you're like well shit this is this is awesome like i i learned more um i'm more efficient i'm doing things faster just because i learned more and now i'm getting rewarded for it like it didn't maybe necessarily take you sometimes it takes you more time but it didn't necessarily cost you uh any more time sometimes it's just because you became like you but it didn't necessarily cost you any more time. Sometimes it's just because you became like, you became a lot more efficient since you started here. You know, you're able to do a lot more things. So you become more valuable as we move along. Right. And you're, you know, trying to figure out, you know, ways of, of being happy ways of being satisfied. And that's when you start to hear people talk about like the work life balance.

And that's, you know, some of the stuff I think is kind of dumb because, um, it, it, it shouldn't be, it should be stuff that your, your subconscious mind, it should be stuff that's like on your radar all the time. Like I worked three days in a row and I have not been around my family at all. And, uh, I need to get my ass back home. Like it should be, it should be on your mind,

uh, because you want to be with your family because you enjoy your family. Um, it shouldn't be, it shouldn't be like, oh shit. Oh, I got to schedule the family in there too, because that's what I'm supposed to do. So it's not, it shouldn't be, it shouldn't be like, oh shit, oh, I got to schedule the family in there too, because that's what I'm supposed to do. So it's not, it's not a, it's not a like

supposed to do or have to do it. So I want to do type of thing, which when it's a priority, what happens? You make it happen. It happens, right? It doesn't just happen. You find a way to make it happen. Yeah. You find a way to make it happen yeah yeah you find a way to make it happen and sometimes you do have to schedule like you know if we're talking relationship wise then yeah you do need to go out of your way to schedule uh date night and stuff especially if you have a kid you got to figure out you know what are we gonna do with the kid where are they where are they gonna be at which what are we doing with them um and uh is it is it a family outing or is it just the two of us or you know some of these things get more complicated and they do need to be, uh, scheduled.

But the way I hear people talking about it kind of sounds to me like they'd rather be doing their job rather than be home. And then it's like, well, you might have, uh, you might need to slow down a little bit with your job, or you might need to have a conversation, because there might be something a little bit different going on than what you think. Maybe your goal's got a hold of you. I'd say just watch the movie Click. Yeah, there you go. Have you seen it with Adam Sandler? Yeah.

Oh, my gosh. So I've seen it before, like when you know, when it first came out or whatever, but we watched it over the weekend and it hit me way different this time around. I was like, oh my gosh. So after watching that, I've been actually trying to, you've been healed. Yeah. But no, I've been, I've been there too. Like, I mean, last night after we trained, I wanted to finish up some work before I went home. So I ended up, I text my girl too. I mean, last night after we trained, I wanted to finish up some work before I went home. So I texted my girl and I'm like, hey, pack up and head out now and work a little bit at home or finish everything right now. So that way by the time I get home, I don't have to even look at a computer.

And so we both agreed to just let traffic pass and then finish up whatever I had left. And then went home and we watched Ozark. Nice. How do you like that show? It's, the first season was a little slow, but then it ramps up really hard. Second season is insane. It's on season two?

Yeah. It's really good so far. A lot of craziness happening, but. I gotta check it out because I need, I could use it i could use a show i don't have any shows right now i mean i got some football i've been watching some football so that's been that's been awesome yeah i tried showing my dad an episode of uh daredevil and he was like all into it and then i look over and he's passed out of sleep

i look over like oh he's gonna love this part and he's going to love this part. And he's snoring. Like, you're so old. That's where I get it from. Man, there's nothing better than getting that snooze. But as you know from reading the book that you're reading, sleep and food. Sleep, food, phone. Sleep, food, phone over and over again. Those are the three major problems not not not terrorism uh it's not race wars it's not it's sleep food and your phone

i agree uh because one thing that i that i actually really worry about i think that um and i don't want to scare the shit out of everybody but i i really think that something something really horrible is going to happen through social media. Because there's been, in our history, there's been people that have led people to do horrific things. You know, sometimes in small groups and sometimes in pretty large groups. You know, you got like the Waco incident from years ago. You got like Charlie Manson from years ago. And on a larger scale, you got like the Waco incident from years ago. You got like Charlie Manson from years ago. And on a larger scale, you got someone like Hitler, right?

Well, can these quote unquote influencers that are on the internet and on Instagram, can they influence people to make bad choices? Can they influence somebody to throw a brick through the window of your house? Absolutely. I think they can. Yeah. And that's scary because maybe they can't do it to you and I because maybe we're like a little older,

but they can do it to a younger generation. Start getting those 14, 15, 17-year-old kids pissed off and you might think they're just kids. Those fuckers are strong, man. Those kids can do some damage. The amount of what they were able to do and conjure up when they were frustrated with all the school shootings and everything they ended up having one of the biggest um uh ended up having one of the biggest rallies like in the history

of america um just these 14 year old kids that were pissed that their school got shot up. And, um, you know, that, that was magnificent. That's actually positive. But I think that, and, but my point is, is that was all through social media. They were able to get the backing, uh, through social media. And I think it just, I don't know. I think something, something insane. And then there's like artificial intelligence. There's other things that can kind of factor in there that can make everything a hundred times worse.

Yeah. You got to check out Black Mirror. It's just, I think each season's only like maybe six episodes, but none of the episodes have anything to do with each other. But it's exactly what you're saying. It's like all like technology and social media turning bad on us. And like it gets crazy. Like I think you'll really like it, especially if you don't have time to like really dig into a whole like. Check it out.

Yeah. I started out season one, episode one, because as they get more popular, the production value goes way up. But it doesn't necessarily mean it gets better it's just more cool visuals and stuff but the original stuff is like uh all from the uk and uh it just it's it's exactly what you just said it's like really eye-opening like oh shit this could happen right you know and some of it's already happening right now with like uh like stupid like the ice bucket challenge or whatever. Like what if it was, I don't know, something.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, what if, yeah. Well, what if, uh, people didn't realize that like one out of every 10 people could have a heart attack from something like that? You know, like, I mean, it could be something like that could be, uh, detrimental, you know? And, you know, I think people are, are on social media, um, because it becomes addicting. I think they're, you know, they're on there and they're trying to like get something that they're, you never actually get your cup filled up, you know, if you will, you never get,

you never really get fulfilled on there. And I think that you think that you are, it just never really happens. Um, and if it does happen then it's like oh on to the next one like you might have a goal like i want i would be so cool if i got like a thousand likes that'd be kind of fun right you know from this particular picture or this particular thing that i did and then you get a thousand likes and it's like that lasts for you know it lasts for 30 seconds and then you see somebody else got 1500 likes or whatever, or there's a damaging comment on there and you're sad and it never really does for you what you want it to do. And I think that a lot of people don't recognize, uh, how addicting it really is.

And another, I think another thing too, is I don't think that people recognize that it is, it is taking over, like raising our children in some way. You know, if you look at, uh, television, you know, television used to be kind of guilty of that. And that's, people would be like, you can't sit in front of TV for hours on end. And a lot of kids would sit in front of the television forever, but there's only so much the TV could do. There's quite a bit of restriction on the television. Uh, there's no nudity, less profanity. You know, nowadays you can kind of find whatever you want to find on TV almost, right?

But it's still not the internet. You know, the internet is a really deep, dark, could turn into a really deep, dark hole in some respects. And so I just think everybody just needs to just just like your health just like your fitness everyone just needs to be aware of it yeah take note yeah i'm really digging the uh the screen time app on the new new ios 12 because like i'll be looking at my phone and i'll send it a warning hey you got five minutes left of instagram how many minutes does it allot you per day you can do whatever you want so i i did 30 minutes just to see so my goal was to end input oh well 30 minutes and then if i don't get close to it

drop it down to 25 and kind of like try to hit a pr every day yeah but man at 30 minutes like if i'm doing probably burns up quick dude one poop and it's done you know but it's really eye-opening because i'm like oh shit like it's not even lunchtime and i'm done with my social media stuff so but it like i said it's a huge eye-opener and it's really helping because like uh get into bed or whatever and it's like oh let me see what's going on and oh wait i can't look at it i guess i'm going to bed and then at nine o'clock my whole phone shuts down like Like I can't view anything except for text and phone calls or whatever. If I have to make them. Other than that, I have to input my PIN number, which is obviously I know it and it's easy.

But I have to make the conscious effort to be like, I'm going to be a shithead right now and not go to sleep and put in my code to give myself permission to look at, you know, Instagram or whatever. Yeah. When I'm supposed to be sleeping and I want to sleep because I have a goal to be bigger and stronger. Right. Right. And then it's like, well, okay, now we're really pulling against like 17 different things at once. And that's, that's kind of my point, you know, kind of is that people will make the right decision if there's enough good options there. And what you did with your phone is a good option. And then it presents you with

a lot of things where you're smart enough to understand, like, this is not a good idea. You know, I, I set this up this way. This wasn't, it wasn't preset by somebody else. I set this up this way. It wasn't preset by somebody else. I set it up this way. And now I'm not following my own rules my own way that I wanted to do. And now I'm going to impede on my sleep. I just spent time reading and studying this book about sleep. I have the knowledge. I have the understanding. And I believe in a lot of the things that Matthew Walker shared.

And now I'm going to be going against that um you know mark tells me i need to get sleep to hit the gym hard i already know that i need sleep because i've been there before when i haven't had a lot of sleep and it sucked and i want to squat big tomorrow and i want to be able to pull big and i want to be able to do all these things and it's just it mounts up mounts up. But I think that when the things, when the things that you're trying to do, um, that are harmful, if it stacks up against you in a negative way, you won't do it, you know, or if it stacks up in a way that doesn't look convenient, you'll go, oh, okay. I got it.

You know, like, um, for example, if you're at, uh like i go to phil's coffee in davis now they actually have nowadays they have some decent food options at phil's but let's just say i'm hungry and i'm leaving phil's i'm starving and i see there's a pizza place right across the street and i'd be like oh man i should go get pizza well what if i went there and i had a prepped meal with me you know and and the and I, the conversation to myself might be, ah, you know what? I don't feel like eating the steak and rice. It's cold. You know, the food's cold. I don't have anywhere to heat it up. It would be nice to get a pizza, right? It's still pulling on me. Right. But I can say, well, you know, you also packed a cheese

stick and an apple and you could just eat that. And then you can wait till you get home and you can cook your stuff up there, or you can get to work and you can microwave stuff at work. And then, so it's like you have options that are not hard to do. They're not, and it's not hard to do at all. It's actually harder and would take longer to sit there and wait for the pizza and to be fat and,

and to know that when you eat the pizza yeah it's going to taste really good but you're also going to have a lot of regret when you're when you're eating it yeah and i uh you know people need a good dose of like self-love they need to not allow themselves to harm themselves um if you if you knew a really good friend was playing with fire and they were doing something really dumb, they were drinking a lot and then they started, you know, and you're like, dude, how'd you get home? And they're like, well, I just drove. You'd be like, Hey man, like, okay, that's, you can't be doing that.

Like you could kill yourself. You could kill somebody, somebody else. I mean, uh, why are you doing that? Right. And you need to have that conversation with yourself. Like, Hey, fatso, like why, why, why are you indulging on that pizza? Like, don't do it. Like, it's not good for your health. It's not good for your goals. It's not what you want to do. I'm not talking about if it's a cheat day and you put in a really good week of

eating and it's, it's a, it's a freebie because everybody deserves those. But I'm talking about just a breakdown, you know, um, during the week and the conversations that you should have with yourself to avoid those, like don't allow it to happen. Uh, my wife went to a meeting the other day and she brought some like prepped food with her and she was like, everyone's going to give me shit. Cause I'm gonna like pull food out of my bag meanwhile everybody's eating uh guadalajara which is amazing by the way yeah but she just knew there's gonna be junk there and uh she didn't want to participate in that so she like whipped out her food you know but i think that people should take pride in that like no fuck you i'm not i don't eat what you eat. Yeah.

Like, you're eating that? What are you doing eating that? Like, why are you eating that bullshit? I don't eat that way. Well, what do you eat? Here's what I eat. I eat potatoes and steak or whatever it is, you know? And it's just, to me, it just shows you got a leg up on somebody. There's nothing negative about it at all.

It's all positive, really. Yeah. My girlfriend's dad invited us to go have pizza the other night and it's one of those like awesome build your own pizzas like unlimited toppings whatever you want they have you know stuffed crust like all the way through the pizza not just in the like the end of the pizza and i was like ah like dude but we can't eat that come on guys let's go and i was like well there's poke around the corner you guys can have that and we'll go get poke and so when we brought

it in everyone's like wait what is that and then it's like you they can see like how fresh it was and yeah it's colorful and it didn't take anything away from their meal, but it did feel pretty good to be in a really good pizza place because pizza is my jam, but be happier to be eating something healthier. So that was like a, I think both of us, we felt like that was a huge win. Oh, that's great. Yeah. I mean, it's, you know, it goes against the grain, you know, it goes against exactly, you know, what was kind of, you know, in front of you. And it's important, you know, it goes against the grain, you know, it goes against exactly, you know, what, what was kind of, you know, in, in front of you. And it's, it's important, you know, it's also important to, you know, have periods of time where you are not on the gas pedal so hard, but you gotta be,

you know, you gotta be a little bit careful of some of that. But, um, we always talk, you know, all the time about consistency. Yeah. And so if you're being consistent, you know, uh, for long periods of time, I think there's usually, you know, about these situations, like the pizza thing, like you kind of knew about it. So you can talk to yourself about it before you get there. And you can say, you know what, there's gonna be pizza there. I don't want to have pizza. I know that I want to do something else. And then you could Google, Oh, there's something right around the corner. Maybe we'll try to go there instead. there i don't want to have pizza i know that i want to do something else and then you could google oh there's something right around the corner maybe we'll try to go there instead of falling

into this pit of eating the pizza at thanksgiving at christmas at these different times a year you know that grandma's gonna make something or your aunt's gonna make something that they make it every year and you love it well that's the time to eat that shit you know that's the time to say you know what i don the time to say, you know what? I don't want to hurt her feelings. I don't want to be a bad sport. I'm diving in. I mean, why not?

Somebody makes it once a year. They make these special meatballs or whatever the hell it is. Just freaking eat it and get it over with. Meatballs. Marinara, mozzarella. were with you know meatballs marinara mozzarella dude does anybody make something that you absolutely can't not eat um because it's too fat just because yeah because you're too fat and it's too good um no not really i i like my my i mean my mom makes really good meatballs um and she cooks

them in uh in some souse and cooks them uh with some um like sausage in the sauce and then it's like this boilie fat like conglomeration of amazingness yeah um and uh i mean when she makes them i just eat them this is too good to be true but i mean i'm sure it's clogging every artery you know and i'm sure it's it's causing a lot of uh probably a lot of permanent damage right going back to sleep i guess it's uh it's been shown proven everything because a lot of people want to catch up on sleep you know it's like i proven everything because a lot of people want to catch up on sleep you know it's like I'm gonna have a workout hard workout tomorrow but it's okay I'm gonna get rest that night or whatever it it's been proven that you get more benefit from sleeping a lot more

the night before a workout then after a workout so the the performance boost you get from the sleep the night before is better than the recovery you get the night after. That's not saying that the night after is bullshit and you can skip it. But if you're going to really double down on one night, it's going to be the night before the workout. Yeah. You know, it all makes sense. And being prepared is something we talk about a lot in this podcast and stuff too.

And actually, let's see, yesterday, yeah, yesterday I wanted to come, I knew I wanted to get here at an early enough time so we could finish our workout so I could get home, I could recharge, I can eat, I can do my walk, I can take my shower, I can do everything I need to do, and I can be prepped to get here at 6 a.m. for our squats. And so, you know, I got here at 2 and we got through everything. And I got home and rifled through everything. But before I came here, I took like about a 25-minute nap, 30-minute nap, somewhere in there. It actually might have even been longer.

But I was like, you know, I was like, I want to get to the gym early. But, man, I know that if I get a nap now, that'll be really productive for tomorrow. And that's what I was thinking. I wasn't even that tired. But I also knew like, hey, if I lay down, I'll probably pass out, you know. And so that's what I did. And it ended up helping today, you know. I mean, I was still, I woke up know? And so that's what I did. And it ended up helping today. You know, I mean, I was still, I woke up at four, so still don't feel amazing, but, um, you know,

it, it helped. Nice. It helped to get that little extra snooze in there. I normally don't ever have time for a nap. So, you know, um, I wish I had more time. What does the book talk about naps? Um, very beneficial. Um, we actually have, uh have our daughter when she's studying for a test and keep in mind she's only in fifth grade but when she's studying for a test we'll have her study and then take a nap and then take the test and it's been so beneficial because what it does is it takes memory from short-term memory and converts it into long-term memory when you sleep. Some brain connect whatever.

So she just basically needs to, she doesn't take the test necessarily right after napping. She just has to nap after she studies. Correct. Yeah. So earlier this week, she took a nap after working on her spelling. And then two days later, she aced the test. And she's been having a hard time with test taking. She got 100%.

Nice. Which is huge. We're celebrating and stuff. Other than that, in some countries, I think, I don't remember. Well, another country. Right. Where they completely shut down the entire like city for everyone to take their siesta so they'll take a 90 minute nap so this is where i was telling

you and andy about matthew walker recommending a 90 minute nap it's just because it's been shown that they just live healthier longer not necessarily like they're not living to 200 but like at at 85 they're healthier than we are without taking midday naps so it yeah it's it shows a lot of benefit in taking a midday nap however if you are having a hard time sleeping throughout the night taking a nap after like two o'clock is a horrible idea because you're not going to want to be able to fall asleep. Oh yeah. Yeah. Especially if you take too long of a nap. Correct.

Yeah. Usually it seems like, uh, kind of, uh, unless you have like real sleep problems and you got like apnea and stuff. Um, it seems like whatever time you lay down for and get up from like seems appropriate,

you know, like, um, it may not feel, it may not always feel great, but it seems like somewhere in that 20 to 40 minute time frame seems seems pretty good and that's normally what i kind of conk out for and you kind of talked about like your body having like an internal clock

and knowing the time i mean i i'm really in tune with it i think part of the reason is we have a an alarm clock that shoots the number up on the ceiling and so i get to i can see the number uh kind of all the time so like i'll go to the bathroom and i see it's like 1 30 and i'm like okay i'm waking up at five like okay you know go back to bed and if i wake up you know at four or something to pee again then i'm like okay i got another hour right but but i i think i've kind of always had that too because i I've never really needed an alarm clock to wake up. Um, except for on some occasions where I wake up really early. Um, I might have it just to like, you know, I would used to set it just to make sure I'd wake up. I, now I don't even bother to set it because I don't want the, you know, I don't want

the anxiety of knowing that it's going to go off and then waking up because that kind of wakes you up in a panic too. Yeah. And leads to heart attacks, unfortunately. Yeah. And every time you hit snooze and you fall asleep and you wake up again, it's the same reaction as like a heart attack. And I do it all the time. Like I'll hit snooze three times and it's like, dude, I just survived three heart attacks this morning. Right.

And then I expect to like, you know, function after that. Like it's really bad. It's kind of the same thing of like getting up in a rush down in a bunch of coffee. Like your body's not really designed for. Yeah. But once you do it, once you start to do it, once you start to get into that habit, it feels like you need to do it all the time. And, uh, there's a lot of science, a lot of research too, showing like, if you make yourself accountable and just wake up earlier all the time. And, uh, there's a lot of science, a lot of research too, showing like, if you make yourself accountable and just wake up earlier all the time, you'll figure almost everything else out and think things like coffee and these different things. You start to kind of learn like waking up at 5.00 AM is just waking up at 5.00 AM. Like it doesn't, coffee doesn't really, it doesn't even

make a dent. It doesn't come close. The only thing that's going to help is if you go to bed earlier. And so that's why I try to recommend to people, you know, set your alarm at night to get yourself to bed. If you're going to have any sort of alarm or alert or whatever you want to call it. I put something on my phone. It's at 730 and I don't go to bed at 730. I'd probably go to bed at 830, but I know at 730, I can kind of look at that and be like, okay, now it's time to figure out, you know, am I going on a 20 minute walk or did I get that done already? Do I need a shower? Like, what do I need to do to make sure that I'm in bed at the right time?

Because that's what I've learned. It takes me like everything takes me a long time. Takes me like two hours to get out of my house. I don't know why. There's nobody's nobody's in the way it's nobody's fault just me but it takes me forever if you just called me and i was like you know just coming from getting out of a shower or something and you're like hey man i need you at the gym it'd take me two hours unless you like for unless it's like emergency then i you know it's going to take me forever but i know that about myself i know how long these things take i'm going to eat i'm going to poop i'm going to make sure i have everything with me and it's just uh anyway you can get yourself back on track

very easy by just trying to wake up earlier so and and another thing too anybody who's having a really hard time staying asleep sleeping is like training and you need to treat it as such. Sleeping is like eating. You're not going to be good at it at first. Somebody says, hey, you know what, man, you got to really clean up your diet. And you're like, okay, what do I need to eat? And they give you a list of food. And, you know, day one, you stop at whole foods and you get a rotisserie chicken and,

and then you buy some rice cakes and then the rotisserie chicken's cold later in the day and you don't want to eat it. And you're like, oh, I don't want to. And you make some weird choices because you don't know what you're doing, but somebody told you to eat chicken. They told you to eat rice and you're trying to figure out these things as you go along well you spent all this money on this rotisserie chicken from whole foods you spent money on buying some other things from there but now you're trying to you know roll through in and out burger because you're trying to get the flying dutchman because you're trying to eat low carb or whatever the case is but you kind of get my point You don't know what you're about to get yourself into yet. You don't know how to diet yet. You don't know what you're doing. And so think about when you're, think about when a kid comes to you and they draw something and they say,

Hey, that was a terrible drawing. And, and, and they, and they feel bad about it, right? They're like, I know this is terrible drawing, but you know, here's this anyway. And you're bad about it, right? They're like, I know this is terrible drawing, but here's this anyway. And you're like, okay, well, maybe that's not as good of a drawing as you want. But if you want it to be better, then you have to draw. A kid will pick up drums, right? And they'll start wailing on the drums. Just pounding. Yeah, just pounding on them.

And as they get older, like when they're young, they'll think they're great, right? But as they get older, they'll be like, that was not very good, right? Like, I'm not that good at drums. No, actually, that's not really true. That's not even a fair assessment. You've never really played the drums before. How are you expecting to be good at this? That doesn't make any sense.

I think some of that comes from sports. Because sports, you just grab a ball and then Billy is over there nailing threes and you don't make any sense. I think some of that comes from sports because sports, you just grab a ball and then Billy is over there nailing threes and you don't know what happened. And this other kid's dunking in sixth grade. And you just think that you're bad at a bunch of different stuff that you never even really worked on before, but everything needs to be worked on. If you're going to be a good baseball player, then you need to get your ass in the batting cage.

If you're going to be a good football player, then you need to get your ass in the batting cage. If you're going to be a good football player, then you better be practicing trying to catch. You better be practicing, uh, all the different drills that you need to be a good football player. You better be lifting weights. You better be in good shape. Um, if Jerry Rice had to train really hard to be the best, then that means everybody has to. Right. Yeah. And you know, if know, if you're talking about practicing, but also the preparation, like nobody knows, we all go to sleep, but nobody really thinks about preparing for bed, you know, the way you have your alarm clock to go to bed. Yeah. But like just simple things like, oh, like the cell phone is on the nightstand and I like to read right before I go to bed. That blue light in that cell phone can suppress your serotonin by like 30%. Right.

So by time. You can do stuff through your phone to combat that or it doesn't work? It works, but. What about the glasses? The Dave Asprey weird orange glasses. So those work, but it's just not enough. The best option is just to not do it. My glasses have a blue filter also, but it's just not enough. The best option is just to not do it. My glasses have a blue filter also,

but it's not enough. Can you see my farts then? I didn't want to tell you, but yeah. Oh my God. I've been lighting it up over here. Just to the right of you is all purple right now. It's like the Joker or something. Big ass purple cloud over there.

Yeah. But when your serotonin and your melatonin is suppressed, it actually takes time to build that back up. And by the time it builds back up, the alarm clock is going off. So you're waking up even more tired. And it's not necessarily because you are extra tired. It's just your body is like, well, fuck, man. I've been trying to build up your sleep pressure this whole, all night long now you're trying to get up like the fuck am i doing right um but i think you're supposed to be away from your phone for like an hour or two before

you go to bed that's like kind of the recommendation right i think so yeah he didn't mention anything like that in the book but i mean that's that's a easily easily easily accomplished yeah thing That's an easily accomplished thing. Well, and I also think, too, like, go a little bit by your history. Like, are you struggling to go to sleep? And be honest with that. And also, are you well-rested? Do you feel really good every day?

Or do you crash midday? These are all things that are important to assess. My wife probably does about every single thing that you can imagine, like quote unquote wrong in terms of her sleep. But she, she, I mean, I don't know anybody healthier than, I mean, she's, she's, she's very, very healthy, but she also has been very health conscious for a long time. She also has swam, you know, thousands of miles in her lifetime. Um,

and so maybe she's healthy kind of despite some of her bad habits, like maybe not, you know, because of these, these habits, like she likes to drink and, you know, like drinking is not great for your sleep. Um,

but then she still wakes up at five 30 and still goes swimming and, and kicks everybody's ass when she goes and does it um but anyway if you're somebody that's listening to this and you struggle with your sleep or you know someone that struggles with their sleep you know some of the questions are you know are you tired you know do you feel tired if you feel tired then you're gonna have to start to make some changes and make, just make one change at a time. Don't feel like you got to go in and like, you know, clean house right away. Um, that just is very, it's just usually not very effective. Try to do it like one thing at a time or two really small things at a time. Um, the request to, uh, you know, not look at your phone an hour ahead

of time, I don't think is, uh, I don't think it's too stressful too demanding i think everyone can do that i don't i don't see a real reason to look at your phone um some people like to look at the time glancing at it for a half second probably not gonna kill you um but if you're if you're somebody who fidgets with it you got to put it you got to put it in another room you know you got to you got to get rid of that thing and um something that's helped me a lot is the tape you know taping up your mouth has helped a ton i still want to try it but man i feel like i just won't be able to breathe now you'll be fine my nose is so stuffy at night i think it's because those damn cum trees um you know i have like a little bit different pillow i've been using too a little lately to try to bring my my chin up a little bit i think that i tend to sleep more with my chin down

and uh i sent you a message the other day you know somebody said like when you remember your head is up yeah when you think your head is down um um, there's some people who believe in like all these kinds of yin and yang type of weird things. And some people don't or whatever, but I think that actually makes some sense. And they, they say that your, uh, your kind of storage unit, if you will, is, is in the back, is in the back of your head. It's located and all the, uh, sleep mechanisms and mechanics and everything is located in the back of your head. And so when you go to sleep, the guy recommended like remembering yourself to sleep rather than thinking yourself to sleep.

So if you think about coming in here and kicking some ass, you're trying to have some good positive thoughts about bench press. That'll probably stir you up and give you too much anxiety to really to really fall asleep effectively so instead you try to remember yourself to sleep maybe you remember a really awesome christmas that you had when you were a kid you know everyone has like those things they can pull everyone has things from their past they can pull on that can make them cry in a second right and everybody has those things from the past that they can pull upon and be like that was a freaking that was an amazing day. Like, I will never forget that.

That was so much fun. My uncle took me on a boat and we caught a big fish or whatever it is. Right. But you can all pull on those things. Um, and so, and I, I've been actually messing with it lately and I've been trying to like, remember my way to sleep and I don't have a ton of problems falling asleep. My biggest problem is getting up a lot. And so the mouth tape has helped because it helps your body to produce more CO2 when you're breathing out through your nose. Um, that's what's happening. And so, uh, just from the information I got from what I've seen, it says that that will help your muscles to relax more your body should become paralyzed when you sleep and you should actually kind of feel that sometimes when you

wake up sometimes you should be like oh my god i kind of can't move not because anything like fell asleep or anything like that but it should almost feel kind of numb it should take you a few seconds to be like oh shit like am i still connected legs? Right. And then you start to move around. You're like, okay, good. Everything's still, everything's still working. But when I fall asleep on my sides, my arms will fall asleep. Yeah, my arms fall asleep a lot. And then the other day, both. With your arm up or your arm, oh.

Both arms fell asleep the other day. And then my alarm clock went off and my hands were totally, like, 100% not even mine anymore at that point. So I was fumbling my phone and I just couldn't. My girlfriend's getting pissed because I can't turn it off. I'm like, I'm sorry, I can't get it. And then eventually I just accidentally pushed a button to get it to turn off.

But yeah, no, it's like if my hand's up under the pillow or down, I just can't. Oh, even if your hand is down, it still falls asleep just if you're on your side yeah i think because like i'm real crouched like just hunched over on it yeah it's really uncomfortable i have to figure out what the hell to do i absolutely love to fall asleep face down i fucking i love it i don't know why it calms me down and i just pass right out huh but my arms fall asleep every time. And I actually fucked myself up years ago. I actually think that it was... So when I was going for a 600-pound bench, I benched 555 in the gym.

I think it was for... I think it was for three... I don't remember. Maybe it was three reps. I don't know. Whatever it was. It was huge PR. I smashed it.

Fucking smashed it. It was an awesome day. And it was was huge pr i smashed it fucking smashed it was an awesome day and i was like okay what else can i do in the gym so i don't hurt myself and uh because the meat was getting close and i was like okay well i'll just do like some tricep push-downs or something because i just want kind of a bullshit exercise kind of finish up the day i don't want heavy on it i kind of felt a little thing in my elbow, but I didn't really notice much. And, uh, I did another exercise or two and I was out, out the door. Um, the next night I went to Vegas for something. I can't remember what it was. I remember sleeping face down.

Both my arms fell asleep. And I remember like rolling over, trying to roll over my sleep. And I was like, oh my God, I just rolled over. And my arm was like in this crazy weird position. And I was like, man, that's going to fucking hurt. And then later that day, my elbow started to hurt. It was all jacked up. And as I was prepping for the meet, I couldn't bench anything.

I was like, man, there's something, something's going on with my arm. Something's going on. Talk about fuck your elbow. Right. I was like, something's going on with my arm. I don't know what it is. And, um, anyway, it took me a few weeks and my arm i don't know what it is and um anyway it took me a few weeks and my arm finally recovered and finally healed up but that was kind of the uh the hitch

and the giddy up of the 600 pound bench because i that's what i was going for at the time i went to the meet i blasted up 578 and it it just flew up it looked like everything was going i took 600 out of the rack it felt light and when i went to press it as soon as my arms needed to kind of kick in for it they my on my right side it just wasn't there and then uh i i actually tore my pec but i tore my pec because my elbow was jacked up damn um and it was just a minor tear the spotters grabbed the weight right away and everything but i think it was from my sleep wow i think it was just a minor tear. The spotters grabbed the weight right away and everything. But I think it was from my sleep. Wow. I think it was from just, you know, sleeping weird.

I don't know. What do they say about, like, what position should you sleep in? Didn't say anything about that. At least not that I can remember. Yeah. I forget a lot of shit, but that's funny. Well, because, like, even Shaw was talking about sleeping on his stomach messed him up, too. Like, he couldn't even, he had zero grip.

He couldn't grab a frying pan. He couldn't hold a frying pan. Yeah. If I lay down, if I fall asleep on my stomach, I won't be able to move the next day. That jacks up my back. I'm sure it kills your back. But sleeping on my back hurts, but once I get through the pain, then I'm actually able to pass out. But then I start snoring.

Oh, if you sleep on your back. Yeah. You ever tried putting a towel behind your head? You ever try that? You roll up a towel and it might leave your neck up. I did that the other day for a nap and it worked pretty good. It's under the neck area, not on the head. Yeah. Yeah, like underneath the head. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like, uh, underneath the little battery pack that's back there. Okay. Gotcha. That,

uh, that might help a little bit, but it will, it'll also like your neck will feel weird because you probably haven't done it before. So it might feel, um, I don't know,

man, I, I tried all kinds of different, I got all kinds of different pillows. I tried CPAP machines. I've tried, and I've tried so many different things. I've never been able to adapt to a CPAP machine.

That thing was just not working for me. But anyway, it takes a great practice to sleep. And it's something that you should try to work on. So if you really struggle, you might want to try to get a Fitbit or some of these rings. There's a Motive ring. There's an Aura ring. They're all pretty effective they're not 100 accurate they don't always tell you the whole story um but at least it's a way

to track your sleep something i've done over the years is i've just recorded myself uh sleeping which sounds really funny um and not not video just audio just i want to see like if i was snoring and how how much i was snoring If it's video, we can probably sell that. Yeah. Yeah, well, I've been known to do some weird stuff in my sleep, so we could definitely sell it for sure. I've heard of this. I know.

I know it's not good. So how did the audio go then? It sounded like a lot of fapping was going on. No, just, yeah, I mean, even with the mouth tape, I was still snoring a little bit um but it was nothing like aggressive i mean it's pretty it was it was pretty mild i don't know i don't even know if snoring is bad i don't know like maybe all snoring is not bad just like all farts aren't bad just like charles was saying on the podcast the other day um anyway before we uh before we head on out i want to kind

of get back to some of these points and about you know kind of believing in yourself um that was a really good discussion about sleep and hopefully people take it as serious as their training and um just realize man it's going to take a lot of practice it'll take a lot of practice to to get used to that and you know you're you're going to have days where you get five hours of sleep and you're gonna have days where you get eight hours of sleep, but you want to try to consistently find something that works for you. Yeah. And like you said, there's just a handful of easy things to do that take zero effort. Uh, the phone thing is one, but that, that does take some effort, but just make the room a little bit colder. Yeah. That helps, uh, go to sleep and wake up at the same time every day. Don't sleep in on the weekends. That's going to mess you all up again. So just every day, same time at night, same time in the

day, those two things will get you right on your way. Yeah. I pretty much wake up around the same time, almost, almost every day. I mean, there's some exceptions. I would say I might have a one or two hour swing here and there, but not too bad. Yeah. But some of the stuff we were talking about earlier, um, you know, and I, we, we beat this to hell on this podcast, but I think it's important. And I want to share things with people, you know, kind of as, as I learn more stuff and as, as I, as things come to me, I want to share them with you guys. So another thing that, uh, that I found really interesting is we were talking earlier about happiness and success and all these different things. Um, happiness doesn't come from big pieces of great success, but it comes from small advantages hammered out day by day.

And again, that was another thing that Benjamin Franklin said. And if you really think about what that means is you're not gonna become an overnight success. There's really not such a thing where you're gonna have success and where things are gonna feel the best to you. Because again, you need to have some sort of mental stability during all this.

If you're gonna be working hard and you're going to try to be successful, having the stability and the coping mechanisms necessary to acquire and obtain more wealth and to acquire and obtain the responsibilities that come along with more success, being more well-known, being famous, these things are going to all take coping mechanisms. And if you don't hammer things out step-by-step, you're going to be missing pieces of the puzzle that would otherwise make you strong enough to handle all those things. So you can't really, you're going to hear of some people here and there that get to skip, skip over things, or you're going to hear people bitch and complain and pretend that somebody else was able to skip over it but if you really think about it they weren't um justin bieber he was uh

discovered on uh on youtube right so i mean people are going to think whatever they're going to think of that oh you know he's whatever he didn't really work for it or whatever you want to say. Well, how is it that he became such a success after he was discovered on YouTube? Because that was only the start. That was only, that was only one, that was one small step in his, in his life. Now, looking back at it, it's this giant pivot point that everybody talks about. But if you actually really think about it, whether you hate him or not, or whatever, he must be a very talented kid to be able to hold on for that long and he still sells i mean yeah it's not like people aren't buying his stuff you know people still buy his stuff so you don't you don't have the opportunity to skip out on these things you still have to have these

kind of um and i like the term advantages you know these are small advantages hammered out every day and the advantage is the work like how cool is that to look at to look at work as leverage like if i put in this work this is leverage towards my future this is leveraging me to be in a better position for tomorrow like that's an outstanding uh philosophy to have most people are like man i gotta do you know i gotta do this thing and it's gonna suck as long as that you don't look at those advantages like every single second of every single day because then you're gonna miss out on the family stuff or the personal uh development like what you always preach yeah and you gotta you have you know we always talk about it too, you gotta have time to dick around.

You gotta have some, there's gotta be some time. That's something that's important is you have to, you know, one thing I heard the other day and this is actually amazing, don't start your day don't start your day until it's finished. And what the guy meant by that is don't start your day until it's finished. And what the guy meant by that is don't start a day that you didn't already, at least halfway plan out, you know, you gotta,

you should plan out your day a little bit. Like, what is it going to look like? You already know certain things are going to happen at certain times. Why not jot some of it down? Um, like for us for today, you could say squat 6am podcast,

nine ish, you know, um, and then whatever else you're going to do after post-production, you could throw in, you know, another thing or two, and then you're out at whatever time you end up leaving. You could have at least some of it written out, but then he goes further and says, don't start your week until your week is planned. Don't start your month until your month is planned. And don't start your year until your year is planned. I was like, holy shit. I'm like, I got a lot of work to do. But man, uh, he's got a good point. Um, this is all from Jim Rohn, the guy I listen to all the time. He's got a really good point because, um, as I've moved forward and as I've had more

responsibilities, it's so much easier for me to be like, oh yeah, November 3rd, I'm over here. November 3rd, I'm in Arizona. And November 7th, we got a guest coming in and over here, we got this going on. And then I'm gone for Thanksgiving for a week and this is happening, that's happening. And then you go behind the bush. Yeah. And you're going to go over there and you're just going to suck the guy's dick and then, yeah. Meet the Millers or we are the Millers. So good. Yeah. And you're going to go over there and you're just going to suck the guy's dick. And then, um, yeah. Meet the Millers or we are the Millers.

So good. Yeah. Um, you want to hammer out a couple of fan questions? Uh, just want to finish this last couple of things. So these are the three keys to success from Benjamin Franklin. Uh, life is plastic. I mentioned that earlier. You should be able to kind of shape your life and tone your life into whatever it is that you want to make it up to be. And you do that by the things that

you pick and you choose. And, and everybody already does that. You chose your friends, you chose where you live, you chose your car, you make these decisions. Now, some people have maybe better options than others, but you, you do choose all these things. You choose a certain pair of glasses. You choose a certain style of hat. These are all things that you choose. So you choose every single thing about your life. You choose your, your partner, you choose your, like you just, it's something that is so ridiculously obvious, but you get to choose all that.

You get to choose whether you sit down and watch SpongeBob SquarePants or whether you read a book. Watching SpongeBob SquarePants is great and we all need downtime and we all need time to do that kind of mindless stuff. And as I mentioned earlier, we need dicking around time. You might come up with brilliant ideas watching SpongeBob. But we also need times where we're going to investigate and learn more about the things that we want to do to be better. Last thing is success is a pleasure. Um, that's something that's really important. So if you're, uh, walking around with resting bitch face all the time on your way to success,

then you're kind of missing out on some of it because success should be a lot of fun. I've always shared with my kids, you know, when they play sports and when they've done different things where there's competition involved, I'll say, I always say to them, and maybe it's the reason why they don't play sports, but I'd always say to them, you know, it's, you'll always feel better when you're winning, you know? Like, I'm not going to sit here and preach to you about you know we got to train and we got to go all out and all these things but the game itself will be more fun if you're kicking ass if you hit the ball it'll be more fun if you strike someone

out it'll be more fun if you hit a home run it'll even be more fun if you hit the game winning home run it'll even be more fun if you catch the game winning touchdown run, it'll even be more fun. If you catch the game winning touchdown, it'll be more like all these things. It's so much more fun when you're kicking ass. It's so much more fun to get stronger. It's so much more fun to have progress. And so that's a huge part of success. And people just, they're not, they don't really think about it that much. Yeah.

I'm ready to hammer out some questions. All right. From one of probably top three best screen names we've had mr butt plug oh wow hey uh hey uh is that kelly's tourette oh yeah the uh the butt plug that's right yeah think of that uh he's just asking i think it's a he hey please no free plugs on this uh podcast right you're gonna have to pay for that butt plug uh just asking if you take apple cider vinegar um i've used apple cider vinegar i know that if you want to find out more information about it you should look into paul check gotcha just youtube paul check apple cider vinegar and he's got some

information on there for you um some people love it i uh i never noticed one thing one way or the other with it and so um i don't utilize it um i think rob wolf may talk about it as well but i don't i don't know a ton about apple cider vinegar i know that when i've asked rhino about it he wasn't a fan um because he thinks it can pull nutrients from your body. But other people like it. I think because he has a sensitive stomach, and it hurts my stomach. So I think that's why he probably doesn't like it. Yeah, it tastes gross. Yeah, just, ugh, anyway.

Nicholas Barkley, I'm not sure where he got his info, but his question is, other than the squat, what has been the most beneficial movement in your life? The most beneficial movement in my life? Huh. movement in your life the most beneficial movement in my life um huh that was a really interesting question i've never been asked that before um most beneficial movement in my life oh shit you know i i think so i think that a squat has to be up there. I know that he said with the exception of the squat, but, um, the squat, you know, because most people during their day and during their week and during their month and during the

course of a year, they may never actually like break parallel, like in their day-to-day life, which is a weird, weird thing to think about. Um, your toilet's not low enough. A lot of times couches and chairs aren't low enough. And so your hip is very rarely below your knee. Your, uh, your hip crease is very rarely below your kneecap. And so, um, then we wonder why we have so many back issues and so many hip issues and it's because people just don't move enough. And so I think a squat squat is i think a squat's a great movement um and i think that uh dead lifting is great because hip hinging and building up the lower back i think is really important um i would add in there i don't

do enough uh i don't do enough unilateral stuff and i wish i did more of it i just need to incorporate it more but uh unilateral stuff just being like things like lunges bulgarian split squats probably more so for the lower body than the upper body upper body stuff's good too but um you just need movement you need to figure out ways of moving quite a bit and um anyway uh to answer the question, I would just say deadlift. Okay. Kay Hag is following in your footsteps, trading in powerlifting shoes for a banana hammock. Oh. Yeah, his question is a little bit broad, but let's see what you think, because you're kind of going through it right now anyways. But when would you start bulking after losing all the powerlifting fat?

I'm assuming post-show, maybe. Yeah. I mean, for me, I'm kind of, I'm not really like bulking necessarily. I'm just not on a real strict diet. I didn't want to choose to like try to bulk because bulking is the same thing as cutting. And the meal frequency is still really high. And the amount of food you got to eat is still really high. And I wish, I wish I did, but I just, I just, um, don't have the, uh, I'm not mentally ready to do that quite yet at the level that I want to do it at.

So I have not, uh, dove into that, but anyway, I think what I run into a lot is people will say, you know, I want to, I want to cut up, but, or I want to, um, I want to, uh, I want to, I want to get bigger. You know, I want more muscle and I want to be stronger and I'll ask them what diet they're on. They're like, Oh, I'm following your war on carbs. And I'll say, okay, well, that's awesome. Thank you so much. I'm glad you followed it. I'm glad it helped you lose some weight. And then the next thing they'll say, but I want to get leaner before I start bulking. And that's kind of a mistake because you can get leaner with a bodybuilding style diet. You can get leaner with carbohydrates. Again, the reason why the keto style diet works and the reason why the war on carbs has been so effective for me and many of

people that bought the book and many people that have checked it out and many people that practiced it, the reason why it's so effective is because it helps get rid of that carb craving cycle. You eat fat, your body starts to run off the fat and your body gets used to how it feels off of fat. And so some, sometimes people will feel a lot better. And oftentimes it just helps get rid of a lot of those cravings and it helps keep the calories moderate to low, which is what helps you lose weight, helps you lose body fat. But then people will kind of be like, oh man, I'd love to eat some carbs, maybe around the workout or get a little boost so I can be like, get like a pump and this different things and just say, but you know, I'm not lean enough to do that yet. And, uh, my answer to that

is you should switch, switch your diet up. You know, if you're currently on a low carb diet or currently intermittent fasting and you've been doing it for a while and you've already gotten some results from it, if you just started and you haven't gotten anywhere with it, then ride it out and lose some weight. Um, but in any event, even if you're 20% body fat and you want to get stronger and you want to, um, have more muscle, you should be eating some carbohydrates. And the reason why is your performance in the gym will be better. is your performance in the gym will be better. If your performance in the gym is enhanced, then your body fat levels will improve. Now, here's where it can get a little tricky. You will have to figure out, am I going to start to

really cut down on some calories? Am I going to start doing some cardio? Um, am I going to, you know, do this for three, for two or three months where I have, you know, 200 grams of carbs a day. And then am I going to start to cut the carbs down and then shift into like more like a keto diet or whatever, because you should be shifting and moving, uh, with whatever, uh, whatever goal you have. That's really the key is like whatever goal you have, you know, pick the appropriate diet, but it's a mistake to think that carbs are going to make you fat. Carbs don't make you fat. You make yourself fat by eating the wrong type of carbohydrates and, and just over consumption of food. I'm not a calories in calories out person

because there's just way too much, uh, that goes into all that from a hormone and chemical standpoint in your body. However, it does matter to some degree. And usually when you eat things like pizza, you don't eat like one slice and just write down that you ate X amount of calories of pizza. Normally you eat like six slices and you eat all the little twisty breads things with them and dip them in ranch like i do and uh that's usually what ends up leading to fat gain so for this guy in particular you know um if you're not currently adding in some carbs or whatever add some carbohydrates into your diet keep them keep them low though just 100 150 something like that should be plenty of carbohydrates to keep you fueled, but not make you gain any fat.

Biggest super fan of the show, Steven Granzella, asks, What size polo is that? It's a 3X. There you go. Smokey, you should be working. What are you doing? Anyway. Any more questions, or do you got to get out of here?

I'm good. Unless there's another good one or two uh just the passing of charles poliquin oh yeah that brutal yeah i've been a huge fan of charles poliquin since um you know since i first found out about him and uh i've had every i've bought and purchased every single book that he's ever written. I bought a lot of his supplements. He's not only supplements that he's helped design, but I've also bought supplements that he's recommended. I followed a lot of his stuff in like a cult-like fashion. You know, I followed a lot of his stuff in a religious fashion.

I remember doing a lot of his arm workouts because, uh, Charles, uh, was kind of known for slapping on some size on the arms. And so I did a lot of his, uh, he had a book called winning the arms race. And I remember actually doing some of those workouts with John Cena back in the day. And those, those workouts had a huge impact on my arms. My arms were actually, my arms aren't as big as they were. Um, but my arms got big from doing a lot of stuff that, that, uh, that Charles shared. And Charles is, you know, he's somebody that brought tempo training to the forefront. He's somebody that brought fish oil to the forefront. He's somebody that brought branch chain amino

acids to the forefront. Um, he was forward thinking he to the forefront. He was forward thinking. He was a pioneer. He was a friend. He's going to be missed greatly. And I talked often, I've actually said on this podcast before, I'm like, man, when that guy dies, it's going to really suck because we're not going to, there's not another mind that's like him. You know, nobody knows the information that he knows. that's like him. Nobody knows the information that he knows. Luckily for us, a lot of people have gone to his seminars. A lot of people have seen what the strength

sensei is capable of doing. Charles came to super training at one point, which was like a dream come true for me because I've been such a huge fan. Actually, I remember probably sometime in maybe like in maybe 2000 or so or 2001, somewhere in there. I can't really remember the exact year. But anyway, I've known I've known of him for a long time and he was a highly sought after coach. He's coached many Olympic athletes. He coached Olympic medalists in 22 different sports, which is just unbelievable because

normally a coach is kind of confined to, you know, one particular sport or just a few. But he had a lot, he had an insane amount of knowledge. But I called him sometime in early 2000. And I remember being so nervous to get on the phone with them. I actually had a friend who set up the call and said, you know, Hey, you know, you better be ready with questions. He doesn't have time for bullshit. And so I wrote down like three questions. I can't remember what I asked him, but I just remember, you know, barely being able to speak just cause I, just like people when they meet me at seminars and stuff. Yeah.

Uh, I was that person. I was that fan and I was really nervous to, uh, to talk to him. But what was cool is he, he kept the relationship and he gave me his email and we continued to communicate. Um, and he helped me and I, I was nobody. I wasn't, um, I wasn't lifting anything big then. I wasn't, uh, you know, Mark Bell, the power lifter. I wasn't Mark Bell, the business guy. I wasn't, I wasn't, I was nobody. I wasn't, um, I wasn't lifting anything big then I wasn't, uh, you know, Mark Bell, the power lifter. I wasn't Mark Bell, the business guy. I wasn't, I wasn't, I was nothing.

Um, and I always thought that that was cool that he was, uh, willing to, you know, put time into me and everything like that. And then he came to super training gym and, uh, I, you guys have seen me squat before and I squat with my hands all the way out, you know, to the, um, all the way out to the collars of the bar. And, uh, that's due to lack of mobility in my thoracic spine and in my shoulders, Charles came to the gym and he pulled on my ears and he jabbed a, uh, a pen cap into, uh, the bed nail of my finger and all this shit hurt really bad. He did a couple other small adjustments. And not only was I able to get under the bar a lot easier with my hands closer, um, but I was able to get the bar down my back and get the bar really low. And if you go

back and watch some of the video, it's also when I'm really, really chubby, probably a good, uh, 290 pounds or so the face is real, real round. And, uh, it was just amazing though. He, he just, um, he was a true, uh, sensei in a way he was a great coach. Um, and in some, some way he was also, uh, like Yoda. He just had these kind of magical powers. And we're watching the video right now. For those of you watching on the YouTube feed, we're watching some of it right now.

And he's jabbing this pen into my finger. And that shit hurt really bad. I'll link it in the description and iTunes show notes. Yeah, it's pretty... I'm laughing because it'm like laughing because it just like made me want to shit my pants. You look like you're about to cry. Yeah. I mean, we lost a really good one and, uh, it sucks, man, because, you know, all that information was trapped inside that head of his, but, uh, you know, luckily a lot of people went to his seminars and his, uh, message and a lot of his knowledge can be carried around by those that

he's impacted. I know Matt Wenning and Ed Cohen, they've done some seminars with him as well as Stan Efferding. And we're all saddened and we're all heartbroken by the loss of Charles Polak when he was an ass kicker. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. Catch you guys later.