Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 730: Lisa Bilyeu- Quest Nutrition Cofounder & Media Mogul

Episode Date: March 19, 2018

In this episode, Sal, Adam, and Justin speak with Lisa Bilyeu, co-founder of Quest Nutrition and co-founder of Impact Theory with her husband Tom Bilyeu. In this episode, the boys go into Lisa's past, her health challenges, he successful career as an entrepreneur and her vision of the future. She has a fascinating life story. The changing of the guard. How she is enjoying the podcasting format and the conversations that ensue. (7:07) Completely went into thinking we would just have some fun. Living the American Dream and how she met her husband, Tom Bilyeu. (10:27) Understanding your audience and her passion for psychology. The beginnings of “Relationship Theory,” the challenges she has faced along the way and how she is enjoying it so far. (16:45) I try to very conscious of his time. When she puts her foot down in the relationship and the importance of establishing roles. (25:25) I was working for one of the biggest nutrition companies in the world and I couldn’t consume the products. Lisa shares her personal health issues, acknowledging her emotions and how she took it into her own hands. (32:25) Went on strict ketogenic diet Symptoms she was having I would cry for no reason. How Tom was her “sober companion” and never wanting to show weakness. (45:15) Doing something every day that is moving you towards something you love. How she defines success and did she ever feel like an imposter. (50:00) We can’t be preachers of what people eat What is our goal or mission? She shares her feelings of their house becoming a set and the impact it has had on her personal life. (56:58) I want to create impact and change people’s lives. Her greatest fears with all decisions she has made with her various businesses. (1:01:45) You need the money to create the content. How are they creating fictional entertainment to monetize their business? (1:05:30) We want to make noise and disrupt the industry. I can take the worst things and make them the best. What are the greatest/worst attributes that she picked up from her parents? (1:18:13) You just need to know when to switch off. How having the control over what you bring into your life is key to self-awareness and empowerment. (1:22:45) Self-desires. The practices she does with her husband to keep their relationship alive and exciting. (1:32:25) Related Links/Products Mentioned: The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts – Book by Gary Chapman The Gut Microbiome and the Brain Viome | Gut Microbiome and Wellness Stanford Prison Experiment Modius Health David Goggins on Impact Theory – YouTube Blockbuster laughed at Netflix partnership offer Featured Guest/People Mentioned: Lisa Bilyeu (@lisabilyeu)  Instagram Tom Bilyeu Tom Bilyeu (@TomBilyeu)  Twitter/Instagram David Goggins (@davidgoggins) Instagram You can learn more about Lisa on Instagram @lisabilyeu YouTube- Tom Bilyeu Health Theory (new show) Facebook- Tom Bilyeu Relationship Theory Would you like to be coached by Sal, Adam & Justin? You can get 30 days of virtual coaching from them for FREE at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Get our newest program, MAPS HIIT, an expertly programmed and phased High Intensity Interval Training program designed to maximize fat burn and improve conditioning. Get it at www.mindpumpmedia.com! Get MAPS Prime, MAPS Anywhere, MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, MAPS Aesthetic, the Butt Builder Blueprint, the Sexy Athlete Mod AND KB4A (The MAPS Super Bundle) packaged together at a substantial DISCOUNT at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Make EVERY workout better with MAPS Prime, the only pre-workout you need… it is now available at mindpumpmedia.com Also check out Thrive Market! Thrive Market makes purchasing organic, non-GMO affordable. With prices up to 50% off retail, Thrive Market blows away most conventional, non-organic foods. PLUS, they offer a NO RISK way to get started which includes: 1. One FREE month’s membership 2. $20 Off your first three purchases of $49 or more (That’s $60 off total!) 3. Free shipping on orders of $49 or more You insure your car but do you insure YOU? If you don’t, and you are the primary breadwinner, you will likely leave your loved ones facing hardship and struggle if you die (harsh reality). Perhaps you think life insurance is expensive, but if you are fit and healthy, you can qualify for approved rates that are truly inexpensive and affordable. To find out if you qualify for the best rates in the industry, go get a quote at www.HealthIQ.com/mindpump Have Sal, Adam & Justin personally train you via video instruction on our YouTube channel, Mind Pump TV. Be sure to Subscribe for updates. Get your Kimera Koffee at www.kimerakoffee.com, code "mindpump" for 10% off! Get Organifi, certified organic greens, protein, probiotics, etc at www.organifi.com Use the code “mindpump” for 20% off. Go to foursigmatic.com/mindpump and use the discount code “mindpump” for 15% off of your first order of health & energy boosting mushroom products. Add to the incredible brain enhancing effect of Kimera Koffee with www.brain.fm/mindpump 10 Free sessions! Music for the brain for incredible focus, sleep and naps! Also includes 20% if you purchase! Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Each week our favorite reviewers are announced on the show and sent Mind Pump T-shirts! Have questions for Mind Pump? Each Monday on Instagram (@mindpumpmedia) look for the QUAH post and input your question there. (Sal, Adam & Justin will answer as many questions as they can)

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mite, op, mite, op with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrew tool. No, I don't have the vocal capacity today. Yeah, see what I'm retarded. How do you pull random references like that out of nowhere? Dude, that's like a, when was that, when did that Simpson episode even play? Probably like 90 something?

Yeah, I've said this before, I'll say it again. I get triggered by like, stuff. If I ever get on a game show where I'm allowed to call a friend Justin Call you for sure. Oh, yeah, they're looking for commercial jingles or cartoons. Yeah, that's probably like hey It's really stop welcome to the game show where you need to get the wrong answers. What friend would you like to call? I don't I'm gonna call Adam You know you're in the cash cab you

Yeah, you call me up welcome to the game where you take a word and make it sound like something different. Who should you call? Yes That could exist someday, you know Yeah, but your handsome. Yeah, this is true He knows this forget me alive. I have a question for you Adam. When did you realize? Okay, this is serious question. All right, when did you first realize you were handsome? I don't think I ever, when your mom's here. I don't think I ever felt that way. I think that we talk about it, we joke about it all the time,

but I don't think I ever really felt like I was just... Never? No. Not even now? Mm-hmm. You don't feel handsome? No, I think that's the big joke is that I say that, but in reality, when I was a kid growing up, I didn't think anything but that at all.

I mean, I was a very, I mean, I was like borderline anorexic skinny. Like, you could see my, I had, my rib cage was poking out. I was so skinny. And your face, sometimes I had my two front teeth for completely turned. Yeah, but you got those eyes, bro.

Okay. It looks like you have eyeliner on. Well, I mean, if you're asking a serious question, you want a serious answer. No, absolutely. I didn't think that way. Oh, man. Yeah, I didn't. I wasn't trying to get sad. Well, it's not a sad story. It's not depressing at all. But I, in fact, I think it builds incredible character

and I'm extremely grateful for that because it forced me to actually not rely on good looks. Now, I think maybe people that have met Bodybuilder Adam who takes a shirt off and looks all jacked and ripped and is on professional photos on Stasian shit might think that I'm this self-indulged weiner and think I'm super handsome.

And we joke and play about it, but in all seriousness, absolutely not that now the not being or not feeling handsome is what also forced me to build character and create confidence which then carries over And now we joke about it that I'm handsome and I'm this and I'm that you just that you guys are a lot uglier That's all I was a loaded question South. Yeah, I know He's trying to be funny, but he's when he's sick. He's not as sharp as he normally is. Hey man

I just want to hand he's been off all morning. What the fuck? Listen, I want to see a picture of you when you were a kid. I'll tell you if you were ugly. Oh yeah, I'll be honest. I'll show you what I look like. I'll tell you the truth. The truth. The truth. The total.

The total truth. But anyway. Well, we don't have to. You're crap this out. Let's bring it back up. I don't know why that has to be a crappy thing. I think there's a lot to learn with stuff that we don't talk about very much.

I think that confidence can be built many, many ways. And I think thinking about the way somebody look is a very superficial way to look at it. And I think it's... I wonder if it could be challenging for someone to be good looking too though. Absolutely it can be. First, I think all the people that I've met

are monster hog. Extremely good looking. Most of those people got a lot of what they wanted when they were younger because they were good looking and it builds, it both build character and so it doesn't build a great character when you're somebody who has relied on your good looks to get all your guesses and get all the things that you've wanted in life. You become dependent on that and then attached to that and we all know that's fleeting, right? As we get older that's fleeting, right?

As we get older. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Anyway. Well, we had a great interview in this episode with Lisa Billu. So she has, she's got a new YouTube channel, right? Or YouTube series, the health theory? Well, the impact.

It's similar to, it's not a new YouTube. It's a new series or whatever. It's within their impact theory page that they're doing, that they're, I mean, God, Tom and Lisa are just. That name is content producers. Yeah, I mean, people think that we produce a lot of content. I would argue that. We look up to them.

Tom and Lisa pretty much shit on everybody. I know out there as far as producing the amount of content that you cannot possibly consume all the information they're putting out there. So what I liked about bringing Lisa on was, you know, her, the part that the role that she plays with Tom and on the shows is this relationship theory. And I think they have a very dynamic relationship,

they have a very cool story. And she's got a lot of good points and like, you know, advice for couples and stuff that she throws into this episode as well. I actually thought she was a psychologist until she cleared that up when I asked that in the episode, just because her wealth of knowledge and experience with her and Tom, and I think she shares that on the show, and I think she distills a lot of information really, really well for the average person to consume, and gives you some really good tips in this episode to apply to your relationship.

Yeah, so the YouTube channel's name is actually Tom Billio. So it's T-O-M-B-I-L-Y-E-U. Health theory is the show that she's hosting, and she's also on relationship theory with her husband Tom. Now they both co-founded Quest Nutrition, but now they're on a different mission altogether, which is to just to bring change through narrative, right, through story. So actually quite compelling. Their channels are very, very compelling.

Now you can find Lisa Billu on Instagram at Lisa Billu. That's L-I-S-A-B-I-L-YILYEU. Also, I'd like to mention that this month we are giving out free access to our forum with the enrollment of any maps bundle. Now, maps bundle takes two or more maps programs and puts them together based on a particular goal that you may have.

So if you want functional athletic performance, but you're also very interested in sculpting an aesthetic physique, we have the sexy athlete bundle. If you're somebody who's training and working out very hard but you find that your glutes just aren't responding the way that you want them to, you find them to be a weak body part, we have the build your butt bundle. We have, what other bundles do we have that are available? Oh, of course, the Super Bundle, which is a year's worth of exercise programming, that combines several maps programs

so you do them in succession and get your body progressed throughout the entire year. Any of the bundles will give you free access to our forum, which normally you have to pay for. So go check that out at mindpumpmedia.com and without any further ado, here is Lisa Bilyu. Have you been doing the rounds now? Have you been getting on a lot of podcasts?

I mean, are you just so busy over there? Well, the rounds are good. Compared to you guys, not at all. I like double in it, but. How do you like the podcasting platform agenda? I love it. To be honest, I like it. One reason I love you guys is you've got the conversation.

Like I really love just a chat. Right. And I can chat for hours. Yeah, I feel like when you listen to a podcast, if it is, if it's a conversation, well, first of all, the medium of podcasting, I feel like serves that better. Like versus, you know, network TV,

where they'll condense a 40 minute interview into like soundbites. You want to hear the whole conversation, and it's so personal, and not only that, but it's boring when you treat an interview like question one, question two. Well, what you say that, I mean, we're really kind of, it's the changing of the guard when it comes to that, right? Because just 10, 15 years ago, that was. Like, you're very formulaic type of interviewers where the most popular, like you're Brian Gumbles

and you're type of people like that, where now you look at, you know, people want more real. I'd rather hear somebody that's messes up a little bit or kind of goes all over the place with their thoughts that at least I know it's a real conversation where some of the conversations that you would hear in interviews 10, 15 years ago, it's like, man, am I really getting what I want?

Am I just getting this big commercial about this person? Well, I know Joe Rogan's, he gets more listens than I think all the top news networks combined. Yeah, Fox and CNN combined. And his average episode is like two to four hours long. Yeah. So it's a totally different long form too. Yeah.

You can really listen to real conversation without all these interruptions of like, now cut to commercial break. Exactly. It's just annoying. I actually had one interview there about a month ago, and the guy had like all his questions were pre-written, he sent them over, and he even wanted us to title the episode.

So Lituya gone the phone to do the podcast interview, and he literally just ran through the questions. When we first heard the other people talking about it, we first started doing interviews. podcast interview and he let you just ram through the questions. When we first have no idea what we're talking about, we first started doing interviews. That's great. Yeah, we have zero idea where this is going to go. When we, when we first started doing interviews, this is what would happen. People would send us over like, okay, well, what are you guys going to talk about with me? And we go, well, fuck, I don't know.

We'll see where it goes. Yeah, we'll see where it goes when we meet you. And, uh, and they're just like, well, you know, I can, know. We'll see where it goes. We'll see where it goes when we meet you. And they're just like, well, could you just give me an idea of what topic? Simple panic sometimes. And so we actually had it. It was really weird for us to provide these questions. And it always happened this way, too.

We would give them to them because they felt so scared to come on the show without having some sort of idea what we were going to do. So we'd give them to them. We never fucking went that direction. It was just a piece, please. Yeah, it was the please to give them on the show without having some sort of idea of what we're gonna do. So we give them to him, we never fucking went that direction. It was just a piece, please. Yeah, it was the please name to get him on the show, that we get him on the show, that we talk about whatever we want to.

We're gonna ask you what your favorite color is. But I actually think that's more enjoyable. Like, I don't know where we're gonna go, but like, let's have fun. Right, it's more real. It's we were to, and I think that's the idea, or let's at least the idea that we try to give to our audience is that, listen, if I'm meeting this person, I'm talking to them, I want you guys to hear the questions that I would really ask them, not this, like, what

you probably already know about them. You could probably Google half the guests that we have and learn all the basic information that the average person interviews, I want to dive into their, like, what makes you tick, you know, so we like that. So what is your background just quickly for the audience? Tell us a little bit about your history before we get into more of the recent. Yeah, how far back do you want me to go? Ooh, I don't know.

Where are you from? Adam writes a good chapter. I love your accent. You're obviously from England. I'm from London. Okay, wonderful. I'm Greek, so my family from Cyprus. I love the Greek people. I'm Sicilian, so we're almost very close. We're very similar.

Very similar. In culture. Sure, yes, amazing food. Yes. Met Tom about 17 years ago, so I was studying filmmaking at University in London, but I didn't get enough experience. My friend gives me this brochure, and I was like, hey, they've got this film course

in Los Angeles called the New York Film Academy. You get to go backstage at Universal Studios, you get to film stuff. So all you need is $10,000, I can't remember how much the course was, but you can go and do this like super intense course, and you get to study film. So I was like, this is amazing. So I had to persuade my dad, because I didn't have that money. So I study films. I was like, this is amazing. So I had to persuade my dad,

because I didn't have that money. So I sat down and I was like, this is why I should do it. And he's like, I need a pros and a cons list. Like why you should go and why you should, you know, like what are the benefits? So it's a long story short, managed to persuade him, come to Los Angeles, day one, I walk into the studio, to the office and this tall handsome American man is standing in front of me.

Little did I know he would end up being my husband. And so for a month I was just like staring at him from afar, and he didn't give me the time of day, and he was like so cocky about it, that it just made me more interested in him. And then, yeah, after our first day, we both thought, like, this is awesome, like, this summer fling. I'm thinking, I've got a great story to tell my friends when I go back to England that I hooked up with this, like, hot American dude. He's thinking, this is amazing,

because he just came out of a relationship with a girl when a bit crazy on him. So he's like, this is perfect. Legally, she has to leave the country. This is the perfect dream. Even if she goes crazy, I give her the word. Yeah, literally, the visa's going to take care of that. So we both went into it completely, just thinking

we were going to have some fun. And within four weeks, we both completely fell for each other. And I went back to England, and he flew to London to see me. And we ended up doing a world-win romance for two years. And then eventually I came to LA, and we ended up doing a world-win romance for two years. And then eventually I came to LA and we built our lives and I started off as a housewife, just thinking, you know, I'm going to support my husband, like we have a path. I'm going to take care of bill you enterprises is what we would call it because I didn't like the phrase housewife, it emotionally didn't fit with me.

So I took care of everything so that he could go off and just focus on work. And then he came home one day. I was completely miserable with everything he was doing. And he's like, I know we just bought a house, but I want to start this new company with my business partners. And then we want it to be fitness.

And how do you feel about putting the house up basically as collateral? And was that scary? Wow. It really that scary? Wow. It really was scary, but I've never felt like, that was my purpose to have a house. I wasn't the person that was like, this is gonna be my life.

And so I didn't really hold strong to the house over what my husband wanted and what his vision was. And I so believed in him and our future that I was like, I can buy another house. If this fails, because it wasn't like, this is gonna work, it was like, if this fails, who cares? Like we'll just get another house Bay, we'll figure it out. But you feeling like that you're being supported

and that you have me to back you, like that to me was the most important thing. Oh, that's such a great thing to hear because I, you know, I was just gonna ask you, was part of it just your belief in what he was doing, or anything that he did. Was he that kind of a person to you? Were you like, you know what?

I believe in what he inquest when you guys first met. So we know. So he wasn't even doing quest. This is how you start a quest, right? Is you put the house up for? Right, we do it. We've been together for nine years. Oh shit, okay.

We've been married for like five or six years. And he was very much chasing entrepreneurship. He found his business partners. And he was like, this is our way to success. Like, we're going to earn enough money. We're going to then make, take the money. We're going to make movies. Like, that was the big plan.

So I was like, okay, I'll support you. We'll figure it out. But he was miserable with the tech company with his business partners. And so eventually he just came home and was like, something has to change. And because I'd seen he was miserable, I was like, as the partner, like I'm not gonna prioritize money,

home over your happiness, like that's crazy to him. It must have been at this point, I mean, because when you're a partner with somebody, how they feel can also influence how you feel. Did you feel a sense of like relief? Like, good, let's change something because you're not happy and it's making things difficult. A hundred percent because he'd been so closed off for, you know, maybe two or three years prior because he was so focused on making money, making money, making money that I had seen that sparks which off in him. And for me, it is my duty as the wife,

as the partner, as the bill you enterprises to help get that spark alive again. And when he came home, it was absolutely scary. But what I always do in life in general is like, what is the worst case scenario? Because if I can live with the worst case scenario, I can attack something 100%. Totally.

And so I said, the worst case scenario in this situation is losing the house, but not having a roof over my head. Like, I don't want to live on the streets. And that was just to be real. I don't want to live on the streets. So, okay, well, I know that's never going to happen. I have family, we have friends. The reality of that is never going to happen.

And I don't want to starve to death. Again, I have family. I know the reality is that's never gonna happen. So when my two worst case scenarios are okay with, like, I know that's not gonna happen, then what does a house mean? Nothing. So I definitely went all in,

but it wasn't like blind, I support you no matter what in regards like, if I felt like it was gonna fail, we would sit down and we would discuss and I would be very open about my thoughts and my perspective on why this could potentially fail and how we protect ourselves from that. But emotionally, I'm all in with him. Like, whatever you want, emotionally, like we will get there, we just have to agree on the route to get there. But feeling that 100% support to me is what marriage is. And yeah, I- Lisa you you have a psychology background too, don't you?

I don't oh you don't you just have a passion for it. Okay. Yeah. I should have a media background Everything is filming. I know you were saying that right now, and I actually thought you actually had a psychology background Because I know you guys dive into the relationship theory So I've seen some of the episodes that you guys have done. I love what you guys are putting out there Where does the passion for that come from? I think the truth is that Tom and I have, we've used psychology with each other because you actually use it in filmmaking, understanding your audience, understanding how people think, and then tapping into it.

What type of music do I use if I want them to feel ex-emotion? Or what type of camera move do we use, things like that. So I've always loved psychology, Tom's always loved psychology. And so when it's come to our relationship, we've just adopted that. Okay, well, how do you actually feel about this and what are you actually thinking here? And people used to think we were crazy. Like, you don't talk to a husband like that.

You just, for instance, the wedding. What does it actually mean to you? Most women gave me the advice of, it's your wedding, you do what you like, and the husband comes along for the ride. But he was like, no, for him, it was like a bonding of these two people coming together, and it was very emotional, and he got a tattoo

to prove that he was going to be different after we got married than from before. So it was really just going deep and having the honest conversations that my friends never had with their partners. And over time, people used to say you're crazy, you're crazy, you're crazy. Well, we've been together for 17 years and in my opinion, have the strongest relationship we've had in this entire time. And so it's really that understanding the psychology actually does make a difference and understanding how the other person thinks makes a difference to how you're going to act towards them, because you know for me is if you want to make someone happy, okay what is your love language?

I don't know if you guys have ever read Vanessa Van Edwards's book, Capture A. It's very similar to the love language book, but you can actually also adopt it with them for work. But it's like, what is your employees language on being appreciated in the workspace? Like when they achieve something, how do they hear praise, right? Some people may want to pay rise, other people may just want public recognition. And the same with relationship, like, what is that language that you use

where your husband or your wife feels like they're loved, feels like they were appreciated. And so psychology really ended up being like the tool to get me to have an amazing relationship and allowed me to, you know, us. Was there any hesitation to do a show like that? Just knowing everything that you guys have on your plate and to kind of put yourself out there

and your relationship out there. Was there any hesitance to that? Like, I don't know if I want to do that. Yeah, there was a bit because I thought, if I'm going to do this, I have to be real. Like, no BS, you can't, you know, don't want to hide like the truth behind getting a successful relationship in what it takes. Like, I can't, I don't want to hide the truth behind getting a successful relationship and what it takes. I didn't want to just go and do the fun fare. If I'm

going to do it, I have to be honest. But then if I do it and I'm honest, people are going to judge me for it. I had to really overcome that. Then the more I did it, because Tom's really good at coaching, so he's like, babe, just be yourself and he would lead the conversation and the biggest thing he ever said to me was like, I'm your safety net. If something bad happens in a conversation, if I feel like it's derailing or I'll be there for you, and so that just really allowed me to go, okay, be yourself, Lisa, and see what comes of it. And the more I did it, the more people responded well to it.

Oh, I bet. That's excellent. I know a lot of times just from my experience, when I get the most wisdom from people on a particular topic, it's because they have dealt with challenges on that topic on a personal level, and which is, because here's the thing, like if you want to learn a lot about, obviously,

we're in fitness, right? So you want to learn a lot about building muscle. You talk to the person who's had the most struggle Building muscle because it's it's something that they've had to work towards for years and years and years and really had to figure out Same thing if you want to talk to somebody about depression The person who's had to battle and deal with depression is the person that may probably give you some of the best results or Wisdom because they've had to on a personal level really dive deep and examine these things. What are some of the, like, is that true for you? You talk a lot about relationships and you've done, and I can only imagine the challenges

that a relationship would have coming together and building a, I think it was the fastest billion dollar and fitness supplement food company in history. And I know what it's like to build what we're building. That's nowhere near the speed or size of what Quest did. And I can see the challenges it puts in my relationships. Like what are some of the challenges you guys went through? Is that accurate? Is this something that you guys are good at

because you've had to work so hard at it? A hundred percent. And that's what we've fallen flat on our faces. We've butted heads. We've had disagreements and is about navigating those waters and figuring out what works. The hardest thing I think for us that we had to attack was there were different elements to our relationships.

So at work, so we were co-founders, but he was still technically my boss, so I ran the media department at Quest, but he was the president. So as a scale of like in any company, he was my boss. So how does that work? Then we're at home, okay, our relationship. To me, he's the alpha male in our relationship and I'm the beta and we've sat down and we've actually established that language and understood what that means for our roles within the family. But I still have, let's say, the ruling of the house, but in our relationship, he has, you know, the sun, things that we've established.

And then now with impact theory, so with the show, I'm the executive producer, so I treat him like my host. So the dynamic switch just completely. Yeah, but it's always switched. So it's been a lot of fun really kind of sitting down, going back to the psychology of things. It's like, okay, well, how do you feel about this situation? What role do you play? What role do I play? And I remember at work, Quest One Day, I turned around and I said, if I don't do my job properly, because I never want to be in a position because I'm a co-founder or because you're my husband or anything like that, that doesn't make me feel

good. I need to bring value. So if I'm not bringing value in my role as running the studio, you need to tell me, fire me, demote me or hire someone above me. I was like, I'm giving you permission to do that. Because I thought as a husband, that's going to be pretty hard to tell your wife, like, hey, you're fired, or you're not doing a great job, I'm hiring above you. And he just looked to me completely deadpan and was like, baby, my goal is to provide for the family. So even if you're the one getting in the way of me providing the family, I'll fire you in a heart booth because you're not going to get in the way of my goal. And so I was like, completely respect that. And yeah, same with the house, we kind of figured out, okay, we were budding heads.

He is very artistic, so he always wants to say, like the furniture and the look. And so it was like, okay, well, instead of us budding heads, who owns what? Okay, the house, because it feels like, you know, it's like the female wants the nest. And, you know, I take a lot more, I think I put a lot more weight to the house than he does. So it's like, well, okay, well, if we butt head, I want a final say, because it means more to me. It's, you know, it's the nesting part of me. So it's like, cool. So if we've ever butted heads with the color of the wallpaper or something, and we can't persuade each other, I get final say, and's very respectful, step-spot. So is it your call to make all the fucking

four-inch cable wires going through the house? Is that your design? In fact, that was him because he's like, you never know we might need it. I'm like, it's an eye-saw. But again, like, you tried to be respectful of each other, so it's like, oh, I don't feel strongly leave the cables there. And of course, two years later, the freaking cables are still there. As you see, right? Yes, yes, yes. So, yeah, so we've just had these agreements, and that all stemmed from always budding heads,

right? Budding heads in the workplace, budding heads as husband and wife, budding heads, and when I was saying about the alpha and the beta role, it's like, okay, well, who leads the family? It's like having a business, right? You can only have one real visionary, and then other people need to, okay, be around you, I think, help execute, figure out.

But if you're both at that same level, and you both have the same role, I don't know, there's never worked for me in him. So we've always tried to establish roles ahead of time. Is there something that you have to put your foot down with time? So I know you say you're the beta, but you know with Katrina and I we have a very similar relationship. We work together. We've been together for seven years and if there's anything that I have a really bad habit of is it's becoming so plugged in and

disconnected from each other that I'm so myopic about work. And, you know, and I definitely have given her that carte blanc to be able to say, hey, wake the fuck up, we haven't worked on us or done anything together and she'll schedule a trip and it doesn't matter if we have work, what about it's being shut down because of that. So she's become that in our relationship

and I respect that when she does it. And she respects me enough to allow me a little bit of latitude of like I know it's a lot of stress at work right now. Is there something that like you have to put your foot down every once in a while and say, wake up Tom, we've got to do this, we've got to do that. Yeah, we've, and I think it's fantastic

that you guys have established that. And I think that's where people get caught up a lot. Is they don't really establish like whose role it is to do what? And so because Tom gets hyper-myard, like he like, focus nothing else exists around him when he goes into the zone. And I know that about him. And as his wife, I want to support him,

but at the same time to me, there are certain things that are important. And he has to, I don't want to say snap out of it, but I need to bring that to his attention. So we've had that agreement that if there are moments where I start feeling like hang on, we're not connecting right now, I will absolutely, I will see him down.

It's like, okay, grab your calendar. What is your agenda look like? Like I'll put it on the schedule, like it's an appointment. Yeah. Because I get that I have to allow him to do the business that he needs to do. But yeah, I'll absolutely say, okay, I need two hours of your time

and I want it on a Friday. Okay, well, when can we, how do we make that happen? And when he does, he puts his phone down, he switches off, he's very respectful, and he doesn't then put it to me, like, oh, you're very needy, because I try to be very conscious about when I need his time and when I don't. And so we have this great understanding that if I ring that bell, I'll put my foot down.

It catches his attention immediately and he's, you know, 100% in. I think it's absolutely brilliant that you say you have established roles because it's, nowadays that's a much more difficult for whatever reason, much more difficult conversation to have because of whether it be gender stereotypes or whatever for people to say, this is my role, this is your role, it doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman, but with any successful anything, like you have a team, you know what your position is and your job is to execute to the best your ability at your position. If we have running backs and you know, and tackles acting like quarterbacks in a game, you're going to fail. You need to know what you're going to do and you need

to go for it. But that can be a difficult conversation, have depending on the role. What were some of the roles that you guys had to discuss where that was a tough one where you guys said, okay, this is what I'm doing. This is what you're doing. Was it easy? No, definitely wasn't easy. A big thing I think was, as I went from being a housewife to an entrepreneur, there was a big change in me because, you know, the expectations were different and your daily activities are different. And so when I started working and when we started quest, I basically started shipping bars from our living room rug. And then it was like, oh, this, we've got like 10 orders today.

That's actually a lot. Maybe we should think about having a put in them in the garage. And I started shipping them to the garage. And so before I knew it, it went from, I was shipping from the living room floor. I was learning how to print orders. I was doing it from the garage to then we had a you know 10,000 square for storage space, I was hiring fork lifters, I was hire you know people that could work the fork lift, I was so before I knew I literally blinks and I had 40 employees underneath

me just in my department alone in a shipping department that had no experience doing. So I just learned as I went along. Wow, how fast was that? What was that? What was the timeframe for that? Probably two years. Two years? Yeah, I went from that to about 40 employees. Wow.

It was crazy. And I'm not tech savvy at all. But it was one of those like, you just got to learn it. You know, like get your hands dirty. But those employees that, especially initially, we were hiring from the inner cities. So they were gang members. There were people who had criminal records. And so I had, I couldn't be a pushover.

Now, I'm five foot one with a British accent. It's hard for, you know, fugs to kind of take you seriously unless you really like hold your ground. And that's exactly what I did. I was like, all right, I'm not going to let the company down. I'm not going to let my husband down. I've got something to prove here So run this like a tight ship and so I don't care

You know there was a guy that was like six foot three and Tom walked in once and I was you know kind of letting him know where he Messed up and I was you know, it's like you're not scared of anyone. I was like well, I can't be you can't show the fear and But because of that I started to harden as a person, as a female. I started changing you as an individual. Right. So before I was a housewife, I was very nurturing. My husband comes home, baby, his dinner, your clothes are ready for you. I've sorted this out for you very nurtured. Now he comes home and he's like, I'm tired and like, don't be a pussy. Yeah, I mean, seriously, right? It became like that where I was like, you know, I don't

have time to make you food. You don't have to deal with it yourself. And, you know, so that type of the personality change, and we had to sit down and go over that because in establishing he's going to be the alpha, what I mean by that is if someone breaks into the house, I want him to go and defend me, right? That's what alpha is to me. If something happens and someone's hurt, he wants me to take care of them. So that's type of thing.

And so when we were kind of establishing these roles, and I started to hard, and I started to not take care of him as much anymore, well, does that now mean that I'm not a nurturing wife? Okay, well, if that's what he's looking for in a wife, then how do we navigate that? Because you can't pretend it's not happening. And I don't want him to be resentful. Five years down the line that I'm not the wife he actually wanted. And vice versa, I don't want to be resentful that he's not the husband that I actually wanted. So we basically broke down all the skill

sets that we had, all the things we wanted to be, all the things we expect from each other, and then it's okay, well what makes sense? And he realized that I'd never come alive before, like I had when I became an entrepreneur. So for him, he was like, there's this part of him that wants me to be nurturing as the wife, but there's other part of him that he loves that I've come alive. And so he said, I've had to accept that you're going to drop this part of your personality because you can't be both. You can't be like this hard-ass working side-by-side daily and then be home and make sure

that everything's taken care of. And he's like, I think I need to let go of this. So we had that verbal discussion that that was something he was willing to let go of. What would you say, Lisa, right now, that you and Tom both individually are kind of working on, whether it be relationship-wise, or business-wise, personal-growth-wise, what's something that you're currently working on right now? Well, over the last three years, I really battled with health. I've had major microbiome issues. So common, by the way. So common. So common. So common. So common. Are you finding that? Because you're tied into the health industry, at least you were very deeply

with Quest. It seems like it's happening all over the place. Yeah, when it first happened, I was embarrassed. Because I was like, here we are. We own one of the largest nutrition companies in the world. And I can't eat our product. I literally couldn't eat it. Anything with, anything process, anything with artificial swinners, way protein, like none of that, I just couldn't digest it anymore. And so for a year I felt embarrassed, I felt badly that here we are with this company

and I can't talk about, and no one asked me to not talk about it. I just felt like in myself I couldn't talk about it. Sure. And Tom took it upon himself to really say like this is my problem to solve. And so he's spent like the last two years he reads, ferociously reads books about health, to try and help me. And so as individuals, it's quite difficult when you're dealing with something like this because for me, I recognize it's going on and I recognize it's really affecting my hormones because I'm so confused I just can't eat I can't eat consistently I always have

stomach cramps and so it's affecting my hormones I have to be aware of that so as an individual I've really been working on the last year on making sure that how my diet and what I eat and the pains that I'm going through do not translate over to my emotions in an irratic way. Because the second that that happens, it then spirals into your business and your personal life. And now I become like the crazy wife that's just like crying for no reason.

And that's not fair on him and that's not good for our relationship. So I have to understand what is going on with me. And so for me, that's been a big thing, is understanding what I'm going through, what my emotions are, you know, what I'm really feeling, and then separate that from what makes sense.

Like I'm feeling emotional about this, like Tom, you've really upset me, but the truth is he hasn't actually said anything to upset me, is my emotions that are kind of going crazy. So that's what I'm really dealing with as an individual and then as a couple that we're constantly communicating on the health front because he's very strategic. Okay, do this, do this, do this, who cares about the emotions, doesn't matter like you have to and you know you have to eat like this and you You have to eat like this and for me it's not that easy. I get it and I will absolutely do it like I don't use that to stop me, but I have to make sure that I'm at least acknowledging my emotions.

And just as a female and for myself, I found that useful. I find that a useful tool to then propel me forward. But because he doesn't do that, he will just like, there's no emotion, it's strategic to do this, do that. We're having to navigate finding that understanding with each other. So that he doesn't feel like I'm not actually actively working towards something, that he can see that I am trying, but that I may not be doing it in the way that he thinks is best. There's a common myth, and I think it originated in Western health or Western medicine that

the emotional side is separate from the physical side, when they're actually, you can't separate them. It's actually quite impossible. So, if you were to, I mean, they can test this, you could think of something that creates an emotion within you, and we see physiological changes within the body happen immediately. And the road actually travels in both directions. We can obviously cause physiological changes to your body, which will then cause emotional changes.

You're talking about your gut or your microbiome. We know that, and this is just what we know factually, but there's much more to this that we're learning. And that's the majority of your neurotransmitters are produced by your gut. I mean, people will take things like SSRI drugs, which are serotonin selective reuptake inhibitors, which increase circulating serotonin in the brain, but that's playing with the small amount of serotonin that's already in your brain. The majority of it's being produced by the gut, and if your gut is off, we know now that it will totally affect

how you feel and even how you think they've even done FMRI studies with women, in fact, where they've, you know, they'll image the brain and then they'll give them a probiotic and they'll notice that the brain actually changes, the blood flow changes within the brain in real time after the probiotic, you know, was consumed. So you really can't separate the two.

Tom comes across, and I've met Tom quite a few times. We love Tom, we love you guys by the way. And he, but he is also extremely driven. And when you read his post and you see what he says, it's very much the wake up grind, make it happen, don't stop, push, nothing can stop you, and that can lead to, it can lead to, you know, HPA access this function,

it can, you know, you might ignore your body's signals because you're so focused on pushing to the, to the sense where your health may actually start to falter. Have you guys encountered any of that, or is that the struggle between the two of you where you're trying to soften it, and he's always pushing on that hard edge? No, he's actually really good at, like, yes, he says grind, push hard,

but he has this internal, like, what would you call it? Like a rev limiter? Yeah, like he just knows. Okay, like this isn't serving me anymore. Like working this hard actually is clouding my judgment. I can't make good decisions. So I need to go get sleep.

I need to rest. I'm the opposite. And that's actually been a big problem. So you find that you just keep going. Oh, I will completely. I'm like a bull in a Chinese shop sometimes. Like there's no stopping me. And the problem is even when my my digestion is screaming, what the hell are you doing?

Like it's cramping because Because I have such a strong head, I can keep going and my head doesn't communicate with my gut, it doesn't communicate with my body and I recognize that. And I recognize like, okay Lisa, your mind is very strong but your body actually isn't. And you need to start making sure that you're addressing the communication between the two

because a big part of it is, you know, like you were saying, the gut is so powerful until you recognize that. I think we're gonna have, like, made just keep going with major issues. And the one thing, so I've worked with a company called Viome, I don't know, you guys have heard of them. They basically have helped me, they have, like, an in-house test,

and they send it to you, and you can do it at your house. You take your, like, a store sample, weight and measurements and all of that and you send them your information. They then take your sample and they break it down until you're all the microbes in your gut and your levels and they basically grabbed me and was like, okay, well, the things that are going on with you is you have SIBO, you have to deal with that, you have a parasite because you don't have enough healthy bacteria to fight off the parasite,

it's just been living inside you. Your gut bacteria is completely skewed, so you actually have, it was something like 6% of the amount of gut bacteria that I need, I only had 6% of it. So while everyone else, let's say, has like 30 different variations, I had like two. Oh, wow.

So I had a little diversity. Yeah, very little. What was your diet leading up to this? Were you eating like super keto? Or was it some because I'm assuming they were probably talking about lactobacillus and the bifidobacterium? So now you're, yeah. It may be, I'm assuming, so I don't know.

But were you, was your diet very restrictive leading up to this? It was, yeah. And that was a problem. I had about 10 to 15 years of antibiotic abuse, I guess you would call it. So it was a vicious cycle. I was, um, I was on a restricted diet because I had been told, hey, fat is very caloric and it's bad for you. You shouldn't eat it.

Hey, carbs is really bad for you. So I was on a pretty much just a protein diet. And I thought that's the way that you build muscle. So it's much protein as you possibly can and everything else don't touch. Now I was getting sick, so I was taking antibiotics. I had to restrict to diet, so I wasn't replenishing my gut. Perfect storm.

In perfect storm. Literally, I was going probably for 10 years, having antibiotics, maybe every six to eight weeks. In perfect storm. Literally I was going probably for 10 years, having antibiotics, maybe every six to eight weeks. Oh my goodness. Wow. So I was getting sick and then the morrow's getting sick and longer it lasted. So it just got to a point, excuse me, I literally my whole digestion just crashed and I've been on a three year battery in a battle and trying to rebuild it. What were your symptoms? Because we have a lot of listeners

that have gone through stuff like this. And I think you get caught in the cycle and you feel like this is normal, or OK, this is what I'm going to do. And what were some of your symptoms so that people can listen and be like, OK, I need to get this checked out. I love that you said that, because I literally thought

it's normal. Like, oh, it's normal that when I have a chocolate cake that my stomach is going to cramp and I'm going to be in pain for 24 hours. Like, I didn't even, which is crazy to me that I used to think that, but it's true. Like, I really did think that. So, it was things like that where all of a sudden you have a new type of food and it completely, like, it would, I don't want to say paralyze me, but for 24 hours, I wasn't able to stand up for longer than five minutes.

I mean, it got to that point where I would have one thing that was off what I would regularly and it would just unravel this whole like pain and digestion issues and inflammation and it got worse and worse. So let's say 10 years ago, I would try a different, like let's say it was a cheat day and I'd have a chocolate cake. It's like, oh, I really like upset my stomach and I'm not sure why.

And you know, year after year after year, it got from that to, wow, I can't really do much today. And then it got to, wow, I can't actually stand up today. And that's when it was like, okay, this isn't normal. Some things going on But I didn't really look into it until one day I got the stomach flu and It that is what like completely just threw me off and was it just didn't want to go away? Where you literally then couldn't eat like I couldn't eat Period so I would try to eat a bit of beef, like some fatty foods, wouldn't work, try to have

chicken. I was losing weight, my hair started falling out because I wasn't getting any nutrients, my nails were breaking, and we were both like, we don't know what to do. I don't know how to fix this. So I went on a ketogenic diet because one of Tom's theories was your digestion is so inflamed all the time. Every time you eat, it's just like treating it like it's a foreign object. It's trying to get rid of it. Yes, autoimmune.

Right. Well, so I went to an autoimmune doctor and they said it's your autoimmune, you have an autoimmune deficiency. So they wanted to give me transfusion. And they're like, it means that basically, they're gonna plug me in and replace all my cells and my body for healthy cells. Cause they're like, no, no, no, no, no, this will fix your gut.

It's because it's your immune system is bad. Now the truth is now that I've realized, it's the other way around. My gut's bad, so my immune system's horrible. And so when Tom heard that, he's like, baby, like that doesn't feel right. Because it was like a six month thing. Gosh, good thing, God, you decided that wasn't right. Because you could have just ended up

back where you were. Oh, 100%. I was a week away from getting it done. And Tom was like, no, this doesn't feel right. Let's go into the R&D department request. Let's really sit down with the team and go over like what we can do. And everyone's worried, it was like, okay, well well maybe if it's a kid, you're going to a

kidogenic diet, it will calm down the inflammation in your digestion, which would then allow you to eat. So I went on a strict kidogenic diet and I was like, even if it gives me a stomach upset, I've just got to have to like swallow it, like literally. And within three days, I felt incredibly better. And then I went into ketosis, and I was very strict on a two to one diet for about, I don't know, maybe six months, really strict. But the problem was I was still getting stomach upsets,

and I couldn't make a correlation between my hang on. I'm doing everything right. My blood levels are great. I would test my levels. I was still in ketosis. And yet, I'm doing everything right, my blood levels are great, I would test my levels, I was still in ketosis, and yet I'm still having digestion issues. Well, now understanding more, I just didn't have the right bacteria in my gut, so on a ketogenic diet you're not eating many vegetables, you're not having a lot of like the fiber. Yeah, prebiotics, they can't.

And I needed a lot of that, and I wasn't having, so the second I would have an artificial sweetener, or the second I would have something that was slightly different, my gut wasn't prepared to fight it. So I realized, okay, ketogenics isn't just the answer, it's only part of it. Well, now, what about the emotional or mental effects from this? Because you talked about the physical effects of the cramping and digestive issues, and by the way, this is an interesting subject for me personally because I went through a very similar story to yours. And so I also noticed looking back, I didn't realize it at the time,

because the physical effects are so obvious, right? I can't keep any food down. I'm losing weight, like that's very obvious, but there were also lots of emotional anxiety. I wouldn't feel as energetic, I couldn't sleep as good, I started getting, you know, almost more paranoid than I normally would. Were you experiencing anything like that? Yeah, absolutely. I'm not a cryer, and then all of a sudden

I started crying for no reason. And I was like, hmm, it's like that completely shocked Tom as well, because he's known me as not really an emotional cryo. And, and so one day I remember we were at Quest and he said something in a meeting and it really upset me and everybody left. And after I was like, you really hurt my feelings. And I was getting myself all worked up and he just looked at me and he's like, what is going on? And I was like, but you were really rude.

And he's like, like, no, something's going on. You're not normally this emotional. I'm like, what do you mean I'm And he's like, no, something's going on. You're not normally this emotional. I'm like, what do you mean I'm not emotional, right? Like, you push it back. Cause I'm like, no, what are you talking about? And I started to cry. And he's like, babe, you never cry. He's like, I love you so much, but this is not you.

And I was like, you're right. Like, the emotions feel so real to me. Because they are, right? Like, my camera calls it telling me, you are upset. And, all right, I'm upset. But I don't need to me because they are, right? Like, my camel was telling me, you are upset. And, all right, I'm upset, but I don't need to succumb to them. And that's what I realized. So that was a big thing. Well, I was like, wow, this is like, come out of the blue.

Didn't see it coming. But as long as I'm talking about it with Tom, and I would break it down on days where I'd feel like, righteous in my being upset. And I'd be like, okay, feeling like this, I need your unbiased opinion. Because I know I can't trust myself. Right? I know I can't trust this emotion. I know I can't trust if I'm feeling anxious. My mind understands it, but my body can't get on the same page. So I need someone who is what we call sober,

you know, quite uncoated. So emotionally, to really let me know, like, am I imagining this? And so I returned him and he was my sober companion and every time I would feel like. It's a lot of trust and that's great. And it is a lot of trust, 100% because you have to make sure that they're not gonna use it to their advantage, right?

It's like, well, there are some times where I'm like, no, this is actually happening. I think you actually were wrong here. And he'd be like, but that's your emotions talking now. What do you do in that case? Well, you're like, no, it's not my emotions talking. I know when it's my... It can feel invalidating.

Right. And those with invalidating, that's perfect word. And I felt invalidated. And so I had to navigate that as well, because he would be like, look, you've told me that you need, you know, that you can trust me. This is one of those moments. And I just had to take a deep breath and go, okay, I trust you. And then I would reassess, right, once my emotions had calmed down, whether it was a few hours later or the next day, I would go, okay, back then when he said it was my emotions, was it actually my emotions? Now that I am in the sober moment, and I'm like, yeah, that was okay, that's another

tick I can trust, right? So it kind of just is positive reinforcement that I could keep turning to him, because he was very good at recognizing those things. Were you still trying to maintain this strength when you're working at Quest, like going through all this stuff and you know, at Am the midst, you know, all these employees and like, how did you hold yourself together for all that? Yeah, I didn't tell anyone. So my husband knew a couple of people

from the R&D department who were helping me, but I didn't want to seem weak and like looking back now, I actually don't think that was a good strategy. I think that you can really empower people by showing them when you're vulnerable and showing that you trust them to not use that vulnerability against you.

But at the time I was just like, stay strong, stay hard. But again, going back to going from the housewife to the entrepreneur, this hardened me even more because I didn't wanna be vulnerable in front of people and I didn't want people to see when I was hurting. And there were days where I'd have to do it, let's say I'd have a test and I had to fast. So I'm now here fasting 24 hours, I have an eaten, I go to work, I'm getting like headed, but you're in production, you can't seem like you're sitting on the sofa, like lazy.

So it was really tough to kind of push through it, but I'm the type of person that I don't want to look at my weaknesses in that moment, because I worry that it could make me weaker. If I focus on the positive, if I focus on the strength, then I feel strong. But I think it's really with anybody right perspective is everything. Absolutely. Lisa, how do you define success? What do you think success is to you? you define success. What do you think success is to you? Doing something you love every single day. Actually, no, that's probably BS. I'm going to take that back.

Because the truth is I love the honesty. Yeah. Like as I was saying, I was like, I love what I do. But there are days I hate what I do. But it's in service of what the final goal, which is what I love. So that's actually more accurate doing something every day that is moving you towards something that you actually love. Meaning. Yeah, you want to have meaning, absolutely. One of the things that we like so much about Tom

is he seems like a genuine individual. He seems like he's got, he's brutally honest, lots of integrity. You come across the same way. Like I feel like you're just, you're very honest. You're gonna say, and you live very honestly. When you're in this situation where your health is declining and you can't consume the product that you're selling,

how do you rectify those two? Because it feels, I could see how that can be a conflict, right? Like, okay. You probably feel like an imposter. Yeah, I can. This product destroys me and makes me feel terrible, but we're selling it as a health product. Are you ignoring that?

Or how are you dealing with that? Has that rectifying? Yeah, so when this all first started happening, I remember taking an Instagram post, and it was when we came out with the pumpkin pie bar. So this is how long ago it was a few years back. And I couldn't try it. And so everyone was celebrating. We did like this big production, our biggest production,

you know, that I was so excited about and proud, but I still couldn't try the bar. And everyone was posting about it. So I'm like, I'm going to post about it. So I took a photo of the bar pretending that I was eating it for breakfast. And I felt so bad because like, you see, like I only like to be honest, I think B-Essing people doesn't serve anyone. It doesn't set them up for success. And so I just felt really bad about myself. Like here I am, not telling my employees how I'm actually feeling, pretending on social media that I'm, you know, eating this bar when I can't even try it.

And I really had to figure out what I was about and what was the most meaning to me. And the biggest thing for me is about being honest. And when I realized you know what, you always said earlier, so many people now are suffering from microbiome issues that instead of trying to pretend that everything's okay, own up to it,

because it's not the quest bother, did it to me. It's just I can't consume it now. But if I don't speak up about what's actually happening, I can't actually then help someone, right? And it's like, if this feels like an epidemic, and if it is, and how can you make the best, the sorry, the worst situation, the best situation, and it's like, okay, well, if I can take all this shit

that's happened with my microbiome, and make, like, actually make a difference to one, two different people that don't have to do, and go through what I've done, then it's worth it. Then that way surpasses my own ego, that way surpasses what people think of me about being a co-founder of question nutrition. Like, I had to just become okay with that and say, you know, haters were always hate, and the people that I actually am helping, that's where I get my true joy from. And so if I can help one or two people Would it be beautiful? I'm not from a unicycological perspective when people make small omissions of truth or small even outblatin, you know lies

Those actually start to change who you become to the point where when you need to have character and stand your ground You're now weak. There's a famous study done And I think it was in Stanford that they did in 1970s and actually they had to discontinue the study And I don't think they'll ever be able to do it again, but they had students Pretend to be guards and some students pretend to be prisoners. I don't know if you saw this I've had a bit but yeah, And the behavior of these students started, the guard started acting like messages and started being very abusive.

And the ones who pretended to be prisoners, excuse me, allowed this horrible treatment of themselves to start to feel differently about themselves and all started with these small, pretending kind of lies. They had to end the study, even though all the students could have stopped at that moment. And we've got, you know, we see this throughout all of history where you get, you know, people to not tell the truth or lie a little bit. And before you know it, they like stand for nothing. And it can be, it can poison you. It can be a very difficult thing.

And so, you know, I understand what you're talking about, what you're going through and how difficult that was, did that start to mold, because there's a huge market for it too. Now, the capitalists, then we think, holy cow, you've got some gut issues, and you've got a company that is worth a billion dollars. This is a huge market. There's a lot of people that might, did you, there might be a huge opportunity, did you start to think, wow, maybe we can cater to this or change the product or try this thing to work with situations like my own? Absolutely when it came to ketogenic products, because that, the studies were becoming out more and more about what the ketogenic diet was doing for cognition, for weight loss,

for inflammation, it was just incredible. So behind the scenes, yeah, we were working hard on the ketogenic products. But to be honest, as we were doing more and more research in understanding how complex the microbiome is, how complex it's insane, that right now, I don't know if any food can solve it, right? It's like my diet now consists of introducing one new ingredient a week.

And so it's to the point where it's like, I have to try one carrot, one bite of a carrot, one day. The second day, it's two bites of a carrot. The third day is three bites of a tiny little carrot. And so how does it was hard to kind of then say, how do you connect that with a product that's going to have the magic solution? And so I think that that is really difficult in that arena. And then also Quest always took a stand from,

we're never going to preach, right? Diet and in general has always become like a religion. Oh totally. If you're like, you talk badly about a vegan, if you fix your macros or meat eating, like, doesn't matter what your diet is, if you talk to someone, you say, why it's not right, they get defensive.

So it becomes like religion. And the one thing very early on, we will realize that question, we can't be preachers of what people should eat. We can only offer the product and let other people make the choice. So it was always kind of from that standpoint, okay, we'll make the product, we'll make it, you know, up to like the best standard we possibly can at, you know, a rate that we can actually afford to, you know, make good quality bars, because that was also important, having our own

morals and making sure that we didn't downgrade the quality of the product. But yeah, we never really were like, okay, we need to make this so that we can push it on this community. Yeah, it's all I knew obviously took me the right decision, the success speaks for itself. Changing gears now, let's talk about what you guys are doing now, because when I came to your house, I don't know how long ago was that? I don't know. That was about eight months ago. Yeah, about eight months ago. This is when Tom was doing the launch of Modius. We're talking about it. Your house, beautiful home. A lot of it looks like a movie set like in your house. How, what is that like? Because I know you're the

the who decided to do that home. Yeah. How do you deal with that? Like you're the, you're the, who decided to do that home? Yeah. How do you deal with that? Like, you literally live in your work for a lot of your home, right? What's that like? Yeah. It was weird at first, because you're having, you know, your house is full of 12, 14 people on a daily basis, and everyone walks into different rooms, and they walk into your, you know, living room, and you're, so it was very weird at first. But I think it always came down to what's our goal, what's our mission? As a couple, me and Tom, as a family, what is that

goal? It's to actually create impact on people, to really show that the mindset is holding you back. Okay, what is that going to take? It means content, right? As you guys know content, it can reach so many people that it's a very powerful tool. So we need to be able to do content. Well, if his time is very valuable, every second he ever spends getting in the car on myself included, it's time a way that you could be creating something. So, if that is taking time, how do you expedite that? Well, if we had the studio in the house, you just walk down the stairs and you're on set. Okay, well, but I don't really want 30 people shooting in my house. Okay, well, maybe we'll just be temporary. So we literally was like, okay, it's just going to be

temporary. And then we realized, wow, as a to work towards our mission, if we really believe it, and we're really trying to get to that goal, this is what it's going to have to take. It's going to have to take building studios in your house. It's going to have to take making sure that every minute of your time is accounted for and that it's not wasted. And Tom, going back to, you know, when he wanted to start quest initially, it's like, I bet on him. Like, I believe in him as a visionary. I believe in him to lead the family. And so, when he has this vision and understanding of this is what it's gonna have to take, I'm on board, let's do it.

It's gotta kill Daysecs though, huh? It does some more. I'm pretty, the camera's gonna be in me. I was gonna say, now you've got six cameras on your baby. Oh, wow. Hey, you know what? The weekend's a fun. You know that chair you're sitting on over there?

Yeah. Let's talk about some of the sets in your home. Because when we were there, there was one main set. I think it was the impact theory set. But you've since added more. We have. And again, this goes to Tom. And I just love his crazy ideas.

I'm so bought in. It's like, we're so kind of crazy. And it's like, why not? Who cares? Like, who says that's wrong? But yeah, it was like, okay, we needed more sets to do, we wanted to do different content. And of course, Tom was like, okay babe, just, you know,

get a couple of chairs and make the set look, you know, make the room look nice. And so again, he's a visionary, I'm the executor. So I'll go out and I started doing this design and getting like nice chairs. And I did this whole layout and I show it to him and he's like, I'm not Martha Stewart. And I'm like, what do you mean he's like, you've done these really fluffy chairs and it looks like a living room, but that's what you said.

And he's like, no, no, no, no, no, no, it needs neon lights and it needs this and that and I'm like, okay, so you want to build a set and he's like well look into it and you know to cut along so we're sure a month later we've got four new sets so one that ended up being a couple of couches and a backdrop is now four sets we built four different walls so that you could angle the camera different ways and it looked like a new set. Oh it's cool. Which meant that my poor mother-in-law's bedroom had to be converted. We took her bed out. My sister-in-law's bedroom has been converted, took her bed out. So it's like literally, like, where each room is now being taken over one by one. And then the other day, someone made a joke about turning our TV room into something.

I was like, yeah, it probably will happen. Like, as long as I draw the line at my bedroom, like, that is it. Just give me my bedroom, put my quave in a fridge and my bedroom and I'm fine. You know, nice TV and I'm good. But I just think like when you have a vision or when you have a, just a goal in life in general, you have to really ask yourself,

like what is it gonna take to get there? And are you actually willing to do it? Because I never wanna turn around and say, oh, poor me, why didn't it work? Like it should have. I can't believe I failed. It's like, no, I gave it my all. I was all in. And I think that that's kind of the attitude you have to have. We had that request and we have that impact theory. So if that means like taking over my entire house to get to our goal, then let's do it. Having that

Let's do it. Having that attitude, what do you think is your greatest fear? My greatest fear. With that attitude specifically? Yeah, just with the... I mean, you've already been a part of building a huge company already. You guys are now in the middle of building another huge company. What is your greatest fear when you look at that?

I mean, I think that we could lose it all. Like, we spend over a year not monetizing our content whatsoever. So Tom and I sat down and we said, how much money are we willing to put towards this cause of really creating impact on what does that look like? So. Let's share a little bit about that

because a lot of people don't know that you guys are doing that. And I do, when I've talked to Tom all the time, and that takes a lot of balls to do that, to be able to put that much money that I know you guys have invested in this business, and not turn the lights switch on to monetize. So talk about why you guys did that

and what that looks like for you. So once Quest became extremely successful, it's kind of like you always think like, oh, I've got what I've always dreamed for and life's gonna be amazing. But the truth is, both Tom and I, what's next kind of people? And so I really have in a background of film and media,

when I started building the media department, I was like, this is exciting. This is what I've always wanted to do. I built a studio, I'm creating content. We had a show called transformation that was really highlighting people's lives and it was really meaningful to me. And it was meaningful, I think, to a lot of people that watch the show. But also that what came with that was the general stuff that you have to do to

run a company. It's the commercials. It's, you know, doing fun things to promote the product. And I started realizing my heart's not in that. And then that really made me assess like, what am I actually working this hard for? And it was to really create impact and to really affect people's lives. And when I realized that my time every day was being spent less and less on that, and it was being spent more and more on helping the company just get more profitable. Which of course it needs to be and I love that and I love how big the company's gotten, but that wasn't what was satisfying anymore. And so I really had to acknowledge that.

And so this isn't fulfilling me anymore. And they're saying with Tom, like Tom realized very quickly that, um, wow, we've booked this massive company and yet his mum and my mum are still severely overweight. You can, I try to throw money at my mum, like, mum, I'll like hire a chef. I'll get you this food, like, whatever it will take, I'll get you a personal trainer. And she was putting on more weight, the more successful quest score. And so was Tom's mum. So that was like a big bell that was like, hang on a minute,

quest is great for the people that are ready are there mentally to want to change their lives. But what are the people who aren't there yet? What are the people that need help switching on that light bulb in the brain because I think it has to start there? And so we were really assessed, okay, well, what are we doing this for?

We've been very fortunate with the success of the company. We've now got financial stability What do we actually want to do with that financial? You know that financial side of things and it was like literally in one hand Do we go and just say fuck it? Let's go buy an island and drink Margarita's our entire lives Because we literally had that discussion. What does that life look like? And I said we were like would be miserable after two weeks. I'd be so bored Like I'd be counting the sand grains, you know?

Like I'd be so bored. So it's like, okay, so what's that other thing that right now we're not being fulfilled? And it was like we're not affecting the people who need the help with the mind. So we're like, well, Squirre, I don't need a big house, I don't need a big yacht or anything. It's like, I'll get bored of that very quickly.

So let's take that money and actually make a difference. so what does that look like and it became impact theory? So what is the monetization look like in the future because I know I mean you guys had a quarter million people on YouTube I know about how much revenue that is that wouldn't even come close to paying your electric bill I I know that I mean I know he you guys started selling shirts not that long ago Which I know what that produces that would be not. Right, exactly. So, you guys really aren't, even though you have some monetization going on, anybody who knows what it takes to build something that big, that doesn't even come close to supporting the staff that you guys have. So, what is the plan to turn on the money and how to actually support the business. Yeah, so we've recently turned on YouTube ads.

That's been one thing that we, and we explained to our audience why we were doing it. Because again, I think you just need to be very transparent. And it's like, I mean, we're not trying to trick anyone. Like the truth is we put every penny over, over a year, we had, you know, 12 staff members and a show and main show that is, in my opinion, extremely well put together. That is not cheap, let me tell you. And so after a year, we're like, okay, how do we sustain this? It's not even about recouping our money back. It's about how do we keep doing this for the next year. And then after we figured out how we do sustain it, how do we then

do have wealth creation because I think that is important because we then want to use that wealth to put back into the community and what we're doing. But I think it's important, like you need the money to create the content. And so if someone thinks like, oh well you're trying to sell shirts to make money, like you're not rich enough, it's, then you don't get what we're trying to do. Of course not. And if you actually knew how much money you're trying to do, it's like, yeah, if you've ever tried to sell a shirt. Yeah, yeah.

And so, yeah, we are looking at what that looks like this year and then what that looks like next year. So we've done a few, like you said, selling shirts, YouTube ads, things like that. But we're now putting ads on our podcast. So there's a few little things that we're doing, but the bigger picture, we're trying to build a studio. And I know we were talking earlier about the Matrix

and how much it's impacted people's lives and what that means to people. And we realized that there's entertainment that can really affect you on a mental level, right? Super hero movies, but now I'm a so wonder woman like I feel bad ass like leaving that place like it can really change your chemicals in your body. And so understanding the entertainment can do that nonfiction and fiction can do that. Sorry fiction can do that like okay. Well what does that then look like if we're the Disney of impact?

So Disney, you know exactly what you're going to get. You can take your kids to watch it. You don't have to worry. In any way, shape or form what it's going to be about, you know the feeling. That's what we want to do with impact theory is create fictional entertainment that you know when you come and watch our movie, read our comic book, watch our animation, that you're going to be empowered, but it's still going to be freaking fun and entertaining and... So is that the ultimate vision for how you would monetize too, then, which is similar to Disney,

which is you build this ginormous network of people, and then where the real money probably comes in, is dolls and action figures. Exactly. The merchandise is really where they make the money. So the problem, though, is with the studio model right now, is you put almost all your eggs in one basket, right? It's like you spend $100 million on a movie and hope it hits. And if it doesn't, then you run more. Right.

And it's like, we don't want to get in that situation. So for us, the community is a big deal for us, because we want to make sure that what we're doing is actually serving the community versus just rolling the dice and taking a gamble. It's like you can do pieces of content and see what resonates with people. You can do a comic book, you can do a short film, you can do an animated series and then see how your community is responding. And are they saying, wow, this really affected me? Or are they saying this was a waste of my time?

So slowly building that up in that way is really the path. You guys haven't even wonters yet. Like any pieces of content you guys are super excited about. It's like, OK, this is going to be a long-term story with us. Yes. So initially, the plan was having people on our main show impact theory and then

seeing who's episodes resonate with people and then talking to them about making deals and potentially doing a fictionalized version of their story. So you've got Goggins for instance, right? Um, then if you guys ever saw the episode of David Goggins but that like smashed it and went viral on Facebook and on YouTube and And so okay, well, he's a great episode and as a character Maybe if you fictionalize him a little because I think you almost have to to be in like that entertaining to kind of do the the superhero-esque character I guess

superhero-esque character, I guess. Yeah, so we were like, okay, well, he's clearly resonated with people. So what would he look like if he was an animated series? Oh, how cool. This started to make more sense. I think I was trying to wrap my brain around what your guy's vision was with this company because it's kind of tough to wrap my brain around.

But yeah, so you're bringing people in, you're understanding their story, what resonates with your audience, and then you might build some form of a story around. So that's how you're using the YouTube right now. So when you guys, oh, that's really interesting. So we want to start dabbling, not sure how much I'm allowed to reveal right now, but we're in deals of a comic book deal with a list, massive celebrity that has really impacted people. So you know it's our mission to try and take their story and you know really use that in an entertaining way.

And they're all for it and they're super excited and Tom's friends with them. So our first step will be a comic book that we're hoping to release in probably around three to six months we're working on it. Oh, wow, that's nice. Yeah. This is brilliant because you guys, you're in LA, but you've got the studio in your home, you're producing your content for the new media, which is internet and whatever. And it's, I think you guys are ahead of the curve, but I feel like a lot of people are going to start trying to do what you guys are doing.

And it's also potentially trying to catch up. I love the competition. Good luck, Trini. It's also potentially disruptive to an industry that is totally entrenched in the old ways of doing me. I don't know. I don't think, have you guys gotten pushed back yet? Or is it too early? Oh, I've really worked stuff in the way, of course.

And the funny thing is when you've got like a notch under your belt, like Quest for Us was like the ground of like no one believed that it would work, everyone told us we were crazy. Everyone looked like an establishment, right? There's already been said protein bars can't be made like that. You either have to eat cardboard or you have, you know, something that is has got hidden sugars in it.

And this bar cannot exist. And so we went in and completely disrupt the industry because we were naive enough to say, well, why can't it work? And I think you almost need that disruption of an industry that has been just rooted for so many years in one way. Unchallenged. Unchallenged exactly. And it's like the world is different now when Disney was built and when all the studios were built, like there was no social media like

it's like today. So you have to move with the times and understanding social media and understanding that your community that you're building is your audience. And you can get real-time feedback, which you couldn't want to put on a time when you build a studio. But it's still okay, because there's still not really doing it. I mean, you look at the social medias of like all these studios and they're not massive. No, it's a big ship. It's a big ship.

It's hard to turn. And people are arrogant. You don't want, if you've been doing something for so long that's been working, you, I mean, there's the famous story of Netflix getting laughed out of the blockbuster offices. I love that so much. Right, like, had they not been so arrogant, they would have seen right in front of them,

like we need to pivot because we're about to be screwed. I just, literally, it's so funny, I just canceled Cable, right? So, I have Cable at home with all the channels. And my kids watch YouTube and Netflix and Hulu. They could give a shit about that. What are we doing anymore? So I call them, I call them up to cancel,

and they're trying to prevent me from canceling. Oh, it's, and I'm like, why would I keep your service when you guys are more expensive and nobody cares? And the guy on the line was getting offended, and he's like, no, and I had to show him statistics. I'm like, actually, you guys are bleeding. You lost 22 million customers last year. And we're going back and forth.

And I mean, you guys, I can't think of a better example of the new guard than you guys, because we've been watching what you're doing. I'm like, this is the future. It's not going to be, the old guard is too expensive. It's too slow, and it's going gonna be, the old guard is, it's too expensive, it's too slow, and it's gonna get out-competed, and they are pretending like that's not gonna happen.

When we go down to LA, we see Netflix movie posters now, every billboard. At the movies, I saw a commercial for a YouTube movie the other day, it's like, oh shit, man, if you don't recognize it now, you're dead. And you guys are definitely on that cutting edge, which is exciting because I think it opens the door for, the barrier to enter is lower, or at least it's,

not that it's gonna be like, you still gotta be good, but the barrier to enter the market before was so high. Like if I wanted to get on a radio show, but I mean, I have a podcast, I'm worth a top fitness podcast in the country. Before this would have been impossible, nobody would have given me the time of day, or I would have had to sell my soul to lie and sell products

I don't believe in in order just to get an opportunity. I mean, it's excellent. It's awesome that you guys have this and you have these people coming in who, I mean, where are you looking for it? Because I know you're working with A-list celebrities, but where else are you looking for breakthroughs? Are you getting through your social media or? Yeah, so an A-list isn't necessarily a must for us.

It's really kind of like, we want to make noise, so it's, you know, having an A-list that helps do that, it helps the mission. But I think it's important, like in general, to like, just make sure that it all comes back to, I would tell an empowering story, because that has to be your guiding force, because it's like, I don't care if you're an a list, if you don't have something impactful for our community, because it's the community we are serving, then it doesn't matter. So, yeah, really I think social helps us establish, like mainly on Tom's social, helps us establish what is resonating with people and what isn't. You know, and it helps guide, it helps put,

like the, what they call, you know, this thing's in the bowling alleys. The bumpers, thank you. But sometimes Tom loves to remove the bumpers completely. It's like that happy midway where sometimes you need them and then sometimes you've got to get rid of them. Is there a story, a particular story that you personally would like to see succeed or anything like, you know? Not really, I think from a personal level, I really do love the female empowerment movement.

Yeah, you talked about Wonder Woman. Yeah. My daughter left that movie, like I'd never seen it before, I loved it. And I just think it's amazing, and I think it's, yeah, it's just empowering for women. And you know, when I talk about female empowerment empowerment, I've heard other people talk where it brings the guy down or tries to diminish the guy's value and bring the women up. I don't see female empowerment like that at all. I just think it's recognizing the strength the women have within themselves.

I wish I had an avenue for that when I was 11, when I was 12, where there were more women being visible, talking openly about the real stuff. Because I think, like, while I love Wonder Woman, it is not a reality in any way, shape or form. Like, I can't use necessarily those skill sets in the movie to actually apply to my real life. You know, how do I overcome food issues? How do I overcome insecurities or women? Like all these things that I think can make you feel powerful when you watch something like one-to-woman,

but they don't actually touch on the everyday, how do I put that into my real life? And that's why I actually love things like what you guys are doing, like coming on the podcast and talking with you guys and having the discussion, like talking real to me, it's the one thing that sets me on fire. Speaking of your 11 and 12 year old self, I'd love to hear what you think are your greatest attributes that you've picked up from your parents and maybe some that you would like

to get rid of. Hmm. That picked up for my parents. I'm not, well, so okay, well here's something real. My mom had eating issues growing up and I saw that and she pretended she didn't. And for a long time, I didn't realize what was right on normal. And so my mom went from being some, I had a gutter. I think I would call her like anorexia,

I mean, she didn't eat much and I saw her with her away when she divorced my dad, to then all of a sudden ballooning up and becoming overweight. So this super unhealthy relationship with food growing up, like it never dawned on me that I should question it. It was just like, this is how women eat. Yeah, normal. But I think that can be, is my one of my biggest blessings, because I think having seen that, having completely ruined my digestion, I think, because I had bad guidelines, it's put me

in the position of who I am today and how I feel about myself today. And I don't think I would be here if I didn't struggle with all of that. And I know I said this earlier and it really is from Tony Robbins where it's like, how can you take the worst thing and make it the best. And so I can look back at all my bad eating habits and look back at how much I was destroying my body and be scarred by it and really make that embedded as an identity. Or I can say, this doesn't define me. I've learned so much from this. I can be stronger and I'm going to use this as my strength now.

And so I hope that answered your question. I guess I learned that from my mom and... Well, what about a characteristic trait or habit that you would like to get rid of? Okay, that is probably, I have a hard time when people disrespect either me or the people around me. And Tom is very much like his motto is you need to accept people for who they are.

Like, why are you always surprised? Like, I think that's a big thing. Like, if I know someone can always be somewhat cool or mean and they are. Like why are you always surprised, like I think that's a big thing. Like if I know someone can always be somewhat cruel or mean and they are again, I still get hurt and upset and I get a bit righteous in like I'm gonna tell them why I think because that's not right. And he's like,

but why are you surprised by it? Like the last time you saw them, they did exactly the same thing. You know when I get all my myself emotionally worked up over it and I really would like to let go of that because I don't want to, I don't think I should let other people influence my emotions like that. Yeah. And so I need to distance myself.

And when I see someone who is being either disrespectful or isn't treating someone in a right way, that's not your right way of saying it. If somebody is, let's say they're dismissive, maybe they don't mean to be rude, but they're dismissive with you. I would still get annoyed by it. And I would let that really affect me emotionally, and it would then kind of infect everything

I was doing that day. Instead of going, okay, that's them, I don't, like, I won't allow that to influence me. I won't allow that to influence me. I won't allow that to make me feel worse about myself. And yeah, I need to let go of that. When you unpack that, where do you think it comes from? I think, so when I was younger, I got picked on a lot of school. So, you know, I had a unibrow, I had the frizzy hair, I got, you know, made fun of a law. And so I think I became very sensitive to how people spoke to me and how if somebody

made fun of me, made me feel less than and made them seem like on a pedestal, I think I would even put them in a pedestal, right? Like, wow, they're strong. Like they don't care what people think. You know, even if they were being horrible, I think I had a, yeah, like a weird view of that. And so I think growing up, I became sensitive to it. So anytime somebody was dismissive,

all was rude, always inappropriate, I felt like immediately that made me feel, like less than. Yeah, what's the old saying? Don't cast pearls before swine. I had the same issue where I'd wanna like teach people. And I'm like, I'm gonna listen to what I'm saying. Why am I wasting my energy and where is that coming from?

It would make me feel temporarily better, but not really, it ended up feeling worse as a result. So you talk a lot about women empowerment. You talked about what you went through as a kid being bullied and now want to speak out. Where do you see a lot of the challenges with women today? Is it with food, is it with body image and self image? Yeah, I mean, I think it's all of the above. I think social media hasn't necessarily helped, but I am not looking to bash social media

because I feel like it is more joy to my life than negative. I think you just need to know when to switch off. I do not follow people that don't make me feel good. I don't follow fake people. I know that about myself. So sure, social media can be bad, but you're the one that controlling it. And I think that's the biggest thing.

You said empowerment, that's empowering. Exactly. Like having the control over what you're bringing into your world is very important. And I just think that, yeah, people... So I think people see unhealthy habits, right? They see people saying, like, look how skinny I am. And I'm actually quite... I get torn about showing abs shots, because I work really hard for my abs. Like I bust myself,

you know, bust my else in the gym to get abs. And so I think it can be empowering to say, hey, if you dedicate yourself, then you can't achieve this. But at the same time, I don't want to dismiss the fact that I have health issues and that the foods that I eat in the way my digestion is now is actually it's helping my abs look great but it's not helping me get healthy. So there's that like this weird like phase that I'm in now where it's like I want to empower people to say you can take control of this but also I don't like talking about necessarily my own diet because I have such a difficult time with what I have to eat based on getting myself healthy or not.

So yeah, so I think body image, food, diet, all of that is rather difficult, I think, as a female. But the biggest thing that I've learned is accepting the truth, right? Like, I think, for me at least, I have a voice in my head that says, oh, if you do that, is that going to keep your abs? I have the voice. I can't switch the voice off. No matter how much I've tried, no matter how much I've, like, told myself, like, ignore, like, don't listen to it, ignore it. The truth is the voice is there. Now I think the empowerment is, what do you do with that voice?

And for me, it's been to talk to speak openly about the fact that yes, I have that voice in my head. I'm only human. I have that thing that's telling me to not do this or to do this. But I have the control. And it is completely up to me whether I listen to the voice, whether I turn the voice down or not, or whether I ignore it.

But I don't want to pretend anymore that that isn't there. You know, that body, that my abs don't matter to me. Yes, my abs matter to me. But I'm not going to let that dictate what I eat. So I'm not pretending that it doesn't matter to me anymore, which I used to. And I think a lot of women try to do. Like there's people that say, like,

oh, just love your body for how it is. That's great in theory, but I'm guessing most people who do that also have that voice in their head, right? They're telling them not to eat theirs or not to do theirs or to do, you know, work out, jump on the treadmill for three hours because you just had that donor. Okay, well, the voice is there. Welcome the voice.

Just don't listen to it. Yeah, we just, I just recently read a quote that was so powerful. It was actually in a book I'm reading right now and it's, care for yourself like you would care for someone that you loved. And so what does that mean? That means that, doesn't mean you give yourself

everything you want all the time. You wouldn't do that with a kid. You wouldn't just give your kid everything they wanted. You want them to be challenged. You want to sometimes say no. Sometimes you say yes. And that's kind of how, so when people confuse the love of yourself with the,

oh, I just love my body how it is, type of deal. No, really loving yourself is also being objective. Like you can look in the mirror, care about yourself and say, wow, I'm, I don't display good health right now. And that doesn't mean you don't love yourself. It actually means the opposite. It means you do love yourself. And that's a, I think it's a, that's a paradigm shift for people. Once you make that paradigm shift, things become a little bit more, I guess a little bit more clear. And then the other side of that is the discussions

that you have with yourself. I think sometimes when we're thinking, we have that voice that says one thing and then we try to create, because that's what thinking is, right? You got one voice and you try to create another side to argue it, but sometimes we create the other side so that we know it's going to lose. We're not really, it's a false conversation. It's propaganda. We know that it's a straw man. Like, you know, my abs are the super important to me. And then you create this other side that's not

really gonna win. And we know it, but it puts up enough of a fight for us to be like, I thought about it. But, you know, so it's really it's interesting. It's itself. You're talking about truth. The biggest lies we do are not to other people or to ourselves. And so that's a big one. I've fallen for that myself where I know what I need to do. I create this false argument that I overcome myself but I knew I would anyway.

It wasn't a real argument and you just end up doing what you were gonna do anyway. And I've desperately tried not to fall into that trap because I have like these two competing goals and dreams and desires, right? One is to have like six pack abs, because I've always wanted them and the other one is to get healthy.

And what happens when your two desires come into collision? Right, so I'm having to do these new foods, these new diets, the Viome people are really helping me eat, like give a food plan. And in the food plan, there are foods that I would never normally like watermelon. Now I freaking love watermelon, but I've always seen it as like nature's candy. With, you know, if you're trying to get vitamins and things like that, okay, have vegetables, have other things, but watermelon is not your go,

it hasn't been my go to food. And so that was on my list of foods that I need to eat. And for a split second, I hesitated. Anditated and that hesitation was like oh this isn't going to do my fizzy kidney good. Now again going back to the voice I just welcomed it and I was like okay recognize that is you hesitated but why okay what am I competing ideas I want six pack abs and I want to get healthy okay well now I understand that what is actually my final goal for have to choose one choose one, it's health 100%. I will take my health over abs any day. So if I put those into conflicts

and I realize, okay, this one is definitely the one that I want more, the voice is coming in. You know, oh, hey, should you eat this? Now I have the answer. How yes, I'm gonna eat this. Because it's serving my final goal and my final goal is health not apps. So understanding those, you know, the competing ideas, the two voices, but knowing when you

shouldn't let something control you has been so powerful for me. But I love that analogy though of like creating a fake voice just so that you can say that, no, I didn't consider it. No, you didn't. No, you didn't. And the irony, it is when we talk about this all the time on the show, when health is optimal, the physical representation of being healthy looks pretty damn good. It usually looks pretty good.

Now what is the health representation of only chasing cosmetic? Many times it's terrible. And then you lose both. And so you actually end up in a situation where you've got nothing. And so it's a false, it's a false comparison that I think a lot of us have in our minds where we think it's one or the other when in reality you get a great deal of both when you focus on health and the irony is the side effect of that

is I've experienced it myself. My health rebelled on me very similarly to how yours did and I completely went after health and then I looked better than I ever looked before on accident You know I remember I look in the mirror and be like this is weird and then I'm stronger in the gym Then I was before I'm like what the fuck's going on there? And it was it was totally paradigm shattering for me so But yeah, I think that's a conversation that needs to be had, but a lot of it is within ourselves.

And I think the people that tend to have the most difficulty with that conversation are those of us that represent health and fitness because it's our business. Right. And I think it's so important why you're being so transparent and honest about it. Because yeah, I think people want everything all at once.

Right? They want to be the strongest, the fittest, the healthiest, the, with the biggest muscles and it's like sometimes it just doesn't work like that and you have to be honest about what takes priority. And then no look down the line, you can get your abs back and you know that you can get stronger. But if you're trying to do both, like you said, it's like you almost end up doing nothing. You get neither. You get neither, exactly right? But for me, it's like, okay, do the health first, rock that out, pride yourself on being

the person that is going to set a goal and actually achieving it. Build yourself a steam around that as well. Once I get healthy, then I can change gears and go, okay, I know I need to keep my health here. But now, how do I do this other goal that I really am striving for? Yeah, it's one of my new motivations is I've noticed very strongly, it's pretty awesome, that because it used to be my motivation when it was aesthetic, then it was, don't let my health get bad, and then my health was really good, and I was able to fix that,

and then I'd kind of play with that a little bit and push it into my health would re-bell a little bit, and then I go back and forth. But now I'm realizing that when I'm healthy, I am way more effective in everything else I do. Like I'm a better podcast host when I'm feeling really good. So it's a new level of motivation to maintain good health, and as I continue down that path, I find more and more things that reinforce it versus the other way around where I feel like I'm not.

So, I have a selfish question that I want to ask before we wrap the podcast up, because find more and more things that reinforce it versus the other way around. I feel like I'm not so. I have a selfish question that I want to ask before we wrap the podcast up because I totally identify with your guys' relationship and what you guys are currently building. I have a partner that's been together for seven years. I share a lot on the podcast like different things that we've learned as far as, you know, how do you take two people that are go getters and can get buried into work and how do you still have a very successful relationship and we've created some habits and exercises that we do for each other can you think of a single exercise or habit that you and Tom had done that it's been a game changer for strengthening your relationship. And the first thing that comes to mind is a game called selfish desires that Tom and I play. That sounds fun. But and his, it's actually really simple.

I made it sound like super like, oh, drum open. It's not orderly by this. It's, I can text it to you right now. It's called selfish desire. It's literally sitting down and saying, okay, I'm not going to be judged. The part is not going to judge me.

What do you selfishly want to do? Don't even think about me. If it's like, hey, I want to go off with my mates for three hours and get drunk. Call, just be honest. Because once you're honest, there's no having to pan do and go around each other. It's like, okay, on a day where it's, let's say, a Saturday. We're like, all right, what's your selfish desire? And he'll say exactly what he wants to do. I'll say exactly what I want to do. And then we figure out how do we both get what we want. So it's like, okay, he wants to play video games. All right, now I love video games. And so I was like, all right, cool. Let's, you know, I really want to play too. So we're aligned there. He wants to read. Man, I don't really want to read. It's like I want to go like do something exciting.

So then we'll figure out, okay, well if you want to read and that's going to be what about two hours? I want to go out shopping. All right, so what I'll do is that, you know, one p.m. I'll go shopping, babe. You read and then when we come back we'll have lunch together and that will be our time together. And so we literally just figure out our agendas, like what we're trying to do, what we want to do, and then how we come together and do it. Because the one thing we started to notice is one of us was always given, not even just giving in.

It's like, hang on, I only get three hours of free time and now I have to do what you wanna do. Well, that's such a good point right there because that's what happens in a lot of relationships. There tends to be one that kind of just drives or can dominate a relationship. And then the other one ends up just kind of always giving in and doesn't get to ever pursue their selfish desire.

Right. I really like that. And we do in exchange, it's like, I wanna go shopping. He has no desire to shop, but I really want him to come with. So I said, all right, babe, what do you want him to turn? Like make a deal. All right, what do you want? I like that. And so it's like, so he's like, all right, well, if you do this and I'll come all right, babe, what do you want in return? Like make a deal. All right, what do you want?

I like that. And so he's like, all right, well, if you do this, then I'll come shop and you've done great. Come shop and win me. And he does it with such excitement. And I then return the favor with such excitement. Because you don't want someone that feels like, they've been drug alarm.

And it's like, it's true, he may have come shopping with me, but now he's sitting there on his phone and he's not paying attention and he looks miserable. It's like, it's not enjoyable for me, it's not enjoyable for him. So we've really figured out how to give each other the gifts of the kingdom and feel like our lives aren't being dictated by what the other person wants. You have to be your own person. What would you say you visit that once a week or once a month?

Oh yeah. Every whenever we've got date Night we always say what's your selfish desire and look sometimes one of us does give in We're so I don't really want to do that, but I can see how happy it's gonna make you so yeah Let's do it and then you jump on board and you're happy with it and you know All we try to find ways to do it together like he wants to read but I don't really want to read the book. He's interested in. So we'll go, all right, well, if this is a time where you just want to activate your

brain and, you know, his stories or anything, what is the book that we can share? And so ready player one, I don't know if you guys. So we started, he was reading it to me. And so it was like, okay, well, this is where we get to bond because I feel like he's, I get to hear his voice which I love hearing and it feels somewhat intimate. He loved the book, he read it so long ago that he was like, I actually want to like read it. So we just had this activity that once a week for an hour, he would just read the book. That's great. Excellent.

I love it. Great book by the way. Yeah, I can't wait to watch the movie. Great conversation. Oh my God, you guys are awesome. Thanks for coming in. Absolutely. I really appreciate it. I'm sure we'll do it again for sure. I can keep going when you set the last specials. No, we could probably go all day with you. I'm sure especially talks like this. We share a lot of that on that and that for me has been when I when we meet people in person, ironically even though we're a health and fitness podcast,

probably the most feedback that I get is when I discuss our relationship, my relationship with Katrina on the show. A lot of people really appreciate that information. And I think you guys have an incredible dynamic to two of you. And I also think that when you are building something that you're building, I know the amount of dedication and sacrifice,

emotionally, physically, everything that it takes to do that. And I don't know, there's very few people I feel like that can navigate through that and have a very successful relationship. So I think that's one of the things that I look at what you guys are doing. I'm most impressed with that. Sure, the business, all the things are very, very cool.

But to have a partner that you actually work together with day, every single day, you got a fucking production studio in your house. I mean, there's a lot of challenges that come with that. And I know that it has to take some habits that you guys have installed to do that. I know it for myself that we've had to learn to do that. And had a lot of success with that.

So I love those are great, great tips. Well, thank you. Excellent. Thank you again. Thank you guys for having me. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance,

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