Something You Should Know - When Knowing Nothing Actually Gives You an Advantage & The Proven Way to Live a Long, Long Life

Episode Date: December 4, 2017

I bet you have Googled medical symptoms you are experiencing. Everyone does. But the information you get can be contradictory and often times inaccurate. However, there is a place to go online that has accurate information and you’ve probably never heard of it before. We start this episode with that. Then, conventional wisdom is that having experience is always better than being a beginner. Well, not so fast. It turns out that starting at something as a newbie gives you a real advantage if you do it right according to Liz Wiseman, who is a researcher, adviser and teacher and has been ranked as one of the top 10 leadership thinkers in the world. Liz is also author of the book, Rookie Smarts: Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work (http://amzn.to/2jcNLR2). For anyone fearful of having to start a new job or career or a new anything, you need to hear what Liz has to say.  Also, is there really a “Fountain of Youth?” There's something pretty close according to cardiologist Dr. John Day, author of the book, The Longevity Plan (http://amzn.to/2Aslo9a). There is a village in a remote part of China where the people who live there live a very long time and never suffer from heart disease, diabetes or obesity. What is it these people know and do that allows them such a long life? We unravel the mystery with Dr Day. Plus, how often have you apologized for something unnecessarily? We all do it: Someone steps on your foot and you say, “I’m sorry.” Why? It wasn’t your fault. Interestingly, successful people apologize less because over-apologizing weakens your message and tends to make you less competent. We explore that in this episode of the program.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As a listener to Something You Should Know, I can only assume that you are someone who likes to learn about new and interesting things and bring more knowledge to work for you in your everyday life. I mean, that's kind of what Something You Should Know was all about. And so I want to invite you to listen to another podcast called TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks. Well, you see, TED Talks Daily is a podcast that brings you a new TED Talk every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Join host Elise Hu.

She goes beyond the headlines so you can hear about the big ideas shaping our future. Learn about things like sustainable fashion, embracing your entrepreneurial spirit, the future of robotics, and so much more. Like I said, if you like this podcast, Something You Should Know, I'm pretty sure you're going to like TED Talks Daily. And you get TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. We'll be right back. good. But being a novice and knowing nothing might even be better. Of course there's a case to be made for years of experience and practice, but surprisingly in so much of the work we do today, we tend to be at our best when we know the very least. Also, do you ever apologize to people even when it isn't your fault? Why you need to stop doing that? And there's a remote village in China where people there almost never get sick

and live a remarkably long time. Why? We tried to analyze it, you know, was it something in the air, something in the water, something else, but it really just kept coming back to the basics. All this today on Something You Should Know. Something You Should Know. Something You Should Know.

Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers. Hi and welcome. You know, I'm just getting over this pretty nasty cold I had, and like most people, I'm sure you probably have gotten sick and gone to the internet to Google your symptoms to see what they are, what your treatment options are, what it all means.

And the problem is that when you do that, you often end up more confused than when you started. Because so much medical information online is confusing and contradictory and just plain wrong. So what do you do? How do you figure out what's true and what's nonsense? Well, perhaps the people who have made the most progress on this are the people at the Cochrane Collaboration. That's Cochrane, C-O-C-H-R-A-N-E dot org. Cochrane dot org. They're an international not-for-profit that was established in the early 1990s, and you've probably never heard of it,

but it is one of the best sources for unbiased medical information in existence today, and really, they should probably be your first stop before you go to Google or WebMD. What they do is they study the studies on illness, disease, remedies, treatments, to see which ones have real evidence to support their claims and which ones don't. The idea is simple. Many studies involving thousands of patients will get us closer to the truth than any single study or anecdote ever could. Today at Cochrane, you'll find reviews on everything from the effects of acupuncture

to preventing migraines, which they say can work, to the usefulness of using cranberry juice to treat bladder infections, which they say probably does not work. The hardworking people behind Cochrane even translate their conclusions into plain language summaries and audio podcasts. So next time, check out Cochrane.org when you have a medical question, before you rely on questionable sources on the internet. And that is something you should know. Have you ever been in that situation where you're trying something completely new, totally different than anything you've done before,

and you feel like such a fish out of water? Like when you learn a new musical instrument, or you take a class in something that you know nothing about. Or more importantly, when you start a job in a new field or a new industry because the job or the field or the industry you've been in has become obsolete. I know I went through this myself when I was working in radio and transitioned into podcasting. And this has always been a side effect of innovation. Some industries and jobs disappear, while new jobs and industries emerge. But when you're in the midst of it, if you actually have to make that transition yourself, it can be very difficult.

But there is a silver lining. It turns out that coming into a new job or a new industry or any new situation has tremendous advantages, even if it doesn't seem so at the time. Liz Wiseman is a researcher, advisor, teacher, and she has been ranked as one of the top ten leadership thinkers in the world. She is president of the Wiseman Group, a leadership research and development firm in Silicon Valley, and she is author of the book, Rookie Smarts, Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work.

Hi, Liz. So how can this be? How can not knowing anything be an advantage when, in our culture anyway, experience and paying your dues is so highly regarded? Actually, contrary to what might be conventional wisdom, we tend to be at our best when we know the very least. When we're new to something and when we're naive. And when we're in that rookie state, there's power in not knowing. I think it's what I found in my research.

There's something about being at the bottom of a steep learning curve that the best of our thinking and the best of our capability tends to kick in, really kind of fueled by a hungry, humble, slightly desperate, or maybe totally desperate approach to our work. But that typically applies, and the situation is typically that it's somebody, you know, fresh out of college or, you know, who's brand new, and they start at the bottom and they learn because they're curious and they're hungry for knowledge. And that's great for them. But if you're somebody who's been in a different industry or in a different company or in a different job,

how is that an advantage? I want to be clear, Mike, on this. It's not that when we're new to anything. It's when we're new to something important and hard. There's something about this trifecta between it's important, it's hard, and we're new to it that tends to prompt our best thinking and our best work, and it's a state. Isn't that interesting that you say that the work has to be hard?

Why? What is it about the fact that things are more difficult that makes you better at it? It's probably what would cause a pilot to flip the switch and take the jet off of autopilot. You know, when conditions are stable, we tend to work in autopilot. I've seen this problem before. I know how to solve it. We conjure up all of our old assumptions, our old ways of working, and we apply it mindlessly. And in some ways, it's a productive way of working, but it's a bit of a vacuous an ice storm.

That's when you can't rely on autopilot. This is when you go into sort of heightened states of observation, of inquiry, and of learning. But there's a difference between learning and being in this heightened state of learning, and that makes you better and experience. Learning and experience. I mean, I could imagine listening to this and saying, well, wait a minute.

I would much rather have an experienced heart surgeon operate on me than a guy who's new at it because he's learning better and he's more engaged and he's not on autopilot. I'd rather have the heart surgeon who's on autopilot because he's done it a million times before. You know, I'm like, I have to confess, I would too. Yeah, I know you would. You don't want a rookie surgeon. You don't want a rookie dentist. You know, if you're going to go skydiving, you don't really want to strap on to the guy who says, like, whoo, me too, this is my first time.

And certainly what I found in the research is in the physical world where it involves physical mastery. You know, experience far trumps inexperience. But in knowledge work, we find that being inexperienced tends to be an advantage, and it's because of what's happening in our knowledge work is that often we don't even face the same problem twice. You know, technology has allowed our cycles to spin so fast that new problems are coming at us at a rate where we can't just draw on, oh, I've done this surgery, you know, 200 times. If what you say is true, if being in that rookie mode really is an advantage, it's only an advantage, I would imagine, if you act on it.

In other words, it's very easy when you're in that rookie state to sit in the corner and say, I don't understand this, I better just sit back and watch and not really engage, because being a rookie is intimidating. Right, and we find that faced with a really steep learning curve, there's usually one of two reactions. There's either the I'm going to sit in the corner and sulk, cry, have a nervous breakdown. People tend to either back away from these challenges or they dig in. They kind of throw it into low gear and they grind their way up it. And I think it is important when we are at the bottom of a learning curve to go into this rookie mode.

And what we find people tend to do in this rookie mode is they ask for help. They ask good questions. They question prevailing assumptions. They don't bring a lot of expertise, so they're forced to go out and get it from others. So they tend to mobilize and integrate expertise to bring that to bear on a problem. In this mode, we tend to simplify. You know, we don't know enough to complexify things. So we tend to be better at identifying what is the core problem we're trying to solve here?

Like, who's the customer? What are we trying to do? And we tend to operate in scrappy, pioneering ways. So we go into this rookie mode, but I think to your point, it's important that we don't just project cluelessness. Like we don't walk into the office like, hey, I'm a rookie, I'm clueless. It's coming at our work with this combination of high self-confidence, but low situational confidence. You're listening to a conversation with Liz Wiseman. She is a teacher, advisor, and researcher, president of the Wiseman Group, and author of the book

Rookie Smarts, Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work. My wife and I just signed up for HelloFresh, and it has changed the way we eat in our house. Let me tell you what happened when we got started. This box got delivered to my front door with all the ingredients for several meals. All I did was pick a meal and get started. I picked sizzling Southwestern chicken with bell peppers and feta crumble. Now that may sound daunting, but the recipe card was easy to follow. I chopped some beautiful fresh produce,

roasted the chicken, chopped the herbs, put it all together, and 30 minutes later I had a delicious restaurant quality meal everyone loved, all for about $10 a meal. And here's something you should know. HelloFresh makes everything simple and convenient. You choose the delivery date, all the ingredients come pre-measured, and there are three plans to choose from. The classic, vegetarian, or family plan. These are really high quality, nutritious meals that taste amazing. You have got to try HelloFresh. It'll change the way you eat, and you get $30 off your first week. Just go to HelloFresh.com and use the promo code SOMETHING30. That's HelloFresh.com, promo code SOMETHING30, for $30 off your first week. So, Liz, also when you're a rookie, when you're a novice at something, and the people that you're working with know you're a rookie,

you also have that problem of people thinking that you don't know what you're talking about and that you should sit down and shut up and listen and watch because we're the pros and watch how we do it. And so you're dealing with personalities, too. Sure, and particularly early on in your career, you're expected to play that kind of a role. But when we are projecting this state of intelligent learner, usually, I mean, maybe there are some personalities that say, you know what, sit down, shut up and listen to the pros. That hasn't been my experience as much. Usually, when someone is an intelligent learner, an aggressive, intelligent learner,

people's mentoring gene gets activated. And we tend to want to help those people. And we want to see them successful. I bet a lot of it is that self-talk going in your mind that's telling you that these people think you're an idiot and that you ought to shut up, but perhaps they're not really thinking that. I don't know. I think we sort of have to earn idiot status, don't you? Certainly I found that my work, life, and experience is that people tend to assume that you're smart and capable if you're in the room, unless you prove yourself otherwise. And so I think what's important is that kind of in this new game of work and this new economy where things are changing really, really fast, I think it's important that we develop a track record of success

in rookie kinds of roles, meaning, hey, you know what? I got put into a job where I was a little underqualified for a big job, and I was able to close that gap and be successful. And I did it here. I did it there. I did it over there, which then earned you the right to go take on those new challenges. It earned you the right maybe in your 50s to make career changes. When you're doing this, you're going to make mistakes. In fact, there's a category of mistakes called rookie mistakes, and we all know what those are. What do you do when you make those so that you don't end up taking 10 steps backwards and now everybody thinks, yeah, see, they're a rookie. They're an idiot.

Yeah. Well, when we are in rookie mode, we do make more mistakes. And that's part of the beauty of why we tend to perform well, because we do fail more often. But what's different is we don't tend to make huge failures. Because when we're in rookie mode, we often think of newcomers as, well, first of all, we think that newcomers bring fresh ideas. And the truth is, they don't really bring fresh ideas. We bring no ideas, which causes us to seek out guidance and mobilize expertise of others. But we also often think that when we're in rookie mode, we take big risks. And actually, when I looked at the data on this, we actually aren't big risk takers when we're in rookie mode. We're risk mitigators. We don't operate in these big, bold leaps of faith.

We actually take baby steps. In some ways, we walk into our challenges the way that you – you can see I travel a fair bit. You know, the way that you walk through a hotel room when you're getting up out of bed in the middle of the night, you're in a brand-new hotel room, you don't know which way is what, and you have to get yourself to the bathroom. You know, your hands are outstretched. You're, like, looking for obstacles. You're taking baby steps, trying to not run into anything. And we do make more mistakes, but the mistakes tend to be smaller. And we're constantly calibrating, almost like the way that in this hotel room your hands are outstretched looking for obstacles.

We're like, we try things and we're desperate to calibrate our performance. And so we say things like, how was that? What did we do? We're extremely open to feedback and adjustment. Whereas when we're experienced to something, we're often so convinced we know how to do it that we lay down plans, big plans, and we often go for long stretches before checking to see if we're even headed in the right direction. When you are a rookie at something and you start something new and you're working through this, at what point do you say, how much time do you give yourself before you say,

you know, I'm really getting this or, you know, this isn't for me? That's a great question. I think there's two important ideas in it. One is when you're in this mode, how big of a bite to take on. First of all, rookies come with all sorts of virtues, which I've tried to share a few of that. But in rookie mode, we often lack direction. We can end up solving the wrong problem really fast. One of my friends is a captain in the U.S. Navy, and he said, you know, rookies, they're all thrust, no vector. And so what we need is, first of all, we need to know which direction to head, which is why it's really important if you're leading someone,

managing someone who's in rookie mode, A, don't let them go too long without figuring out if they're doing it right, but B, make sure they get direction. So like if I'm new, if I'm trying something for the very first time, I'm going to work up front to make sure I really understand what the target is. So that's like part A. Part B is you don't want to go too long before figuring out if you're doing it right. We actually did a little bit of, my research team and I did a little bit of study on this, looking for what is the kind of optimal size challenge for someone who's new to something.

And we found that, you know, you want to give someone a micro challenge, and the best micro challenge is about a two-week duration, meaning here's a piece of work. Like don't say, hey, come in, why don't you revamp all of our file management system? Like come see me in six months when you've got that done. You'd never want to give a rookie that and you'd never want to take on an assignment like that. You'd want to parse that and say, okay, you know what, here's a bite that you can get done. Two weeks is a great amount of time to give someone a chance to struggle with something and to wrestle with it, but also gives you quick feedback to know whether or not that person is on track.

Did you do any looking at whether or not it matters like how far afield you go? In other words, if you used to be in industry A, is it better to go into industry B or something so different, industry Z? Or does it not really matter? Yeah, you know, we did look at this. And I think the answer to this, coming at it from several different angles, is a pivot of one. One of the executives I work with at Google, she made this observation about rookie mode. She said, it seems to me that people are going to perform at their best when they're doing something new, important, and hard if they can take one strength with them. The other way I would, I see kind of the answer being one is if you look at it from a hiring manager standpoint,

you probably get a lot of people saying, hey, you know, I want to do something different, or hey, I want to be a podcaster. I know you help a lot of people do that. What I find is that people are willing to make bets on people who go into new challenges, new assignments. We want to see people be successful, but most hiring managers or investors or sponsors or stakeholders are really only willing to make one bet. Meaning if I'm in finance and I work in the nonprofit sector, and really I have this passion, I want to go do social media marketing, and I want to transition into the for-profit sector. Okay, now you're talking two leaps.

So I would think in terms of take one strength with you and make one pivot at a time. Because when people are in that position of needing to make a transition, it's hard to know where to go. And that advice you just gave makes it a little simpler. It narrows it down as to what your choices are. If you follow that advice, it's not like you could do anything. You ought to do something that's somewhat related to what you've been doing and not go so far afield because then you're just flailing around and not knowing anything. Yeah, you know, and sort of bringing down the whole rookie state in general. It's like we end up making a bad name for ourselves when we try to go with a complete reinvention. I'm going to follow my

passion and reinvent myself versus I'm going to pivot from one thing I know how to do and point that in a different direction. I'm going to make a bunch of strategic pivots. That's a really good point. So sum up your message here. Sum things up. I might sum it up with, we're not always at our most brilliant when we're new to something. Of course there's a case to be made for years of experience and practice and mastery, and there are certain jobs where I would only want experienced people in that job. But surprisingly, in so much of the work we do today, we tend to be at our best when we know the very least. Well, that's comforting to hear for anybody who's either forced to or wants to try something new, that there is that silver lining that you can use your rookiness to your advantage.

Liz Wiseman has been my guest. She is president of the Wiseman Group, a leadership research and development firm, and author of the book Rookie Smarts, Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work. There's a link to her book at Amazon in this episode's show notes, which you'll find wherever you listen to this podcast. Well, you know what, Mike, so great talking to you. Yeah, you too, Liz. I appreciate your time. Thanks so much. Okay. Talk to you later. Bye.

Is there a fountain of youth? What if I told you that if you really wanted to, you could increase your chances of living to 100 and beyond? But you'd have to make some changes. What kind of changes? Well, cardiologist Dr. John Day has found a remote village in China where, amongst the people who live there, there are no cases of heart disease,

no cases of diabetes or obesity, and very little use of life-extending medication. In this village, one out of every 100 people is 100 years old or older, which statistically is extraordinary. In his book, The Longevity Plan, Dr. Day took a look at what it is that makes these people live so long. Is it their genes? Is it something in the water? What is it? Welcome, Dr. Day. So first, how did you find these people in this little village in China? One thing about me is I do speak fluent Chinese, and I'm frequently asked

to go to China and represent our medical society and do teaching and cases and speak at the big meetings. And through these trips, the people introduced me to this longevity village, which is in the Guangxi province in southwest China near the Vietnam border, where these people live these remarkably long lives. And in fact, it has the highest known percentage of centenarians in the world. And at first, I didn't quite believe that this place could exist, but after many trips, took our family there, our research team, did genetic studies, extensive research, I'm convinced there's something there, and that's what led to the book, The Longevity Plan. And couldn't it just be these people have good genes?

So that was my initial hypothesis, is that, look, there's this little mountainous community. They're cut off from the rest of China. They're cut off from the rest of the world. They must have some superhuman genes, and they just keep inbreeding, and they are able to defy the normal laws of aging and chronic diseases and all these others. But what we found in our research team is we did genetic studies on all of these centenarians and their genetic profile is no different than ours. Many of these centenarians have genes that would have predicted cancer, cardiovascular disease, early death, but yet they've come to defy that. And really it comes down to epigenetics.

They're just like us. We all have good genes. We all have bad genes. But the decisions that we make, the lifestyle we live, what goes on around us determines to a large extent which genes get turned on and which genes get turned off. And so is the way they live their life what we would call a, quote, healthy lifestyle? Is it just the things we've all heard about eat right, exercise, get your sleep, and have friends? You know, you've hit on many of the key elements to that. And yes, they're all important. We tried to analyze it, you know, you've hit on many of the key elements to that. And, yes, they're all important.

We tried to analyze it, you know, was it something in the air, something in the water, something else. But it really just kept coming back to the basics, eating real food, being physically active, being outside, being connected with others, embracing your stress, optimizing your sleep, living in harmony with the rhythms of life. And it's not that hard, but yet it's very profound in the health effects that it can have. And these same principles, when I applied them to my own practice here in Salt Lake City, people that previously I would have treated with medications or procedures, that remarkably, many of these people were able to put their heart disease into remission without drugs or without procedures, just following these basic principles. And so what are some of those basic principles? So we identified seven key features. The first being eating real food. And in a nutshell, they eat real. They didn't

have any processed foods, added sugar. They didn't even have any cooking oil until just recently. Basically, they ate a lot of wild fruits, wild vegetables, these small oily fish high in omega-3s that they pulled out of the river. But it was all real. Around the time of Chinese New Year, they might eat the entire pig. But otherwise, vegetables was part of their breakfast, their lunch, their dinner. It was a way of life for them. We talked about the physical activity. They were very connected. There was no loneliness here in this village. Most of these centenarians lived in four or five generation homes. So just the amazing magic that can happen when you tie the generations together in a positive way. They lived in accordance with their circadian rhythms.

The environment around them was one conducive to health, and they all had a strong sense of purpose or life purpose. What does it mean to live in accordance with your circadian rhythms is one of the things I think you said. What does that mean exactly? That's great. And that's something that a lot of people, for those of your listeners who may have read a lot of health and wellness related books, this isn't something that's talked about frequently.

And as a cardiologist, I specialize in rhythms, so helping people to keep their hearts in rhythm. And it's something that really was quite striking to me is the way they lived their lives. For example, in the morning, they would get up with the sun. They would be outside. They would get plenty of that natural sunlight during the day. At night, they didn't have artificial lights, screen time, all these other things that activated their brains in a way that never allowed them to unwind or to feel tired naturally, to have that natural melatonin release. Their meals were not at crazy times each day, depending on work assignments or travel or that, but rather they ate at a set time. And the interesting thing is there's a wealth of scientific literature that supports these natural rhythms that happen.

For example, people who, even something as simple as daylight savings time, can increase your risk of a heart attack, depending on which study you look at, 20 to 40% for one week. And that's just compromising on one hour of sleep. But even a bad night of sleep can activate up to 711 different genes. So these simple things, eating in regular times helps to be conducive to maintaining a healthy weight. And so there was so much about their lives and in rhythms and seasons that really convinced us that there was something there that accounted for their health and longevity. Don't you think people have a general sense that they should lead a healthier life and that that means eating better food and sleeping when they should sleep and not staying up all night and all that. But they know it, they just choose not to do it. You bring up a great point. On one hand, for example, with food,

there's so much misinformation about what is healthy and what's not. And if you believe these healthy labels that you read at the grocery store, you're going to end up eating a lot of processed crap, which is not good for health. So a lot of us feel like we may know it, and many people do, but it's on the execution. And that's really where in this village that they had this huge advantage, is that they had this strong sense of purpose that was driving them to provide for their family, which can be very motivational. But probably more important than anything is they lived in an environment where people

weren't bringing in stale donuts or leftover Halloween candy or whatever else. They weren't pumping their kids full of sugar at their scouting events or church or school or after soccer games, but rather the entire environment was one that supported health. And so without that temptation, healthy choices, healthy lifestyles, it was the path of least resistance. But as I say, people have a sense of this. They understand that they should be spending more time in the produce section and not in the ice cream section at the supermarket, but people make the choices they make.

Do you think that people don't know this, that they're ignorant, or that they just know it and choose otherwise? I think both are true. For example, I see many people in my practice that really have no understanding of what it means to eat healthy, or even some people that feel that as long as they go to the gym, they're okay and they can sit down for 15 hours a day in their cubicle or whatever, not realizing that motion through the day is important or artificial light and natural sunlight. So there is an education gap, but I agree with you that it's in the execution that's probably more important than anything.

And the lesson really from this is that our willpower, willpower is like a muscle. It can be fatigued depending on what's going on in our life or what time of the day it is or how we're feeling. And so to try and create an environment where willpower is not needed so that execution can happen, so that we're not always bombarded with all these temptations and trying to say, do I eat the cake this time or not? Or what if I just have a bite? And at the end of the day, that just wears us out. And so the key in the execution for people who already have that education component is to minimize the decisions, to make it so that right decisions are the path of least resistance. Do you think that it works as a sliding scale? In other words, you don't have to do all the things these people in China do to live a longer life,

but at least if you move down the scale closer to them, things will be better. Absolutely. And that's what I tell people is there are seven principles that we identified here in the book to focus on, and it's well supported by Western medical literature, but I would encourage people to start where they need it the most. For example, with me, exercise was never, being physically active was never, that's something that just came naturally to me. If I'm not physically active, I'm very irritable and depressed and nobody wants to be around me.

But for me, the diet portion was huge. I lived a standard American diet. I ate a couple of donuts and bagels and cream cheese and Coca-Cola products, which were all provided free for me in my doctor's cafeteria for years. That's how I started my breakfast. I didn't even think twice about it. So for me, food was a huge component. And then the stress, the sense of time urgency always and not being mindful. And those were the two big areas that I really needed to work on the most. So finding, but even before you get to that point is you have

to have a why. You have to have a reason. You have to have something that's motivating you or why bother? And so I think first figuring out, does it matter to you? And if so, then working on the areas that you need the most help with and then moving on from there. But you're right, whatever you can move down the scale will pay tremendous dividends in your health, happiness, and longevity. It's interesting, and you probably know this better than most, how sometimes it takes that heart attack to motivate you to do things that you thought you never could do before, that you wouldn't give up before.

And that's unfortunately the way it was with me, is it took me losing my health, being on five prescription medications in my mid-40s, feeling awful, having troubles, wondering if I'm going to have to go on disability with my profession and not even be able to shoot a basketball with my kids that really made me to give me that desire that I got to the point that I was willing to do anything, anything to get my health back. And sometimes that's what it takes. And when you get right down to it, your health is your most important possession, whether you're a billionaire or you're just struggling to survive. You know, if you don't feel well, even if you have a billion dollars

in the bank, all you're going to be focused on is your health. And sadly, it takes oftentimes hitting a health rock bottom of sorts before people are ready to make the changes. They're ready to do whatever is needed to get their health back. We do live in a world of temptation here in this country, and, you know, in the Western civilization is full of temptation that those people in China don't have. You wonder if they had those temptations, would they succumb, or would they keep on the straight and narrow? Well, they're actually experiencing that now. In the last 10 years, they've had a highway that was paved. Now they can have access to things. For example, on our first trip to this village,

there were no Coca-Cola products. By our second journey to the village, Coca-Cola had invaded the village. They started getting processed foods. Even some of our American processed foods made their way to the middle of nowhere in China. And then they, of course, they had their own Chinese versions of processed foods. And they are now succumbing to the same temptations that we have. And whenever they do something in China, they like to do it in a big way. And that economic miracle has reached this village. They now have disposable income. They're no longer walking everywhere. Now they have electricity. They have TV. They have video games. They have processed foods. And the younger generations are embracing this. And it's sad to

see. But unfortunately, they're going to have to learn the way many of us have had to learn here in the West. And it's, you know, you want to reach out and you want to say, stop, don't, don't, don't go down that pathway. But sadly, people, everyone has to travel their own path. And hopefully, at some point, they can find what it takes to regain the health that they had prior to just recent years. I agree that from my perspective, I'm no expert, but it does seem to me that people have a pretty good sense that when they're... I do it myself and you did it too. I mean, you have a sense that, you know,

we probably shouldn't do this. We probably don't need to eat this second helping. But you rationalize. You rationalize. Sure, right. Well, it's just once and blah, blah, blah. Everybody else looks fine. You know, they seem to be eating this way and they don't look too bad. Right, but there's that little thing in the back of your head

that says, you know, this is wrong. You know it's wrong, but you're doing it anyway, and maybe it's okay once in a while, because it's your birthday and you should have an extra piece of cake, but if the temptations weren't there, it sure would make life a lot easier, and I think that when you get those temptations out of your house, it does make it easier, because they're not there to eat. I couldn't agree more, And that's the best place to start because I can guarantee whatever junk you bring into your house, I don't care how much willpower you have, sooner or later, it's going to disappear. You're going to eat it.

But if you can keep it out of the house, keep it out, then it just makes life so much better. You have so much more energy and willpower. You can focus on other things than always having to be battling these temptations. It's exhausting. So where's a good place to start, do you think? Where do you think people can bite off enough that they get into this without having to just give up their whole world? I think it's just starting one step at a time. This is a journey. There are some people who can cold turkey, turn everything around, but they are few and far between. I think for most people, it's working on one thing and then moving on to the next.

And as they become habits, they become easier. And you may have to set up various protocols or ways to minimize decision fatigue or willpower fatigue, but it can be done. And I've seen it in my patients. And in fact, as I took many of my patients with advanced heart disease who a life of abusing their body, you know, 92% of them were able to adapt to this lifestyle while I was working with them for four months. And so it can be done. It's not too hard. It's just making it a priority and creating an environment that allows you to succeed.

If you so choose. But it's good to hear that it's not particularly hard. It's really a matter of priority. And I think one of the things you talked about that was really important is you've got to get the temptation out of the way. If you've got a bunch of crap in the house, as you say, it's going to get eaten. But if it isn't there, it won't. My guest has been Dr. John Day. He is a cardiologist and author of the book, The Longevity Plan.

There's a link to his book at Amazon in the show notes for this episode of the podcast. Thank you, doctor. Thank you so much for having me on. How often have you apologized for something you didn't do or apologized before something you did do. Often when people feel less confident, they apologize before they ask for something or pitch an idea. You know, like, sorry to bother you but, or sorry if this sounds stupid but. The fact is that successful people apologize less. They apologize when an apology is required, but it makes no sense to apologize for something you haven't done or said yet. What it does is weaken your message and makes you

appear unsure of yourself. It also doesn't make a lot of sense to apologize for something that's not your fault. How often have you had somebody step on your foot and then you say, oh sorry, excuse me, why? It's the other person who should apologize. So if you ever catch yourself wanting to apologize first before you say or do something, or apologize for something you didn't do, try to catch yourself. You'll feel better for it. And that is something you should know. If you have a question or a comment or would like to get in touch, you can always reach me by email at mike at somethingyoushouldknow.net, not dot com, dot net. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Do you love Disney?

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We are famous for rabbit holes, Disney themed games, and fun facts you didn't know you needed. I had Danielle and Megan record some answers to seemingly meaningless questions. I asked Danielle, what insect song is typically higher pitched in hotter temperatures and lower pitched in cooler temperatures? You got this. No, I didn't. Don't believe that. About a witch coming this. No, I didn't. Don't believe that.

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