The Bossticks - How Air Quality Affects Longevity, Indoor Home Health, & Healing After Wildfires Ft. Mike Feldstein Founder Of Jaspr

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

#837: Join us as we sit down with Mike Feldstein – founder of Jaspr. After years in the wildfire & flood restoration sector, as well as air quality consulting, Mike witnessed firsthand how polluted air can severely impact our health. Frustrated by the lack of truly effective air purifiers on the market, he set out to create his own solution – Jaspr. In this episode, Mike shares how the LA wildfires affected air quality, gives practical tips to detox the air in your home, reveals the hidden truth of mold toxicity, & dives into why purifying your air is more important than ever!    To Watch the Show click HERE   For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM   To connect with Jaspr click HERE   To connect with Lauryn Bosstick click HERE   To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE   Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE   Get your burning questions featured on the show! Leave the Him & Her Show a voicemail at [phone].   This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential   Head to the HIM & HER Show ShopMy page HERE and LTK page HERE to find all of Michael and Lauryn's favorite products mentioned on their latest episodes.   Visit jaspr.co/skinny to learn more and use code SKINNY for $400 off your Jaspr purchase!    To learn more about Kindling Academy visit kindling.academy.   Visit istandwithmypack.org to support I Stand With My Pack's (ISWMP) mission by donating or adopting. Every contribution helps!   This episode is sponsored by ASTRAL House Marg Summer is here. Time to stock up! Go to astraltequila.com to find Astral near you - and don't forget the limes! Please Enjoy Responsibly.    This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp Visit BetterHelp.com/SKINNY to get 10% off your first month.   This episode is sponsored by Cymbiotika Go to Cymbiotika.com/TSC to get 20% off plus free shipping.    Produced by Dear Media

The following podcast is a dear media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her.

Hello everybody. Welcome back to the skinny confidential, him and her show. We are all obsessed over what we put in our bodies, our food, our skin, supplements, but what about the air we breathe? Turns out your home's air might be silently wrecking your health. Between wildfire smoke, mold, and hidden toxins, today's guest is pulling back the curtain on what's really in your air. Mike Felstein is the founder of Jasper, a revolutionary air purification company born out of disaster response. He's here to break down the dark truths about air quality, what's floating around your home, expose the hidden danger of wildfire smoke,

why most air purifies are just band-aids and so much more. If you care about your health, your sleep, longevity. This episode will give you takeaways on how you can breathe better air starting today. With that, let's get into the show. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. Everyone is cold plunging. They're saunty. They care about the water they drink. They're using non-toxic cleaning supplies. Seed oils, fragrances. Working out, lifting weights, but people are not talking about the air. So this episode,

we've talked a little bit about this with you, air awareness. We're going to go really into. We're going to talk about mold allergens, the fires. What people don't know is actually living in the air. We're going to get granular. Let's do it. First, just give the audience a little bit of your expertise. Like, give us some context about you.

And if you didn't hear the last episode that I was on, check the show notes for the previous one, because it would be great to reference that. That one's like part one. Yep. So if anyone hasn't heard that one, that one would be a good one to check out for like setting the foundation. That one blew everyone's mind. I got so many DMs about that episode. No one had any idea what was in their air. So this is part two. So if you haven't listened, check that one out. Yeah, my background was in wildfire restoration, mold cleanup, air quality consulting.

So I was the guy who would travel around to fires, floods, hurricanes, and rebuild homes and clean up toxic homes to get people back in there. And then in between disasters, I would consult people on their air. So if people were sick, at home and they didn't know why. They've done all the detoxes. They were doing the sauna. They've done the supplements. They're doing all the things they're supposed to do. And then they're just been sick, unwell for years. Not sick, sick, but tired. Just not optimal. Then they go on vacation one time or on a camping trip and they feel great. And they're like, whoa, I'm cured. They go home. They're sick again. Is my home making me sick? We were the guys who would go out to your home and figure out if something in your indoor environment is potentially making you sick.

That could be allergens. That could be mold. That could be a number of things. things after. So that that is what my background was before doing this stuff. What is the grossest thing you have discovered in someone's air? I mean, it's usually the same few things, but it's almost always the same as just in what concentration. There's always mold. There's always pollen. There's always insect parts. Every single breath we take. That one's pretty gross. Insect parts. In any baby's nursery, there's fecal matter, especially if those diapers aren't gotten outside. That's pretty gross. Doesn't get that much more gross than poo. Of course, there's glyphosate, there's allergens, there's dust mites.

There's a lot of gross stuff. Just like your water, right? Like we know we have to filter our water. Tap water is pretty gross, but we're all breathing tap air all day long. With what happened to L.A. recently, it was wild. But what my brain went to was when everything got lit on fire, there's all this off-gassing happening. So like, say someone's house was on fire and the was done, all of those chemicals, the paint, the toxins, the nail polish, whatever is all in the air. Is that correct? Completely. Okay.

But your guys' timing on your move from L.A. couldn't have been better. Well, you know, we moved, we moved in 2020. But funny enough, we happened to be in L.A. the day that happened. It was so sad. And we were flying in. We recorded a podcast with Ivanka Trump. We've never actually even told this story live. I'll just tell you.

We recorded the podcast with her the morning the LA fire started here in this studio that you're sitting in now. Wow. And the very same day, we recorded with Tony Robbins in L.A., which was kind of logistically a total mess. But it was the only day that we could all get together and make that happen so that all those episodes got done. And we obviously wanted to interview both of them. So we started here in the morning, shot over there. And we were like while we were interviewing Tony, I kept looking at the window. I'm like, what the hell is going on out there in the sky?

because we were in our LA studios. And yeah, so we were there when that happened. And we were planned to stay for a while. But then obviously we wanted to clear out of there and free up room for people that needed hotel space because we're not local there anymore. But of all my years, because we grew up in California and there was all, you know, San Diego had wildfires,

LA had fires, NorCal had fires. Like I'd say like every other year, there's some fire in one of those places. It's just like, if you're from California, you know what I'm talking about. But when I saw that going on, I was like, holy shit, this is, this is massive. We haven't seen anything like that.

I guess what my question is, Is the air worse when the fire is going on? Or is it actually worse afterwards when everything is off gas? Both are bad. During is worse. It's like unbreatheable. But the thing is this fire is truly like unprecedented. That's what I'm saying.

Of all the years I've seen fires. This is different. Yeah, it's different. So the reason I, and I, I flew out to L.A. A few weeks after the fire because like I have really unique experience from a fire in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada in 2016, where 100,000, thousand people got evacuated. So the whole city was shut down for a month. Smaller city, but the whole city shut down. What I was specializing in there is only 3,000 or so homes

burnt down, but every single home in the city was unlivable because it got, it got intoxicated by smoke. So the smoke damage is very, very significant in these situations. Now, what's unique about this is this is not just like a regular tree fire, you know, making smores in your backyard, you smell a little smoke. And anyone who's ever, like, like they had a fire, maybe someone had to drink too many, throws their marshmallow bag in the fire. You know what that plastic smells like. You're like, this is not good. So now, to your point, we've never seen so many electric cars burn. How many thousands of Tesla batteries burnt with all the chemicals and the lithium and all that aerosolized, airborne. So, you know, I feel for the people

who lost their homes, but you know who's even worse? The person next door who didn't lose their home. The person who lost their home is more than likely, 99.9% of the time, they get a brand new house. They get a million dollar check for their possessions. The person who lives down the street, their home is unlivable and insurance is saying go home. So homes typically burn at about 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. At about 1,100 degrees, steel loses half of its strength. So when I was in LA and I was taking some pictures, there was metal rivers going down people's driveways because the metal in your car, it just turns into like literally liquid, liquidified aluminum, molten aluminum. So in this case, we have the 12,000 plus homes, 20,000 plus cars, many of which are EV.

Every paint, toxin, chemical gets in your soil, gets in your water, gets in your homes. It's on another level in terms of what we've ever seen before. So I went there and I started testing the air. Also, Kayla Barnes, she's a biohacker who lives in L.A., and she's been testing her blood for a couple years monthly. So she got her blood work post fire. Her heavy metals, her mycotoxins and her chemicals are off the charts. You know who also posted something similar to that is Brian Johnson? Because he's like, he posted, he's like, oh, who else is, you know, he's been measuring

his body so consistently for so long and it would happen. Same thing. He had issues. This is the moment when the biohackers getting their blood work every month. It's really useful data. Whether or not everybody else is playing that longevity game, it's super impactful to see that data before and after. So this is, this is a big one.

You know, at the least bad situation, it all blows over. And in six, seven months, the air is okay. At the worst, this is like a 9-11 situation where everybody gets really sick. So I'm pretty concerned. We tested a lot of people's air. And so when it rains, everyone's like, it's all good. So actually, I was testing the air all throughout the day when it did rain. The air actually got worse when it was raining than the next couple days was way better.

But it actually had got worse for a little bit because the rain's kicking up all the particles. and then because a lot of those homes, almost basically all of them, there's still piles of ash. So every time the wind blows and kicks that up into the air, it just starts the process again. Basically, what people also don't understand is even in a fire like Fort McMurray, the air quality was compromised six months after the fire. It can be years. It can be because it's soil. It's the water.

It's your insulation, your carpets, your couching, your couches, your clothing, anything that can absorb water, absorb smoke and air and toxins. So with this LA fire situation, it's a big problem. How are people going to feel if they know they've been affected by the air quality? Sometimes it's a little chronic and it's hard to tell like when you're not paying attention. It's like allergies. It's like low grade fatigue or something. It could be that.

It could also be like, you know, the kind of thing that gives you cancer in five years. Not everything has a symptom immediately. For a lot of people though, like if you talk to pediatricians and doctors and basically it's a big stressor, it's a big toxin that's coming in now. So like everything's just up. You know, asthma is worse. autoimmune is worse. It's just like another, another stressor on top of already kind of polluted life in Los Angeles. But it's the something that I was, it was bittersweet for us,

but there was two folks because I went around offering free air testing because I just wanted to see what the levels were. And because of my experience in Fort McMurray, I'm like uniquely qualified to detox homes from smoke. So by the way, that was nice of you. It was nice, but I need, like, I need to know. I mostly was visiting Jasper customers and then anyone that they refer to us to. I just put up an Instagram post and like free air testing for a week and just drove around and check things out because like most people, you could have someone who's been doing restoration for 50 years. They're really used to kitchen fires and drier fires, but they don't know regional smoke damage. So I have this like really unique experience of this of this type of situation.

So we went there and Ashley and Javier, if you guys are listening, they lived one floor apart in the same apartment building. She had a Jasper. He had nothing. Also, even if people had air filters, a lot of them lost power. So if that's the case, your home got messed up. If you had four or five filters and you had power, you're okay because you were filtering the toxins in as they were coming in. Her home had really good air. His home was almost unlivable. He had 1.4 million particles.

She had 250,000. Those are big numbers, but like 600,000 is normal. So that was like a cool moment for me to just see how Jasper held up to like that level of toxins and that level of situation. Is there anything people can do for free? today with their air? Yes. So at the far end of the spectrum, you have someone who totally lost their home.

Sad, but it's a straightforward process. You need to get a new home. And for them, you actually look up schedule of loss. Or, yeah, schedule of loss. It's basically when you're dealing with a fire, you really need to advocate for yourself with these insurance companies. So you basically make a spreadsheet,

itemizing everything you had. The problem to not, you know, again, like this, the reason this is such a mess is there's plenty of people that I know over there that fit the bucket you're talking about, which they lost their house, they're insured, they're likely getting new houses, sometimes in new cities, new places, even better rebuilding with they have. A lot of those people, and they, and you know, a lot of them are wealthy people, but it was also an area that was not wealthy and a lot of these people lost insurance because of, again, like, I'm not going to get going on a rant on California, but the insurance

companies were screaming for a long time that some of these policies needed to be changed in order for them to continue to insure the state. And the adjacency I correlate it to in my mind is if you go for a life insurance policy and you super sick or you have something, likely you're going to get denied insurance. Exactly. Good analogy. Right. And so like these insurance companies have so much data. So if they're, if you're, the state should have recognized that if there's a bunch of insurance companies screaming that they're not going to continue to insure people. That is the insurance company putting their data together saying we know we know something is going to happen. not that it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. For those people, they don't have the opportunity to go through any of this. They just lost everything. And it's like there's nothing they can do.

No. It's terrible. It is. So they need to go back to what you were saying. They need to implement. What can they do? Yeah. So if people, no matter what, be very diligent with your schedule of loss.

Remember, the insurance company is not your friend. It's kind of like a cop who pulls you over who makes nice and then writes you up a ticket. The adjuster is going to pretend to be your best friend ever. Record every single phone call. you ever have. So number one, if they're recording, you record two. So if they ever say, hey, this call is recorded, get your voice recorder out and you want to record every single call you have with insurance. If they ever promise you anything, say, hey, really appreciate that for my records. Can you just shoot me a one-liner email confirming that right now?

If you have that in writing, you're gold, but often they'll promise you stuff. Next week, it's a new adjuster on the fire. Like, but they told me, where's the proof? You're screwed. So document, document, document. Put your journalist hat on here. Now, to the next tier of people, who, if you came back to your house and there was ash or smoke in the home or your smoke filter was very, your furnace filter was very discolored, that means your home got heavily drenched with toxic smoke. So same with you. You need to be, you need to be opening an insurance claim. A lot of people are, but a lot of people just don't think about it. They go home, they clean and that's it. No, no, no. And you're saying not just related to California, you can do this kind of insurance claimant for any,

any insurance policy. Any smoke, any smoke situation. So this could apply to anyone in the country time who had a big smoke issue. If there's ash and sutt, and normally if there's ash and soot in your window sill, that means your windows blue, which means your windows have to get replaced. And it's not okay to clean your couch. Sure, we could clean the outside of the couch, but the inside, the foam and everything that's porous, it's all drenched with smoke. You cannot clean the inside of a couch. So you need to be advocating for you and your family. If you had, this is for people who had ash and sutt in their homes. Your home was for sure contaminated. A proper restoration claim. Your insulation's getting replaced. Your

carpet's all getting ripped out, all your furniture, your bedding, your clothing is being replaced. Every book. It's porous. So anything that could get wet needs to be replaced. Also, chat GPT is amazing at this because you're going to be fighting with your insurance. They're going to say you have to keep this. You just say, hey buddy, hey GPT. I need you to explain to my insurance company why a couch cannot be salvaged. It's masterful. So that's a really good resource for people. Geez, Mike. Now we have our next category, people. You're like five, miles from the fire. You're like, we didn't have ash and soot in the house per se, but it definitely smelled smoky when we moved home. What should we do? This is the big, this is the millions of people.

This is everyone who's like, we're not that bad. We're okay. You're not that okay. So people who lived in New York City a couple years ago when Quebec fires blew in, people would never thought New York City could turn into that apocalyptic state. It did. If you go to their homes now and we test their carpet or their bedding or their furniture, we can still find smoke, soot, and ash. And that fire was thousands of miles away. So imagine LA and the Tesla batteries and the chemicals. So if you live within 15, 20 miles and you smelt smoke outside at all, if you smelt the smoke outside, it came inside too. There's no magical air barrier between your home and the outside. So what you have to be doing is what I call it a DIY smoke detox of your home. Which is. Which is.

So basically it should look something like this. All your clothing should be taken out of the home to be cleaned. Dry cleaner would be a great way to go. Like wash and full. holds fine too, but all your clothes needs to leave the home because it's porous. While your clothes is out of the home, you want to get all of your carpets, if you have carpets, get all your carpets, your bedding and your furniture, steam cleaned, professionally steam cleaned. So now all the, because you don't want, if you leave your clothes there and then you're cleaning some stuff haphazardly, you can recontaminate stuff. But insurance doesn't pay for this, right? This is the DIY. It's going to be two grand or so. This is the DIY. This is the, you're on your own. It's not an insurance

a lot of time. You can use money here to supplement time or it's really a lot of time. But, you know, getting your clothes cleaned as someone, I've cleaned the home of hundreds and hundreds of people's homes, you're probably looking at about a $700 dry cleaning slash clothes cleaning bill for like the average family of fours stuff. And that's in. Thank God we don't have to clean your clothes, Michael. Yeah, it'd be a little more. Michael's like, I mean, oh my God, go ahead. You might nail that. You might take that average up. You might take the average up. So while you're doing that, you're getting your furniture and your carpet. steam cleaned. You're also getting your ducks cleaned because the ducts are the lungs of your home. So we want to get those cleaned. So now we have clean clothes. We have clean couches, beds, all that good stuff. We're getting our ducks cleaned as well. And then the last thing is treat this like a construction job. Everybody knows when you get a bathroom renovated, the dust goes everywhere, no matter how good they could isolate the room. So what you want to do is you want to get basically a construction deep clean. It's going to be two or three cleaners for a whole day, maybe two. They're going to be, you know, pulling, pulling furniture back, removing plates and cups and cutlery, like a deep, deep clean.

So this is, you know, a couple thousand dollars situation. But if you don't do that, and this is especially true if you weren't filtering your air or if you lost power, the alternative is you have lithium smoke in your bed, in your furniture. This is not an option. Like you need to make time and budget for this. And a lot of it's elbow grease. So you could also rent a steam cleaner, rent a happy vacuum. You could spend four or five days and do this all yourself.

But, you know, you can't clean your own. own ducks. So this is essential though. So if someone was 15 to 20 miles away from the fire, they still need to be proactive about the smoke that is living in their homes. Big time. By the way, I went to the studio for like eight. I kept, I was having one-on-one chats with everybody like an hour, an hour, an hour. So I went to a studio here in Austin and I recorded like a two-hour smoke detox masterclass. Okay. It's free. I did this just to not have the conversations. I talk about how to assess the damage in your home, how to restore your own home, how to deal with insurance, how to deal with contractors, all that stuff. It's jasper.co slash smoke.

Okay. So j-a-spr.com slash smoke. And gives you the masterclass. If you live in L.A. and you're anywhere within 20, 30 miles, and it's a choose-your-own adventure. So it's like a bunch of little five-minute segments. So you don't have to watch some long two-hour video. Pick the little thing that applies to your situation. And that will be helpful if you live in L.A.

I have worked really hard on my home when it comes to picking paints and using non-toxic cleaning supplies and just being thoughtful about everything we're doing. If let's say someone is using like Windex every single day, does the air filter clean the chemicals from toxic cleaning supplies or toxic paints? So yeah, anything that touches the filter is going to be caught by it. So it's going to be great for paints. It's going to be great for chemicals, for toxins. So it pulls the cat. So even if you're like, I love Windex. I can't live without it.

It's my favorite thing ever. It can't be 100% because some of it might have got into surfaces. But the air, but the air filter is still helping to clean that. But I think like the core of like this messaging on this. Listen, some people are going to, you know, keep doing what they're doing. But I think the core of this show and this messaging is like, listen, we are offering, we're not telling you, but we're at least offering resources for healthier cleaning supplies, healthier food options, healthier ways to live.

That's what this whole show is about. And if you're doing all those things, you should also be looking at healthy clean air alternatives like the Jaspers because it's just taking it to the, it's almost like if it exists, why would you not utilize a tool like this? It's the laziest way to be healthy. For me, it kind of doesn't make sense to get a Jaspor and then spray windex everywhere or use toxic paint. You should have those bases cover.

I realize what this show is, okay? It's like a buffet. So the buffet, you might want pineapple, you might want cottage cheese. You might, Michael doesn't want cottage cheese. You might want a croissant and you might want oatmeal. You got to pick and choose what you like. Personally, for me, the air I breathe and the air, my kids breathe and my dogs are breathing and Michael is breathing is really important to me, which is why I'm passionate about this. And I think that out of all of the wellness categories, this one gets the least attention.

For now. Which is wild because you're breathing it all. You live in it. What's the analogy is like the fish that's swimming in the dirty water that has known? Yeah, like what water is to fish air is to people. So if you think about a fish bowl, what do you, if you have a fish tank, you got to get a water filter. You can't just like let the water be dirty and scrub the perimeter. If you have a swimming pool, you don't jump in there with a sponge and scrub the sides of the pool.

you get a water filter or that pool is going to get nasty. Meanwhile, with our air, with our homes, we're spending all this time wiping kitchen counters, vacuuming, mopping, all this stuff. But the air or the air within our home, we're not even filtering it. So when you look at a carpet, and if you ever seen steam cleaning, it's like black. The water comes out black. 50% of what's on your carpet came from surface, pets, kids, food. The other 50% comes from your air. Carpets are actually the biggest filter in your home. We just don't treat them like that. We don't clean them. We don't change them, we just let them sit. So yeah, what water is to fish air as to people is the way to think about it. And fish don't tend to swim away from the toxic water to the clean water.

It's just like we have no awareness of the air that we're in. The same thing with the fish. Hello, everybody. Now for one of the most exciting parts of the show, because I have three bottles of delicious tequila right here in front of me, not one, not two, but three. And they are a straw tequila. I have the repisado with a Michael engraved bottle. I have a Blanco, with a happy birthday, Michael engraved bottle. And then I have the anahoe. Looks like we gave up on the engraving on that one. But two out of three, not bad.

My drink of choice for years and always when I'm out at the bar, when I'm meeting up with friends, is tequila. I think it's one of the cleanest alcohols you can have. You drink it, you feel good, you have a great time with friends, and you can enjoy it in so many different ways. This is why I'm so excited to be partnering with a stroll. A straw makes a premium tequila that is crafted using 100% blue agave. It's an incredible tequila.

And like I said, you can enjoy it in so many different ways. If you're feeling like you want to let loose with some friends, have a little bit of a social hour. If you feel like you want to wind down at the end of the day, a straw has you covered. The way I like to enjoy it is typically neat. I typically start with the Blanco, but I have been known to dive into the anahoe. They are going to give you this kind of citrus profile forward taste. Obviously, mixed with the agave. But my go-to is the repasado that I use in my margaritas.

Many people use Blanco in their margarita. I think that the repisado allows for a different kind of more flavorful taste. And to make a perfect margarita, there are very simple ingredients needed. All you need is obviously the tequila, in this case the repisado, fresh lime. You've got to have a fresh lime juice. And obviously, quantro. Some people like to use triple sec. I think quantro is better.

And what I like to use is this three to one ratio, which you can never forget. Three parts, tequila, call it one and a half ounces, one ounce of quintro, and then three-fourths of an ounce of the lime. This is going to give you a perfectly balanced margarita every single time. What I love about a straw is they come in these beautiful bottles. The tequila is amazing. Like I said, it's from 100% blue agave straight out of Mexico, and you can just never go wrong with it. When Lorne and I are hosting at the house, when we're having people over here in this office at Dear Media, we always have bottles of a straw because like I said, you can never go wrong with a great ball of tequila. I also love the meaning behind a straw. A straw means

of the stars, which is a great way to think about connecting people and spending time with loved ones. And listen, we talk about all things health and wellness on this podcast all the time, but we also enjoy a great cocktail. And a straw tequila helps make some of the greatest cocktails, if I do say so myself. If you're new to tequila or thinking about which bottle to try first, I would start with the Blanco because it's so versatile, it's got that clean, consistent taste. But if you're looking for something with a little bit more flavor and you want to enjoy it neat, maybe with a little bit of an orange slice, definitely try the anieho.

and for the perfect margarita, again, with that 3-2-1 ratio, I would go with my favorite, which is the repisado. There are obviously so many choices when it comes to which tequila you should choose. A straw has quickly become my go-to whenever I can get it. I'm going for it. We stock it in the house. We stock it in the offices. So when you're thinking about making the choice on which tequila you want to go with,

definitely check out a straw because you cannot go wrong with any of the three bottles. Of course, drink it responsibly and make delicious cocktails. So check them out. Housemark Summer is here. Time to stock up. So go to www.a-S-T-R-A-L-T-E-Q-U-I-L-A dot com to find a straw near you. And don't forget the Limes. Please enjoy responsibly.

The Skinny Confidential him and her show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Mental health awareness is growing, but there's still progress to be made. 26% of Americans who participate in a recent survey say they have avoided seeking mental health support due to fear of judgment. If there's one thing Lauren and I have learned doing this show and talking to so many high performers from so many different walks of life and industry is that many of them use and utilize therapy consistently to help themselves get through their issues, better their lives, work through business problems, marital issues, relationship issues, parenting, you name it, therapy is clearly helping people to change their lives for the better. When people hesitate to get help, it doesn't

just affect them. It impacts families, workplaces, and entire communities. What if you could go online and get that help right now? Well, you can with better help and you can do it cost effectively. So this Mental Health Awareness Month let's encourage everyone to take care of their well-being and break the stigma. The world is better when people are healthy and happy. BetterHelp has over 10 years of experience matching people with the right therapists

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help.com slash skinny. Where is the air the worst? Like if you had to put an air filter in one room and you had it's the worst. It's the worst. Well, it's not just that it's the worst. It's the same, but it's the most important. Because you're sleeping. You're sleeping. You're there a third of your life. While your body's supposed to be getting parismpathetic, resting, recovering, healing. It's playing defense against the pollen and the mold and all that all night long. One is enough for the whole room. You don't need two. For a bedroom, one's amazing.

Okay, okay. Just making, like, you don't need one for the bathroom, too. No, you don't. Okay. No. Unless you spend a third of your life in the bathroom, then you might want to consider it. Is it bad that I, like, once in, I'll just go in there, even if the air shows green and I'll hit that turbo button.

No, that turbo is good. Yeah, hit the turbo's good. Yeah, you love to do that. That's his favorite. That's good. Do a quick deep clean. Yeah, I know I'm going to bed in like 30 minutes. I'll hit that turbo.

I do it too. That's his contribution to the night. I'm turning on all the red light and getting the 528 Earth hurts on. He gets the turbo going. He gets the turbo. He's more efficient. Yeah, it is. No, it does.

I hit the turbo in the kids' rooms too. The nursery is another, in my opinion, maybe the second most important place to put it. First. Oh, I thought you said the bedroom for a baby. Okay, fair, fair, fair. So when you're. I think we put our room first. Yeah, everyone does.

No, I did put my own room first. I put it by my bed too. Listen, these little guys, these little guys, they got better immune systems. They're stronger. They got more resilience. How does fecal matter get into the air, though, to begin with? Diapers. A lot of people don't take the diapers out.

They put in a little diaper pail. Okay. And if you ever gone into a nursery with a diaper pale, it stinks like poo. Those things aren't actually airtight. Just the same way you smell garbage. Should we be taking the diaper out every time? You don't? We put it.

No, we have. At least daily. Hold on. Of course daily. Yeah, we do daily. It's not in the room. It's not in the room. It's in the bathroom.

Okay. And then that, does that get outside daily? Yes. Okay. Yeah. Don't let that things do. Don't let it. Does it go outside daily? Every day. If not update those

SOPs when you get home. If I have to be pregnant, you're going to have to take the dirty diapers out every day. You don't even know where the diapers go, do you? What do you do it? I'm not going to do that. You just got caught. You just got called out. You haven't been the dust. She's growing the baby. I just caught her in the trash. I'll grow the baby and I'll take care of the kids and you take the diapers up. Do you even know where the diaper pill is?

I'm not a diaper pal. She just got called out. That's your job. Take the, if I, why am I married if you don't take it out? This is why I say to them about the trash. If I don't have a coffee and my trash can, I'll figure it out. What's the point? I figured out.

I mean, listen, selfishly, I just don't want shit diapers all over the house, you know? Yeah. Okay, so what we can do is we can put an air filter in. What else should we open the windows? What are the other things we can do for free? For the smoke people, we're past smoke or we're still on smoke? No, we're on fagal matter, Mike. We're on fecal matter.

Get the diapers out, clean the air. Low VOC paint. Ideally, if you're going to get your nursery ready, paint as early as possible. Okay. If you're going to be painting, paint early because the off-gassing is the most extreme early on. So if you paint like a month before your baby is born, that off-gassing is still heavy. So you want to paint as early as you can before your baby comes out. You also, ideally, if the temperature is good, open the windows in the nursery so it can breathe.

You want that nursery breathing. I open the windows in my house all day long. Perfect. We were introduced by Ryan of Test My Home. That's how you and I met. It is. And he like raved about you and he's very, very specific on which products that he uses. And he told me whenever you light a fire in the morning because we turn our fire on, he said, you have to open the doors.

And I'm constantly airing the house out to the point where Michael wants to kill me. Here's why. I want to ask you this now. I think it's a relevant time, especially this season, especially in Austin. But other places, too, in the country, end in the world. allergies are crazy right now. Cedar pollen is all over the place. So I am battling, opening the windows, which I like to do and want to do, as well as the

pollens and the allergies outside of the house. And so how would you think about managing that at this time of the year? Yeah, if the allergens are like, so when we test the home indoors, there's typically five times more pollen inside than outside. So you think it's a bad allergen. It's trapped. It comes in. You have pretty clean air at your home.

So this is not really a problem for you. It's in, it's more inside than outside. Yeah, because it comes inside. Because it gets trapped. So what he's saying is open the door. No, he's not. Oh. If you don't have air filters, yes.

If you're filtering your air, like you'd say, think about it like a mini wildfire smoke. If the outside air is really bad and you have a bunch of air filters, then you want to close your doors a little bit more and let those filters go. I like fresh air though. What do I do about that? I would say the morning is your best time. Like especially now in Austin, the mornings are cool. Fresh. So when things are cool, cars aren't yet on the road.

There's not as much. when things heat up they aerosolize more. She's not as affected by the pollen as I am, but what I can tell, like right now, if you open the windows in the middle of the day in the heat in Austin, like you are just getting bombarded with pollen.

You know, for this episode, I went and asked our mutual friend, Brian, about which paints to use? And you were talking about nurseries. And the four paints that he says that are non-toxic, we'll leave it in the show notes, is E-C-O-S paints,

Claire Paint, C-L-A-R, E. AMF Safecoat paint and Romo Bio-Limewash paint. Okay. Four good paints. He said these are really great for people with chemical sensitivities and they are all catered towards healthier indoor environments. Maybe we need a, because Jasper is like the prettiest color. I love how you did the color tone. I know that's random.

No. But maybe we need like a collab of that color with one of these people. paint companies. We could do it. Because then we could just paint the nursery. Ah, cute, right? Very cute. I know. It would be such a fun collab. You could paint the nursery with non-toxic paint on the on the on the on the on the on the docket coming out. I am about to I am about to paint a nursery. Do it soon. Yeah. Oh, I see what you're saying. So you're saying do it now. Do it now. And also if I'm going to do wallpaper right. Do it now. That's so smart. Let that room breathe out so you don't take baby out of the baby born bring it home.

bam, off gas in the face, that's not ideal. How, like, the sooner you do it, the better. Yeah. So you've already painted your nursery? This week, starting Sunday. Wow. Yeah. So you just let it all off gas and open the windows.

Yeah, and I'll keep those windows open. I'll keep that door shut. I'll keep a Jasper in that room. So any of the pollen that's coming in through that room will be contained to that space. That is so smart. So, okay. So if you have the Jasper in the house and there's crazy allergies, it's better open the windows in the morning. then after close them, if the pollen's in there, let them run in the day, but keep the windows like...

Especially like in your bedroom, like keep it cranking at night. So at least where you're personally breathing will be filtered. So because what I'm trying to tell her and like she's fighting me on this is you can get the fresh air in the morning, but if you just let it go all day long in the middle of the day and the heat, you're just getting... So opening windows is not the only way to get fresh air in your home. If there's bathroom fans, you could theoretically use those. You could use the range hood. There's other things to vent stale air out in a more controlled way than just opening

I'm really about energy and I don't like stagnant energy. I like it to flow and move. Mornings then. Michael, Michael, you don't mind a closed window and a curtain and a bright light. I don't need the window open all day long with these allergies running around. But mold is an allergen too. Mold is the biggest allergen of the mall. People don't realize that's outside, that's inside.

Let's expose the dark side of the mold industry. Let's talk about mold. Talk to us about the mold industry in general. because you used to be in the mold industry. I was. So I was the guy. You probably know people now. They go to the naturopath. They're not feeling good.

They hear about this toxic mold disease going around, you know, mold toxicity. They go to a natural path. They get a blood test. They get a urine test. They go, you got the mold. And then they say, get your house tested. Someone comes out to your home. Test your home.

You've got the mold. You freak out. You go, I'm sick. And I didn't know why. And now my blood work shows mold. My home shows mold. I've got this problem. And you're kind of, sometimes people are relieved because they're like, this is the reason I'm not feeling good.

Finally, we've been trying to figure it out. Yeah. So we have this path to go down. And then they go get a quote for mold removal and someone comes to their house and can tell them $20, $30,000, $200,000. We got to rip it all apart. You have to move out for six months. This is the dark side of the mold industry. Because not every time, this often the reaction, you know, often the reaction is more damaging

than the problem itself. So in this case, a lot of people don't have huge issues. They have moderate airborne mold issues. And I don't blame anyone here. You know, a lot of people talk about food and insurance and the pharma and all that. And it's like evil corruption stuff. This is not the case here. This was a road to hell paved with good intention situation.

So, you know, naturopath, functional medicine doc, they're all of a sudden getting tons of people asking about mold illness. So what do they do? They take like a two-day course on mold stuff. And then there's various types of tests. So a lot of people who are getting tested for mold, Ryan talks about this all the time, Ryan Blazer. An error test skews false negative.

An Ermi skews false positive. Guess what all the restoration guys use? They use the Ermi because it's an alarmist test by nature. You can run that test basically anywhere and it's a big scary red report. And I've seen a lot of people who they move out for six months and they spend, get a huge mortgage, they actually move into an apartment that's moldier than the home that they started with. Now, don't get me wrong. If you have visible, physical black mold growing, it came from water.

There's a water source. There was a leak. It could be from a kitchen. It could be from, it could be, you know, a faucet. It could be a shower. It could be a foundation leak. There's water there. You have a mold issue, a roof leak.

Yes. Get a restoration guy. Get three quotes, by the way. And don't assume the most expensive person is the best person at all because mold is a very, like, yeah, there's two sayings. They used to call it the mold rush and mold is gold. Because contractors realized it's a, $1,000 to demo a bathroom, but it's 10,000 if there's mold in it. It's pretty much the same

work. You contain it. You use, you know, antimicrobial cleaning agents, and it's 10 times the revenue. So what's happened is who do you think is educating a lot of the naturopass? The mold experts, like that's the business I was in. And so they come to your home and I call it whack a mold. Because often, there's no visible mold. They're just testing your air. If you went outside that day and tested there be mold. So it's often, like I don't want to diminish people who have significant mold issues and need remediation. What I'm saying is, there's people that take advantage of the space. Big time. You know what it is. What is it? The word mold is like moist. There's something about that word that's like just the scary word. It's gross. No, it's like a

This isn't scary. No, moist. Moist is scary in certain context. It's not scary. It's just like. I don't know what context is you're thinking of. It's not the context I'm thinking of. Okay, maybe another one.

I'm thinking like a moist muffin, Lauren. What are you thinking of, Lauren? Moist is not how. Moist is not like mold. Mold makes me sick. The word mold is just like a weird word. Yeah. Like hits you wrong.

And you think about the, what experience you're thinking about your moldy cheese. your moldy fruits, the scary black stuff. So any visual association you have with it is. It's like schincter. Do you know what I mean? Like that word is like so off putting. It makes you want to like gag. It's that's how mold is.

It also smells. Mold is a smelly thing that you know makes you sick. That looks growth. It's gross. It's like the trifecta of scary. How does someone know if they have mold in their home? What are the ailments that you have seen people have from mold where it's bad? So typically, and you can have a family of five.

One person's health is ravaged. They're chronically ill. Two people, just like it's an allergen. Some people are affected by cedar, some pollen, some peanuts, some mold species. So some people can, they detox, they methylate, their body deals with mold really well. Other people not so well. But often it could be stuff like it could be asthmatic symptoms, difficulty breathing. It could be dry eyes.

It could be skin issues. It could be, you could wake up exhausted. You could find yourself sleeping like 10 hours a night waking up exhausted. So a very unrestful sleep. And then if they're breathing with their mouth open, you've got to use my mouth tape with the Jasper. That's the best sleep of my life, by the way. That's the stack.

The skinny confidential mouth tape with a red light and the Jasper 528 hertz, your husband to sleep, it's maybe a red book light. That is the dream. That's the dream habit stack. It's the skinny sleep stack right there. When the mouth is open and there's mold, I'm sure it's like hell. Yeah, also you're bringing in a lot of carbon dioxide. side, you're not sleeping efficiently, more filtration. Your nose is a much better filter than your

mouth. So yes, absolutely completely agree with that. Do you tape your mouth shut? No, I did for a long time. You've got to try it. I have. And I think it's really effective. To me, it was honestly like, I'll probably find myself doing it like a few months out of the year. And it's like training wheels for me. I get, I got pretty proficient and I'm keeping my mouth shut. And then I find myself slipping and I'm back on it. So I use it, I've been using it to recorrect. Let me ask you a question that we've never asked on this podcast, I'm so curious about, I know nothing about this specific topic, but I'd love to know. The shit that they're pouring out of airplanes. So I'll give you an example, like Bakersfield. I know someone who lived there her whole life and there was pesticides that

they were spraying or chemicals on all of the plants. What does that do to our air? And how do we mitigate against that? I don't know specifically, like, I'm sure different planes spray different things. I could speak to glyphosate, which is like round up. Okay. sprayed on crops everywhere. A lot of people think if they live far out from the city, their air is fine. But all those farms and all those crops. And if you are in the city, people's front lawns are getting sprayed to, all of that stuff aerosolizes. If you think about sunscreen, it's not as fragrant because they don't add fragrant to it. But if you think about sunscreen, you can smell that stuff 100 feet in any direction. So glyphosate is also

aerosolizing, especially if it's hot outside. So yeah, that's obviously, you know, from the body perspective, a lot of research has been done of what that's doing to our health. I'm more of an air guy than the body guy, but I know glyphosate can be very harmful for people. And I know that it definitely kicks up in the air in a significant way. It's crazy how they're like just allowed to take a plane and put chemicals everywhere. It's wild. It is wild. And you don't really know what they are. But just to close the loop on like people at home. So to know if you have a mold problem, trusting your nose is honestly still the best way. Like having people come over and just ask them straight up if your house smells musty.

Like once I tested hundreds of homes, talk about this with Ryan. I could go in a home. You know if it's moldy in the first five minutes. All that test data is just to like help the homeowner understand and have some data that backs it up. But you know just by smelling it, just by feeling it, just being in that environment if it's moldy.

But pretty much like you should look for mold. If you can't find mold, physical black stuff growing, don't start gutting your home. And like I showed you guys that lab study, that we did before, air purifiers are so effective for mold. So like if you think about water in your home, everybody knows if you have well water or city water, that water is not good to drink, straight tap water.

We have to filter our water. That's just the reality of modern life. But with our air, we don't pay attention to it at all. You don't have to rip out the pipes of your home if your water is contaminated. You just have to get a filter. You can put it on your tap, put on your shower. You could put it on the, you know, the whole home filter for your house. So the fact is with our air, it's coming in through.

windows and doors and cracks. So yes, it's moldy. But when you filter your air, you can remove 99% of that mold very effortlessly. What water filter do you like? I actually use a Culligan, whole home. So not like the Culligan, like the jug that you get filled. Okay. Most filters, water filters are made at the same couple places. Okay. A whole home filter. I have it to remove chlorine. We have reverse osmosis in the kitchen that's only for washing hands and for cooking. We don't drink that water and then we get Manchin Valley spring water glass jugs delivered. Do you have like one for your shower and your bath or no? We used to have a jolly shower filter, but once you have a whole home that's declawinating, you don't need it on the showers. I'm so curious you get access to some really

smart people when it comes to creating such a healthy home environment. What are some pillars that you live by in your own home that don't have to do with air? Like what are things you do? Water for sure. Okay. Water's really, really big. What do you do for your pool? So I have my whole home water feeding our pool. So we chew up filters and water softens and stuff a little bit quicker. Not that much more though. So the water that is automatically filling the pool comes through the whole home system. So that's number one. We switched from chlorine to salt. That's good too. We have the pool guy coming weekly instead of biweekly because that way he can otherwise if they come every second week, they have to put twice as much chlorine in it. If they come every week, they only have to put

little bits of chlorine to keep it level. Do we do that? We switch a salt, but yeah, it comes weekly. Rachel uses stainless steel pans and some cast iron. We cook outside a lot too. Like we cook we cook outside very frequently. We use I love my primally pure and branch basics, big fans of both those brands. We don't bring our shoes inside the house. We don't have big carpets. We do have area rugs that we also clean monthly with a hepa vacuum. So tell me about shoes in the house. It's a no it's a no no go. And if I do wear shoes in the house, it's like just like to run to the kitchen island and clean it and then we wipe that up right after. I make him go on his knees.

Knees? You've been in our house. You've seen it. No, but he, I have made him crawl across, across the house on his knees. The only thing that I ask for is I need like a little bit of a mud room.

No. You know what I mean? Because like I need a place to put. Why not? Just take the shoes off before. I'm like out in the fucking cold. I got to do a public service announcement about this one. My friend Weston,

he walks in our house and then removes his shoes and leaves the shoes and leaves the shoes in the house. Can we just make it like a general rule to take the shoes off before you get in house? Yeah, but you have to have as a host terrible host. I have slippers. I have slippers. Mona and Gary Vee gave me a link to slippers. I'm not talking about the slippers. I'm saying you need a place where the guests can remove the shoes comfortably without breaking their neck. I have a chair outside. No. So if I ever come in with maybe contractor skinny booties at the, uh, you know, I have those. I have these poor guys they come in. She's like, here can you help me? And then they're pink booties running around. So I know, um, someone who actually leaves shoes staged outside their house.

Ooh, that's smart. Because they found that if they, no matter what they do, no one gets it. So when they stage a bunch of shoes in front of their home, people got it. So it's like take off your shoes and that signs near other shoes. Then people kick off the shoes. So they literally stage shoes. Like they keep their old shoes outside has the reminders. That's a really good idea.

Putting tips in the tip jar. That's really, really smart. I just need a little bit of like a chair or a seat to get my shoes on and off. I can't help that you wear those boots. I feel like you're going to have to figure that out. We have a doorbell sign on our doorbell that says, please do not ring the doorbell. Babies will cry,

kids will scream, dogs will bark. And admit it, it is the best hack because our doorbell never rings. Because think about it, every time the doorbell rings, it's like the whole house goes crazy. We don't have a doorbell.

Oh, well, geez, you got me. You don't have a doorbell? I'm going to rip my doorbell off. Just leave the fucking doorbell alone. The worst is, and I'm sorry, like, maybe this is a super sexist thing to say. For sure, it's sexist. She gets all these contractors. She doesn't bid anything out.

They all rip her off. She has no idea what she's fixing. She fixes one thing, another thing breaks. And I just think, like, let me do it. I don't know if that's a sexist thing to say or not, but it's like, you were talking about bids and all this, like, ripping the doorbell. Just leave some sumptful alone. Okay. admit it. When's the last time you had a job bidded out?

Maybe this is going to sound sexist, but you better fucking take your shoes off before you go in my job. When did you, when have you ever gotten three bids? No, I feel like that's the guy's job. But if you're contracting the job. No. Are you the family G.C? No, I'm the family aesthetic. No, so she's behaving as the family GC.

It's a total disaster. You know what is aesthetic? The air filter. Okay. So here's my experience with Jasper. I have one in almost. Every room in my house. Before I had a Jasper, I had your competitor because I didn't know about Jasper.

We're all allies here. And it's, I'm sure you're all allies because it's fixing the air. But I personally really like your air filter because it's state of the art and it's beautiful. When you decided to get into this space, what did you want to disrupt? Because the way you've done it is unique. Yeah. So because my background was in floods, fires, mold, etc. in that business, we were using machines called air scrubbers.

These are like subwoofer and a photocopier had a baby, like 60, 80 pounds, big metal, hideous, loud, super effective though, right? These were like garbage trucks, you know, before pickup trucks. Like it was too industrial. So awesome for a construction site, it was the most effective thing ever. But if you compared that to what you'd find out like Best Buy Home Depot, Walmart, Amazon, those little things don't really work. So my vision was, okay, I have this unique insight. who's been removing mold and detoxing homes and wildfire smoke and stuff like that. I'm like, I wanted to create a commercial grade air purifier that also was pretty and quiet. That's why we use

steel. That's why we made it look good. Because like, I probably would have actually not minded an industrial grade one in my own, but Rachel would say, hell no, you can't put that thing in the house. But if it's beautiful and it's quiet, all of a sudden, you're proud to have four or five of them in your home. So it had to be as effective as an industrial grade machine, but really aesthetic to. So I wasn't approaching it. Also, we only do. one thing. Most companies, they sell seven models. They make water filters. They make diffusers. They make everything. We only make one thing. So we're like the food truck of air purifiers. You know, some of the best tacos you could ever get. Best food in general,

it's at a food truck. Only some rare restaurants can do 40 or 50 things well. So we're like, that ain't us. We could do one thing world class and support it world class. As soon as we start to try to do too much, our quality will diminish. Forever, a symbiotica fan. I take it all the In fact, I've been doing this new thing where I take sparkling water and then I'll take a packet of their elderberry. The elderberry is so good. It's filled with vitamin E. It's good for your immune system. I'll open it up. I'll squeeze it into the sparkling water. And then sometimes if I can, I'll add an orange or a lime. And it is so delicious, you guys. It's unreal. What I like about Symbiotica's products is they're so easy to implement into your routine. the elderberry I'll have in my sparkling water. And then the vitamin C I can add to my morning water.

And then the glutathion you can take if you're recovering from a workout or even a hangover. And then even they have this spray that I keep talking about. I cannot stop with the spray. It's like a magnesium lavender spray. And I spray it on my kids' feet. I'll spray it on my neck. It's so nice. It's not like fragrancey, if that makes sense. So it's non-toxic. And it's letting the magnesium go into the skin as opposed to like taking a pill. So they've really thought of everything when it comes to finding clean, trustworthy, and effective supplements. It can be really hard. And there's too many brands that hide behind fillers or mystery additives or fake natural flavors. And they don't do that. It's truly as high quality as it gets. Go to symbiotica.com slash t-s-c-you-get-off

plus free shipping. That's C-Y-M-B-I-O-T-I-A.com slash skinny. You get 20% off plus free shipping. Let's talk about my favorite female run nonprofit. I'm so passionate about the charity I stand with my pack. It's dedicated to saving animals and preventing cruelty locally and globally. So I was introduced to this charity by a friend of mine, Lucy, probably about five years ago. And she was really passionate about how much that I stand with my pack helps dogs. So what they do is they rescue dogs from high kill shelters in Southern California, and they help them find loving foster homes or forever homes.

There is an urgent need right now for donations and fosters. So even if you can donate a dollar, every dollar counts. This goes to helping to cover medical care, food, transportation for rescue dogs. You can donate or sign up to foster at Istandwithmypack.org. That's Istandwithmypack.org. Also, sometimes they'll just Venmo them. It makes it really simple. More information at Istandwithmypack.org.

What I love about your company and what you do is you're constantly innovating. Even if you're updating the filter or the tech on it, it's just like you can just tell you really care about the space. Speaking of innovating, I got something exciting to tell you guys. Tell us. I might have teased it another time, but as of two days ago, it will be public by the time this podcast dropped soon. Tell us. So we bought a school. That is so cool.

We bought a school right by our house. I'm not going to say exactly where that is. But this lady was going to sell the land. And it was going to be bought and torn down and turn into like a strip mall or a home. It's been there for a long time. We can ride our kids there on a bicycle with a little trailer or take them on a golf cart. And it's this amazing, it's a Montessori. But there was a study in Finland that happened a few months ago that they published this study.

And it showed that as soon as they put small air purifiers and kids class in daycares, absenteeism dropped by 30%. Runny noses went down. Sick kids went down. What is the true cost of a sick child? They get the runny nose, the boogers. They come home and they make the parents sick. You make the colleagues sick.

It's actually massive how many one sick kid could take out half the class. And then eight families. We know. Trust us. We know. So when I first donated a Jasper to Arias first school, all of a sudden the runny noses and the boogies stopped coming home. It was like instant. So I was amazed to see this.

study by Finland. And we're like, you know, when Aria, our oldest daughter, the girl in my socks, was getting sick a lot. The doctors were generally like, this is normal. Little kids are supposed to be chronically sick. It's just part of their immune system developing. I'm like, maybe like six times a year, but I don't think they should be sick like chronically ill. This doesn't seem right. The worst is when they get sick and then you all get through it and then they come home with another one the day after the sickness is. How do you avoid it? What do you do? Like not hug and kiss and cuddle your No, I like make out with my kids. You're screwed.

You're done. You know, so no matter how sick your kid is, you're in for it too. It's a really good test of your own immunity. So then that study came out, that really reinforced things. And I'm like, and I could see the products that the school is using. They're using bright LED lights. They're using toxic cleaning products. They're using air fresheners.

So I see it all. The mission is for the school is to make the healthiest school in America. So here's how we're going to do it. Day one, Jasper's in every classroom, two per class. whole entire school is going to have filtered water. It's going to be, you know, all branch basics, non-toxic products like that, great lighting. On top of that, it's going to be very entrepreneurial, very entrepreneurial.

So the great thing about these Montessori schools, my, by the way, my new instabio is going to be like founder at Jaspur, chief wellness officer at Kindling Academy. Quick question is, are they going to be outside a lot or on screens a lot? So great question. So with the way we're doing it is this, there'll be huge screened in porches. So there's the inside, of course. Then the next layer is massive screened in porches. So they can be in like a fresh air environment, but still.

But then huge playgrounds with tree weaves, tree forts, we'll call it fun things like the Owls Nest. I've built this school in my head, but you executed. And then there's a little thing called the Spark Market. Amazing. So the kids will actually be able to run a little market that's community facing and open to the city. So we found that Montessori amazing, teaches kids to read, to learn, all that. But the downfall there was a little bit too independent, isolated. play. Okay. So they don't do any project based, no team, no leadership. So that was, there was a lot of

strong parts, but has they got older, there was no collaboration. Then you have the Waldorf kids. They're like everything, you know, they're learning how to like build fires and stuff, but they're like 10 and they can't read. Some people think that's okay. All I know is my daughter's five and she loves reading. And now it's, it's changing the whole way that she can interface with the world. And it took like half an hour a day. Wasn't a big deal. Wasn't like she was like dying in a classroom studying. Hold on. Your daughter can read a book. Like pretty well. Like pretty well.

So yeah, Rachel was a labor and delivery nurse. So like, but she was going to be a teacher, but there was no jobs at the time. So like, you know, it went from babies and now kids. And we went to all the different schools in Austin. We've tried them all. We've studied them all. Like there's other schools that are like very iPad forward. Learn, learn, learn, learn, learn.

And I'm like, you can't tell me that being on an iPad eight hours a day is good for a kid. No. When they're eight years old, should we do some AI? And then, sure. And like big fan of project-based learning. So what that means is the kids basically like, for example, we're going to have a little podcast studio at the school. When does the school open?

It officially will open like August 15th of this year. We get the keys in May. Then we're, it's called kindling academy. How many students per class? The max capacity. So right now it's only 18 months to six. But Ari is five. So we're going to be extending the seven to nine program really quickly.

And it's going to grow. There's a few adjacent lots for sale. So it'll go all the way up. We're going to make it all the way up to high school. And how do you pick the curriculum and the teachers? So the school's been around for a very long time. It has, so they're not teachers. They're guides.

They're like mentors. And then we have a small network of people who live here in the community who are entrepreneurial. So, you know, my friend UJ, for example, he started a journal company called the five-minute journal a long time ago. So he doesn't want to like... The what? Five-minute journal?

I'm kidding. It's everywhere. Okay. So he's a great, you know, writer, thinker, gratitude, all that. He's like, I don't want to work at a school, but coming in once or twice a month and teaching gratitude with the kids, he's like, I would love to do that. So we're crowdsourcing the parents and getting different community mentors. That is so cool. So you can be a part of the school. So like if our kids went there, we could like go teach a class on like entrepreneurship,

even if your kids don't go there. But so we're really infusing the community. But the goal is, well, Rachel, all the way, man. This is all her. Your wife's the principal. Big time. Okay. I'm just the chief wellness officer. So my job is to make a, get the healthiest school in the world. Cool. So I have access to the good products, the air, the lighting, and she's going to, she's actually the one bringing all the entrepreneurial elements into place. So it's like, let's say the kids want to like upgrade the park.

It's like, cool, what materials will we need? How much will that cost? So it's like there's always a real world component to everything that they do once they're like 7, 8, 9. It's not just like studying in a room. So she's, it's kind of like we flipped. I'm focusing on all the wellness stuff and she's focusing on the like the entrepreneur. And since we were 19, I'm 34 now, we've been building curriculums, has a hobby this whole time,

like developing education and uncommon common sense. And now it's like all coming to life. So yeah. Man, that is cool. Yeah. Because it's funny. Every time I tour schools, I'm like, there's Lysol and there's Windex and there's a window closed and this artificial light and there's no outside play. And it's a lot of screen.

I'm just being honest. Like it's, it's, so I will like design a school in my head. I'm like, I want more nature. Rachel. Oh my God. I could I would have a field day. Well like a lot of these kids are being like we're under studio lights. A lot of these kids are like under these studio light all day. Can I also like give

a little bit of a two cents? Please. I am on this this like tour about I don't understand why kids have to go to school at 7.30 in the morning. Like I personally think like

no, but I think I think nine is a good time and I'll tell you why. I don't want to rip my kid out of bed, force feed them, rip their clothes off, and have to, like, they're, my kids at least, my kids sleep until probably 7, 715, sometimes 7.30. I prefer them to wake up a little bit more naturally. I don't get this 7.30 situation. You have to wake up at 6.15 to get them to school. So this school is not for everyone. The school is specifically designed for free thinking entrepreneurs. So what that means is you can drop off your kid anytime between 8 and 9.

we want late drop-offs. And the first hour, they're just going to be playing outside. It's just going to be park time, basically. So they're going to get their circadian rhythm going? 100%. So 9 o'clock is the drop-off time. Pretty much, how did I design Jaspur? I just designed the air purifier.

A former mold fire flood guy would want for himself. The school, we're just designing the school of our dreams for our kids. And there's a lot of people. Same thing. So let's say you want to travel. We really encourage traveling. So if the student, if the family's going on a trip for two or three weeks, it's like cool.

Well, the guides are going to help you create a little. passport book to, you know, take some photos and document your trip and then present on it when you get back. That is so cool. And really encourage the family to travel. I would have thrived in that school. Me too. I loved, like making scrapbooks and magazines. I would have loved, loved, loved that. Listen, I mean, people get super touchy about this subject, but it's not like this country's like getting stellar marks in education right now, right? Like, it's far from it. Arguably, like, some of the worst marks in the world, right? Yeah. Kids more literate than ever. Nobody knows how to do math anymore. Like, you know, I was, I was talking to a friend of ours who has older kids. And he's like,

yeah, they can like figure anything out because of technology, but like they don't know how to do math and they don't know how to read. Yeah. So there's like there's issues. And so, you know, I think that a lot of parents that came up through the traditional schooling cycle like we did, as I look back, I'm like hindsight, a lot of the stuff that I went through as a student. We came through the public school system. Some of it great. Some of it really bad. And we're looking at it now and saying, okay, like, the system needs a little bit of a revisit. Some people may not agree with that, but I think a lot of parents are starting to wake up to that.

And I was talking to my dad, who's 80 now, 80 plus. And I was saying, you know, dad, my curriculum and his curriculum were closer than the curriculum now that our children have. And I think, like, a lot of the older generation is not aware of that. You know, it's just much different now. And I think that, you know, unfortunately, our kids are going to bear the cost. of not these kids. Yeah. So it's also it's almost a two-acre property. So we have a sauna and a cold plunge on the secondary lot like a big epic sauna. So when parents come for drop off or pickup,

if they want to come a little earlier, stay a little late, they can hit the sauna, hit the cold plunge. And that's the way to foster the community between parents. So this is just like this place we really want to be a part of. So yeah, it's and I've never talked about it before. Pickup is three. Okay. If you want to come a little earlier some days after. two, that last hour will be a little more, like two to three 30 kind of flexibly. Like play. But there's no like five, six pickup that's too late for the kids. Yeah.

And then we found a really great chef. So the chef will cook them healthy lunches. So nobody has to cook, pack their kids lunch for school. Then we want to infuse that. So the kids can also like learn a little bit about cooking and cooking outside. So it's like, don't just like make a fire outside. It's like, let's learn to make a fire and let's learn to cook on that fire. And here's the ingredients.

Here's where they're sourced. So really infusing everything can be, you know, explore deeply. So, you know, we just don't like packing lunches every day. It just becomes this whole thing. And eventually we want to do something where there could be like dinner served at the school at 4 o'clock. So families who want to come have a healthy dinner and not have to go home and deal with cooking and dinner. And then just enjoy the evening with your kids. Seems like you pick your kids up. It's like, so you rip them out of bed in the morning, like force them to school, like makes you feel annoyed and shitty and rushed. And they're like, okay, that was quick. I just woke up. They're there

for like eight, nine hours, then you rip them home, you have like an hour, then it's dinner and then it's bedtime. It's like, where did the day go? I also think, I was just talking to my best friend and she's like, because it's dark when you wake up right now. She's like, my daughter thinks I'm doing like an alarm

when I wake her up. It's so jarring. She's like, mom, what's wrong? Well, daylight savings times a whole other issue. Yeah, daylight savings I'm done with that. I'm over that. But I don't, I'm not into this. Like, can we go, but I just want to. They keep saying it's going to end and it doesn't. I'm can we do a petition to end this?

This is so stupid. It's messing up with our hormones. And kids don't like waking up in the dark. Who likes waking up in the dark? Nobody likes it. Why I don't live in Canada anymore. Like it's not a good way to be. I don't want to wake up in the dark. So Michael, can you fix this?

Yeah, let me just fix the daylight savings. Andrew Huberman hates it too. It's not like I'm just pulling shit on. Cuban's got a big enough voice where he can start rattling some cages and maybe getting people to think about it. Do we have a code for our audience? I just want to know, we do. I'll never come on the podcast and not leave. your guests with a little something special. You could do the best codes always. Okay. You do. I do.

No, you always do. I don't mess around. No, you don't mess. So, but by the way, that school, if anybody wants to read about it or learn about it, join the wait list. But even if you don't live in Austin, we're using this, we're open sourcing everything that we're doing. Okay. So we're going to share the model, share the everything we're going to be also documenting absenteeism, runny noses. And because schools already document this stuff. So we're going to publish it all. So we want to benchmark the average school, how sick kids are getting versus this school. And we want to really like every, every interior design, everything we do is going to be open sourced. Someone could literally steal our, take our construction files, our water, our everything,

our curriculum, it's all open source. So kindling dot academy. Okay. Is the website. So if you live in Austin and you want to check it out, go for it. It's a not for profit. Rachel's paying yourself nothing. So do you have to get accreditation or because the school's been around for so long? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're doing all that. Okay. And then anyone who's not local, we're going to be teaching. and talking and this will all be very public. So we want to use this to teach people a better way to do school. And instead of just complaining about it, actually put our foot down.

That's the kind of thing because Jasper has one product, we get to be really creative and have fun and be impactful in things that aren't just making new products. Yeah, I think people are really open to these kind of ideas. I mean, some maybe not, but I think a lot of parents are starting to open their eyes to this because, again, like the education system is just, it's failing a lot of people in a lot of ways. I don't want to put the blanket statement and shit on everybody

and there's some great teachers out there. I just want to play. I'm just saying in general, the numbers are not going the way they should be going. The education system is just in my opinion

like the healthcare system. It is. You have to do your own research. You have to be your own advocate. You have to be your own guru. You have to go out and take accountability for yourself

in health and in education or else you just get put into a system. Agreed. And, Academy's weird, but that's what it is. It's literally kindling.com. I was going to ask you. Okay. Okay. So yeah, code. Of course. I will never come on the pod and not leave the guest with something special. So I think this is going to come out soon May 2nd. Okay. So code skinny. And we're going to do it. The code will be $400 off. Oh, wow. It'll be $400 off this time. And not only that, not only is it $400 off, but it stacks with our discounts. So, you know, once upon a time people were buying one air purifier for the bedroom. they realize what about my kids? What about the living room? What about the cooking? And they have this shift. You know, a thousand dollar air purifier expensive, but like 25, 2,600 for a whole home air filtration

system with a lifetime warranty, not that expensive. So if you want to have just clean air in a bedroom, one will be great. But what we did is so Code Skinny is $400 off. And by the way, this, this is going to be valid until the end of May. So May is Clean Air Month for Skinny listeners. Now I will say last time I came on the podcast, thousands of people bought and it sold us out very, very quickly. Could you do a pre-order if it sells out? If it's pre-order to just be back-orders, people will just be waiting a couple weeks. We'll still under the code. The whole month of May, $400 off and it will combine with our discount code. So as you add two, three or four in the cart, it will automatically give people bigger deals. And like I said before we recorded literally

like, I've had girls come up to me on the street or at events and say like, Mike, I'm so happy. I've heard you on a bunch of podcasts. Skinny Confidential was the first time I've ever heard you guys before. I've been thinking about my fragrances and my soaps and my cooking. I didn't realize that that was just air has a topic. So I'm really grateful for last time how much we just like elevated air awareness. And I hope we got to do that again. And anyone, just so anyone who does decide to buy and this is air purifier investing month for you, if it's not a no brainer, if you're not sleeping better, if you're not feeling better. We did an aura study this year. The average 100, 50 people use Jaspers for a month.

The average person slept 25 minutes more per night, 18% more deep sleep, fell asleep five minutes faster. So if you're not feeling way better, we'll give you all your money back. And then it's a lifetime warranty. So sometimes it's very expensive being cheap. So most air purifiers have a one-year warranty. We have a lifetime warranty. If it breaks, we send you a new one.

You take the new one out of the box. You put the old one in the box. We even give you a prepaid UPS shipping label and we send UPS to your front door at 9 a.m. Because who wants to spend half a day getting boxes going to fend. FedEx paying hundreds of dollars for shipping. So yeah, the date this pod comes out, code Skinny, $400 off through the month of May, and it will combine with our quantity discounts as well. Amazing. Go to jasper, j-a-spr.com slash skinny to grab yours today. Mike, thanks for coming on the podcast. You're always a wealth of information and knowledge.