The Bossticks - How To Rid Your Home Of Things That Are Harming You, Including Mold, Hazards, Bacteria, EMF, & More With Test My Home's Ryan Blaser

Episode Date: March 16, 2023

#552: Today we're sitting down with Ryan Blaser, Founder of Test My Home. Ryan's passion is bridging the gap between environment and wellness, and this has fueled his 25 year career as an electrical e...ngineer specializing in health hazards of the environment. Ryan's work is now at the forefront of a cutting edge industry, and he dedicates his time to helping people protect and reclaim their health by identifying and eliminating the dangers that may exist in their home & workplace. Today we get into what exactly in your home is can hurt you and how to minimize the effects of dangerous molds, toxins, and hazards in the home.  To connect with Test My Home click HERE To check out the Jasper Air Purifier click HERE Code: TMH200 To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential This episode is brought to you Stanley The Quencher 40oz is the must-have hydration accessory. Shop the quencher and other Stanley hydration favorites at stanley1913.com. Also available at Dick's Sporting Goods, REI, Scheel's, Amazon and more. This episode is brought to you by Sun Bum Sun Bum creates products to protect the world from the sun, specifically formulated to help protect those of us who love and live in the sun. Use code SKINNY at www.sunbum.com for 15% off your first purchase. This episode is brought to you by Living Proof Living Proof understands that there's no 'one-size-fits-all' solution for all hair types and textures. Visit livingproof.com/skinny and use code SKINNY for a free travel sized dry shampoo with a purchase of $45 or more. This episode is brought to you by AG1 AG1 is way more than greens. It's all of your key multi-vitamins, minerals, pre-and probiotics, and more, working together as one. Go to athleticgreens.com/SKINNY to get a free 1 year supply of vitamin D and 5 free travel packs with your first purchase. This episode is brought to you by DoorDash You've trusted DoorDash to deliver your restaurant favorites and now you can get grocery delivery, too. Get 50% off your first DoorDash order up to a twenty dollar value by using code SKINNY at checkout on the app. This episode is brought to you by Perfect Snacks Made with freshly-ground nut butter, organic honey and 20 organic superfoods, Perfect Bar has a variety of products that are good to eat and good for you. Go to perfectsnacks.com/skinny to learn how you can receive a perfect bar for free. Produced by Dear Media

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Starting point is 00:00:00 The following podcast is a dear media production. You have seen the famous Stanley Quencher on TikTok. You can't miss it. Everyone has one. The only decision that you need to make is what color to go with. I recently got a neon green one. I am obsessed with this. I will show it to you on my Instagram story.
Starting point is 00:00:22 But here's the thing about the Stanley Quencher and the thing I'm obsessed with is that it makes it's so much easier to drink water. I drink about 10 times the amount of water now with my Stanley quencher. Like it's so easy to have it by my bedside. I put tons of ice in it. Sometimes I put electrolytes in it. Sometimes I put chia seeds. Sometimes I put lemon. I mix it up. But the point is, is it's so much easier to drink water. It just really helps me hit my hydration goals. The quencher is 40 ounces, so I don't have to fill it up a lot, which is great. I try to refill it three times a day. It stays cold all day long.
Starting point is 00:01:04 Like literally, it stays cold in the morning, which is amazing. And sometimes even when I wake up, the ice is still in it. The handle makes it so efficient and seamless to carry, and it's perfect for when I have my arms full with the kids. If you're looking to stay hydrated like me, definitely go check out their neon green one. It's such a moment. You're going to head to Stanley 1913.com and check out the other sizes and colors on their site. Also available at Dick's sporting goods, REI, Shields, Amazon, and more.
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Starting point is 00:01:52 A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you alone for the rock. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her. But once you level up and you're like, oh, wow, I like how I feel. That was great. But then you go back to that. You're like, okay, I remember that.
Starting point is 00:02:12 That sucks. I don't want to do that anymore. But if you keep leveling up, then you become more and more aware. But you're not aware until you actually take that leap and level up. It's kind of like the habits they have and it feels like they're going to have to change your life. They're going to have to get out of their comfort zone. They're going to have to make changes. It might cost them money.
Starting point is 00:02:27 and people don't like to make change. I don't like to do those things. Even when their health is on the line or their family's helping. This is an episode that you do not want to miss. Today, we are sitting down with Ryan Blazer, the founder of Test My Home. To give you a little background,
Starting point is 00:02:47 I was on Instagram, and this company, Test My Home, popped up. And I looked at the page, and I was like, I have to have this person on the podcast. So I harassed Ryan on Instagram and said, you have to come on the podcast. podcast and talk about the killer toxins that are hiding in our home. And here's the thing. This is one of those things that when you're aware of them, you can make a big difference. In this podcast, we are going to
Starting point is 00:03:14 go through so many different topics. What to do with your phone at night. The most common toxins that might be hiding in your home, how your body responds to toxins in your home, how you can be an advocate for your own health, what EMF is, cleaning products that affect your immune system, and what to look for when buying a home. We also talk about mold, air quality, and EMFs. This episode is really important because there's a lot of people that are actually sick from their environment and don't know it. I am so excited to have Ryan of Test My Home on this podcast. I personally learned so much. I even learned a hack for EMF with my phone. We talk about it in this episode. I learned about where mold is hiding in my house. And he really pointed out things I never would have known about.
Starting point is 00:04:00 if it weren't for him. Anyway, if you are interested in bridging the gap between environment and wellness, you got to check this episode out. You're going to learn everything that you need to know about your home and your environment with Ryan of Test My Home. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. What does everyone need to do with their phone in the night? Put it on airplane mode and keep away from the bed as you can.
Starting point is 00:04:27 You want to create a nice eight-foot bubble around the bed and not have any electronics in that zone. Why do you not want to turn off the phone? Because you were explaining this to me yesterday. Yeah, so we learned that with you guys' phone when we were measuring. If you turn it off, it actually still is transmitting back out to the tower. And it does that for Find My Phone or to Peeing, you're lost or something. So what it's doing is it's trying to find your iPhone. So it's more strategic to just put it on airplane mode, turn your Wi-Fi off and turn your Bluetooth off. Yes, correct.
Starting point is 00:04:55 Okay. All right. What are the things blow everyone's mind in people's home that you find the most that people would be shocked at? Mold in places they didn't think they had mold. I think that's the number one thing is moldy homes. I'd say that the second biggest thing is lack of ventilation. People's homes are not ventilated properly, especially new homes. They're built super airtight. And a lot of times the only time we're getting fresh air in and out of the home
Starting point is 00:05:21 is when we open up the doors and windows to go outside of the house. Why are they built that way now? Is that just for energy efficiency? What are other little tiny things that people can look for in their homes, condos, apartments that they wouldn't think about? So, I mean, toxic chemicals, that's another big one. I'm sure you guys fully wear that. Obviously, your house is very great. Very good with that. But making sure that you're not bringing things in that you wouldn't want to ingest that you wouldn't want to put on your body, things that are very non-toxic. If there's like one blanket thing that you could tell to everyone who lives in an apartment, a condo, and a house that they can do right now today, that's an easy switch. Besides the EMF, what is that? Go open your windows right now and get your house aired out.
Starting point is 00:05:59 What if it's a rainy day like today? Still, you can open window a little bit, crack it and get some fresh air in there. And tell Michael and I about that one tip that you told us about the air conditioning vent. Yeah, so if you can turn your fan to on versus auto mode. Typically, if you have it to auto, the fan will turn on when the air conditioner and the heat kicks on. But if you go over and turn it to on, then it will turn on all the time, and it will filter your air continually and distribute it throughout the house. When you go into someone's home and you see some of the things that people aren't, aren't seen and their home has so many different things. Is it causing certain diseases,
Starting point is 00:06:36 allergens, allergies? Absolutely. There's so many things that it's affecting in people's lives. It's affecting their sleep. It's affecting how they think, their brain fog, how their body is just working in general. Your body just works so much better when you don't have these environmental stressors constantly pounding the body. So what do you do when there's a house that's too crazy? Well, I mean, if it's too crazy and it's going to be too much effort to fix it, we talk about potentially moving. You know, if you're not emotionally tied to that spot, let's talk about maybe it's a good time to move, upgrade the home. And what if people can't move? Then we start with the low-hanging fruit, the easy stuff, and we make a list and we prioritize it and we just start going down the list.
Starting point is 00:07:15 So when you were saying earlier that people find mold in places they wouldn't think about. Like when I hear mold, I'm thinking, okay, it's probably the wet spots of the house. It's the bathrooms. It's the maybe around the kitchen. It's maybe around some of the appliances, but are you saying that that is not necessarily the most common places? Those are common places, but maybe humidifier in a kid's room is a common one that you might not think about. Maybe the toilet tank behind your toilet. But yeah, all the places in your house where you have water, that's where you want to look first. Why did you become passionate about testing homes? Like what's your story and how does it sort of intertwine with this?
Starting point is 00:07:48 You know, I've always been kind of fascinated with the environment and how it affects the body. And in my first part of my career, we were designing, building nightclubs and recording studios, and we were interacting with the body with sound lights, video, acoustics, and it was fascinating how our bodies and our mental state can change when we go into different environments. There's also the dark side of the environment. It's the harmful things, the mold, the chemicals, the poor water quality, even weird noises and vibrations that can be stressors on our body over time. And so my own personal journey, I was in a home that was fairly moldy.
Starting point is 00:08:21 I was restoring this old car and I was grinding on the metal. It had lead in it. Wasn't being careful with that. And I got my body pretty toxicified to where I was going to several different doctors. I couldn't figure out what it was. They felt me about stomach cancer or they wanted to take my gallbladder out. Finally went to a functional medicine doctor and he ran some tests and said I'm pretty toxic with mold and heavy metals in my body. So going through the process of cleansing my house, cleansing my body, I was able to get better and just kind of kept on that journey.
Starting point is 00:08:49 because the better I felt, the more I liked it, and then the more I wanted to do. It's overwhelming when you're sitting here and a lot of my audience, like, they don't even know where to start. Well, I think it's a hard topic too, because for whatever reason, especially in this country, people, and I was one of these people, so I can say this, I think people are more resistant to these type of things potentially being a problem for you. We believe that, oh, the government has let these things happen or people have allowed these buildings to be stood up this way. Or even if you go into our food supply, like these chemicals were allowed by the FDA or whatever. So people just assume because somebody gave it a stamp of approval that it must be good for them. When that's just not necessarily a case. And I think of anything over the last few years has taught us is that maybe some of these entities
Starting point is 00:09:34 don't necessarily have your best interests at heart. In some cases, maybe it's for better energy efficiency or it's for making a cheaper product or for its streamlining a logistics supply chain. There's a whole bunch of reasons that may fall into a reason why something gets done. and it may not include you and your health being at the top of that list. Absolutely. That's a really good point. You know, I used to work for Department of Environmental Quality and Department of Energy. And they come up with those numbers based on how far can we push these toxins on the people tell so many people get sick and we get sued and we get pushed back.
Starting point is 00:10:08 It's a numbers game. You know, it's totally a numbers game. And they push these limits as far as they can to where they say, okay, X percent of the population is going to be affected and we're okay with that because we need to make money off industry. You need to mine this goal. We've got to put out these toxins. We've got to burn this. We've got to do that.
Starting point is 00:10:24 And so they're always pushing these levels to the limit. And that's not healthy. That's not the safest levels. I also think that people don't believe that it could happen to them. They believe that, oh, at this time, in this modern age, they've taken care of all this stuff. And they forget about asbestos and now recently round up and all these things that were approved products at one point.
Starting point is 00:10:42 And we're allowed and we're stamped with a bill of health. And I just think that we were so comfortable as a population. that we don't actually believe that we could be living in a time where something like an asbestos or something like a roundup could be allowed to enter our environment when it's just that's not the case. We see all the time things getting recalled or new data coming out saying this was really harmful for you or whatever the case may be. Absolutely right. There's always the new thing coming down the horizon.
Starting point is 00:11:07 And that's kind of where EMF jumps into. I believe that's going to be the new cigarettes of our time. We're starting to see some of the effects of that already. But some of this stuff is more long term, more chronic. That's what Robert Slovak said when he came on the podcast. He is very, very into the whole EMF thing and he sort of broke it down for us. I would love to go into what EMF is, how we can be smart about it. I don't want to be like. We don't want to be like Howard Hughes living with eight feet, you know, fingernails. Have you ever seen what's that movie or what's that show with the guy with the, um, the aluminum cap on? Better call sell. Yes. Yes. Better call saw. And he has like an aluminum cap and he doesn't want like, I don't. Like, I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I. Like, I don't. I don't. I don't want to go that crazy, but like, what are some tangible tips that people can do to eliminate so much EMF? And what is it? Yeah. You know, and the sad thing is there are actually people that are very, very sensitive like that. Almost look at like gluten where some people just can't
Starting point is 00:12:01 even be around it. And there truly are people that are that sensitive to electronics. It's crazy. I would have never thought. But, you know, limiting your usage on devices that you're not actually using at the time, we call it practical avoidance. So if you don't need to be using your Wi-Fi at night when you're sleeping, might as well turn it off. Same thing with your phone. If you don't need to use it, put it on airplane mode. You're not using the PlayStation or the TV entertainment center during the day. Turn that stuff off. So turn these off, distance yourself. Those are some really easy things you can do. And what actually is it doing? So, you know, and going back to what is EMF. EMF is the electromagnetic fields and frequencies that we have that are traveling
Starting point is 00:12:38 through our air. Up until 100 years ago, it was all natural that came from the sun. It came from space. We have the static field of our earth that doesn't change. Now we've come up with all. these electronics, we've come up with alternating current, we've came up with wireless technology that's sending these high energy frequency waves through the air, and it's interacting with our bodies. Our bodies are electrical beings, our heart, our brain, our nervous system, even our cells are working on these little electrical impulses. And when we send these artificial frequencies through our body, it causes a lot of interference and it causes a lot of inflammation and it causes a lot of problem in our bodies.
Starting point is 00:13:12 Yeah, I look at this stuff, again, like not to be tin-foil hat like we're talking about, But I look at this stuff the same way that I potentially look at something like a diet Coke. Once in a while, I might have a Diet Coke. It's not good. I don't think it's going to kill me. I don't think it's great for me. But at the same time, I'm not going to have a bite. I'm not going to be drinking them all the time if it's not necessary.
Starting point is 00:13:31 And I think the same thing for the phone. It's like I don't need to sleep with it right next to my head. I don't need to have it on my lap all the time. I don't need to fall asleep with an iPad on my chest or, you know, my lights on or whatever. And I think like that is something just as a human we should get in practice doing because these things have such a choke. over our lives now. You know, you meet people, especially younger people, not to be ages,
Starting point is 00:13:50 that have grown up with knowing nothing but this technology. Lorna and I were lucky because we, like, I didn't get a smartphone until I was getting right out of college. I had like the little flip phone, so not to date myself too much, but it wasn't something that was such a big part of our childhood, right? It wasn't like this thing that we carried all the time and used for social interaction. You used to page me. Yeah, used to page her. That's not going to change now, but I think that there's a difficulty now with people that are getting so used to interact with these things, to let the thing go once in a while and just go and actually have an experience without holding some electronic device in their hand or pocket at all time. Right. Absolutely. It comes back to that 80-20
Starting point is 00:14:23 rule. If we can do this stuff 80% of the time, not worry about the other 20% of the time, it's amazing how many of these toxic exposures we can reduce if we're mindful about it, know where they're coming from and then take the appropriate actions. You know what's crazy too. And I'm always resistance, not resistant, but I'm always a little bit like, okay, like I want to see the data behind a lot of this stuff. And Lauren always gave me shit for wearing or for having this in my front pocket. It's hurting my sperm. We were, yeah, we were talking about Andrew Heerman yesterday and he literally just came out of an episode showing there actually is backable scientific data that shows that you could actually drop your testosterone levels and that the heat from
Starting point is 00:14:58 the phone is actually hurting your hormone levels by carrying your pocket. And so this, you know, somebody saying this three or four years ago, again, you would have looked at them like tinfoil half, but now there's reputable scientists coming out saying like there actually is real data that proves this to be true. I am so sensitive. Like I'm such a sensitive person as you saw yesterday to sensory stuff. Light, sounds, chemicals. I'm just sensitive. And so I feel like if you can tap into that intuition side too, you can feel what works for you. And what I mean by that is like when you're at a restaurant, this probably drives you nuts. We could go off on this. You're in a restaurant and you're eating tacos. And they start cleaning with Windex as you're eating the tacos. And I'm, it's like, how, how can we even, or you're at a gym and you're sweating. And then someone's cleaning their mat next to you with Windex. It's because we've been.
Starting point is 00:15:54 It's like we've been conditioned that this is okay to literally pour Windex everywhere we are. Well, we've been conditioned as a society that you use these things as cleaning devices that will keep you safe. And honestly, just even coming out of the pandemic, you see how many people like, we're using all these disinfectants all the time. I got to be honest. I didn't use hand sanitizer once. Sorry, everyone.
Starting point is 00:16:17 If you thought I did, I didn't use it once. It dries my hands out. It gives you wrinkles. Listen, they offer that shit to me on the plane. I'm like, I don't want to touch. I don't need any more stuff bombarding my system. And again, people are going to disagree with that.
Starting point is 00:16:27 But if you think that it's natural to go through your entire life using chemical formulations to guard your immune system, like that to me just doesn't map out. Right? You don't, like, I understand being clean and cleanliness and all of that, but that never included using chemical formulations. That usually included using all natural things that the earth provided. Yeah, and we've been doing it fine on this planet for thousands and thousands of years, and our bodies have provided the stuff that we need.
Starting point is 00:16:53 It's called a microbiome, and we have it on our hands and our gut and our skin. And when we introduce these chemicals, we're killing that off. We're sterilizing that and we're changing the whole microbiome of our body. And our bodies aren't used to that. Yeah, it's like when you have a, you know, you have kids, you have a kid, you want them to get out and actually play in the dirt and get stuff in their mouth and pick up ants and do all this stuff because it builds their immune function. And I think as adults, you kind of go the opposite way. It's like you don't allow anything ever to enter your system.
Starting point is 00:17:14 And so you have a completely weak immune function. I mean, people don't like to hear this either, but I was probably on 60, 75 flights throughout the pandemic. And I'm fine. It built my immune system where I know a lot of people that were hiding indoors and under the covers for the last three years. And it's like their immune system's fucked up. Like they can't handle normal. Like, you have all these things with kids now with RSV coming back and just normal colds. And like, people are getting destroyed by this stuff because they battered their immune system into nothing, let alone probably adding chemical formulations and hormone disruptors all the time. Yeah, and there's something to that called hermetic stress, and it's an important point
Starting point is 00:17:46 that we need to talk about, is that our bodies can build up resistance to things. It's the same principle when we go to the gym and we work out. Let's say we're working out biceps today. Okay, I'm working out really hard, a couple minutes, do some good sets, but then I set it down and I let it rest for a couple days. And I don't sit there and work the muscle nonstop. It's the same thing with toxins, and it's the same thing with the chemicals, the same with EMF, we can take a little bit because that's what's going to help us evolve. That's what's
Starting point is 00:18:08 going to help make our body stronger. But where we fail is that we don't get away from it. We don't give our body the rest and the break from it. We're constantly being exposed to toxins. We're constantly being exposed to EMF. We're constantly being exposed to toxic energy and bad vibes. And that's where our bodies break down. And that's where the cancers and the chronic illness come in, because you have to have that break. You have to have a clean home environment that you can go back to and take a break from this stuff. We had Sherveen of Symbiotica on the podcast and he said something which is so in line with what you're saying. He's like, your home is where you detox. It's a sanctuary. Why are we not treating it like that? Why are we treating it like a chemical infestation?
Starting point is 00:18:45 100%. What are some success stories that you've seen personally after you've gone in and tested someone's home? Oh wow. So many success stories. It's crazy. Yeah, I don't even know where to start on that one. There's so many that we go into people's homes and we find these problems. these sicknesses. I can tell you one that's interesting that has to do with a pet. They called us up and he said, you know what? I had a dog that died two years ago of cancer. And now the same type of dog has cancer again, but a different dog. And we need to go get the home checked out because we think there might be something going. We did the full analysis. Come to find out, they had a wiring error messed up with the hot tub. It was grounding through the wrong electrical
Starting point is 00:19:23 system right exactly where the dog had laid and the previous dog was extremely high magnetic field, higher than if you were to live underneath the high voltage power line. And they are tying that directly, a contributor to the cancer of the dog. So we were able to fix that. It was a simple fix, but believe that's what the thing that caused the cancer. And unfortunately, I have stories like that with humans as well. Tell us some of the human stories. A daughter of this family, eight years old, had a rare blood cancer. We went to the home. Everything checked out fine, but right specifically where the daughter was, was right on the other side of the electrical panel. And she had slept there, the whole life and those levels were extremely high.
Starting point is 00:20:01 Did you check that my kids aren't sleeping against an electric panel? Yeah, you're fine. For people that are maybe just thinking, hey, you know, before they work with you or someone like you, they can just take care of a few things. Like, we're sitting here in front of branch basics and we were talking about our cleaning supplies. Like we don't have, we use branch basics and then thieves and maybe some like water and vinegar.
Starting point is 00:20:19 That's all that's in our house. And Lauren did that and convinced me to do that a few years ago now, which I think has made a huge difference. I'm still working on the wasp spray. That's the most toxic thing that you could possibly. I didn't see that at your house. Can you, can I throw that away? Can we just have an intervention? Can I throw away the wasp right?
Starting point is 00:20:35 Yeah, you know, the thing is you usually spraying that all over where you're eating, having picnics, hanging out outside and where that lands on your chairs and then it gets on your body, you're getting absorbed. It's nasty stuff. I'm throwing that away. Okay. That's got to go. How do you kill a wasp? Like, is there a way?
Starting point is 00:20:48 You need to kill it? High-powered vacuum cleaner. Yeah, and it's like, what am I married for if you can't kill a wasp with your hands? Kill a wasp with your toe. Figure out how to kill the fucking wasp. Just get that chemical out of your car. You can get rid of the was spray, no problem. But I need you to get the was.
Starting point is 00:21:02 I'm scared of those things. Those things are mean. But, okay, if somebody wanted to just do some, like, if you could wave a magic wand and said, I would do these few things that before we even have to check the house, just basic general practice, maybe one of those is no more shoes in the house, which we talked about. Maybe one of those is changing the clean. Like, what are the things that people can just do no problem right now?
Starting point is 00:21:22 Yeah. You know, I would say quit wearing the shoes. That's a really big one. Think about all the nasty stuff we walk through during the day. We go fill up our car with gas. There's petroleum products and oils on the ground. Then we go into the public bathroom. There's e-Cola on the floor.
Starting point is 00:21:34 There's harsh cleaning chemicals. Then we go walk through the park with the pesticides and the herbicides. Then we go walk in our house and we walk through the rug and we kick our feet up on the and then your little baby comes crawling along the floor with their hands and feet. That's probably one of the biggest things that's easy and free that you can do right now is quit wearing shoes in the house. It's, you know, like back in the day, it was socially acceptable to smoke in people's homes. then the restaurants, you know, 50 years ago.
Starting point is 00:21:58 But today, you would never think about lighten up a cigarette. Hopefully no one's still smoking. It's ridiculous. But it's a good example with shoes. I think it's going to be socially, like, frowned upon to be wearing shoes in people's house. It's already in Asian cultures. It's a big deal. You don't do that.
Starting point is 00:22:11 This episode is brought to you by Sunbum. I am all about getting the sun in my eyes in the morning. I like the sun. People mistake that with me. I just like to stay very protected. So when it comes to sunscreen for my kids, I've done a lot of research. It's something that's really important to me because I am putting it on their pure beautiful skin. I'm sure mothers can relate. Fathers can relate. But the point is, is if they're going to go in the sun, I want to make sure what's
Starting point is 00:22:48 going on their body is something that's not super chemical driven. So they have this mineral line. It's by sunbum. And the one that I like is the Roll on Mineral Baby. What I like about them is they're very up front about the ingredients. It's also like a gentle, lightweight, non-greasy sunscreen, which is very important to me. I was in San Diego for a month with my kids and I had to find a sunscreen that was mineral. And this was the one that I reached for. I used it the whole month we were there. This specific one creates a sunscreen barrier on the skin that blocks UV rays by absorbing and reflecting them away from the skin. So it's super cool. Sunbum's whole motto is to trust the bum. They want to be a trusted brand and an educational resource. SunBum has helped me find
Starting point is 00:23:36 products with legit ingredients that have helped protect my kids from the sun. You're going to use one-time code skinny at checkout for 15% off your purchase at sunbum.com. This ends December 31st, 2003. And like I said, the product to check out is the Roll on Mineral Baby. When we moved to Austin, we did an audit of our products, of our home, as you can tell by this podcast, of all the things. We just really wanted to step it up a notch. And even when it comes to our beauty products, so one of the things that I have switched out in all my bathrooms is my shampoo and conditioner. So there's this brand. It's called Living Proof. I've talked with you about it before. And what I like about it is it has no silicones, no harsh sulfates. It has no SLS, parabins. And they're also PETA
Starting point is 00:24:30 certified, cruelty-free, color safe, and safer chemically treated hair. I actually will bring my own products if I'm ever getting a blowout too because I feel like with this I can really control what is being put on my face, on my skin and on my scalp because it does get onto your skin. So when I moved to Austin, I was really able to just do an audit of everything. If I had to recommend one of their products to you, the one that I definitely like the best and my mother-in-law likes this too. She's obsessed is their original dry shampoo formula. So why I like this is it gives you like a little bit of texture and hold to the hair, but it also works as a shampoo. I'm not a huge fan of overwashing my hair. I wash my hair once a week, and it's like a shampoo with a leave and conditioner
Starting point is 00:25:14 together. It makes your hair shiny, soft, smooth. So all you have to do is go on their site and you take this little quiz and then it analyzes your specific hair care needs. You're going to visit livingproof.com slash skinny and use code skinny to get a free travel size dry shampoo, the one that I like, with your purchase of $45 or more. That's livingproof.com slash skinny code skinny to get a free travel size dry shampoo with your purchase of $45 or more. Livingproof.com slash skinny code skinny. It's not hard to just take your shoes off. Especially in L.A. there was like literally like we'd walk outside.
Starting point is 00:25:57 There was like semen on the street. Like just take your shoes off when you go in someone's house. I don't understand. I always ask. Like do you want me to take my shoes off? Michael needs a little intervention because he runs across the house real quick and his shoes thinking he can get away with it. Well, sometimes I got the boots on and I just go. I got to make it three steps. That's not going to work for me. You need to take your petroleum boots off, please.
Starting point is 00:26:17 Sorry. I didn't mean to, hopefully I didn't leave any semen in the driveway and step through it. I know. Stepping through seamen, walking it through my house with was spray. It's like enough is enough. But okay, so the shoes, the cleaning supplies. What are other things that you, you know, if you could just wave a wand and say, hey, these are just general practices that anyone could implement.
Starting point is 00:26:34 I would say 90% of the homes that I have tested on do not have enough ventilation. Arna, just go open your windows right now. Even if you're in your house, listen to this, just go over and open your window. Crack it. Even if it's really hot or cold, outside, just open that up and get some fresh air. Put a jacket on, turn your heater up, whatever. I also think this is really weird, but energetically, to let the air flow through, it's better energy than trapping yourself indoors.
Starting point is 00:26:58 Does that make sense? Candles. I'm a big candle person. What do we need to be looking for with candles? So make sure that it's natural beeswax or a soy based and make sure that it has natural essential oils for smell. And the majority of the candles that smell good are toxic chemicals. So you're basically released in particulates from petroleum products from the candle aligned with the chemicals, the fallates, and the condesrupters, and you're breeding that in. It's creating a toxic soup in your air. And also you gave me such a good tip about the fireplace too. You have to tell them.
Starting point is 00:27:30 Yeah, if you're burning the fireplace, good idea to crack a window in the same room so that you can get that good airflow that goes up and out the flu. So every time you turn on the fireplace, the window needs to be open. Well, yeah, and with our house, when we're cooking on the stove, we always crack a window. Because, you know, new homes are super airtight. Where's that air coming from? And so if the air has got exhaust out the vent, we've got to have somewhere for that air to come back in. So you're huge on airflow because you also mentioned that, you know, when you're cooking, you have the fan above the stove. of like, why are you so big on the airflow?
Starting point is 00:28:00 Like, what happens if you don't get good airflow through the house? Because there's so many things in the air that we can breathe in that gets in our body that's completely harmful to us. So the majority of the dust we find in the air, which comes from the air, is dead skin cells, it's insect parts, it's insect feces, it's broken down foams, fibers, pesticides, bacteria, mycotoxins, endotoxins. I can go on and on. There's so many things that primarily make up dust in the air and settled in our home that
Starting point is 00:28:25 we do not want to breathe in. So if we can open up the doors and windows and flush that out regularly, and not to mention if you live in a newer home and it's off gassing or you're not being careful about your products that you're bringing in, all of these chemicals are building up into the air and we're just sitting there breathing the stuff in. I think a lot of people, too, are wondering about laundry and dish soap because the cleaning supplies, yes, but make sure you're switching out your laundry because to me you're sleeping on a pillow for eight to nine hours a night breathing that in.
Starting point is 00:28:52 Like, how important is that? Very important. The sleeping area is one thing you really want to really, want to be critical about. And so you're washing these clothes and this laundry detergent and then the fabric softener and then you got the dryer sheets. All these things have toxic chemicals in them. One other thing that I think we should talk about, say, I know you do this kind of consulting work, but say somebody's looking to either move and rent a new place or they're looking to actually buy a new place. What are things that you would tell them to look for or to potentially
Starting point is 00:29:18 avoid as they're potentially doing a move? So sweet spot is to look for a home that's somewhere between a year and a half and five years old. And the reason is, is brand, brand new homes have a lot of off-gassing from the paint, the flooring, the cabinetry, the carpets. And then older homes, we have the potential for build-up for the mold, the mycotoxins, the pest, the pest control, toxins that have been sprayed and used in the house that we don't necessarily know about. You know, you buy a 50, 60-year-old home, you have no idea of the history and what's gone on in that house. It could be pretty toxic already going into it. And are there things that they could actually even look for in the house? Like, say they're doing a walkthrough, the things that you would, or areas that you point them to
Starting point is 00:29:57 you to say, like, look for this. And if the spot has this, then maybe think twice. Yeah, good simple hack. And you can even do this with your own house is go lift up the toilet tank in your toilets, in your bathroom. Because that's a place that it's cold, it's dark, it's damp. And when you flush the toilet, it pulls mold spores into the toilet tank. And they can sit there and grow mold. And so if your home has a potential mold problem, a lot of times that's going to show up in the toilet tank. What are the different kinds of molds? You know, there's thousands of different species of mold, just like there's thousands of species of animals. And some of them are very harmful.
Starting point is 00:30:27 Some of them are not at all. So, you know, we have little kitty cat, not a big deal. We have lions and tigers and bears very dangerous. Same thing with mold. And the different types of mold can also be more dangerous depending on what they're eating. So if a mold is eating on a piece of drywall that has formaldehyde and it has glues and binders, the mold is also going to be digesting and releasing those into the environment as well. And what are some symptoms if someone's experiencing something with mold?
Starting point is 00:30:52 If you're more allergic to mold and it's a pretty heavy mold sport problem, you're going to see more of the respiratory issues. You're going to get the stuffy nose, the runny nose, the watery eyes. You can get rash. You can get the sore throat. You can get a cough. But the more dangerous part, the mold is the mycotoxin. And so mold puts off mycotoxin as its defense mechanism. And it does that to kill off all the other mold and microbiology in the area.
Starting point is 00:31:13 Problem is it can be very, very poisonous to us. And that's when we're going to see more of the headache, the brain fog. Iridability is a big one. neurological issues. In fact, you know, funny story, I had a client I was working with, and they were dealing with mold. I got them to move out of the house. Serious problem. Working about six months, they called me back and they said, you know what? You actually saved our marriage because we were about to get divorced, living in this home. They just could not get along with each other. When they moved out of the house, they started to get along again. They found out that the previous owner had moved
Starting point is 00:31:42 out of the house because of a divorce. And now they were getting back together as well. And so the mold itself was making them so irritable and so angry with each other, it almost ruined their marriage. So if you're sitting at home and you're feeling irritable, you're always tired, you should definitely try to check. Is there a kit that you can buy off Amazon to just do this quickly and efficiently? You know, there's a couple different ways to test mold. Really the biggest one is if you have any kind of water issue in your house, any kind of leak, any kind of flooding that didn't get fixed properly, there's a really good chance you have mold. There's air testing you can do, but a lot of times it comes back false negative because you have to have actual mold spores in the air for it to pick that up. You can do what's called an Ermi test or a dust test.
Starting point is 00:32:26 Michael Rubino with Home Cleanz has a really good dust test. And it gets a little swiffer and you go through the dust and send that to the lab and it tells you if there's mold spores in the air. I know this is very niche, but we talked about yesterday. I think it's relevant. And then we should actually talk about what we did yesterday at our house. But we had that leak in the upstairs. There was an upstairs bathroom. and it leaked downstairs and I showed you the spot.
Starting point is 00:32:47 But I said, like, what we did actually is we cut all the drywall out and completely got rid of it and then aired it out. And you said, that's the right strategy. But some people don't do that. They just try to do like a patch up. Can you explain why you can't do that? Mold is going to start growing in about 48 hours. So if you have a wall cavity that has insulation in it and it gets completely soaked and saturated
Starting point is 00:33:05 and it's up there and it's not open or exposed, that could stay wet for months. And after a couple days, it's going to start growing. And that mold is going to have a party up there. It's going to be, it's a cold, damp, wet place, and it's going to continue to grow mold until it's fully dried out, which could be months. So if someone's listening, they've had a leak and they just kind of patched it and they, you know, didn't do that stuff to get rid of the actual stuff that got wet. Like, there's a good chance that that could potentially be a spot for mold to be growing right now. Yeah, especially if they're not starting to not feel well or, man, I'm getting sick more often. I just don't feel the best.
Starting point is 00:33:35 What's going on? Then you start looking at some of those options. You really liked how we had Venetian plaster throughout our house. Why did you like that? And then also if someone wants to paint their walls, what's a good brand to go for? And it was because of the paint. The walls is the biggest surface in the house. So when you cover that with the chemical, that's going to be your biggest exposure of off-gassing. And it takes about two to three years to really off-gas to a level where I would consider it safe to be in unless you're doing major ventilation. So when we have the plasters and the lime and the clay, it's much more natural and it's not going to
Starting point is 00:34:08 be off-gas in those chemicals. I'm going to live in an all-clay house. When we build a house, I already told Ryan and Sam, I'm like, you guys are coming to my house and I'm building a house of clay. So on that note, let's talk about how you work with clients. And we can even use us as an example. So when you start working with someone and we could talk about how you know, even us as an example, you come in and it looks like what you do the first day is you fully just go through the house top to bottom. And we're not talking guys for an hour. I mean, you guys were there pretty much all day yesterday. Yep. What are you doing during that process and what are you looking for?
Starting point is 00:34:39 So, you know, we're collecting data. But even before that, we have your full. fill out a pretty extensive client intake form. We're asking questions about the health of the people in the home. We're asking about the history of the house. We're finding about your habits and how you interact with the house, what chemicals we're using. And we're getting as much data as we can. It's almost like a thousand piece puzzle. We walk into it.
Starting point is 00:34:58 It's all spread on the ground. And we start turning these puzzle pieces over. And we're trying to get a big picture of what's going on with your environment. So once we kind of get the history of you and the home and the health, then we start going through the home with meters that we use to measure stuff on site. and we're measuring air quality, light intensity, light calibration. We're doing the EMF. We're doing mold analysis.
Starting point is 00:35:19 We collect a water sample. And some of the stuff we can read and sense on site with the equipment, but the other half we have to send to the laboratory. So we're collecting dust and air and water and send those to the laboratory. So once we get all that stuff back, then we have a really good idea of what the things are in the house that are affecting you and how they're affecting you. So then we come up with a plan. And that's really when the fun starts.
Starting point is 00:35:39 And we start coming up with a list and we prioritize. say, okay, these are easy things that you can do. This is low-hanging fruit. Then these middle things, they might cost a little bit of money, but they're going to be big impact. And then lower down the list, you know, this is lower-impact stuff, you know, once we get this bigger stuff done. And we start working through the list.
Starting point is 00:35:55 And it's not just a one-shot deal. This is over years sometimes. I have clients that I've worked with for five years and we just continue upgrading their life, upgrading their health. And we just keep revisiting it. I think with us, if we just use us as an example, the first, the top three things that we discussed and we'll probably hop on a Skype call, I would think, after this, after you get everything to the lab, is we want to change up our EMF, maybe do a kill switch in our room.
Starting point is 00:36:21 So when we press the switch, like everything in our room will turn off. And then we also want to get more ventilation through the fans. And then the third one, what did you say? Well, it sounds like what we, oh, the water. We have maybe an air purification system that is maybe just not being set up to its full effect because it's installed, right? Yeah, you guys had the equipment, but it wasn't set up properly. So I imagine like, so a lot of people don't, like, again, if you move into a house, you just assume that the equipment's working the way it's supposed to be working. That's what we assumed. And when you go and take a look
Starting point is 00:36:54 at it, I was like, oh, actually, we have this thing that's supposed to be functioning in our air purification system, but maybe it's not set up properly or maybe it's not turned on. And so just going through that and having the knowledge. And then the other thing you found is maybe we want to add in some water filters to change some of the water that's coming into our house. Yes. Which to me, doesn't sound like, I feel like everybody would want a better filtration system. Again, it comes down to cost, but, you know, if you're just analyzing this stuff, I'm like, what's an effective? Yeah, if you're still drinking tap water, you need to catch up with the times because there's no water that's coming out of the faucet that right now that's safe for you. You were really interested
Starting point is 00:37:27 in putting a soft water situation in our house with hydrogen. Why? So soft water is going to take out some of the minerals, but it's going to be a lot easier on your faucets and your pipes and you use less soap when you shower, it feels better. You know, the hydrogen water, that's kind of more of an afterthought. So we always try to go in and focus on, let's get rid of all of the toxins. Let's clean up the water. Let's clean up the air. Let's clean up the EMF. And then we can come in after and add some of these cool biohacking type stuff. So the hydrogen water is something we have at our house and I feel a lot better on it. More regular when I drink. It's weird symptom that I have with when I'm drinking the hydrogen water. I just get super regular versus when I'm not. And so it's
Starting point is 00:38:06 something that you can tie into your drinking water system that infuses hydrogen. I would love to play a little, like, game with you because I feel like you're the perfect person to do this. I would love to go through things and for you to tell me your favorite brand and why. Okay. So let's start with an air purification system. Jasper air purifiers is definitely the top of the list for me. And you just gifted me one, and you guys, they're so sleek and gorgeous and modern.
Starting point is 00:38:31 They're like kind of a cream. Tell me about, like, what this is made out of, too. It's not plastic. Yeah, so the guy that invented this used to come from the flood and fire industry. And he had the big commercial units. And he wanted to design something that was a lot quieter and looked a lot nicer, that he could sell to doctors offices and dentist offices and found a need to try to branch into residential. And so, you know, he's coming from the professional world working his way down.
Starting point is 00:39:02 And so these units are no joke. They move a lot of air quality. They're made of solid metal that's recyclable. They have sensors in them. So it will sense when the particles start to get high in the air and it will automatically increase the speed accordingly. Lifetime warranty and these things are legit. Cleaning supplies? You know, we keep things really simple actually at our house.
Starting point is 00:39:19 We use vinegar, distilled water and a little bit of lemon essential oil or just lemon pills in it. And we clean, I'd say, 95% of our house with vinegar and water. But we also use hypochlorous acid, which is like force of nature. makes a little unit that you can make self-stable hypercoric acid for a couple days. We use that around the toilets, places where we need to kill off bacteria. Force of Nature is that the, that's the beef I eat? Is that the same company? Oh, I think you're thinking of something different. I know what you're talking about, though. There's a company called Force of something that I eat their beef.
Starting point is 00:39:51 And you like Branch Basics, too? Oh, Branch Basics is great. Yeah. Okay. And we also talked about Molly Suds that you liked for detergent. Yep. Okay. Yep. PURC is another one we use for detergent as well. Do you have a candle brand? We don't burn candles at our house just because it's more particles that are in there. Even healthy candles, we'll put off particles into the air.
Starting point is 00:40:10 So you just don't even go there? Don't even go there, yeah. Talk to me about the lights. You told me that you are attracted to warmer lights. So our bodies have been tuned to the sun on this planet. And that's how we get the cues to sleep and when to be awake, when to be hungry, we want to do all the things we do, is a lot of it is based off of lights. So ancestrally, when the sun comes up and it's high up in the middle of the day
Starting point is 00:40:32 we're getting the full spectrum of light and it's above us, it's suppressing melatonin. Now when we start to go into the evening time and we get the reds and the orange hues and then the sun goes down. And essentially, we had fires, we had candles, we had gas burning lanterns. And so they were all in those red and orange hues. And so we want those lights to kind of mimic that. Now what happens is the sun goes down. Our body says, oh, it's nighttime, start getting ready to produce melatonin.
Starting point is 00:41:00 Now we click on all these bright lights. We click on the blue screens. We get on the computer, the TV, and it tricks our brain. And they, oh, wait, never mind. It's not nighttime. It's the middle of the day. Suppressed melatonin. And then people have a hard time sleeping.
Starting point is 00:41:12 And so I think if you know if you're on your phone, an hour, 30 minutes before bedtime, a lot of times you're going to have a hard time getting to sleep. This morning I woke up. I meditated. I opened the shades. I did my lemon and chia seed and like mineral water. And then I did my AG1 by Athletic Greens. This is such an easy way to get daily nutrients in.
Starting point is 00:41:36 it also supports long-term gut health. So to me to just do like a heaping scoop in water, I froth it up, I add ice, I put my little straw in there and I sip it down. It has multivitamins, minerals, pre and probiotics, everything working together as one. And it supports your gut. A lot of people ask like what's a supplement that you recommend that you really like die for? This one's great because it's just one scoop and I feel like it has so many different nutrients in it. And it's very convenient. It's easy. You can travel. with it. They have these little travel packets that I take when I'm on the go. I just feel like I get my greens. And the benefits are like insane. So how I like to take it is I take AG1 in the morning. I gave
Starting point is 00:42:18 AG1 a try because I had seen it on so many podcasts and then Michael got it and he got me hooked to it. And what I like about it is like I said, there's those travel packets. So you can just implement it into your routine so easily. I also think it tastes so good. So if you want like a nutritional drink in the morning, you've got to try it, you've seen it everywhere. So if you want to take ownership of your health, today is a good time to start. Athletic Greens is giving you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. That's what I was talking about. You're going to love those packs. Go to athletic greens.com slash skinny. That's athletic greens.com slash skinny. Check it out. The other day, I sat down to make my matcha. I do two big heaping tablespoons of this
Starting point is 00:43:10 match with protein. I had my cinnamon and I realized that I did not have my very specific unsweetened almond milk. So what did I do? I door dashed. I love DoorDash because not only does DoorDash grocery delivery save you time, it also saves you a headache. You don't have to get in the car. You don't have to park. You don't have to go in, wait in line, deal with all the things that you normally have to deal with at the grocery store. What it does is just deliver it. straight to your door. So what I did is I ordered my almond milk. I got the vanilla. I got the unsweetened. I got the oat. I even got the chocolate milk for Zaza, all on DoorDash grocery delivery. If you like convenience like I do and you want it straight to your door, that's DoorDash.
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Starting point is 00:44:41 Skinny for 50% off your first order with DoorDash. All right, I am traveling to New York for a quick trip and of course I am bringing perfect bar. I bring one for me and one for Michael because if he gets hungry, it's a real nightmare. I travel with these in my purse and my diaper bag. I always go for the dark chocolate chip peanut butter with sea salt. It's so crunchy, delicious. It kind of taste like a creamy cookie dough texture. But the best part is it's filled with 17 grams of protein per bar. It comes in all different flavors. If I had to pick like three others, I'd probably pick the dark chocolate chip peanut peanut peanut butter and the cookie dough. Those are those are the moves. Okay. They also have these mini little bars that I have in my fridge for Zaza to just grab and go.
Starting point is 00:45:31 And those have six grams of protein. So you can't go wrong with these if you just need like a snack that has protein after a workout, if you're traveling, if you're on the go, even if you're like running to work. These tastes good. There's no chalky artificial aftertaste. I'm telling you, you got to try them, whole foods, and no artificial preservatives. Perfect bar knows that will be love at first bite. So for a limited time, they're offering you a chance to try their refrigerated protein
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Starting point is 00:46:22 You know what's a real hack that you'll appreciate? I got salt rock nightlights. You probably saw them when you were looking in the home. And instead of like when I take a shower, I'll just put the night light on. And you can see. Like it still lets you see, but it's like warm like you're saying. And I feel like it maybe eliminates what's the word I'm looking. for it. It gives off like a...
Starting point is 00:46:43 What's like more of that fire campside effect? Yeah. And you look a lot better. And this is something I've realized even early on in life is that you look a lot better in front of a fire. So if you're on a first date or you want to look good, sit in front of a fire. You always look like a couple notches higher. Always. That is so funny that you just said that I'm reading Barbara Walter's book audition. And she says that you always want to sit in a fire on a first date. Yes. And you never want like cool overhead lights on your face. But she says she hates cool over headlighting.
Starting point is 00:47:13 And so that's my other thing that I want Michael to switch up is some of the lights in our house are a little too cool for me, if I'm being honest. So listen, inevitably with what we do, especially on a public platform to a wide audience, there's always skeptics. I mean, I could tell them that the, you know, the sun comes up in the morning. There's some people that are going to be like, no, I don't think so because you said it. But for people that are skeptic and they're saying, I don't see any problem with my cleaning supplies, what negative effect could this have?
Starting point is 00:47:38 Scientifically, how can you prove it? So maybe we'll tackle cleaning supplies. and then EMF and maybe they can, you know, if you were going to convince somebody like to change cleaning supplies, what would be the main reasons? I would always ask, you know, what exactly are you skeptical about? Is it that the chemicals, you think that our bodies like chemicals? You think that our bodies don't like things from nature? Which part of it are you having a hard time with? I think it's nostalgic. There's that too. No, I think a lot of it is what I said earlier too, which is people believe that if it's an approved product that somebody's selling on a shelf,
Starting point is 00:48:08 that it must be fine for you. We all know. especially in modern times, that we're probably not living in the healthiest way possible. And some people attribute that to poor food or poor exercise habits or poor sleep. But I feel a lot of people don't get to the root. And we were talking about Lauren and I, you were asking how we feel now the main difference between when we lived in L.A. and here. And I don't necessarily think, I mean, maybe L.A., it's a kind of chaotic city. There was a huge difference.
Starting point is 00:48:35 But one of the things that we did that was completely different is we completely changed our living environment, which you saw. We completely changed the stuff that's in that environment, which includes the air filtration system, the cleaning supplies, the lights, the way we interact. And it's had a dramatic effect on our health. Now, that may just be because we were so, you know, geared up in L.A. that happened. But I also think it has a lot to do with the environment. And so again, back to what I was saying is I think people are skeptical because they don't want to believe that potentially some of the habits they have are actually contributing to poor health in their life. I think you nailed it right there. It's the habits they have and it feels like they're going
Starting point is 00:49:14 to have to change their life. They're going to have to get out of their comfort zone. They're going to have to make changes. It might cost them money and people don't like to make change. They don't like to do those things. Even when their health is on the line or their family's health. But, you know, with chemical, there's a company or website, EWG, Environmental Working Group, that is amazing. You can go on there. They've done all the research. There's a ton of studies. You know, if you're the scientific guy, you can read all the studies. It's all legitimate. If it's EMF that you're concerned about, there's environmental health trust is a really, really good website. There's a lady Deborah Davis that put that together.
Starting point is 00:49:45 She's a doctor. She's a scientist and she's compiled all the different studies. There's a lot. And that's the thing with EMF, there's studies all the way back from the 40s that saying this stuff is dangerous. The problem is you just, you know, you're not going to see this stuff front and center because a lot of the devices that we're doing this research on are wireless devices. They're emmph. So, you know, of course, these billion dollar industries don't want this information. front and center.
Starting point is 00:50:08 Well, it's funny when we talk about the EWG, we've been brought up on the show. So in the last like five or six episodes, multiple times. So people are talking about it more, especially mainstream. And I think that, again, people feel that if they don't notice an immediate effect,
Starting point is 00:50:23 or maybe there's people listening like, I don't feel anything. I'm not as, like I'm not as sensitive as Lauren, right? But I also am aware that, you know, I'll give a weird example that I correlate the shoe. I had a bad, my neck was out for a very long time. And eventually our friend Josh, who does bodywork on us,
Starting point is 00:50:41 he got it out. And this sounds like a strange example, but I didn't realize how out it was for for so long, right? I was just kind of going through because it just became my new norm. And so I feel like if you're somebody that's operated in this norm with all these phones and this norm in these cleaning supplies, you don't think anything's wrong because that's your new norm. You don't realize how much you could potentially improve by changing these things. Like when my neck got back in place, everything changed. When we change the cleaning supplies in the house, everything changed, right? But if you don't feel like there's something going on immediately because you're so used to living the way you are, maybe you don't feel like anything's wrong. Absolutely. You're complacent
Starting point is 00:51:16 with your symptoms and they become the norm. But once you level up and you're like, oh, wow, I like how I feel. That was great. But then you go back to that. You're like, okay, I remember that. That sucks. I don't want to do that anymore. But if you keep leveling up, then you become more and more aware, but you're not aware until you actually take that leap and level up. It's kind of like what happened yesterday when we turned the power off. If you guys, that was the norm, but what happened as soon as we turned the power off? How did you feel? My nervous system immediately relaxed. I can't, like, I just, it was like my adrenals or my hormones or something just immediately, everything kind of, my, Haley, my assistant said her shoulders dropped. Like, you just sort of,
Starting point is 00:51:51 ah. It's like somebody being overweight and not taking care of themselves and huffing and puffing up the stairs and not eating right and drinking alcohol multiple times. We can just thinking that they're fine because that's how they've always felt. That's how they feel. And they're missing the whole area of life where it's like, well, if you got in shape and lost some weight, you built some muscle mass, you started eating well. You kind of slept better. You'd feel completely different, but their their norm is feeling bad. Right. And they don't, so if that's your norm, they don't even recognize that it's bad. That's just the norm. Right? You don't realize there's a whole other way to live life. Yeah. So we leveled you guys up just a little bit with that. And so feeling that, then you're like,
Starting point is 00:52:27 how can I feel like this all the time in my house? This is great. You know, I think there's another side of this too. And I was at a conference. I was listening to a cancer doctor talk. And you said, one of the reason cancer is so dangerous is because our bodies don't really have a warning system for cancer. Cancer mimics our own cells. And so when the T cells and the immune system is going through, it just cruises right on by cancer. So I was like, nothing's wrong. Everything's fine here, nothing to look at. That's because there's no receptor or no sensory for our body. So when we're doing something, when we're being exposed to a toxin or a chemical or an email, amf or a stressor that's causing cancer in our body, there's no way for our body to really send
Starting point is 00:53:02 off a signal. We don't feel that. The only time we feel it is when the body is actually breaking down our body to the point where we're not functioning anymore. A lot of times then it's too late. And so when we're doing these things, saying, well, I don't notice a difference. Yeah, well, you might be preventing cancer in your body and you don't know it. My thing too in my life is I constantly want to level up. I constantly want to be the best version of myself. And I know it's a journey. It's not something that happens overnight. And if I can do little things every single day that overall make a big difference over time, I'm all about that. I think you have to be open-minded to other possibilities other than what we grew up with. I mean, you can't, you can't get attached.
Starting point is 00:53:37 Well, I also think that it's any, like, the way that I justify a lot of this in my mind is like, I don't see any downside in putting better cleaning supplies in the house, getting better water supplies, getting better air filtration. And, you know, maybe some of the pushback is, well, they'll say, easy for you to say, Michael, you can afford a lot of this stuff. Or that, and that is a valid point. Though, people can afford. But that is a valid point. They know some of this stuff requires an investment.
Starting point is 00:54:00 But I always push back and challenge people that say that kind of thing to me to say, okay, like how many nights a week are eating out? How many nights a week you go and drinking? How many, you know, what kind of material things are you buying consistent? Like, there's ways, like if you prioritize certain things in this case, your health, that you can find savings in other areas that are maybe pushing against your health, right? Absolutely. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:54:20 And it doesn't cost any money to go open the windows. get some fresh air. It doesn't cost any money to leave your shoes at the door. It doesn't cost any money to throw toxic chemicals out and use vinegar and water. It doesn't cost any money to turn your electronics off when you're not using them. Those are all free things you can do that can make a huge impact right now that you can do. Yeah. And I always say this, regardless of money was not an issue, you could snap your fingers and do these things. You would still think that a lot of these practices are good ideas, right? So I always figure, like, I take in the financial aspect of a lot of this stuff all the time. You just mentioned a bunch of free things.
Starting point is 00:54:51 but I always weigh it against, okay, if money wasn't an object, is it still a good idea? And to me, like a lot of this stuff, so I always figure it if it's a good idea, like, you might as well figure a way to find the resources to be able to pay for those kind of things because ultimately the one thing, money in a bank account, money in a bank account, but your health is your health, right? And if you, at the end of your life, nobody's going to sit there and care about how much money you've saved. You're going to sit there and care about the state of condition that your body and mind are in.
Starting point is 00:55:19 Right? Like nobody on their deathbed's like, oh, thank God, I have a million dollars in the bank. They're sitting there saying, shit, I wish I had more time. I wish I took better care of myself. Absolutely. And if you're running a business and you got 200 people in your business center and you can optimize those people 10% over the year, how much money are you saving? If you can make the air quality cleaner so that they have less sick days, if you can lower the EMF so they have better thinking capabilities and less brain fog, you can reduce the chemicals in their body so that they feel better over time. How much dollar-wise? Does that make sense to invest into that? I say, yeah, it absolutely does. You have to tell us the weirdest thing that you've ever found in someone's home. Please don't be our home. Sexual or non-sexual? It could be anything. Oh, if it's sexual, it might be our home.
Starting point is 00:56:00 I was going to say, like, maybe you found like, just something so random. I mean, every once in a while, you know, well, there was this home that they had, okay, so I'm in this house. Then it was a single guy. And he says, there's one room that normally don't have open to people, but I want the whole house inspected. I'm like, okay, so I didn't know what I was going through the house. It was out of his office and it was this bookcase that was cracked open.
Starting point is 00:56:25 And I go in there and it's a full on sex room like dungeon style. Like, but it had, let me check that dildo from old. It had, but it was crazy. Like he had had a good time I can tell. It had six queen beds, three on each side. There were stripper poles in the middle. Then there was a big stage up front. And then he had these big closets with every kind of costume you could ever imagine for
Starting point is 00:56:48 and all the toys you can imagine big speaker system lights like holy shit this guy he's had a good time what about the weirdest thing that you've ever found when it comes to like mold EMF air quality like something so random where you just couldn't believe that you found it well i mean there was one house i went into and it's like you got to go to my buddy's house he's really sick he moved into this place and within six months he's almost lost all his health and I pull up first of all he's right underneath the high voltage power line I could hear it crackling and pop in I could have stood on his roof and hit it with you with the broom, it was that low.
Starting point is 00:57:20 Walk into the house and I look and one whole side of his whole house was just covered in mold. And then I look and then there's cat shit and there's dog shit and there's beer cans. I'm like, dude, what in the hell are you doing in here? He's like, I don't know, man, I can't go to work anymore. I can't say, I can't even leave my house. Like I'm, my health's gone down.
Starting point is 00:57:37 I'm dude, you gotta get out of this way. I didn't even go in the house much further. I'm like, you know, I'm not gonna charge you for this. Like you just need to leave. And he did, he lived. And I ran into him in a grocery store a couple months later. like, man, you saved my life like I'm turned around. And he was drinking and smoking because he felt so horrible.
Starting point is 00:57:53 And that's the only way he know how to self-medicate. That makes sense. It's a vicious circle. Yep. Yep. Who needs test my home? Anybody that lives inside of an indoor environment, I think needs to make sure that your home is good.
Starting point is 00:58:06 So unless you're living in a cave, like a caveman. That's kind of an indoor environment. With rounded edges, with good airflow and no molds and no toilets. You need test my own. Yeah, and the reason, you know, up to 100 years ago, it was the word outdoor, indoor, I don't even think was like a thing because everybody spent time outside. Everybody spent time outside growing and hunting and farming and ancestrally, you would go inside your shelter to sleep or to get away from the rain.
Starting point is 00:58:34 The rest of the time you lived outside. Now, we have that flip now. Everything's opposite. How many people actually go outside? How much of your time would you say do you spend outside of either your car or your work or your home? I tried to be really mindful of it. I don't know exactly how much time, but I try to be mindful. But I mean, even with that, like if you were to audit the time, I would say maximum
Starting point is 00:58:55 20% of the time. And we're trying to be mindful of it, you know, and get out. And so I'd imagine, especially in a more urban, you know, environment. Like your people aren't outside nearly enough anymore. Yeah. And so a study was done actually, and this would be pre-COVA that said 92% of our lives are spent inside of an enclosed space, either homework or car. Now, I would even argue after COVID, that probably has gone up since people spent so much more time in their house. That's a scary
Starting point is 00:59:22 thought to think that that's the only time that we're getting fresh air, we're getting natural sunlight, that we're getting freedom from the electronics and the chemicals in our home. And you'll do any space. Like you'll do offices, you'll do college dorms, etc., etc. Yeah, anybody that wants to optimize their living space that wants to turn it into a true healing sanctuary instead of a toxic environment. We deal with that. And my last question, if you ever want to build a house, you help people build the house, right? Yep. Yeah. And those are some of the funnest projects when someone comes to me and said, hey, we really want to dial this in from the ground up and truly make it a healthy home.
Starting point is 00:59:55 And we can start from picking out the right lot. We can help them lay out their home. We can all the building material, the whole nine yards, everything. You know what? It's so great, those rounded edges because it makes you feel like you're in a cave, huh? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Rounded edges are good. I'd love rounded edges. Where can everyone find you? Tell us, pimp yourself out, your Instagram. Where can they contact you? Tell us all the things. So Instagram is just Test My Home. All of our handles are Test My Home.com. And you got me these air purifiers on Jasper. Yep. Okay. You guys go check them out. They're so pretty. And if you want to use a code for Branch Basics, we have a code skinny. I got the starter pack to start and I love it. Test my home. Ryan and Sam, thank you so much for testing.
Starting point is 01:00:40 our home. I look forward to optimizing our living space. I'm so glad you subtly manipulated my husband. I think we should do this again too because we're still going through the audit with you and we send a much, you're sending some stuff out and the ones we do it and make the changes, we can update everybody on what we've done. Yeah, a lot more to talk about. A lot more. There's just the beginning. There's a lot of different ways. It's going to go. Thank you, Ryan. Thank you so much for coming on. Oh, thank you guys. This is great. Test my home. Wait, don't go. We are going to leave a code for the Jasper Air Purifier in the show notes. I'm in love with mine. I got two. They're nude. They match my house. They're absolutely beautiful. And they really work. And then we are also going to do a giveaway.
Starting point is 01:01:22 I have never given this away. So this will be fun on the podcast. I'm giving away the skinny confidential diffuser. It is absolutely magical for the home. It's perfect for the home. And it's human and pet safe. So all you have to do is tell us your best favorite takeaway from this episode with Test My Home. on my latest post at Lauren Bostick. Thank you guys for listening. As always, DM me or comment your feedback. We always want to make sure we're having on guests that you guys absolutely love. See you next time.
Starting point is 01:02:01 You have seen the famous Stanley quencher on TikTok. You can't miss it. Everyone has one. The only decision that you need to make is what color to go with. I recently got a neon green one. I am obsessed with this. I will show it to you on my Instagram story. But here's the thing about the Stanley quencher and the thing I'm obsessed with is that it makes
Starting point is 01:02:26 it so much easier to drink water. I drink about 10 times the amount of water now with my Stanley quencher. Like it's so easy to have it by my bedside. I put tons of ice in it. Sometimes I put electrolytes in it. Sometimes I put chia seeds. Sometimes I put lemon. I mix it up.
Starting point is 01:02:46 But the point is, is it's so much easier to drink water. It just really helps me hit my hydration goals. The quencher is 40 ounces, so I don't have to fill it up a lot, which is great. I try to refill it three times a day. It stays cold all day long. Like literally, it stays cold in the morning, which is amazing. And sometimes even when I wake up, the ice is still in it. The handle makes it so efficient and seamless to carry, and it's perfect for when I have my arms full with the kids.
Starting point is 01:03:14 If you're looking to stay hydrated like me, definitely go check out their neon green one. It's such a moment. You're going to head to Stanley 1913.com and check out the other sizes and colors on their site. Also available at Dick's Sporting Goods, REI, Shields, Amazon, and more. And you should know that you should hurry. These sell out so fast. So you'll soon feel as hydrated as I feel. This is so good for your skin.
Starting point is 01:03:37 Keep listening and sipping away with your new must-have hydration accessory from Stanley, the quencher.

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