The Bossticks - Valentine Thomas - How To Quit A Job You Hate To Pursue A Career You Love, Sustainable & Ethical Eating, Spear Fishing, & Using Social Media To Build A Career

Episode Date: February 22, 2019

#171: Valentine Thomas is a Canadian born lawyer who worked in finance in London for six year before quitting that career path and pursuing her new career path of Spearfishing. Yes, Spearfishing! She is now a professional free diving instructor, spear fisher, TEDx speaker, & soon to be published author. On this episode we discuss how to quit a career you dislike, spearfishing, how to fish, shop, and eat sustainably and ethically, and why it's so important to pursue what you love. We also discuss how social media has helped individuals in ever profession shed light into professions that may have lived in obscurity.  To Connect with Valentine Thomas click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) For Detailed Show Notes click HERE This episode was brought to you by Fabletics. Your new go to for all athletic wear.  Fabletics is offering our listeners an incredible deal you don't want to miss: Get 2 leggings for only $24 a ($99 value) when you sign up for a VIP membership. Just go to Fabletics.com/skinny to take advantage of this deal now. International shipping is available and there is absolutely no commitment when you purchase your first order!  Fabletics.com/skinny Terms and conditions apply.  This episode is brought to you by Robinhood. For a free stock visit skinny.robinhood.com  and start investing today with this easy to use mobile platform. 

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.

Aha. My first years were not very easy, I guess, because I was used to living in London when I had a brand new Mercedes. and a very nice apartment and I just quit everything and sold everything and I got stuck living in my car at some point because I just have, I was making a job for myself and a job that didn't exist before. Even in those times when it was harder,

I never regretted it because I was waking up every morning by the beach, eating the best food I had had in my life. We are back. It's Friday. Happy Friday. You have just me, Lauren, today. Michael is out of the office. he's running around in a suit and tie, which is kind of hot.

This morning he came in all hot and bothered in his suit and tie, and I was like, meow. Anyway, that's off on a tangent. But you just have me today. Taylor is in studio with me. He told me that this is the time for me to podcast because I have energy. Taylor, write it down 11.31 a.m. I had two cups of coffee with inulin and cinnamon. So I'm like off to the races.

Anyways, so today we have a Valentin. She is going to talk about spearfishing, and we'll get into that. But before we get into that, I wanted to tell you five very niche productivity hacks that have really been working for me. I think it's important as we, you know, interview a bunch of guests to check in with you guys and let us, let you know any tips or tricks that are working for Michael and I. And even if that just means, you know, 10 to 15 to 20 minute intros that have a couple of valuable hacks for you, I'm very much about it. So over the last couple months, I've been writing down niche productivity hacks that have been working for me. And some of these are ones that you guys maybe have heard over and over again, but I think it's important to keep going back to them because they really seem to be working

for me and a bunch of you. I'm always checking in on DM or in the secret Facebook group. And to see these hacks working for you guys and also working for me really showcases their value. So some of these tips are even tips that I picked up from other podcasters too. So the first tip that I think everyone should do, and this is going to sound maybe, you know, counterproductive, but it's not, is reading. Reading to me is life-changing. I've been a big reader ever since I was little. I remember when I was little, my mom used to say, you need to go outside and play with your friends because I would be reading a book on the couch. And so reading something that I've always gone to as an outlet, you know, as I grew up and experienced any kind of adversity, I would always turn to a book.

There's something about being immersed in a book in someone else's life and reading about it and getting lost in that that just really does it for me. Sometimes I go through seasons with reading, though. Like I'll read so many biographies or, you know, so much fiction or whatever it is. And then I'll stop for a month. and I notice when I stop reading that I'm not as sharp. So while reading takes up time, and a lot of people are going to say I don't have time, it also adds so much value to your life and keeps your brain sharp. When I don't read for a month, I swear, like I said, I'm not the same.

I'm not functioning at the same level. I now make it a point to read every single night for 30 minutes. So if I like to be in bed at 10 o'clock, then I'll get in bed at 9.45. and, you know, read till 10, 15. There's also something about reading that puts your brain at ease right before you go to bed. It's so nice to be, like, done with your checklist, in bed, your emails are done, whatever it is, and you can just open a book and get lost in it. So I believe that you have to get interested outside yourself and not just be completely interested

in whatever you're doing. To me, it feels selfish if I'm not interested in other people. I'm constantly wanting to be curious, and that's what reading makes me more curious. It gives me so many ideas. It inspires me of people to interview. It inspires me to ask certain people on the podcast. For instance, Michael's reading a book on sleep, and we reached out to him on Twitter. So reading gets your wheels spinning.

So yes, it does take time, but in the end, I believe reading makes you more productive. And Taylor, I hope you're reading. Those crickets. Okay. The next productivity hack is Time Batching. You've heard this one from me, but honestly, it's life-changing. Like, I can't even imagine not time-batching. What time-batching is is it's essentially doing the same task for a big amount of time.

So I've been scheduling all my photo shoots on Fridays. I know on Fridays that I am going to be in a photo shoot all day and creating content. So I need to be fresh, contoured. You know, the facial massage needs to be happening like a lot night before. I need to be hydrated. I need to be ready to play. Like really, I think of my business as a sport. And when it comes to Fridays, when I know I'm shooting and I'm going to be on camera, I've got to be clearheaded. I can't be hung over. I don't want to have a lot of salty foods the night before. I want to get a workout in in the morning. My morning routine is so important. So I know Fridays is like a game day. Another day of the week, and you guys I've talked about this before, is Wednesdays. I do all my conference calls and interviews on Wednesdays. So I know Wednesday is going to be a day of talking. So in knowing that, you can prepare yourself for the day and time batch all those tasks and one. I used to do my conference calls throughout the week. And what ended up happening is I would be doing something and immersed in a project and

have to take a conference call. So it actually ended up creating like ups and downs throughout the whole day. And I couldn't concentrate on one task. So conference calls are on Wednesdays. Mondays I try to clear because I know on Mondays there's going to be all these different fires that I have to put out within the business. So Mondays are more of like, I want to call almost a reaction day. Like I'm reacting to different things. I'm making sure that systems are in place to get the week all streamlined. I have a call with my team. Everyone sort of knows what the goals of the week are. So Monday I would say are like getting the goals of the week ready to go. And then Tuesdays and Thursdays are open for creation for me. My business is creating.

and I need to be able to scale the business and grow the business. So those are days that I clear off for content creation. And that could be anything from ideas for the podcast, reaching out to guests, you know, building a media kit, you know, working on a potential product, whatever that is. Those are Tuesdays and Thursdays. And I really try to move meetings off of those days because it can be a lot when you're going from meeting to meeting. So time batching, try it.

You could, and just like an example, if you work nine to five, maybe you return all your emails on Mondays and then Tuesdays is a day of, you know, setting goals and creating the systems to get to those goals. Or maybe Wednesdays is the days you take clients out to lunch. I don't know whatever it is, but I do notice that doing the same task within a block of time is incredibly helpful. And also, of course, you know, the time blocking cube really helps with time batching, too. If you don't have one of those, I'm telling you, it's life changing. Do not use your phone for time walking, you will get distracted and start scrolling through Instagram. Third productivity hack is spending money on time.

This is weird. Okay? You're going to be like, what? I believe in spending money on my time. So wherever that is, I utilize it. For instance, if I have to post some Instagram stories, I'll take an Uber instead of driving. That $6 that I spent on Uber allowed me 10 minutes to post all my Instagram stories and the

fonts and colors that I wanted it. You know, maybe I go get a blowout at drybar. I can take my computer and work on blog posts. Or maybe I have 100 emails to return. Then I can go get a facial and, you know, get my skin all tight and glowing and dewy. Whatever is important to you, it could be even getting your nails done. I would use that time to listen to a book on tape, to listen to a podcast. I'm always looking for spots where I can be better, do better, be the best version of myself.

So, you know, if there's five minutes of walking to coffee and I can listen to an Ed Milet episode, love him, I'll do it. This morning, you know, literally five minutes I walk to coffee. I'm listening to a podcast on Ed's morning routine. People ask me who are your mentors. My mentors are whoever the fuck I want them to be because you have access to all of this on the internet and all of their podcasts. So to walk to coffee with Ed Milet while he talks about his morning routine is super powerful. Those five minutes of my day really kick started the day.

I'm really cognitive about whose content I'm consuming too, even if it's just for five minutes. So the point is, utilize your time. I like to pay for time. It's just, it works for me. If I have an event, I'll get my makeup done so I can spend an hour on emails or an hour on Slack or even conference calls. I'm walking. I'm moving. Maybe I'll go get like a moon juice. Whatever it is, I really evaluate my time and my energy. I think that that's really important to sit back and look at. The fourth productivity hack that's really been working for me is to write stuff down. We've talked about this. I write the first seven priorities of the day down on a piece of paper. I start with the most important one and then go down to the least important one. I do not move on to the second one until the first one is done. I do not move on to the

third one until the second one is done. That's called the Ivy Lee method, I believe, and it's by Charles Swab. And it really, really works for execution. Just that simple practice of writing those seven things down. every single day is a game changer. I have this notebook that I use. It's hot pink and very cute. And I have my specific pen that you can find on the Instagram account and the skinny was like. And what I do in this notebook is on the first page of this notebook is my goals for 2019. So the second that I wake up, I open that notebook and I see those goals every single day. I flip the pages and I get to my page where I write my seven things down. And each day, sometimes those seven things will roll over, roll over, roll over, like a tumbleweed. But the point is, is that I'm focusing on the priorities of the day.

I used to be that person that was like crossing off my to-do list and getting an orgasm every single time I crossed something off. And then I realized that I was working in my business and not on my business. So now I really, really apply a huge chunk, 80% of my energy, towards scaling my business and those big priorities of the day. The little stuff is going to have to wait until those priorities to get done. It's just, it's mandatory for me. And I think to continue to grow a business, it's so important to be working on the big picture and not just on the micro, if that makes sense.

The last productivity hack that's been life-changing for me is to completely take control of your calendar. spend five minutes before you go to bed on your calendar. This was a tip from my friend Steve. He is major and he said that he spends at least five to ten minutes every night before he goes to bed evaluating his calendar, making sure that there's driving time in there, making sure that, you know, the important urgent things are in red. I color code all my beauty appointments in pink. I color code my workouts in yellow. I color code the blog posts in red.

I color code meetings in orange. You get the drift. So I have like a whole color coded situation that when I look at it, my brain automatically knows what I'm doing when I'm doing it. I found that to be extremely helpful. The color coding on Google Cal is insane. It's just the Google Cal app. And I think you can even like pick the pinks and the different stuff that you like.

Shout out to Mimi for showing me that. So I just think that having full control. control over your calendar and actually scheduling in email time and scheduling in time to relax. I have reading time in there. I have my morning pages in there. I even have my 10 minutes of meditation in my calendar. I know exactly what I'm doing for each day and it just gives me this feeling of control. And not the word control can sound negative, but I mean, control over my day. I mean, that's so important. You can also have empty spaces on your calendar and use those for opportunities to rest, relax, rejuvenate, workout, whatever it is. I know Michael creates space in his calendar,

like I said, for just reading. I hope you guys enjoyed my five productivity hacks and just some other ones that are really quick for you to think about. I'm going to fire them off are cut your meeting times by 25%. I used to take meetings for an hour. Now I do 30 minutes. I used to do conference calls for 20 minutes. Now I do 10 minutes. Cut it. in half. That's really helped. Another one is to know one to delegate. You got to know one to outsource. You got to know one to delegate. It's hard to give up control over certain things, but you will get overloaded if you don't delegate. Another thing that I've done is the app unroll. So unsubscribe, unfollow, unroll. Get that shit out of your email box. Get unfollow people that aren't serving you.

Unsubscribe from emails. Get it out. Move it. And then the last thing I would say is always have a no strategy. No is really important. You have to know when to say yes and you have to know when to say no. If something is taking your energy, I tend to say no. If something's giving me energy, I tend to say yes. But yes, there are going to be things where you have to get uncomfortable to get comfortable. But it's important to know there is such power in saying no. And it clears space off your calendar for you to do something that's productive. With that, those are my hacks. I hope you guys like them. Let's meet Valentin. Okay, hold on. Before we get into that, we need to talk about fabletics. Now, if you've been following along on my Instagram stories, you know I love fabletics to work out in. First of all, it's so affordable, but also so cute, you guys. Like, I can't even tell you. I just got this zip up moment, which is really great for me because if I'm wearing makeup, I don't have to pull it over my head and ruin my makeup and screw up my hair. And I just throw it on, zip it up, and then I put on the matching pants. I love how Fabletics has sets.

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Terms and conditions do apply. Valentin Thomas is a former lawyer who quit at all to pursue a sustainable quest for happiness as a spearfisher woman, which is so different. Today we catch up with her to hear all about her spearfishing journey. She's been featured on everything from the Daily Mail to Joe Rogan. and today we pick her brain about her story of spearfishing. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. Telling you that we discovered you through Joe Rogan, you're saying you reached out to him,

and he probably was like, what a unique perspective, right? It was, well, I was looking for a podcast to listen to, and my friend suggested me to check out the Rogan when, and I saw I was following me on Instagram, so I was like, oh, hello. And he just. I was like, hey, by the way, if you ever need it, guest on your podcast like he was like yeah how was like the 27 August I was like uh even if I was getting married I would cancel to come so yes yeah who cares about the groom leaving for Joe Rogan

I wouldn't care either exactly later well I can understand why you got such a quick invite because you have a very very unique story which is why when we heard about it I was like I got to get we I have to figure out what's going on here so you let's get a little background from Montreal from Montreal had a legal career let's let's go back let's let's go way back let's let's hear How this all began? I studied law in Montreal, and then I did my master in law, and I just, I want to move, so I have a French passport, so I had a chance to move to Europe. I moved to London when I work in finance for six years, and when I moved to London, I discovered

a super weird sport that was spiffishing. I'm not, I'm not a swimmer, I'm not an outdoor person, I'm not, I've never had the side of me, but I've cooked. I always cook. cooking is one of my passion and I just fell in love with the whole process of catching my own fish and I got hired to do documentary in South Africa in 2015, 16 and when I came back to my desk I just remember telling myself like,

all right, I'm out. So I sold everything I had. But whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, how do you just fall in love with the process of catching your own fish? Is it because you wanted to have clean fish to eat? Yes, it's that I was like the day is you go out. out on a boat from the shore and you spend the entirety in the water and you get to interact with dolphins and sharks and whales and a lot of super cool stuff. And you come back home and you have fresh fish that you just got and you know it's caught in a responsible way at the same time. Yeah. And there's more of a connect. There's like a connection to the food. And also there's a

connection to nature. It's probably, you know how they tell you when you're stressed out to go walk on the beach and do grounding and get all those ions in? You're out in the middle of nature interacting with the animals. There's something probably therapeutic about that. Yes. And also you burn between 1,500 calories an hour. Sign me up. Where do I spearfish? There's a lot here that I want to go over. Let's back a couple of them. So you were in law and you're maybe, you weren't happy, right? It wasn't like something that was firing you up. And so all of a sudden somebody invites you on a spearfishing trip. And you said, you know what? Screw the law stuff. I'm done. I'm sure, were your parents involved?

Are they happy about this decision? No, they were not. I can't imagine what this conversation looked like. I started spivishing about two, like about a year after I moved to London. And I kind of liked it, but it was not, again, I was petrified of the ocean. I almost drowned and it was 14, so I didn't swim in the ocean for about 10 years after that. So when I took my first free diving class, I was like, yeah, no, like, I don't really want to do it, but my friends kind of forced me to do it.

And I really liked it, but it was, it's not, I didn't follow in love with spivishing for the diving part of it. That took me a good two, three years to really like that boat. For anybody that's thinking about spearfishing, what do you need to know about swimming and diving? I know, like, there's probably a lot of breathwork, right? Because you're not down there in scuba gear. You're free diving, right? Yes, but the human body is actually made to hold its breath. So you have natural reactions happening in your body as soon as you emerge yourself in the water. So the human body is made to hold its breath. There's just tricks to trigger that. Okay. So what are those tricks?

You have to slow down your heartbeat is one of the biggest one, because you want your body to use as little oxygen as possible so that we can function for longer without breathing. So how do you do that? You just go into like a meditative state? Yes, it's very close to meditation and yoga. That's a free diving part of it. Walk us through what a day in the life of a spearfisher is. Like I want to get so specific what equipment you wear, what you do when you wake up, how you prepare yourself, what you're, what you do when you wake up, how you prepare yourself, what you. you do while you're doing it and what you do after. A typical spearfishing day is you get up pretty early, you go out on a boat, and you fish all day. And what I do is at the end of the day, already have my little ingredients shop up, and we do Civeche right on a boat. So we just eat fresh fish that we just got, and we're just having a few beers, and then we go on a way back.

We clean all the fish, we're bringing home, and we make a massive meal with everybody. This sounds pretty good. And then... Oh, Michael. Take this fucking headset off and get out there and start spear fishing. But then you go out different wear, but it depends where. But in certain locations, it's so fishy that you go back and you fill your freezer for the next two weeks. And you have basically free food.

But for someone like me that doesn't, when you say spearfishing, what I'm picturing in my head is how I don't really think it is. What are the tools you're using? How do you do it? What are you wearing? Like, give us the whole, like, picture of it. So you have a wetsuit because it's too cold otherwise? especially in California and you hold your breath

so you take one last deep breath and then you take a dive and then you go down with as little movements as possible you're going to go down there's two types of spit fishing you have the reef fishing you have the blue water hunting

and a reef you go down to the reef you hide yourself a little bit and you have a spear gun with a trigger on it and you hide yourself and then you wait you wait until something shows up when you're out of air you come back to the surface

and you do that again and again and again in again. Why can't you wear, and this might be a dumb question, but why can't you wear a tank that has oxygen in it while you're down there? You have to be mobile, right? You can, but it's the, it's front upon. Let's put it like that. It's kind of cheating, I guess a lot of people feel that way. It's not pure for the sport. Yes, but also personally, I don't mind because I think if you know, if you're already risking your life and going into water, catch your fish, it's, you're already deserving it. But also, the problem with a tank is you make so. many bubbles that you just care to fish off.

Ah. The reason I love stories like this, though, is because you've basically defied the odds and quit a typical, let's say, like a legal career and created a completely brand new career path for yourself and something that is so non-traditional that nobody would think like, hey, you know, I guarantee when you were going up, you never thought, hey, this is what I'm going to be doing for a living and having a cookbook from them and all these different things. It's so amazing the path that people can take, you know, with a little bit of social media, we're going to pull up your social a little bit because it's crazy.

In a career you can build in something that's just so non-traditional. It's definitely difference. It's a type of entrepreneurship, I guess. And it was my first years were not very easy, I guess, because I was used to living in London when I had a brand new Mercedes and a very nice apartment and a lot of shoes. And I just quit everything and sold everything. And I was the first year I got stuck living in my car at some point because I just have,

I was making a job for myself, a job that didn't exist before, so I was kind of creating something. But even in those times, when it was harder, I never regretted it because I was waking up every morning by the beach, eating the best food I've had in my life. I mean, I eat better than Nobu. And it's... You're eating right there.

I eat better than Nobu. That should be your tagline. That's amazing. Taylor, pull up some of this, pull up the social accounts. I'm going to go. Some of this stuff I was looking on here out there with Oct. Some of these fish you catch are massive. They're bigger than you.

Yes, some of them. Some of them. What is the most dangerous situation you've encountered while you're spearfishing? Look at this thing. Was that swordfish? That's a mile. Holy shit. Wait, hold on.

Hold on. This is how, like, I thought it was like a little fish. No, no, no, no. We are not, listen, we are in the... That's my biggest one. We're in the big leagues here as spearfishing everyone. This is the size of you when I first met you when you were 12. Like, this is a 4-1 fish.

That fish is larger than me. So let me ask you this. So you go, you catch these things and you can make a living now. Do you sell them to restaurants or how do you? No, I don't sell my fish. So all of my fish, I use it and I share it. That fish, that Marlin, by example, I got it in Mexico. And I brought a lot of it back with me at home and Florida.

And I made a post on Instagram and I said, okay, who wants to get fish? I have fish for a lot of people. And something like about 80 people showed up. And I just distribute fished as many people as I can. So I don't believe in selling it. Okay. But that's what I eat. So what's the reason behind not something?

I don't want to say, do you use the word sustainable in fishing? Yes, it's like sustainable fishing? Of course. Spirit fishing is the most sustainable way to eat fish and seafood because you're on the water and you catch only the fish that you want to percent of sure you're going to eat for dinner. So we inform ourselves a lot on what's in reproduction season, what's endangered. How do you, you're really picky about what you're going to eat. And when you buy your fish at a grocery store, you don't know where it's from.

You don't know how it's been cash. know, the buycatch just came out of it. So it's a pretty, it's the best way to eat. So if, if you're like me and you can't go spearfishing, how would you make educated decisions when you're in a restaurant or in the marketplace? Well, you can just be friends with me. That's a good story. Okay. I'll come. I'll just send you fish. I'll just hear you fish. There's some organizations. One of them is the Marines through a ship council, and it's like a blue thick on the fish, and that shows you that has been caught in a sustainable way. So there's, But you need to know and you need to inform yourself and like don't be shy to ask at a grocery store.

Where is that? How is it caught and everything like that? You know what? This is interesting to bring up. I'm sure with social and some of the images that you have on here with spear fishing, I'm sure you've gotten some flak, right? People coming out, animal protecting people, being upset that you're spearfishing. But I think that this is one of the most responsible ways to eat, especially because like you said, you don't know how a lot of these other fish are caught or how animals are fed or, you know, I think that kind of human to nature. hunting connection where you're actually going out and, you know, responsibly searching for food and catching your own food and then responsibly cooking up with all of these things, I believe, are much more, I don't want to say like humane, but in a way, much more humane than a lot of the practices that we have as, you know, just a general person shopping in a superfood store.

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Well, the answer to that is I eat fish. But when I eat my fish, I risk my life. I take time and I go out and see to catch exactly what I want. And I know that that fish is being caught in the right way. And it's, I just don't know why people can't see that. because if you eat fish, there's no way you're against pivishing. It just doesn't make sense. Yeah, I mean, there's some horrendous stories you hear about, like, a lot of, you know,

like get down international waters, people throwing these massive nets and just scooping up dolphins and fish and whatever they're scooping up, throwing the nets back of the water. And like, that is not anywhere near as responsible is what you're doing. Yes. And if, you know, if we go even more in details of that, even people that go line fishing, what they do when it casts a fish, you're throwing a cooler and it slowly dies. Why did you decide to stop catching octopus? Can you tell our audience? Oh, yeah, because they were so smart.

It was like, I had like a weird connection when we look at each other in the eye, and I felt, I felt intelligent so much. And it's, it sounds like weird, like it's discriminating, I guess, the words of their species. But it's, I don't know, there was, I just spelled something that didn't make me want to eat that anymore. Octopus are one of the freakiest things on this planet. I mean, they're, they're like from another planet. Wait, I still have to know what the scale. scariest stuff you've seen underwater? Is it like a shark?

What? Yes, it was a shark. That was the time I was just most scared. There's two times that it was very scared. The first one, I was a shark. It was in, I mean, shark are part of the sport. It's part of his lifestyle. I mean, we hunt in the territory and they were there.

And they're very lazy. So if they know that you're catching fish, they want to be there and they want to grab your fish before eating. So I was in Tampa and we were in very shallow water and we were a little bit spread around, which you should not do normally, but the water was so shallow that I was a little bit cocky, and this baby tiger shark just comes towards me, and I had a fish clip to my gun, and he just charges me.

So I was poking it back with my gun, and I was trying to aim for, like, its eyes, the gills, or everything, they would try to hurt it enough, so he would leave. But he was very skinny, and he kept charging and charging, and charging. You wanted a fish that I had on me, but he was charging me so often that I didn't have time to take it off. So I was screaming to my friend to try to get somebody to come, and at some point you roll his eyes back, which is when a shark is ready to eat. And that's when I told myself, okay, that's it.

Oh, fuck. That's the end of it. And at that time, my friend arrived. So he's like, oh, why is screaming? Do you have a fish? I'm like, there's a giant freaking shark behind you. He's like, put you back against mine. Cover you have a cover mine.

And the shark, because we were two, we didn't really like that, so we finally left. Wait, how are you talking to your friend when you're underwater? We're on the surface. Surfacing up and done. Got it. I was looking down, but as soon as you're friends, so the Charlotte backed out a little bit because they don't like being outnumbered. Got it. This is the thing.

I don't think I can. Hold on. She said there's another scary time. I need to hear the other scary time. Well, the biggest danger in spearfishing is what we call shallow water blackout. So it's passing out. And it's why it's a team sport, I guess. You always chew when you dive.

And I was in the Bahamas, and I took a drop at 85 feet. And I just shot a fish, and I missed it. And I chased it. and I just realized, oh, I'm actually in very deep water, and I should probably come back up. And I came back up, and I felt that I was about to pass out. And if my body was not watching me, I would have died. So I was coming back up.

I could feel I was starting making weird movements because that's when your brain sort of shut down. And I just, I was spinning as fast as I can. And I was like, okay, if he's not watching me, I'm dead. So I'm just hoping that he does. And he was because he actually lost his brother a few years before to a shallow water blackout. So he was looking at me very well.

And you go back from more. And you go back for more. There's got to be, this is some crazy. She's relentless. I really like fish. Yeah. I mean, you got to really like fish. How can you scale a business in this and how have you been able to not only monetize,

but just become really successful at this career? I get a lot of gigs. It's very, very. So, yeah, I have a cookbook coming out this April. It's going to be in French first, but it's going to be in the U.S. after. I have sponsors. I have just, it's so many things. I get, I get, I do a lot of branded content for different brands.

I just recently filmed for Forbes and now this and different type of media platform. And with my sister, we have a recycled baiting suit line coming out this spring. Perfect. I just work in different projects, and I have pots and different. Of all the countries that you make sense, but whatever. You're doing a medley of things. It's not just one thing. No, exactly. I'm trying different things, so I have a lot of lines in the water. There you go. Of all the different countries you've spent time fishing, I guess fishing in, which ones do you think have the most sustainable practices or like laws? Which ones do you think are being the most responsible, which countries? Honestly, we're all bad. I'm not going to lie. It's like the United States is very good at protecting his water. It's we have the coast of,

of the United States is very fishy, it's very well maintained, and it's very protected. And everybody can go out there and catch their own dinner. It's very, very easy for that. There's a lot of illegal vessels in other countries when it comes to different species, and the U.S. is part of it. So is Canada, so is the EU, so is a lot of countries. But it's, there's a problem right now. It gets weird into a weird space with the oceans, right? Like, who controls what? It's to get these international waters, the laws are, like, not a lot of laws. exist out there.

Nobody's really painted. Taylor, what are you doing back there? I can hear you be clicking around. This guy's always clicking. You DM himing something back there? No, he's eating a Hichu and you can like hear it through. It's like your, look at this guy.

Look at it. He's creeping around. No, he is clicking through her Instagram. But I also hear, and I chat Hichu, ask your question. What is the long cable that's usually in the photos with you when you're deep sea diving? If you look on the screen here, there's a photo of her on her Instagram and it looks like it's some sort of, I'm not certain what that would be. So when you are fishing food.

bigger species, you have an elastic, or a rope, which is attached to the spear of your gun. So when you shoot a fish, you don't have to fight it underwater. You go back to the surface and then you fight the fish. Yeah, that makes sense. It's attached to a buoy at the surface. Okay. What advice would you give to someone that's listening that's absolutely miserable in their job that knows that they have a niche passion like you have?

Where would you tell them to start? You know, when you have a job, you have to try as many things as possible. And it's not easy. It's not an easy, Pat. It's not like you're going to wake up one day and you're going to quit everything and you're going to start being a millionaire. It's going to require a lot of work. But, again, if you work 40 hours a week and a job, if you spend that working on your job and your business and yourself, something is going to work out at some point.

And it's just about, yeah, it's about exploring as many avenues as you can. And it's, we're so lucky these days. We live in a generation where we're social media and things like. You can reach so many people. How have you utilized social media to sort of enhance your career? I try to be as authentic as what I believe in. And that's not been easy because, of course, I kill fish. So I get a lot of people that are not happy about that.

But it's, it's whatever. This is what I wanted to touch on. Like, what is the general consensus or the general messages that come in when people aren't unhappy? Like, what are they saying? Are they mad that just you're just at the general fact that you kill fish? Are they mad that you display the, like, what is the general? consensus about what they're upset about. I can understand like high level like maybe people just disagree with this practice, but I stopped posting photos of when I'm holding fish and there's

blood and things like that because it was distressing people. And yes, it's part of what I do. But there is right now a very thick curtain when it comes to food sourcing. And a lot of people still eat fish and still eat meat, but I don't want to know where it's fun. Well, that's the problem I have with it, right? That's a big problem. Well, it's like ignorance. Because people will complain about this. Yes. People will sit here and they'll complain and they'll say, I can't. can't believe she does this and then they'll go to sugarfish or they'll go to nobu or they'll go to Katsuya and they'll order massive sushi dinners and they'll eat and spend all this money but then they'll point fingers at people like you that are doing it maybe more responsibly and sustainably

or they'll wear leather or there's a fur listen or yeah or eat avocado because apparently that's bad now too listen there's a big there's kind of a big resurgence of people out there hunting for their food and killing their own food and butchering their own food sustainably and getting a lot of shit for it and then people being mad that they did that. It's like, listen, you're eating steaks and you're eating burgers and you're doing the same thing. I can understand people being mad about, you know, going down Africa and killing rhinos or hurting elephants or just hunting endangered species. That, but fuck those people. Like, I don't, I don't agree with that. But for what you do, there's a really big argument to me that this is a very, a much more responsible way to eat fish if you're

going to. Yes. And I had, last year, I had a pretty weird experience. So I was in New Caledonia and South Pacific and my friends took me hunting. So I was like, yeah, okay, why not? You know, I'll try it. I eat meat, so why not? So I go in the heels and everything and I shot a deer from pretty far. And I started crying, crying. I couldn't stop crying.

I was like, I can't believe I killed Bambi. This is so horrible and I felt so bad. And I just couldn't stand that whole thing. And so we got to get animals and I was like, I was so distressed. I was like, this is terrible. How did I do that? And then I carried it back because I was like, you know, like I killed it. I'm going to carry it back. And we went back to the camp and my friend just cut it. And when it looked like pieces of meat, I started getting hungry and all my guilt went away. So I was like, okay, this is actually very hypocrite of me. So now that it's living and it's looking cute on land, I don't feel bad. But a second it looks like a burger, I really want to eat it. But this is what I'm talking about. This people, the same thing happens, right? You people hear that story and they relate to Bambi and they're so sad and they're like, I can't believe this. But they'll go to a nice restaurant.

and they'll order a steak or they'll order a burger and their mouth will start watering like oh this is so good on my plate and it's hypocritical and it's I can understand like listen I'm almost like we're all hypocrites though like everyone but this is what I try to put but it's hard too because you know we all see the the meat farms and we all think it's disgusting we're all sharing those videos but then you go to whole food and you have the chicken at six bucks and you had a one at 35 and you know they yeah everybody wants to get the nice chicken that was running away and that was like running in grass and was having a good

but it's, you know, it's not everybody that has $35 to feed five kids at home. So we're being used to all of that. I went to see a sustainable tuna fishery in the Marshall Islands, and the kind of tuna is $3. So when you have another one at the 50 cents, it's really hard to convince people to change their habits. We're so used to that. No, I mean, I think these types of conversations are important

because it maybe gets people to question their own thoughts and beliefs around. I mean, when I first started looking into a lot of the stuff and what you do and what some hunters do. I was like, you know what, that makes a lot more sense. There's a connection to the food. You've had to work for it. There's a connection to the animal. You know where it came from.

Human beings have been hunters gatherers for a very, very long time. This is how we've evolved over time. It's not normal that you would just walk into some butcher shop or some grocery store and say like, okay, I'll take those eggs. I'll take that fish. I'll take that chicken. I'll take that beef. And not question.

And because you haven't seen the process of how it was butchered or caught or whatever, you don't question and you think it's responsible. but like you said you don't know where that came from you know exactly where you found your food where it came from what you had to do to work for it and there's i think it's the most responsible way to eat meat or fish if you're going to 100% and when i was living in london i never even crossed my mind at a grocery store to ask myself oh i'm wondering how that cut has been caught and if it was good if it i've never even think about it we're not it's kind of again there's a thick iron curtain food searching is what we eat and if that keeps going that's we're never going to solve anything

and so yeah we have to look at the dirty stuff we have to look at the gorse stuff because if you don't take the time to interest yourself to where you food is from that's what allows to be company to keep doing what they're doing they're happy that we're like oh no I want to see that I don't want to know all I want is my little stick in my packet they're happy for us to do what would you tell people like maybe the other side of the coin people that are hunting or fishing irresponsibly right and I don't know if you you can think of any examples, but people, like, let's say the vanity hunters that maybe go down to Africa trying to hunt rhino horns or people that are trying to get, like, a trophy. Do you...

It's... That is such, um, it's a very touchy subject because I, I personally do not understand why you would want to kill elephant or giraffe. Like, for me, you're freaking dumb ass. If you get trill out of that. Well, a lot of these, like, um, you know, there's some of these, like, rich Asian guys over there, they think if they drink rhino tea with the ground-up rhino horns that they're going to get um what's what's a nice way to say this with two women what's a nice way to say this two women think they're going to get a harder um harder dick yeah harder dick they think they think they think that it actually taylor don't try to do that the vitality and they you know so these guys go okay i need to get this rhino horn um tea it doesn't listen that's not proven at all it's this whole thing but people think like that and so i mean there's a lot of

reasons they do it i it's a market that's that's why but it's a gross market though but but the thin line with the Africa thing is that a lot of reserves depends on that money. So it costs, I don't know, something like $150,000 to kill a giraffe. It's a ridiculous amount of money. Oh, my God. And it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, they need the money, they need that. And they often, what they do is that they, they, they sell an, an older animal that needs to be

taking up the reserve because, I don't know, he's too protective of the females, so he's preventing, I don't know, like the population to breed. They explained it to me in that in South Africa, but that was a while ago. And it's, he was, he was telling me, it was like, sometimes we don't have the choice to sell those permits because we need the money. We need to get three new rhino in the reserve so the population can thrive. And if we need to get rid of one, well, we're going to sell it to an idiot that is getting excited by shooting one in the face. If I took 10 people, of fish from all different walks, some from the supermarket, some from sugarfish, some from Nobu, your own fish that you caught and I mixed it all up and lined it up and you tasted

it. Would you be able to tell the difference between each one or no? I don't know. You have to do that. That's an Instagram challenge. I'm challenging you to do that. I want to know if you can tell the difference just by taste. Well, that Nobu looks very good, so I probably know that's not mine. Okay. Don't fuck up Nobu for us. Okay. Can you tell my color sometimes? Um, often tuna, definitely. Or maybe another question is when fish that's been processed into the, not only say processed, that's not the right word, but brought into supermarkets, are there things that would be added or in that fish that would maybe not necessarily be in the fish that you

catch? Like you should always go for wild, right? Not farmed. Is that right? Or is that just propaganda? That depends. Okay. There's some farms that are very responsible and there's some farms that are horrible.

So, and the same thing about, there are some commercial fishing boat that are very respectful. And there's some fishing bowl that are too. terrible. It's all about sourcing everything smartly and responsibly. You just have to make sure that the farm is doing their job well. If you saw a beautiful fish that you've never seen before, just lustrous colors. Would you see it and go, I'm coming for you? No, I don't shoot anything that I don't know what it is and if I'm allowed to shoot it. It's really part of, if you want to be an ethical, spivishing person, you have to make sure that you know the area

when you go fishing, were you allowed to shoot, where you're not allowed to shoot. And it's, you have to inform yourself. But this is what I'm saying. You're just don't go around and shoot anything. This is what I'm saying. You're informed about this. You're not just some guy jumping in the water and shooting something or some guy going in the forest and shoot.

You actually are doing the research and looking into like what makes sense to hunt for. Yes, you have to. And if you have a doubt, you don't shoot. And if you want to get into spivishing, take a free life class. That's step one. Take a free life class. So if Taylor was dressed as a stingray and he was coming toward you, wouldn't shoot him.

No. Might have to shoot him. I didn't even shoot a shirt. I was trying to eat me. Thank you for doing the show. Thank you so much for coming on. Of course. Thank you for having me.

Very interesting. Hey guys, what's up? It's Lauren. I hope you enjoyed that episode. That was super interesting and off the cuff for us. I would love to know your favorite part of this episode. Could be the productivity tips. Could be something from Valentin on my latest Instagram.

And if you let us know on my latest Instagram, I will send you a TSC meal plan will drop into your DMs. We really appreciate your feedback and it helps us grow as a podcast. If this podcast has brought you any kind of value, please rate, subscribe and review the podcast on iTunes. It takes two seconds and it helps us grow as a community and a show. Hopefully we'll eventually be able to do a live tours. With that, we will see you on Tuesday. Thank you, thank you, thank you for listening as always.