The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - Dr. Josh Axe - Post Covid Health Protocols, Hormone Regulation, & Essential Supplements

Episode Date: June 19, 2024

#715: Today we're sitting down with Dr. Josh Axe. Dr. Josh Axe, DC, DNM, CNS, is a doctor of chiropractic, certified doctor of natural medicine, and clinical nutritionist with a passion to help people eat healthy and live a healthy lifestyle. He joins us today for a discussion on overall health, common health issues that most people are facing, and the link between cultural changes in the world and the physical health of the general public. To connect with Dr. Josh Axe click HERE To connect with Lauryn Bosstick click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE To Watch the Show click 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 Head to the HIM & HER Show ShopMy page HERE to find all of Michael and Lauryn’s favorite products mentioned on their latest episodes. This episode is brought to you by Branch Basics The Branch Basics Premium Starter Kit will provide you with everything you need to replace all of your toxic cleaning products in your home. It’s really a no-brainer. Go to branchbasics.com and use code SKINNY for 15% off their starter kit and free shipping. This episode is brought to you by AG1 If you want to take ownership of your health, it starts with AG1. Go to drinkAG1.com/SKINNY to get a free 1-year supply of Vitamin D3K2 AND 5 free AG1 Travel Packs with your first purchase.   This episode is brought to you by Squarespace From websites and online stores to marketing tools and analytics, Squarespace is the all-in-one platform to build a beautiful online presence and run your business. Go to squarespace.com/skinny for a free trial & use code SKINNY for 10% off your first purchase of a website domain. This episode is brought to you by Vegamour Give your hair the power of the little pink bottle. Visit vegamour.com/SKINNY and use code SKINNY at checkout to receive 20% off your first subscription order. This episode is brought to you by Pique Visit piquelife.com/skinny to get up to 15% off and a free cup and frother + free shipping for life. This episode is brought to you by Sunday Lawn Care Sunday is available at Target, Walmart, and Lowe’s stores nationwide. Use code SKINNY20 for 20% off your custom lawn plan on getsunday.com Produced by Dear Media.

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

Aha! Him and her. When somebody retires from work, if they don't find something else they're passionate about or something else to pour into once they retire, it decreases their lifespan. They die early. And so our entire like our physical health is very tied to purpose. It's very tied to identity. I think these things are in a category of really spirituality. And so one of the things that I really have focused on, I wrote a book on a lot of these topics called Think This, Not That, that really gets into here's how to create your best life possible, your best health

possible through the power of your mindset. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Skinny Confidential Him and Her Show. Today, we have a friend of the show, Dr. Josh Axe. It's been a minute since he's been on, but this is his second appearance on the show. For those of you that are not familiar with Dr. Josh Axe, Dr. Josh is a doctor of chiropractic, certified doctor of natural medicine, and clinical nutritionist with a passion to help people eat healthy and live a healthy lifestyle. He joins us today for a discussion on overall health, common health issues that most people are facing, and the link between cultural changes in the world and the physical health

of the general public. We talk about what functional medicine is, the biggest breakthroughs in functional health, how COVID and the vaccine are still impacting people's health, and so many other things. We also talk about a wild story that Dr. Josh has where he was actually almost paralyzed and couldn't walk for a long period of time with stem cells. This was a wild story that Dr. Josh has where he was actually almost paralyzed and couldn't walk for a long period of time with stem cells. This was a wild story, one of the craziest ones we've heard on the show. We love having Dr. Josh on the show. He is a wealth of information. With that, Dr. Josh Axe, welcome back to The Skinny Confidential, him and her show. This is The Skinny Confidential, him and her. We talked to you when? right before the pandemic in january 2020 it's

been a long time yeah it's been almost yeah four years a little more more four and a half almost yeah we need to get into your story i mean this is a wild crazy story was it an accident well so well so here's what happened well one i i almost died about a year and nine months ago and when i said people might say, but no, I was very, very close to death and almost being very close to being permanently disabled. And so what happened was I had injured my back weightlifting and I tried all kinds of things.

It got somewhat better, but not all the way. I just had this, I went and I was lifting and I bulged two discs in my back. Squatting or something? Back squatting? No, it was more crossfit and then doing heavy rows, actually really heavy with a cable. And then I ended up getting stem cell done in my back squatting or something back squatting i was more crossfit and then doing heavy rows actually really heavy with a cable and then i ended up getting stem cell done in my disc i took my own bone marrow concentrated and it helped tremendously i couldn't even believe how much it helped and then i thought well i'm going to get it done again these years later got it done

again this was about a year and about a year and nine months ago and then something just didn't feel right after i kept feeling worse and worse and worse. Finally, I had to wear a back brace. Finally, one morning I woke up and I couldn't walk. The pain was so excruciating. I mean, I'm talking about a 10 out of 10 pain. And we had to call an ambulance. We were living in Puerto Rico at the time, between Puerto Rico and Nashville.

Yeah, that's scary. And had to have an ambulance come pick me up, bring me and get an MRI. And I got the MRI report back and it said I had a spinal infection. And not only was it a minor infection, it was in the disc. It had gotten into my bone. It was throughout my entire L5 vertebra. And then there was an abscess that was in my spinal canal of an infection. And so I had to take a medical flight.

And if people don't know how serious that is, I mean, if you have an infection by your spinal cord, it is, again, it is deadly. And so I took a flight to Florida, met with an infectious disease specialist. And here's what he told me. He said, Josh, here's your prognosis. The very best case scenario, you're going to have chronic pain the rest of your life. And you'll be the first person that knows if bad weather's coming through. I mean, this is really going to, there's going to be permanent issues from this. And he said, in the worst case scenario is you could die and there's a good likelihood you're going to be permanently disabled. Now, I had just gone from a few months before throwing my two-year-old daughter seven feet in the air in the pool, squatting, deadlifting, cycling, running, into some of the best shape of my life, and to then think about a medical mistake to where I now could be permanently disabled, have rods put in my spine or partially paralyzed, whatever it is.

There were emotions I had never experienced before. I'm a very positive person. I know you guys are positive as well, but I felt despair and hopelessness. Like I just, I mean, it was crippling for two days. And then finally I sort of had this spiritual moment where I was like, you know what? This is not serving me. I have a God that's bigger than my diagnosis and I really need to do everything I can in my power to heal. And just because this doctor said, this doesn't have to be me. And I started thinking about, you know what, there are people all the time that are told they'll never walk again. They'll be permanently paralyzed and

they start walking. And so I said, I'm just going to do everything in my ability. The doctor recommended I get on antibiotics. What they typically recommend is six weeks of IV antibiotics and then six weeks of oral. So three months straight of antibiotics for how severe it was. And so I also at the same time said, I want to minimize my harm, but maximize my healing. And I read this great study on hyperbaric chambers. And if you get in a hyperbaric chamber, there was a study done on people with a spinal infection

and it decreased their time to having to only do it for four weeks. So I did for, and I hadn't taken a medication maybe once when I had a procedure, but I hadn't taken a medication since high school. And then I was 40. So I got on the antibiotic IV. Okay. Cause I'm not stupid.

Again, there's a place for, for medicine, of course. So I got on that, but then I got in a hyperbaric chamber for five days a week for 40 days. And it was a hard chamber, a really strong one, two hours. So two hours a day, I got IVs for a couple hours a day of Jensen blue of blue and I'm sorry, methylene blue and colloidal or it's the Jensen silver and some, some nutrients. I only ate meat and vegetables pretty much in berries and did everything I could prayer, visualize visualizing. I read this great, uh, it wasn't a study, but it was a researcher. And he said, you can maximize the placebo effect. They said, you want to visualize exactly what you want.

So the healing of your thyroid or the healing of your spinal infection, and then what you're going to be doing after. So I pictured myself throwing my two-year-old in the air. I pictured myself back fully working out. And then he said, you want to tie emotions to it and feel the future emotion right now. And so he said, you want to pick, you want to tie emotions to it and feel the future emotion right now. And so he said, when you're throwing your daughter up in the air, be filled with joy, be excited, feel that smile, smile that same way right now. Is that Joe Dispenza? I don't remember. It might've been Dispenza. I don't remember. And then they said, the other thing is, is that you need to have a very specific plan in place. Because the reality is sometimes your nervous system doesn't believe you. It's like toxic positivity. You're telling yourself, you know, what was that?

I'm trying to remember that old SNL skill. Like I'm good enough. I'm smart enough. And gosh, people like me anyways. So, but, but you're, you're neat. Your nervous system needs to believe you. And so I really laid out very specifically here is how I'm going to heal. Here's the exact perfect plan to heal. And I started following the plan. And after two weeks, I started feeling what at the first two weeks, I felt nothing. And then finally one day I felt 1% better. And then the next week, 1%, the next week, 1%. Well, it took a long time to heal because you have almost no blood supply in your discs, in your bones, in the spine. And so I didn't walk for 10 months.

Wow. Oh my God. So this time last year that we're talking right now, I was just getting on a walker. So is your wife helping you through all this? Yeah. So I had my father-in-law, who was the most amazing servant man ever, who really just took care of me. And I couldn't sit in a wheelchair because the pain was as bad sitting. So the only thing I could do was lay in bed. And then a couple months i was able to finally start crawling and getting into a pool we had a pool so i started crawling out there and getting in there holy shit that is so scary when you look back on that what do you do you just feel gratitude now do you feel like like what do you feel like you learned from this experience because this is a big experience. Well, one, I know God uses all

things for good. And so I think if you allow God to work through you and you have that sort of mindset mentality, I think he will use it for good. And I was aware of this because my mom, like when I was a kid, what allowed me or wanted me, the reason why I wanted to become a doctor in the first place was my mom got breast cancer when she was 40. And I remember the conventional medical treatments. I used to remember this day, my mom taking a comb through her hair and all her hair coming out in chunks. I remember going in another room and I remember just sobbing. And I remember thinking a few things at the time, God, why does my mom have cancer? I remember thinking, I want to help people like my mom. So I want to be a doctor in the future. I remember thinking, I want to help people like my mom. So I want to be a doctor in the future. I remember thinking there's got to be a better way to help someone get healthy. But then

to see my mom finally, the second time, and she was diagnosed with cancer for the second time, she got cancer again. I helped her heal all naturally. But now to look like my mom is so grateful. My mom helps other women with breast cancer create green smoothies and juice vegetables. She helps them now. And if you would ask her, she'd say, I'm glad I got that because I am now like I've learned a number of my days. I'm so, so grateful for life. And so I think it's a very similar thing that I am more grateful now. I've been able to prioritize better realizing that my faith and my family spending time like now, I mean, I'm just cherishing every moment with my four-year-old and five-month old and so yes i'm i'm absolutely i'm i'm absolutely so grateful i'm closer to god i prayed through this as well i said god i had this limiting belief when i was going through this and

here's what it was i thought well i can heal but i can probably only get it back about 70 80 of where i am and i really felt like in talking to god it was was, no, I'm going to get back to a hundred percent. Yeah. Right now I'm about 80, 85. I'm already better than that doctor told me I'd be. I mean, I'm lifting weights again. I'm carrying my two-year-old around. I'm traveling all over.

I mean, so, so I'm. It's funny when I saw you, I was like, oh, you look in shape. Yeah. I'll be a hundred percent by, by the end of this year. So, and, and, but I grew spiritually and mentally more through that than anything else I've ever gone through in my life. And so, yes, I can look back with that opportunity and be really grateful. It was a life-altering experience. There's this saying that I love, everything's happening for you. I feel like you're going to

use all this and there's another chapter that you haven't even seen yet. Agreed. Well, imagine too now in your life after going through something like that, many of the other day-to-day issues that we go through that maybe would stress you out in the past probably don't stress you out at all. Absolutely. So many things just seem petty now and not important. I mean, listen, you don't wish ill fortune on anyone, but to some degree you kind of do

because it gives people the tools to realize they can do and get through really hard things. Does that make sense? Yeah, and because of it, I took a year. I wrote that book, Think This, Not That during that time. And it's the best book I've ever written. I also spent a lot of time studying longevity and regenerative medicine.

I mean, the amount that I know now, just for myself, my own knowledge, but, and well I'm helping others to be like, whether it's my podcast or something else, but I know so much more now about regenerative medicine and longevity because I read thousands of medical journals. I studied it for myself. Cause when you're trying to heal a family member or yourself, I spent thousands of hours researching, how do I extend my lab? How do I promote cellular regeneration? I mean, it's, you know, yeah. I had one other question as a follow-up to what you went through. A lot of people have been interested in stem cell research. So what is your perspective on that now?

Because this is obviously a terrifying story. I've had stem cell again since then. Okay. So what do you think happened in that instance? Well, I think when I had this injection, one, let me say this too, the doctor reached out to me not long ago and he said, I'm probably the last person you want to hear from. And I told him, I said, listen, I just, it was a text message, but I said, listen, I love you.

All's forgiven. And listen, I'm sorry I didn't reach out sooner because I know you've probably felt guilty about it. And so for me, my mentality is just, you know, forgive, move on, bless. But I think that there was, listen, they cleaned me off Well, I think it was when I read online. It was like a one in a million chance I mean it can happen even when somebody totally cleans the needle if they get a knee replacement or shoulder has this

It can just happen. And so so the needle wasn't fully cleaned Is that no, I think it was clean. It's hard to know how how the bacteria got in the disc I mean, we just don this is like a weird question, but could the person who given you the needle have just gone to the bathroom? Or like, is that because it's airborne? They were there with me and he had not. I mean, they had scrubbed me down four times.

Now, let me say again, I've had it done since then and it really helped my healing. I mean, there's a doctor, I love his name, he's Dr. Rafael Gonzalez. He has a clinic in, I think it's the best in the world, called ReHealth, where they do stem cell and exosome and NK cells. And I've referred some other people, and it's just been miraculous for them for issues. But yeah, I wouldn't have had stem cell again. And now this time it was from umbilical cord, and they were cultured and so i think these stem cells are even stronger but no i mean listen i just it was i think one of those one in a million

chances since the last time we talked to you what is the most prominent thing that you're seeing with people's health since that time well well i'll tell you when i first opened up my functional medicine practice in nashville you know, the conditions that were really prominently growing were cancer, heart disease, diabetes, hypothyroidism, autoimmune disease. The past 10 years, it's been mental health issues. I mean, loneliness, identity issues, depression, anxiety. I mean, those have continued to just go through the roof. Have you seen more of the other things too? Because I've talked to a lot of doctors, like I'm, I'll just call it out right now since the vaccine came out, that there's a surge of all different other things too. And this is being logical. I'm just telling you what I've heard behind the scenes. Yeah. So, so if we're talking about the root cause, and I talk a lot about Western medicine, also Eastern medicine, from an Eastern medicine perspective, what that virus did to the body was really affect the blood, which then affected the neurological system.

This is why people are losing their taste and their sense of smell. This is why a lot of people are getting, you know, we're having a lot of those long COVID symptoms that were somewhat neurological. And so what it does is it makes your blood sticky, essentially. So your blood clots together too much. This is also why it's linked to myocarditis so if you have the red blood cells start to clot and stick together it affects your heart and can increase your risk of some of those heart issues and i think for a lot of people anytime you expose the body to something new it needs time to adapt

and be able to take it on and so i think this is a completely new virus whether it was created in a lab in wuhan or not either way it's a new virus that the body hadn't been able to deal with yet. So people had a lot more severe symptoms and it impacted them in a bigger way. And it's still impacting people. I think people are getting more sick now. The symptoms are more severe now than let's say 10 years ago or 30 years ago when we were kids. I mean, the symptoms are definitely more severe, but I do think that it's a blood issue. And so if you have a blood issue where your blood's sticking together, that can cause fatigue, can cause more heart issues. It's going to increase your risk of almost every health problem. I think people are still having

a lot of issues because of it. With general health and wellbeing, like say it is a blood issue, what are things people can do to have, I guess is not a medical term not so sticky blood yeah yeah so there's a lot of things and so um just putting my medical hat on there everybody yeah so so to help with the clotting in in in in that way in the and and what we talked about there quercetin is great bromelain a lot of proteolytic enzymes natokinase there's some amazing studies out of Japan and Asia out of that specifically. I just got that. Helping with long COVID symptoms.

In fact, I would put natokinase at the very top. Yeah, quercetin, bromelain, turmeric in general, things like beetroot juice, things that help build the blood and move the blood are also gonna help the lingo. Can we talk about natokinis a little bit more. I recently got, I was trying to explain this to Lauren. I've heard though, that you might want to consult a doctor because it could create blood thinning in some cases. Is that true or not? Well, there's a

lot of natural blood thinners. And so there's no doubt that things that thin your blood, if you're on Coumadin or Warfarin or a blood thinner that, that you want to be conscious of that work with your physician on that. Now, on the other side of this, it's like if you're working with a good functional medicine doctor who knows what they're doing, what they're going to try and do is have you take things like natokinase and garlic and fish oil and certain types of NK to thin your blood to reduce the medication you're on and not try and keep you on this drug that is very harmful with major side effects long term. So it's, but yes, yeah, absolutely. You know, natakinus is amazing. I mean, it's a compound you get from natto, so fermented soy, and the benefits are really tremendous for strengthening

your blood, but also boosting your immune system. I mean, there are studies on it for fighting cancer, studies on it for strengthening lung health and immune health. And so it's really an amazing, amazing supplement. It's used a lot more in Asia than America, but amazing. Yeah. I've heard it's also incredible for the heart. Yes, exactly. And then so that blood heart connection. Interesting. If you could wave a wand and have everyone have one supplement, like say there's one supplement on the earth, which supplement are you picking?

Well, I mean, statistically vitamin D is going to be number one. And the reason is, is if you look at the amount of people that are deficient in vitamin D today, it's 94%. Wow. I mean, that's shocking. I mean, that's a crazy number. And then, and by the way, there are multiple studies and every time they come back, it's 92, 94, 96. I mean, so it's incredibly high. Vitamin D is really important because it's a pro-hormone that's responsible for our immune system, for balancing all of our hormones. In fact, if you look at, this is another thing we could talk about.

I mean, the testosterone in men today has plummeted. What the fuck is going on with that? I'm talking to so many of my friends. Go off on that. In the last 50 to 60 years, the average male testosterone has dropped by 33%. Why? Which essentially, so let me get into that, but let me also say, so this is what this means though. The average man in their 20s, if we'd go back in 60 years ago, a man in their 60s had the

same testosterone levels. So I mean, it's dropped that dramatically. And I think it really is a combination of things. I think one, there are a lot of estrogen producing chemicals that we expose ourselves to everything, of course, microplastics, forever chemicals, like a phosphate. I mean, all those things together are just adding up. So that's one thing. The second thing in is men are just too comfortable in doing weak things. It used to be where men were spending a lot more times outside doing farming, doing industrial work, doing actual physical labor. That's going to help boost testosterone. So you're saying men are being pussies. That's not my language, but generally men have become very weak. And I think this is physically, and I also think it's

mentally. I think cultural today, and this is more, this is more of a, let me, let me call it an, an Eastern view and Chinese medicine would say this as well. Culture went from being very much masculine and praising masculinity to today, really praising femininity and feminine qualities in men. And we've really done men a real injustice by doing that. And let me give you there you there there's a study and this is really interesting they did a study on testosterone levels in men and looking at the psychology behind testosterone and they had men go and do a rowing contest and now they couldn't see each other okay and so they put men in a room and they had three groups of people groups that they told the men now again some of them actually had did a great job rowing, but they said, okay, afterwards they said, okay, you lost. They had another group of men that said, you won. Then they had another group of men that whether

they won or lost, they actually found that these men believed that they were winners. That was part of their identity and their self-confidence. They found that the men who believed that they lost had about a five to 7% lower testosterone rate. The men that won had about a 7%. And then the men that had believed just in turn, they're winners. It's about a 15% increase. And the reason I think this is so important is culture today tells men that you're bad if you're masculine. And even a lot of women today, I think part of this is a feminist movement. Again, some people may not like some of what I have to say here, but I think that men need to feel like they're strong and they're powerful and respected in order to be healthy. And so if men don't feel that way, if they don't have a spouse or a partner, people in their life

saying, you're great. Like my wife is so amazing. My my wife is like i'm so proud of you i love you great job go get them tiger sort of things and but there are a lot of women who are very destructive and critical and breaking down now now the other there's another side of this too in chinese medicine that for a woman to be expressing the proper amounts of progesterone and estrogen, they need to feel pursued, protected, provided for, and beautiful. And that actually helps balance those hormones out. But I think that that's a whole nother... Anyway, so I mean, a lot of times we don't think about these mind-body connection issues, but they are a huge deal. And I think an even bigger deal today, because you add things one on top of another, like all three of those things, the chemicals, the poor diet, the not doing hard things, the psychology of it, I think they're all adding up. I am one of the converted that has completely

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Who the fuck's putting a disclaimer on it? No, I'm just saying like the fact that you even have to like worry and like, like it's like laser tag that you can't say men should be strong. It's so fucking wild to me. It feels like I'm in the twilight because there's a large group of women that get offended with the idea that there could be a difference between men and women's energy, right? And men too, right? And those, I would say some of those people are the ones responsible for men being such bitches, right? Because they, the guy gets beat down. He doesn't want to hear about it anymore. And he

goes, okay, whatever. And then he has to take accountability too. Sure. But both, but here's the thing. You can have equality and you can sit in your masculine and feminine power and recognize that men are biologically different than women. Not a controversial statement, in fact. And people can sit in each of their feminine and masculine i work with a ton of women right there's there's no reason that i have to walk around the office and act feminine i could still be a man and still work with women and still respect them and vice versa and i think that this idea that men have to kind of maybe not act as their masculine selves or women have to be more masculine themselves or That's strange. That's not how we've evolved.

Well, you know, I think there are some people that maybe haven't quite thought of this. I was thinking about this the other day, but I, you know, what, and again, I think this is a, for this way, it sounds somewhat spiritual, but I think it's a force of evil that culture in general, when you have an evil culture,

they try and make men more like women and women more like men. They try and make people the same. And I think we were uniquely designed by God and all of us are very unique individuals. And I think the reality is there's a lot of unhappy people today because they're trying to be something they're not. If you, you will be the happiest when you do what God designed you to do, when you're using your unique gifts and talents that no one else has in the world. And if you're a man being a man, if woman being a woman, and if not, you're going to be unhappy and you're going to be miserable. If you're trying to, it's an example

of this. If you have somebody who is, Shaquille O'Neal is built to play basketball, Michael Phelps, who I had the opportunity to speak with some, I mean, he, he's built to swim. I mean, if you ever see his body, he is built to swim. And so if he, if he would, and I think again, that brings happiness to people. So, you know, and so again, and I think it's just, and people also become more physically unhealthy when they try and be something they're not. I had a friend call me the other day who got his testosterone levels checked and they were dangerously low. Right. Yeah. And I'm not a doctor. You gave great advice though. But what I just want to share the advice and I want to see if you agree with it. So I said,

the first thing I told him is that he needed to, this is going to sound strange. I was like, you need to go through all of your cleaning supplies and get all the bullshit out. That's all this chemical

and all the fragrance, all I need to get it out. I said, stop wearing deodorant, stop wearing cologne, all this stuff, number one. I said, you need to get into the gym and you need to be doing low repetition, heavy, massive weights with a trainer that pushes you past your comfort zone with somebody helping you

spot and doing that low repetitions, heavy weights. So you need to get outside, take your shirt off, let the sun hit your body, run around. I thought you were going to say you got to get outside, whip your dick out and get sucked. I did say that I thought that he could do some more zinc supplementation some podosha and tonga dolly for like at least two months on and off side because i said before because the doctor was saying hey you need to get immediately on to trt and i said you should do a lot of these things first also i said you got to get rid of like mint and peppermint experiment although he likes mint teas and stuff like that so you get rid of all that shit i mean i don't

know what else to do but it's like kind of starting with that mixed with better sleep and all that. You hit on what 90% of doctors don't hit on. And so again, 90% of people to get better advice from you than from getting advice from most doctors. And so I think that's, I mean, you hit on a lot of really good things. I mean, let me just mention this about TRT therapy.

The fact that there are men today in their 20s and 30s, especially, getting TRT therapy. When you look at the studies, by the way, I've looked at not just one study. There are a lot of studies on this. And it's a contraceptive for men. I don't think people realize that. But if men take testosterone exogenously via an injection like that, this is why your testes shrink. You stop producing sperm and testosterone on your own in that area.

And so your testosterone, your ability to have kids right then is going to go down to almost nothing. Now, some studies show after, let's say you're on it for two years. After about two years, then you might get back to close to where you were. But there's some studies showing,

some, that you're not going to get back to where you were. And if you take it too long, you'll never be able to, or for 10 years, you may never be able to have kids again. And so can you imagine you're a 20-year-old, you go into your doctor and they say, take this testosterone. You don't think about it. You get to be 30 years old. You want to go and have kids. I actually can't imagine something similar, which we can also get into. That's what they do to women with birth control.'s talk about the birth control there's a lot of parallels

before we jump to that though i think it's important to articulate this because a lot of young guys are not being told that they're being told hey your testosterone's low yeah get on trt without the oh you might not be able to procreate later on if you do this that's very dangerous it it's it's dangerous it's unethical it's breaking the hippocratic oath of first do no harm without the, oh, you might not be able to procreate later on if you do this. That's very dangerous. It's dangerous. It's unethical. It's breaking the Hippocratic oath of first do no harm. And here's the other thing. Why not just do what you just shared? And let me hit on my top ones, which is always going to repeat a lot of exactly what you said, but it is getting rid of all the microplastics, the deodorants, the chemicals, all of that stuff that increases estrogen. It's getting outside with your shirt off for vitamin D. It's heavy weightlifting with large muscle groups. It's vitamin D and zinc are the two most important.

The herbs are probably going to be fenugreek and ginseng. And there are studies showing, I mean, vitamin D and zinc supplementation help dramatically. Also, once a week to do a good amount of sprint work. Perfect. Hill sprints and stuff like that. Can I share one more interesting study that was awesome on testosterone? They showed that men that go out and chop wood have higher testosterone, produce more testosterone than men that are playing sports like soccer and basketball and other things that help increase it somewhat. And I think there's something physical. I mean, listen, chopping wood is a full body exercise, but also I think there's something

psychological there. Like I remember when my dad brought me on the yard and taught me how to chop wood, which is appropriate because our last name is Axe, but he showed me how to do it. And I probably never felt more like a man when I was a kid than I was chopping wood with my dad. If I woke up tomorrow morning and I opened the blinds like I do every morning and I looked down and you were chopping wood, I would be so turned on. With his shirt off, sweating. I honestly, I can't believe I've never had you do that.

That is such a fantasy for me. If you were chopping wood outside, I would be like, oh my God, get up here. Listen, for the guys out there that are worried about their testosterone and your girl's not letting you, get out there, shoot some guns, chop some wood, ride a motorcycle, do the shit that you're not supposed to do.

That's right. Do the stuff society tells you is not. If I was in that situation right now, I would grow a long ass beard and mustache. I'd be out there slamming that wood, shooting guns, doing all this shit. I'm fine with that. You can't because listen, it is a health issue, right? It is. You don't want to get in a position where you have this at a young age

because it's going to only get worse. Well, it's a big marker of longevity and mortality. So if a man has low testosterone, it takes years off his life versus if it stays high longer, it adds years to your life. So it goes beyond vanity or even having kids. It goes to just, yeah, your general health. So let's talk also about the reverse,

which is birth control with women, because that's been a topic that's come up on this show a lot. And again, I think it's a sensitive issue because it taps into reproductive rights, but just let's talk, let's focus in on specifically what you've seen the medicine do to people and maybe some of the things they should be aware of if they're deciding to use a birth control. Well, one, what I'm going to share is probably going to surprise some people, but this is all based on clinical literature. One of the studies was a very large scale study from the British Medical Journal. But to starters, the biggest thing I think that upsets me is that doctors are just prescribing this stuff like it's candy. And, you know, there's a lot of

young girls going in high school and whether they need a contraceptive or not, they are deciding to get on it for acne or just so they don't get their period for comfort. So doctors are saying, well, just get on it because just to be more comfortable in life. And so I think just the way it's prescribed today is unethical. But also, people think when they read the label of a medication and they see the side effects, those are the only potential side effects. The reality is no medication puts on their label the nutritional deficiencies that the medications cause. Birth control pills, and this has been scientifically proven with multiple studies, deplete your body of vitamin B2, B6, folate, B12, zinc, magnesium, selenium, vitamin C, probiotics. Wow. All of those.

And there was a study done in the British Medical Journal that found that if you take birth control for 10 years or just long-term, it increases your risk of hypothyroidism by 283.7%. And guess what I have? And guess when I got prescribed birth control? 16 years old. Do you know how many women... So my biggest entire surprise of all of... When I first opened up practice,

my mid and late 20s, I think 26, started seeing patients for the first time. And I could not believe how many women were coming in with hypothyroidism. I mean, it was like every woman in their 30s and 40s had hypothyroidism. And now you look at the studies, it's like, again, they get put on, women get put on birth control when they're 16, 17, 18, early 20s, and then start trying to have kids five, 10 years later. I think there's a really direct cause to... And then now I think there's a really direct cause to... And then now I think there's a slight elevation in infertility, but the bigger issue is hypothyroidism.

Can I ask you a question on hypothyroidism? Yeah. Take birth control out of it. When would you typically see hypothyroidism show itself in a patient that's not on birth control? Why does that end up happening to someone without birth control? And at what age does it typically present? So let me hit on the Eastern and then the Western perspective. So one, it should never happen. But two, hypothyroidism in Chinese medicine is known as a qi and yang deficiency. Now what qi is, if we now translate that into Western medicine, is basically your adrenal energy, your body's battery. So if your body starts producing, if your body gets in a high stress state and produces too

much cortisol and stress hormones, over time, imagine your body like a battery on your phone, it starts to get lower and lower and lower. When that battery gets too low, that's part of what supplies energy to everything else in your body. So if that battery gets too low, your body is smart. It says to itself, I don't have enough supply here to create a new human being. And so that's one of the biggest limiting factors. And so, so, and so, so she and Chinese medicine is really connected to those adren about anabolic steroids, it's your body's ability to regenerate and grow and heal more quickly. And so women that have hypothyroidism have low chi and low yang. Now there are a lot of herbal prescriptions for this. In fact, ashwagandha is known as a chi and yang booster, cordyceps, rhodiola rosea, ginseng for men, dong quai for women. Those are some of those sort of

quintessential herbs that have been used throughout history. The amount of women that have hypothyroidism and don't realize it is like 60%. So there are millions of women who have hypothyroidism and they don't realize they have it. So if you had a client that had hypothyroidism, would you first tell them to take all those herbs or would you immediately prescribe a synthetic? What's a pig? What's a pig? What? Well, it's pig thyroid tissue. And so it's T3 and T4. It's called Armor. Yes. And there are a few other brands there too. So here's what I would do and recommend. I would recommend, and by the way, I don't have a license to prescribe drugs. So I only prescribe, recommend herbs and vitamins and all those things. Let me tell you exactly what I would do if somebody has hypothyroid.

I would first address, we need to address cortisol, okay? And there are lifestyle factors there. So we got to get that battery back charged up. Acupuncture is great for that. Doing things that just are not busy, that where you're not trying to get ahead. Reading a novel,

lunch with a best friend, walking in nature, again, just having real downtime to recharge your batteries, that is essential, and then good sleep. I'd get an Oura Ring or whatever sort of tracker. I would try and get a sleep score in the 80s and 90s as often as possible. I would then go and take certain vitamins.

So I mentioned this before. Most women with hypothyroidism, many of them have methylation issues, which basically means that they're not converting the B vitamins in their body to the factors that then your cells and organs use. So they're not converting those properly. Would you take like a methylated B vitamin?

Exactly. I would take a methylated B vitamin supplement, probably a higher dose than most people think though. I'd probably do two. I would do it twice a day. The normal, it's hard for me to say it because I need to know the brand, but my point is I would probably do serving twice a day. Assuming that, yeah. And this is just broadly, it's not obviously each person's individual. Yeah. Again, I would really look at selenium. I'd consider vitamin D as well. And so I would really make sure I cover those nutritional bases from a dietary standpoint. Now, this is big. This is where a lot of women mess up

with hypothyroid. Your body is cold with hypothyroidism. You have a yang deficiency. You need to consume foods that are anabolic and warming. And so that's going to be red meat, lots of cooked red meat. It's wild salmon. It's chicken too, but it's those foods that are anabolic. It's gonna be, you don't wanna do salads. You don't wanna do vegetable juices. You don't wanna do ice cold smoothies. You wanna do things that are warming, soups and stews and those sorts of foods.

You wanna be doing sweet potato and rice as those sort of carbohydrates. You wanna be doing fenugreek and cinnamon. Is cold plunge bad? If they're gonna cold plunge once a week, a short time, but ideally it's either zero days a week orunge once a week, a short time, but ideally it's the max, it's either zero days a week or one day a week for three minutes. And that's it. I would much prefer them do infrared sauna and a lot of infrared sauna because we want to,

but part of the thing about this, the body temperatures in let's call it 97 something when the body temperature is low, that's a, that's the biggest sign. One of the biggest signs of hypothyroidism, we really need to warm the body internally. And so those infrared light panels are great because it starts to drive heat deeper into your tissues. And that's more of what you want to try and do for that. And that's funny, doing this podcast and speaking on this subject before, there have been many women that have written in with this issue. And we know some as well.

I'm not trying to put a blanket statement on statement, but I think there's maybe a light bulb moment here where a lot of the people that we've talked to have a diet that you described, which is a lot of cold foods, a lot of salads, a lot of smoothies, a lot of very little red meat. And when we moved to Texas, Lauren kind of, that's how you used to eat in LA.

Now you switch, you're eating a bunch of red meat. And I think like a lot of the issue is resolved, but you've switched up a lot of the diet that you used to. Oh, I eat so much red meat. But it's interesting that you mentioned that because I've never heard anyone say that. I eat red meat every single day. Perfect. I mean, I'm a big believer in a personalized diet. Everyone is unique. I mean, some people can do what, you know, here's what happens with most physicians. They adopt and they're like, you know, you have a physician and they're like, everyone should do paleo or everyone should do keto or everyone should be vegan. And when you go back

and study these ancient forms of medicine, no, everything is personalized. Nobody should be eating the exact same diet hardly. Now, maybe people with hypothyroidism, most of them, there's a lot of overlapping foods, but people need to eat foods that are right for them. I learned this in practice. If I had somebody come in with inflammatory bowel disease, like IBSD, IBS with diarrhea, if I would have them eat raw vegetables, it would wreck their system. So I would never do that.

I'd have them eat a lot of soups. However, if I have someone coming with cancer, most types of cancer, I'm going to have them do some raw, some raw veggie juices, maybe some salads, some things like that, because we really are focusing more on healing the liver and the lymphatics and some of those areas that may tolerate raw foods. Whereas the gut and GI, if you got inflammatory bowel disease, that would wreck you. So it's not

that I don't think that salads and veggie juices and those things can be healthy, but for some people that are going to be poisoned for some people, they're going to be poison. For some people, they're going to be liquid gold. It just depends. If someone's got hyperthyroidism and they're cold, you don't want to lean in that direction. You want to go in a hot direction. Exactly. Exactly. What about barrel sauna? I think barrel sauna can be great. Both of them are great. Both types of sauna are great. I like barrel sauna if you want to sweat more, get more movement, detoxify the liver, the lymph, I think it's probably better for those things.

But I think for someone with hypothyroid and somebody where you're trying to get heat deeper in the system, because that's part of what red light does, it's going to penetrate deeper and warm the body more internally than a barrel sauna. For that, I like infrared better. They're both great you're gonna get benefits from both but if i'm kind of half and forced to pick which is better for hypothyroid i'm i'm i'm gonna pick the infrared okay so i need i have an infrared but i always go towards the barrel so i listen i prefer barrel i mean i mean like if i'm you know yes i mean you're sweating so much more there's this great experience. I have heard from multiple people off air and on air that Ozempic will soon be like a Botox, meaning people will be talking about it like they're going to get Botox. And I actually heard

from someone who's from Korea that in Korea, they go to a drug store like a Rite Aid and they just get Ozempic like it's not a big deal. Do you believe we're headed that way? What do you believe are the pros and the cons of that? Do I believe we're headed that way? Yes. Do I wish deeply that it wasn't headed that way? Yes. So here's the biggest thing that people need to know about Ozempic and Wegovy and these medications. They cause your body to lose muscle mass. So if you are on a, let's say you're on a, you know, losing weight via any other way, let's say it's exercise or eating healthy or just, let's say just calorie restriction, the amount of muscle mass you'll tend to lose is maybe 20, maybe even 25%, okay? When you're doing Ozempic, you're going to lose 40%.

Wow. So you could be losing almost double the amount of muscle mass taking these medications. I mean, losing double the muscle mass, what that does and hurts your longevity. Here's the other thing. Ozempic and Wolgovy cause something called gastroparesis.

And you can just look that up. That's the main thing it does. So what it does is it slows how quickly these foods pass through your GI, through your digestive tract. And what that also is tied to is nutrient malabsorption. So you'll start to see people, watch this. You'll start to see people that are this, you'll start to see people that are on those medications like Ozempic and Gove. You'll start to see, look this up,

it's called Ozempic face or hashtag Ozempic face. You'll start to see a sunken in look. That's the look of malnutrition. It's not from just a fast weight loss. No, no, it's from malnutrition. But in addition, you'll see more sagginess too, because they're losing more muscle. They're losing way more muscle than they should be. And so people just have to understand there are so many ways to do this better. It's like, I know it's a little harder to,

you know, eat protein, I guess it's harder. Yeah, than taking a pill it is, you know, changing your diet and exercising and doing all these other things. But if somebody just started walking a little bit more Trying to just really focus on upping their protein intake and maybe took a supplement like I don't know baby or berberine That alone would get the same results. We're brewing burbans a supplement. Yeah, but what is it? So berberine is a compound from the bayberry leaf that is probably the number one thing you could take for balancing blood sugar levels and helping insulin. So it's almost like a,

imagine a natural metformin. Now it's not exactly because I think metformin is extracted from lilacs. Well, it was the idea and then it was, now it's made synthetically. But I think that basically if you want to take something that's amazing for balancing blood sugar, like for diabetics, there's nothing better than berberine. And what's the brand you like? I can't even think of a brand. Thorne does a berberine, yeah. Yeah, there are several great brands out there.

And if somebody really wants to balance their blood sugar, they should do berberine, Cylon, cinnamon, and fenugreek. Those are probably the three strongest. And so one other supplement, chromium picolinate. You have to write those down for us because you said saline. It's a type of cinnamon because you also have cassia that people buy sometimes,

but it's silent cinnamon. Is it a supplement? No. You could use these in food. What we'll do for this episode, Carson, we'll make a note for the team to do some show notes and kind of write out

all the supplements. We'll pull the transcripts. Yeah, and I can share that. I can text or message you guys later. Yeah, because you're like, take Vazavuzaga. And I'm like, okay, I want to take it, but what's the brand Dr. Josh Axe likes? I need the details of it. Yeah, for those that don't know, I think- We'll do a blog post.

Many do know. We have a resource, tscpodcast.com, where we go and write down and highlight all the episodes. We'll put the notes there. But anyway, on this subject, we went to a dinner with a really interesting group of people recently, a lot of people in the longevity space. And one of the questions, it was like a Jeffersonian style dinner. And one of the questions was, if there was an algorithm that existed, that if you took it, you would have perfect health, perfect mental well-being, all of these, perfect sleep, perfect, you wouldn't be depressed, you wouldn't be anxious, all that. But you had to follow it specifically. If it told you to stop eating at

11, you had to stop. If it said you had to go to bed at three o'clock in the afternoon, you had to do it. You had no personal will. And went around the table and said, would you follow that or not? Most people said no, and they justify all these reasons about they want free will and all that. And some people said yes. But anyways, at the end of the discussion, he said, well, there's algorithms like this that are starting to exist. If you would have asked people five years ago, would you take a shot that would suppress your appetite and slow your digestion and make you lose muscle mass, but you would lose weight?

Would you take it? Everyone would say no, but now there's Ozempic. He says, now fast forward five years. What if there is a quote unquote Ozempic or Wagovi, but for depression or for hair loss or for cognition or for better sleep, all of a sudden you have all these people doing these things and they say they wouldn't do it. If I said to everybody, you're taking five shots a week into your ass, but it would perfect all of these things and put you on autopilot. Most people listening are like, I would never do that.

But as soon as these things become available, humans don't have the willpower to say you know what i might do it the harder way that dr josh ack says and i might take the protein and i might do the weight or the weight management through weight lifting and i might get better sleep it's like nope i'll take the thing but most people say they would never take the thing until it presents itself yeah well here's why i i well i think one big reason you have people like Oprah and this celebrity and this celebrity and this celebrity who are out there just, you know, saying how much it helped them. And I think also some people, for some people, ignorance is bliss and at least they think

it is for a short time. And then later on in life, then it's not. But I think, I think that's, that's, that's one of the things that happens is we see these influencers and celebrities and things taking these things and promoting them. And listen, I'm talking about the side effects, but there's not many people out there that are. One thing I am very, very serious about is my hair. I decided about a year ago that I didn't want to do clip-in extensions anymore. And so I started really, really taking care of my hair. I do high frequency wand on my hair. It's amazing. And I feel like it

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I understand the benefits of a medication like this for people that have, like they're at their wits end and they've tried everything and they can't do it and they've got a real problem. And this could be really, I want to like for those people to be very helpful. What scares me about this stuff is as a species, I think as soon as human beings are presented with an easy path, they always take it. Like we've gone to a place where we're just looking for convenient, fast, get me down the road instead of let me enjoy the process and the

struggle. And I think that becomes dangerous because the example I mentioned earlier, which is that long-winded rant about would you take an algorithm, is we're moving further and further in that direction. I'm going to remind you of that when you order Postmates and you don't go kill a cattle out in the back and chop wood. You want me to get a cattle and start butchering in the back

with my axe that I'm I'll be chopping the wood? I'm just saying you're using the easy way out. My testosterone is going to fly through the roof. With microplastics in your Postmates, I'm just telling you. I'm going to chop a cow's head off in the back. Don't pull that out of context. It's a joke, people. My testosterone is going to be massive. But no, you hear what I'm saying here?

I do. What I think about all of these medications or anything like that is if you've been trying and doing all the things that you would prescribe and it's just not getting you there, maybe you might want to try. But I think as a first step and as a first path or as a first step on the path, like maybe that's not the right answer. Here's the reality. Our entire medical system is backwards. What people consider alternative medicine should be primary care. And what people consider primary care should be alternative medicine. So wild.

And so it's like, if somebody comes in and they have type two diabetes, I mean, I've helped tens of thousands of people reverse, I'm sorry, you know what, if I'm thinking about globally, just even my own practice, there was at least hundreds or thousands of people reverse type two diabetes, reverse hypothyroidism, reverse autoimmune disease. And with type two diabetes, as an example, it really is something that 90 plus percent of the time I was able to reverse with them in part. Let me tell you one reason why one is I believed in them that they could do hard things like, like, like, you know, I think to a degree it's thinking too little of people to just think, oh, everybody's only just going to take a pill.

No, I think people are capable of doing hard things. I think people want to live great lives. And so that's part of where this starts. And then I think from there, it's, hey, let's follow this diet, this exercise. Exercise could just be walking. You don't have to go in and do hours in the gym. There are really some small steps and you can reverse a lot of conditions. It's like what we started this conversation with, which is the testosterone issue. The first thing

was take TRT. There wasn't the other eight things that you can do for free by yourself without doing that. It's just jump to the medicine. The reality is somebody should go into a doctor, like what is a functional medicine doctor or someone that's natural, do everything they can, exhaust those options. And still after three months or a year or two years, if it's not working, okay, now there's a place for medication. You get on it temporarily, but still you're trying to get off. What happens most of the time, I mean, I had so many patients come in. It was constant that said this to me. They said, my doctor told me my condition is irreversible. And most of the things were not irreversible.

Again, like type 2 diabetes. And they would say, you've got to be on this medication the rest of your life. That's just, you know, and because every medication, as I mentioned earlier, has a side effect, will lead to another condition. I want to pivot to spirituality and mindset. Who are people that you look to in the space that have really helped you? And what do you use from those learnings that you apply to your own life? And what are your own practices? First off, there are so many people I love in the space of spiritual growth. And let me hit on sort of Protestant, Orthodox, Catholic.

Let me think about a rabbi here as well. I like Craig Rochelle a lot. I like a guy named Ed Silvoso a lot. I love Tim Keller. So he's a pastor I loved and followed for years. I like Bishop Barron. He's a brilliant Catholic priest. I like Jonathan Paggio. So these are some people I listen to a lot of their podcasts and talks. And when I think about, this may be what you asked me or it may not, but I'll just go, go here for a minute. You know, one of the things I've realized in my life is, is that, I mean, physical health is important, but first off, I noticed this with patients and that their spiritual health and their mental health had an bigger impact on their physical

health and the most, a lot of the physical things that they even did. I mean, it's really important. Most people don't realize how powerful the mind is at helping you heal and excel. Like, here's a prime example of this. During, I think it was World War I, I don't think it was World War II, I think it was World War I, there was a practicing physician

who was taking care of the men who had extreme injuries, losing limbs, just extreme pain, agonizing pain. And they gave these soldiers morphine. And we all know morphine is an incredibly strong painkiller. Well, he ran out of morphine and these men were just in absolute agony, but he thought I've got to give them something because they want something. So he started giving them sugar pills, essentially. Here's the crazy part. Around 30 to 40% of those men experienced the same level of pain relief as if they were taking morphine. That's wild. That's the mind. I mean, your body, your brain is creating neurochemicals that can numb an area to that

strength or heal an area. And there's some amazing research around the field of neuroplasticity to where your brain and your body will start creating new nerves, new neural pathways in order to heal an area or create new and healthy tissue. And so we've hardly tapped into really the power of, I think, how important it is your mindset when it comes to healing. Again, I think there's an interesting sort of health perspective here. But even beyond that, there's a study I read years ago that found that when somebody retires from work, if they don't find something else they're passionate about or something else to pour into once they retire, it decreases their lifespan. They die early. And so our physical health is very tied to purpose. It's very tied to identity. I think these things are in a category of really

spirituality. And so one of the things that I really have focused on, I wrote a book on a lot of these topics called Think This, Not That, that really gets into here's how to create your best life possible, your best health possible through the power of your mindset. What do you do in the morning and night to support your mindset? So let me say one thing and then I'll answer that. I think for most people, there's this term in Latin that I think is really powerful. It's called sonum bonum and it's the greatest good. And so I think one thing that people need to do is they need to think about their life in light of eternity. So there's a study many years ago, you guys have heard of it before. It's called

the marshmallow study that determines success, right? So they had kids set up and they said, hey, if you wait, then you'll get two marshmallows. If you eat it now, you'll just get one. And the kids that waited for the two marshmallows were much, much more successful later on in life because they were putting off immediate gratification and thinking more long-term. We need to do that to our kids.

Sounds, oh, I know. They might eat those marshmallows. And you guys are true in this because I've talked to you enough and aware enough of your business is that you guys are more long-term thinkers. You've got a roadmap of saying, we want to do this in one year, this in five years, this in the long term. But what's the longest of long term? Well, it's your entire life are the people that think most about the next life. The Mother Teresa's, the Martin Luther King Jr.'s, the St. Francis of Assisi's, the St. Augustine's, those people. And so all that being said, I think that's one place that would start. Like for myself, I really believe that my purpose, there's three main things I really try and focus

on. I could even say four. One is love God, have a deep connection to God. Number two, love other people. That means willing the good of the other. I'm going to sacrifice myself in order to benefit others, even if it means I don't feel like I'm going to win in the short term. I'm called to make this planet a paradise, take the original calling of taking the Garden of Eden and making the entire earth a garden. And I am blessed to be able to practice that with some regenerative agriculture stuff I'm able to do. But there's a lot of ways people could do that. And the other thing is, it's mentor others, really help mentor others to their best life possible. So those are the things I really focus on. And so in terms of my spiritual practice, I'm not trying to start for myself just treasures here. It's really more focused on eternity. And I think the big focus

is on not just what I accomplish here, but who I become. And so I really focus on trying to grow in my character and taking what my unique talents are and multiplying those. There's a parable in the Bible. God is known as the master in this parable. And then he says he gives one person, one talent, one, two, and one, five. And talents are money in that exact context, but also we could see it as our own gifts. So you're a guy's ability to communicate and educate and lead. And so what it says there is that the person with the one talent buried it, just wasted their talents. And then God says, you evil and wicked servant.

And there's punishment for that. The person with two, they went and doubled it. They grew. They got better, better, better at that thing. God says, well done, good and faithful servant. The person with five, he doubled and he gave him even more. My point there is, is like, I'm very focused on those things I shared along with saying, I want to maximize my character, becoming more like Jesus, Mother Teresa, MLK, these

people, and taking my unique talent to the absolute max. Think about Michelangelo. He took his talent to the highest level possible where people are still in awe of the work he did today. So when I wake up in the morning, I spend time wanting gratitude. I try and go for a walk outside. I just wake up, pretty much go on a walk. And it's typically pretty short, five, 10 minutes, and just say everything I'm grateful for and really just adore and glorify God. I get back inside and I'll read my Bible and typically have some sort of breakfast. Could be a superfood smoothie,

could be eggs and sourdough, could be, I don't know, sweet potatoes and beef sausage, something. While I read my Bible or a book about the book, and then I will maybe spend some time in either prayer or meditation for a few minutes. And that's a big part of my practice, but also I'm really connected to like a growth group, sort of iron sharpens iron. It's like, if you want to grow in anything,

Dave Ramsey did this. I interviewed him recently and he had a great study. He told me they did this study at his organization and they found that the biggest, I think he said the biggest determining factor in somebody being wealthy was the people that other people spent time with. And so somebody's net worth on average is the average of the 10 people they spend the most time with. So if you hang out with people that are very successful business-wise and entrepreneurs and those sort of things,

you're going to tend to, it's going to increase your wealth. Well, the same thing, if you want to grow spiritually, hang out with those sort of people. So I'm also really conscious about hanging around those sort of people. By the way, I know I've said a lot there.

No, no, it's great. And what really stuck with me there is, we try to be long-term thinkers, I think, namely because at a minimum, I think it takes a lot of stress out of your life. When you're somebody who's focused on, and I used to be like this, the what's next, the right now, the this month I need to do it, the next moment, that becomes really stressful. But if you set a goal for yourself and you allow that goal to manifest over 10 years, then you don't feel the kind of pressure day to day and you, but you also have a target. So I, I like what you said about taking it to eternity because for me, what was the thing that kind of

gave me the next level of long-term thing? He was when we had children, it's like, okay, now I'm no longer, you know what I mean? It's like, I'm no longer just doing this for myself and Lauren. It's like, okay, now I'm no longer just doing this for myself and Lauren. It's like, now I got to think about their wellbeing throughout their entire lives. But if you take it an even step further and you think about eternity and their children's children and so on, then you're going to make decisions, I think, that are going to have greater impact. I think for me having kids, it brought me closer to God from this standpoint is that the way that society works today, where you have a husband and wife and kids, it brought me closer to God from this standpoint is that the way that society works today, where you have a husband and wife and kids, there is a awareness of like, for instance,

you guys are the same in this, but it's like, I'd take a bullet for my kids. I would die for my kids. I would do anything for my kids. And God feels even stronger about us. And so I think when we know that when we're, when you're, when somebody is building their identity, here's actually how identity works. You have a foundational piece and it's actually not even your own identity at the base. It's what you believe about God. A.W. Tozer said, what you believe about God is the most important thing about you. And then the next thing is your own identity in connection to others. Because like, for instance, when I became a dad, well, that's connected to other people that radically changed my, my roles, my responsibilities. And then your identity is what feeds your purpose. And then your purpose feeds, you know, your actions and, and so on and so

forth. But I think that, man, yeah, being a parent, I think I became more aware of, yeah, it makes you much more aware of the long-term. Dr. Josh Axe, thank you for coming on, telling your story, giving us so many tangible tips, telling my husband to wake up and chop wood tomorrow. I'm not joking. I would get, which kind of ax should we get? Send us the link. We will put all of this in the show notes. That was so inspiring. Where can everyone find you and your book? So I've got a podcast called the Dr. Josh Axe Show, which I want to have you guys on really bad. So if we can, you know, I'd love to have you guys on at some point. I don't know if we're going to be as smart

as some of the other guests, depending on the topics, but let me say this. You guys are smart and fun. And so I can't wait to have you on. So again, it's the Dr. Josh Axe Show, you know, Apple, iTunes, and people could also search. Like if I touched on a topic

that they want to learn more about, they could go to a place like YouTube and just search Dr. Axe hypothyroid or Dr. Axe PCOS or whatever. And I've done a lot of content on their social media handles at Dr. Josh Axe, new books, think this, not that. That's it. But by the way, you guys are the best hosts I've ever experienced. It's really- Well, thank you. That's a compliment. You make it fun and awesome. Thank you. Who's better?

No, I said you guys are the best. I'm talking about you're like number one. No, I'm saying who's better, me or him? Oh, gosh. I would never get in the middle of that. I'm smarter than that. Just say her. I would lose all wisdom if I were to, you know, go ahead and take a side on that. Well, we appreciate it.

We have fun every time. I mean, I can't believe it took us so long to do this again with you. Come back anytime. COVID kind of screwed us up there. Yeah, it did. Thank you. A lot of thanks. Thank you, buddy. screwed us up there yeah it did thank you a lot of things thank you buddy